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“I want this house surrounded.”

“Got it,” he says grimly. “You’re going to want to see this.”

Twelve

RINA

Ihear Carson and Spider leave the front porch and lean my forehead against the wood of the door, scared and worried and still reeling from one hell of an orgasm.

What in the hell is going on?

I hustle around our small house, making sure that all the windows and doors are locked. When I glance out the window over the sink in the kitchen, I see men patrolling around the outside, and it makes me feel a little better because I know that Carson has things in place to make sure that Charlie and I are safe.

I don’t even know for sure that what Spider was talking about has to do with us. It could be about anything. Carson has all kinds of businesses, and things going on with his brothers, and who knows what else. Whatever Spider needed to talk to him about could be about any one of those things.

But he scared me a little when he told me to come in, lock up, and not answer for anyone but him. Was that a reflex, or did Spider confirm some bad news about me?

I really hate being in the dark. I’m too much of a control freak to sit idly by while someone else figures out my life.

Quietly, I check on my boy and see that he’s sleeping peacefully, completely unaware of my own turmoil. I leave him be, making sure his noise machine is on, just in case, and then walk out to the living room to wait.

I don’t even have Carson’s number, so I can’t text and check in with him. How long am I supposed to wait here? Hours?

Days?

I’m not waiting days. That’s ridiculous.

Thirteen

CARSON

“Report,” I bark as soon as I walk into the house. In the past two days, we’ve set this place up as a temporary office, since I don’t know when I’ll be able to talk Rina into moving to Vegas with me. We hauled out the couch, and in its place is a big desk with several computers.

Spider takes the seat at it and starts tapping the keys.

“We’ve run background checks on every single person that interacts with the missus and the kid every day. Even though she quit the clinic, we still ran all of that. Aside from the piece-of-shit doctor and his inability to keep his dick zipped up, everyone checked out there.”

He keeps tapping keys, and I’m frustrated as fuck that he won’t get to the goddamn point.

“You didn’t need me for this.”

“I’m getting there,” he says. “Then we did the school. I started with the first-line people. Teachers, admin, you know. No red flags there. Then I went deeper.”

The hair on the back of my neck stands up as I round the desk to look over his shoulder.

“I dug around on the teachers’ aides, the lunch lady, and⁠—”

“The goddamn custodian,” I growl, immediately recognizing the face of Nico Makris, one of the assholes that used to work for Julian’s father. I pull out my phone and video call my brother, who answers on the fourth ring, looking like he’s just finished fucking his wife.

I don’t fucking care.

“Nico Makris,” I growl, and Julian’s eyebrows pull together.

“What about him?”

“Where the fuck do you think he is?”

“I’ll be right back, Angel,” Julian murmurs, and then he’s on the move. “He’s retired. I’m going to the office to look up specifics. He worked for⁠—”