Page 49 of The Deputy's Secret Double

It wasn’t until he was being driven away that he let himself sit with his thoughts.

After a few minutes he turned to the man sitting beside him in the back seat.

“Marty Goldman might not be adopted. It might have been a lie his parents told to cover up an affair.”

“Is that why you didn’t grab him?” the man asked.

Lawson didn’t want to go into detail.

“Find out if it’s true.”

The man nodded. He wasn’t in a position to ask too many questions. It was his fault Lawson had gone into public in the first place after his botched attempt to get Josiah Teller.

Lawson ran a hand through his hair.

He spied a rip in his suit jacket’s sleeve.

He’d already not been a fan of Deputy Collins since his involvement in their Jamie Bell search. And now? Now he was around Marty Goldman?

It looked like the deputy had caught on to their common thread.

Not that he was too surprised. It wasn’t like there were that many men from Seven Roads of the same age and adopted.

Still, the deputy sure had become surprisingly annoying.

Not to mention his woman.

Lawson noted the various pains she had inflicted on him.

He decided then and there that before this was over, he would teach them both a lesson.

And his mantra?

Ladies first.

Lawson pulled the name tag that had fallen off inside of the elevator out of his pocket and handed it to the man next to him.

“I also want you to find out everything you can on JJ Shaw.”

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Lawson was nowhere to be found. Security didn’t see him and the cameras around the convention center were of no help. The fact that there had been none in the area where they had fought Lawson definitely was a blow to Price’s mood.

As was Marty Goldman’s apparent lack of information about the man.

“He said he was one of the investors from a group I’ve been trying to get in touch with,” he’d told JJ and Price once they confirmed he was absolutely fine. “He said he could get me into his higher ups’ good graces if I could pitch my newest idea to them here. I—I didn’t have any of my notes or information, but I couldn’t pass up the opportunity.”

So the panicked Marty they had seen had been because of business, not safety.

He wasn’t JJ’s brother, but she couldn’t help but feel sisterly and scold him.

“Next time a stranger asks you to come with him to a secluded place, don’t,” she’d said.

Marty, to his credit, looked sorrowful for his error in judgment. He made another one as he accepted her lie that she believed the man had been a scammer, ready to take his money.

Price, in hearing this, followed up with such a serious warning that both she and Marty had snapped to attention.

“If you ever see or hear from him again, immediately call me.”