Page 145 of Untouchable

“I had a break-in last night.”

Caleb’s body went cold. “What was stolen?”

“An old computer. My wife uses it for her recipes and computer games. It used to be mine.”

“Nothing was on it, was it?”

“I’d deleted everything work related, but sometimes things can be retrieved.”

“Who did it?”

“I don’t know. Professionals. My security system isn’t peanuts, you know. You need to protect yourself.”

“I’m protected. Let me know if I can do anything.”

“Will do.”

When Caleb hung up, he felt rattled and anxious in a way he almost never was.

There was legally nothing that could be done to him. But if certain things became public, then Kelly would find out about them. She would never forgive him. She would leave him. He knew it for sure.

The thought panicked him so much he did his normal mental-defenses thing and focused on what he could control.

He had to get through this business meeting. Then he would call in a few favors to find out who was investigating Vinnie. If they found out the source of the search, then he’d be in a much better position to make it stop.

Get through the dinner. Find out the source of the investigation. Stop it.

These were things he could do.

Living without Kelly, now that he’d found her, was something he couldn’t do.

Three hours later he was in his home office, staring at more email on his computer.

He despised his email so much this evening that he felt vaguely nauseated at the sight of so many unanswered messages.

The meeting over dinner had been fine. Then he’d made some calls and gotten things going on finding out who was looking into Vinnie.

But there was nothing else he could do. Kelly wasn’t even here. She’d gone out to dinner with her friend Reese, so he couldn’t even bury himself in her and start to feel better.

He felt himself going into an emotional spiral of anxiety, stress, and helplessness. He could feel it happening. It hadhappened before. And every time it had, he’d done things he’d ended up regretting.

He needed Kelly. She could help him stop it. He pulled out his phone and texted her.You coming over tonight?

She’d said she probably would, but it hadn’t been definite.

It was a few minutes before she answered.Yeah. I will. You okay?

Sure.

He wasn’t okay. He hated feeling this way. The first time it had ever happened had been when he was ten, sitting next to Mallory’s bed in the hospital, watching her die and having absolutely no way to stop it.

There was no reason to feel that way now, but he did.

He pulled out his phone again and texted Wes.Tell me.

A minute or two later a reply came through.I finally had an idea about who she reminded me of so I searched some old photos. Check your email.

Caleb had his email open, so he watched as a new message popped up in his inbox.