Page 46 of Healing Conviction

“Should we call the cops?”

“We can’t. If we do, we’ll get implicated and we’re already shit at keeping a low profile as it is.”

“Are we going back to the hotel?”

“You said you have your essentials? I know I left a few of your bags in the toolbox in the bed of the truck.”

Nora thought again before nodding. “Yeah, I didn’t really unpack. Just my clothing bags and toiletries.”

“Same here. I’ve got a shit ton of camping supplies in the toolbox, too, if we need them. It’s better if we don’t go back to the hotel, then. We don’t know who those people were, whether they were for us or her.” He tipped his head to the unconscious woman beside him. “Or if theyhavebeen watching us, then for how long?”

“They had to have been after her. No one else knew we were coming. Heck, I didn’t even know when we were leaving until I was all but thrown into the truck.”

“Yeah… I guess you’re right. I still don’t want to chance it. No more hotels. Just in case.”

She sighed and collapsed back into her seat. “Oh my gods, this is such a mess. What’re we gonna do?”

His eyes met hers in the rearview before they shifted to their guest.

“Wait until Sleeping Beauty wakes up, apparently.”

CHAPTERSEVENTEEN

“What do you mean, youlostthem?” Stefan hissed into his phone as he paced in front of Gail’s desk. “We have someone on the inside, and you still fucking lost them? How do you do that?”

It was a disaster. Stefan’s men he’d sicced on the BlackStone Securities agents had failed epically. The woman the CTI security team had tailed wasn’t even meant to be alive, but someone over the last two years didn’t do their job. Or didn’t think she was worth killing.

Thank God for that. Maybe she’ll have a chance this time.

Of course, two years ago, Gail hadn’t known anything about Shanna Jacobs. Gail had successfully kept her head in the sand about the whole operation—and everyone involved—until two months ago. It took her assistant questioning her to her face, challenging her, and frankly, the threat of finally being caught, to go back and research her files.

Now knowing the stories of the three women who’d attended the party at the Rahab Foundation’s request that year was the least she could do to alleviate her guilt. She still didn’t fully understand why the fourth woman had been invited, butthe boss, as Stefan called him, was good at keeping his secrets.

The new CTI security team supervisor coughed over the speakerphone. “I-I’m sorry. There was no way to know that the truck was decked out with road spikes. I lost good men today, sir.”

“Oh, don’t give me that. The team is full of borderline thugs, and you know it. Maybe you weren’t ready for the promotion, hm?”

There was a pause on the other side of the phone. “I’m sorry, sir. It won’t happen again.”

“It better not. Find them before the week is out, or we’ll all be out of a fucking job.”

He hung up the phone and crashed it to the desk, but Gail didn’t jump. She tilted her head at Stefan before continuing to type on the laptop in front of her computer monitor. “You know, if we had stayed hands off, they wouldn’t even know they’re being looked for.”

“They might still not know that,” Stefan spat. “Our security team found Shanna Jacobs first, so they might think she was the target.”

Gail shrugged and went back to the work on her screen. “Okay.”

The scoff in front of her made her pause, her fingers ready over the keyboard. “Do you have something you would like to say, Stefan?”

“Why are you so glib about this?”

“There’s not much we can do about it one way or another, is there?” As she watched him have a meltdown in front of her, her eyes caught on the picture frame on her desk and her chest tightened. “The way I see it, we’re all operating on borrowed time anyway.”

Besides, watching you lose it is a silver lining.

Stefan sighed. “You’re always such a pessimist. You didn’t used to be this way, you know. What happened to you?”

Gail pursed her lips as she mentally answered to the photo in front of her.