Page 17 of Bait and Switch (Subtle Deceptions #2)

TWELVE

Casey

Tuesday night

Maybe it was a mix of the long day, the iffy rescue, and the confrontation with Rizzi when he and Greta had stopped in to report what Carlos had told them before losing consciousness, but Casey was in an odd humor.

Twitchy. Too aware.

He toyed with the idea that it was the presence of Charming Fucker on what Casey considered his dock—even if they were currently aboard the Ticket . It was a shock to realize he was glad that Gabriel had stopped him and offered ice cream.

They didn’t know yet if Carlos would survive his injuries. Only time and good medical care would tell. When they’d gotten him loaded up, he’d been slipping in and out of unconsciousness, always a bad sign, and he hadn’t spoken again.

The cat squirmed his arms. “You want to get down now? Alright.” He glanced at Gabe, who shrugged.

Casey knew that Bowie wouldn’t do anything; his best dog was nothing if not well-behaved.

Giving the cat one last squeeze and a final wipe with the now filthy towel, Casey set it down on the floor.

It immediately began to explore the cabin while keeping to the perimeter of the room.

“Don’t clam up on me now, Karne. I’m not used to you being quiet.”

Gabe had retrieved the ice cream and was busy splitting it between a cereal bowl and a coffee mug.

“I do have more than one spoon, don’t worry,” he said, setting the bowl in front of Casey and taking the mug for himself before passing him a spoon from the dish drainer.

“Anyway, the wild news is that Vale wasn’t Peter’s name. He was a Stevens, and he grew up here on Heartstone. His father was the county prosecutor you talked about the other day.”

Casey blinked comically, a spoonful of ice cream halfway to his mouth.

“What?” he said, jamming the sweet dessert into his mouth and letting the chill of it against his teeth ground him.

“Peter’s last name was, in fact, Stevens,” Karne repeated. “At least, that’s the name he was born with.”

Casey swallowed and then popped another spoonful of frozen deliciousness into his mouth, giving himself time to process what Gabriel was telling him.

After swallowing that bite, he scooped more into his mouth, managing not to make a single inappropriate sound.

He was pretty sure that having Jewel Creamery ice cream in stock single-handedly kept Norskland General Store in business over the slow months.

“You’re not kidding around, are you?” he finally managed to say.

Karne shook his head. “Nope. Not kidding, not even joking.”

A megawatt smile had Casey blinking. Could a frozen dairy product be an aphrodisiac?

“Good ice cream, huh?” Karne said with an added eyebrow waggle.

Casey forced his thoughts back on track.

The right track. Not only was Charming Fucker’s ex originally from Heartstone, but the ex was also related to the man who’d ultimately been responsible for his brother going to prison.

Was, in fact, the asshole’s son. Sure, Rizzi had supplied the so-called evidence , but the Honorable John Stevens was the one who’d manipulated it to lock up Mickie.

“The fuck.”

“Yeah, mind-blowing, huh? Do you think you knew him? Peter, I mean. If he was from here originally, then maybe he didn’t show up here the other day because of me.”

“You’re the only person he asked about.”

“How the fuck did he know I was here, then? For the life of me, I cannot figure out how he could have traced me to Heartstone.”

“Does it matter?” Watching him closely, Casey scooped the last bite out of his bowl. “Your dessert is melting.”

Karne shot him a glance before answering. He stirred the softened ice cream and spooned some into his mouth. A little bit ended up on his top lip, and he stuck his lip out and licked it off. Slowly.

Not sexy , Casey reminded himself. His reaction was ludicrous.

After years of no serious sexual interest in another human, he did not need his libido coming online for a sketchy con man.

Lucky for him, the cat chose that moment to startle and jump back into his lap, clawing his thigh in the process.

“Colavitos.” The word came out so fast Casey almost missed it.

“Say again? Slowly this time.”

“The Colavitos,” Karne repeated through gritted teeth.

“Yeah, you’ve mentioned them before.”

Gabe’s eyes rolled up to the ceiling for a second.

“Is there more I need to know? We need to know?”

Casey was the recipient of a dirty look before he got his answer.

“I mean, they are who Peter and I pissed off, remember? They are why I’m here—them and my mother’s letter.

” He tapped his chin and looked thoughtful.

“Actually, that letter had more to do with my arrival here specifically than the Colavitos. If not for her, I would’ve headed south to Venice Beach or the border. ”

“So, the Colavitos followed you here. Or, possibly, they followed Peter?”

