Page 17

L ate Monday night, Levi decided that Sara was dodging his calls.

She hadn’t shown up at the lounge for her shift on Monday, and she hadn’t been at her friend’s house where he had found her.

The next order of business was to corner Sara’s friend and get to the bottom of Sara’s disappearance.

“You guys get settled in?” King asked, and they all gave a round of nods.

Right then, they were kicking back in the living room of a house King had rented in the San Francisco Bay area suburb of Palo Alto. Their leader said it was cheaper than renting a hotel room for however long they’d be there.

“Anything?” Levi roughly asked Rowan, who was back on the laptop searching for Sara’s attackers.

The techie had run the perps’ faces through the local PD system’s facial recognition and got hits on both of Sara’s attackers. The pair of henchmen were already wanted for aggravated assault and assault with a deadly weapon.

Now, Rowan was trying to pinpoint the bastards’ exact location.

Levi cracked his knuckles, he couldn’t wait to get his hands on the men who had hurt Sara.

“Not yet, but it shouldn’t be long. Right now, I’m running their faces through the city-wide surveillance to find their specific coordinates,” Rowan murmured.

“So why is Sara not taking your calls?” West asked, drawing Levi’s attention from Rowan.

Levi glanced blankly at West and suddenly found all of them staring at him, waiting for answers. Except for Nash, who was in the kitchen making himself lunch.

“I…maybe it’s because I left so early Sunday morning?” Levi said.

“Left what?” All ears, West scooted forward on the sofa and Rowan pushed the laptop away just a bit.

“Her…bed.” Levi rubbed at the back of his neck.

“No, you didn’t,” Rowan said, his eyes wide. “You screwed up.”

“What do you mean?”

“It wouldn’t matter how early you left her bed if you didn’t say the right words,” Rowan said.

“That’s true,” West agreed. “What did you say when you left?”

“Ahh, she asked if I was going back to Seattle and I said no.”

“Did you tell her you wanted to see her again?” Rowan asked.

Levi blinked, and his stomach fell. “No? But I do.”

“You fucked up right there, buddy,” Nash said, coming out of the kitchen with cheese rolled around slices of ham. The man took a big bite of one. “Women need to hear that shit. You can’t just assume that they know,” Nash said around the food in his mouth.

“You got that right,” West said with a nod.

“I was going to ask her out for a date when I called her, but she won’t answer the phone,” Levi muttered.

“You took her to the beach,” Nash reminded him.

Paralyzing fear suddenly spiked through Levi. What if there was a repeat of the attack on Sara?

“Shit, what if…” he swallowed hard, not able to get the rest of the words out.

“Hold on,” Rowan soothed and lifted the laptop. With a few key taps, the man pulled up the nearest surveillance of the street in front of Mandy’s home.

“Back it up to yesterday,” Levi said hoarsely, and they all watched as Rowan brought up where Mandy and Sara left in Mandy’s car around noon. With a fast forward, the women returned later that afternoon. Then, Sara left the house toward dusk with a small overnight case in a Lyft car.

“She hasn’t come back since then,” Rowan said, scrolling through the video.

“It seems okay.” West pointed to the screen. “Maybe she had plans.”

Levi managed to release the breath he’d been holding, but he was still worried as hell.

He tried her number again, but it went to voicemail.

“How long have you and Sara been sleeping together?”

Levi coughed, gripped his phone tightly, and shot West a glare. “Just a few times…over a month ago…and then again when I got back into town.” Levi grimaced, keeping it vague. He wasn’t going to share about how many times they had gone at it Saturday night.

He felt like an asshole. No wonder she wasn’t taking his calls, and no wonder she was no longer at Mandy’s. He’d be lucky if she ever talked to him again.

“She probably thinks you’re a casual fuck,” West said.

“No, she thinks he thinks they are a casual fuck,” Nash disagreed.

“There’s nothing casual about us,” Levi snapped with a scowl.

“Does she know that?” Nash asked and sat on the couch to finish his food.

“ Again , I was going to talk with her over a date night,” he reiterated with frustration.

“Bro…you took her to the farmers market. If that’s not a date, I don’t know what is,” Nash said with a laugh.

“It’s too late anyway, dude.” West cut in. “You missed your window.”

“Well, shit,” Levi muttered. “Now what?”

“Now?” West’s laugh was loud. “You grovel.”

“I will when I talk to her.”

“Maybe her boss knows where she is?” West asked. “She didn’t show up for work today, then she might have called in.”

With that said, West stood, stretched, and headed into the kitchen.

“We could go to the Velvet Lounge and squeeze Kevin Wilson,” Rowan suggested.

“Wouldn’t that blow our cover?” Levi asked with a frown.

“Without Sara, we don’t have a cover,” Rowan reminded him.

“They are short-handed and need staff,” Levi said and pointed in the direction of the kitchen. “West could go in as a bartender.”

“Wait… what? No way,” West said, poking his head out the kitchen doorway.

“Sara is a manager, having her gone wouldn’t make Kevin hire another bartender,” Rowan pointed out.

“They have several positions advertised on the internet,” Levi said.

“It’s worth a shot,” Rowan agreed and glanced at West, who was still at the kitchen doorway.

“What kind of positions?” West asked reluctantly.

“I’m sure one of them will be right up your alley.” Levi smirked. “You up for the challenge or chicken?”

West scowled at him and then flipped him the finger. “You suck.”

Levi laughed and Rowan stood to make his way to the kitchen. They all heard West complaining to Rowan as the pair made food.

“What do you think?” Levi turned to King, who hadn’t said anything past asking if they were settled in.

“I think we need to find Sara and figure out what the hell is going on.”

“I can interrogate her friend,” Levi said.

“Use kid gloves,” King responded.

“I will, but let’s do one thing at a time. Let’s find Sara’s attackers and take care of them, then we can swing by that house and question Mandy,” Levi said.

“Sounds good. After we deal with Sara’s attackers, you question Mandy, and I’ll take West into the Velvet Lounge. He and I will see what intel we can gather,” King said, twisting off the cap of a water bottle.

“But first, let’s deal with the perps,” Levi agreed.

“What about me and Rowan? What do you want us to do?” Nash asked, wiping his hands on a napkin.

“Go with Levi to talk to this woman, Mandy, god knows he needs monitoring,” King said.

Levi flipped off King, who only smirked.

The laptop dinged and Levi leaped to his feet. That had to be the information on the two men.

Rowan hurried out of the kitchen, tapped the keyboard, and studied it for several moments.

Levi held his breath, fists clenched at his sides.

Rowan lifted his eyes from the laptop. “I found their location.”

Levi pulled his weapon from his holster and checked the clip. When he slammed it home, he gazed at King across the distance.

“Let’s move,” King said with a nod.

Hell yeah.

Levi was itching for some payback.