Page 122 of See You There

Luke ran his fingers over her, finding the center of nerves nestled there. Dahlia’s hips jerked. “I’d rather take it up with you.” He murmured against her hot flesh.

“There’s a formal proce—” Dahlia cried out when Luke lifted her leg over his shoulder and his mouth covered her.

“I prefer to go straight to the source,” he said before settling over her again.

“What doyou want to do today? Lake?” Dahlia asked Luke the next morning. “I have a call at noon with the agent I really want to represent me, but other than that, my schedule is open if you want to go swimming or hiking. It’s supposed to rain tomorrow, and then…” The unspoken message was there. They were quickly running out of time before the premiere.

“We can do whatever you want. I want to go over the security for the red carpet with Brady again, and I’ll tell him to start the search for Scott.” Luke mentally crossed his fingers at the tiny white lie. Brady had been searching for days. “It will only take a minute.”

“I’m not sure how I’ll ever be able to thank you for all you’ve done for me.”

“I’m sure you can think of something.”

“You have a one-track mind. Let’s go to the lake.”

“Sounds perfect.” Luke’s phone buzzed, and he winked at her. “Speaking of Brady… If you’ll get the towels, we can go right away and be back for your meeting.”

Dahlia grinned at him, and Luke watched her disappear into the bedroom, happiness spreading through his chest. It would be a little sad to leave the cabin. It had proven to be the perfect hideaway, but he knew how excited she was for the movie’s debut. If Hank still hadn’t been arrested, there was no reason they couldn’t come back.

“I was going to call you today.”

“Luke, I know what I’m doing. We don’t have to keep going over the plan.”

“I’m not taking the tiniest chance with her safety.”

Brady sighed. “Before we get into that, I have news.”

Luke’s neck tensed. He glanced at the bedroom, and then took the call on the deck, closing the doors behind him.

“I found the mother on social media by using a reverse image search. It was a stroke of good luck, that I already had a guy in Albuquerque finishing up a job, and he was able to put eyes on her within a couple of hours.”

Luke could tell by Brady’s tone that something was up. “How bad is it?”

“That depends on your definition of bad.”

Sometimes Brady’s lack of communication was exceedingly annoying. “Just tell me.”

“Not long after he arrived, she left the house with a little boy dressed for soccer practice, which struck him as a little unusual. He followed them to a park, and they met with a younger woman who returned to the house with them in a separate car. Our luck held, because the car had a ‘for sale’ sign on the window. He made an appointment to look at it.”

“I don’t need to know how you did it. Tell me what you found out.”

“You know, patience is a virtue. James likes all the details—”

Luke growled.

“Fine. Don’t appreciate my talents. He struck up a conversation with the woman, flirted a little, and managed to get out of her that she’s a widow.”

Luke frowned. “What does that have to do with—”

“The kid came out, and my guy got a picture and sent it to me with the rest of the information. The kid’s eyes are two different colors, just like Scott English.”

The hairs on the back of Luke’s neck rose. “That’s not common.”

“No, it’s not. Factor that with Scott’s mom living with them… I did some more digging. Scott English’s name is on the original mortgage documents. A mortgage that was paid in full about five years ago.”

“You said you couldn’t find a death certificate.”

“I can’t. And there’s no record this woman was ever legally married. But I checked with my operative, and he said his gut feeling was she was telling the truth as she knew it.”