“I don’t know what to think. Maybe they did follow Peter. But, and I ask you this in all seriousness, what the fuck? Nothing makes sense! If they followed him, offed him, and dumped him on the Shangri-La , why didn’t they kill me too? I mean, I was literally thirty feet away!”

“You weren’t here when Vale was dumped,” Casey felt the need to point out.

“No, I wasn’t. But they still left the Ticket alone.

If the Colavitos are behind this, it seems they—at the very least—would have ransacked my boat.

They’re pissed. Only offing Peter alone wouldn’t be enough.

They said they want to destroy both of us if they catch us on their turf, and they don’t care how they do it.

This is why I’m starting to think maybe it wasn’t them.

If Larry Colavito and, or, his henchmen were on the island, I think everyone would know it.

Larry does not believe in the word subtle. ”

“Noted. What else did you find out?”

Gabe was peering inside his mug. He frowned, apparently disappointed that his ice cream had disappeared.

Karne lifted his head and caught Casey watching him—and grinned.

A full-on, no-holds-barred grin that was almost blinding.

No doubt about it, that grin was going to be a problem.

Charming Fucker as a whole? Also a problem.

“What else?” Gabe blinked at him. “Oh, you mean from my super fun session with the cops today. They don’t have a suspect other than me to focus on, and they don’t plan on looking that hard.

At least, that utter toad, Deputy Spurring, isn’t looking anywhere else.

I didn’t get to experience the joy of Rizzi this morning.

Which means it’s up to me to get myself out of this mess—again. ”

Casey pressed his lips together for a second.

Footage of Gabriel Karne wreaking havoc across Heartstone and elsewhere as he turned every stone looking for a killer streamed across his mental screen.

What he imagined was not so much the turning of stones but tossing, throwing, and lobbing, and not caring where the rocks landed as long as he wasn’t the one in the hot seat.

He also wasn’t shocked that the Sheriff’s Office had wanted to interview Charming again.

“Did anyone aside from Spurring question you this time?”

Casey and Greta had stopped by the station after coming down the mountain.

It was their duty to let the officers know what Carlos had said about a possible sighting of Calvin Perkins.

Rizzi had been less than thrilled to see them and had half-heartedly jotted down notes while a wet-behind-the-ears trainee deputy had watched him.

But maybe his attitude had more to do with Gabriel Karne than Casey’s appearance at the station.

“Nope. He smells like dirty gym socks. Or it was the room, could’ve been both.”

What was Rizzi up to? Casey had expected him to at least display some kind of interest over the fact there’d been a possible sighting of his nephew.

Instead, the man had stared impassively at Casey and Greta from behind his gunmetal gray desk and dismissed them with a curt “Thank you” and then picked up his phone, but he’d waited until they’d turned to leave to punch in a number.

Glancing back over his shoulder, Casey’d seen an almost calculating expression cross the sheriff’s face, but it went blank when he realized Casey was watching him.

“Was that weird?” Greta had asked him on their way back to the truck. “I think that was weird, even for Rizzi.”

Casey agreed with her. As far as he was concerned, Rizzi was a misfortune the citizens of the county were forced to suffer through until the man decided to retire.

Unfortunately, Casey’s opinion was not the popular one, considering Rizzi ran unopposed every four years.

The man was dirty, and Casey just hadn’t figured out how to prove it yet, not even with the shooting of Deter Nolan.

The Sheriff’s Office released a public statement almost immediately after the “self-defense” shooting of the deputy.

It hadn’t gone into detail, only stating that Nolan had drawn first with intent to harm and Rizzi had reacted.

The sheriff was cleared of any wrongdoing—easy to do when you were the one in charge.

Karne and a freaked-out Gordon MacDonald were the only witnesses to the shooting, and Nolan had been abducting MacDonald, so maybe Rizzi had been justified. But damn it had been fast. And Casey couldn’t help but think he’d arrived at the hospital prepared for violence.

“Deputy Eagan seems okay—for a cop,” Gabe said thoughtfully, bringing Casey back to the present. “But once Deputy Spurring showed up, he pretty much shut her out. I was lucky enough to get him to myself today. Not.”

That wasn’t a shock. Spurring probably wanted to be the one to solve Vale’s murder. It would be a feather in his cap, and maybe he’d get a pat on the head from Rizzi.