Page 25

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

David

"What the hell do you mean they should be at the prom? Kassandra wouldn't be freaking out for no reason!"

"I followed behind them, just like you asked, a few car lengths away. They briefly pulled off the side of the road, but it wasn't for more than a minute or two. Then I watched them pull into a parking garage across from the hotel, and staged myself down the road, like you asked," Jacob assured me.

"But did you actually see them exit the parking garage and head into the hotel?"

"No, boss. But there's a catwalk between the two structures, so I assumed that's what they used."

I cursed my lack of foresight when I assigned Jacob to Mikey's detail. I was so sure that Kassandra would be the target that I placed Cobra on her and left Mikey with one of my other teams.

"I don't pay you to assume . I pay you to be sure."

I hung up before I could say more, or fire his ass for doing what I said, even though I knew Cobra would never have made such a rookie error. My other Boston teams weren't former Special Forces. They were average security guards earning a decent paycheck.

Kassandra rushed through the front door a few minutes later with Rhett hot on her heels.

"Did you find them?"

"Not yet. Jacob watched their car pull into the parking garage across from the hotel. He assumed they entered the prom from the catwalk." I looked over her shoulder at Rhett. "Get Matthew and Graham to check it out. I want to know if their car is still there."

"On it."

"Where could they have gone?"

That wasn't a question I was ready to answer. Not yet anyway, and not without more proof.

"I don't know but we're going to find out. It's only been forty minutes since they were last seen."

That was forty minutes too long, but again, I wasn't about to tell Kassandra that. I needed her not to panic any more than she already was.

"Mom? What's going on? I thought you were chaperoning the prom tonight."

She left my arms and went straight to her son. "Your brother and Brittany are missing."

"What do you mean missing? What happened to them?"

I walked over to them and answered so Kassandra didn't have to. "I'm not sure but I'm going to find out."

"Boss?" Rhett pulled my attention away from the people who meant the world to me.

"What?" I snapped at him.

"You're going to want to see this."

I followed him out the front door and watched as someone ran down the road toward us. I recognized the person immediately.

"Kassandra! Come here!" I shouted before I took off in a sprint and met Mikey about a hundred feet from the house. "Mikey, are you okay? What happened to Brittany?"

His wrists were bleeding from what looked like rope burns, but at first glance I couldn't see any other injuries.

"Mikey!" Kassandra plowed into the two of us and was shortly joined by Nate. The four of us hugged in the middle of the sidewalk.

"Let's get him inside."

We moved as one until we were back inside the house and sitting on the couch. Mikey still wore his tuxedo, and besides a few wrinkles, no one would know anything happened to him.

"What happened?"

"It was Brittany." Mikey gulped. "She asked me to pull over to help a stranded woman but then she injected me with something. The next thing I know, I'm tied up in her basement."

I met Kassandra's shocked gaze.

"Her father came down to talk to me. Told me he was working with Dad. Something about a bad investment and one point five million dollars."

I looked at Kassandra but she simply shrugged her shoulder like she had no idea what Mikey was talking about.

"Hang on, I'm going to call Bree."

"Who's Bree?" Nate asked.

"She's one of my technical analysts. If anyone can find out who Brittany and her father are, it's her."

I dialed Bree's number and for once she didn't answer with attitude. "Hey, did you find Mikey?"

"Yeah, he's here with us now. I'm going to turn this into a video chat. I need your expertise."

"Hit me."

Seconds later I could see Bree sitting in her office snacking on a black licorice. "Mikey! It's so good to see you, you had everyone worried."

"Ah, thanks." He sounded shy for the first time since I knew him. Bree tended to have that effect on people.

Bree chuckled. "So what do you have for me?"

"I need you to find everything you can on Mikey's girlfriend, Brittany Smith and her father . . ." I looked at Mikey.

"Benjamin Smith."

"Such ordinary names but I got you. Give me a few seconds."

We watched as Bree did her magic. Both humming to herself and snacking on licorice in the process.

"Dang, Mikey. I didn't realize you were into older chicks."

"Wait, what?" I gasped.

"Well, since Brittany isn't her real name, I'm guessing you didn't know she wasn't seventeen either."

Shit. I never thought to check out Mikey's girlfriend; they’d been together long before I showed up. At least a year, if not more, if I remembered correctly.

"Who is she, Bree?"

"I think the better question is who isn't she? I'm sorry to say, Mikey, but your girlfriend and her father are con artists. Well, and her mother too."

" Ex -girlfriend," Mikey clarified.

"Probably smart."

"What's the connection to Michael? Benjamin mentioned they worked together."

Bree continued to tap away at her keys while the rest of us sat in silence. I was too busy taking it all in to say anything, and I had to assume it was the same for everyone else.

"I can't find any connection. Not a digital footprint. Nothing. If I didn't know any better, I’d think the two of them never met."

"But they did," Mikey told us. "Not often because my dad was never around, but we all had dinner together at least once or twice."

"Mikey's right. They were together long enough that I wanted to meet her parents. They always seemed so nice, but I could only convince Michael to come with us twice. Every other time something would come up and he would have to back out."

"So then, what if the only connection is Brittany?" Bree bit off a large piece of licorice before pointing the rest at us.

"What are you trying to say?" I lifted my brow at Bree. I didn't have time for her mind games.

"I'm saying, what if they went old school. Brittany came over a lot, right?"

Mikey, Kassandra, and Nate all nodded their heads yes.

"So what if their only way of communicating was through her. She would pass notes or information back and forth. Whatever they needed."

"I always thought it was weird she would bring a backpack over, but leave it in the entryway even when the two of you were working on homework," Kassandra said to Mikey.

"I just figured it was kinda how you carried a purse everywhere you went. I never thought about it," Mikey told her.

"What if the backpack was actually the carrier pigeon? Or would it be Brittany was the pigeon and the backpack was the little sack the pigeon used to carry around? Was it even a sack or was it just a ribbon?" Bree was off on one of her tangents, so I let her go for a few minutes. Eventually she would come back around to the discussion at hand. "It doesn't matter either way. It makes sense if Brittany was placed there to pass information so that no one would suspect the two were working together."

"Okay, but what about the one point five million dollars Brittany's father was questioning Mikey about?"

"Ah, that one I have a definitive answer to." Bree smiled at us through the screen as she read another screen out of view. "Benjamin did in fact get one point five million dollars from a hedge fund to invest, but since he's a con man, I'm going to assume he planned to set up Michael. Instead, Michael attempted to con the con man, but made a bad investment that lost him all the money, so before both Benjamin and the hedge fund guy could get him, he killed himself."

I think I followed her line of thinking but I had to admit it sounded a bit crazy. "What are the odds this hedge fund is someone we can pay off, or eliminate, easily?"

"No can do, boss man. Benjamin apparently had to find himself one with criminal ties. I'm not saying you can't handle it, but it's going to take some serious manpower."

It was a good thing I had that kind of manpower available at my disposal.

"Round up Phantom. I want them on their way here tomorrow. We are going to finish this."

I was going to do everything I could to protect my newfound family.