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“You’re making excuses. I didn’t do the crime. The cops will find that out when they investigate,” she says. “That’s what they do.”

“We don’t know that they will,” Golden interrupts.

I’d almost forgotten he, Bronx, and Rook were in the room.

Golden continues, “You’re banking a lot on them getting to the bottom of something where the evidence points to one outcome.”

“The fact that I ended up working as a stripper surely points to my not having any stolen money socked away,” she says.

Our girl had to strip to make ends meet? She was starving and evicted on top of everything else she went through. She was hurting while we were living like fucking gods.

The unfairness of that turns my gut. I promised her I would bring her with me all the way to the top. She should have had everything she ever wanted and more. “Please, Kelsey. Just give me some time. I have someone working on tracking the money and finding proof that she was behind it. Once we have it, she’ll be fucking done.”

“We’ll make sure of it,” Bronx says. “We never should have doubted you. We’re going to make it up to you.”

“How long?” she asks.

“A week. Maybe two.” That should be enough time for Micah to find something.

“And she’s going to be on the tour that whole time?”

“Unfortunately.” I grimace.

“Then I am not going to be on your bus. I’m going to need to be on whichever bus is the furthest away from her. Or I just might kill her.”

“You can share mine,” Kodiak says.

She looks up at him with warmth that hasn’t been diluted by the stupid shit the rest of us have done. “Thanks.”

I hate that she won’t be with me, but I can live with it. Whatever it takes to keep her with us. Where we can protect her from Marco.

“I want to leave now.” When Kodiak nods, she turns to Rook. “Can you retrieve my phone?”

“Yeah, we haven’t finished.” I grimace. “Sonatina knew way more than she should have.”

“You suspect it’s someone on the team?” Kodiak asks. “Because only a few people know that we’ve all gotten a hell of a lot closer lately.”

“Those that know are the ones we trust,” Golden says. “None of them would tell Sonatina shit.”

“And the rest we don’t really have anything to do with,” I say. Once the label started handpicking the crew, we turned a lot more inward. “Which makes me wonder... Rook, could she be listening to us?”

“You’re thinking she’s bugged you.” Rook pushes off the wall to take part in the conversation. “We check for listening devices. Never found any.”

“Yeah. Maybe that’s because we’re looking for devices from outside. The media. Hotel staff.” My stalker, but that doesn’t need to be mentioned now. We can’t get off track. “Not the record label that’s helped us climb to the top. Or our manager.”

He considers it. “If we’re assuming it’s Sonatina or someone attached to Sonatina, it could be the buses, your gear. Your devices. The places to hide these things grows dramatically.”

“That’s why we’re having this conversation here?” Golden questions me. “Without our phones.”

“Could you find them? You and Jasper?”

“It’ll take a while, but yes. The bigger problem is probably doing so without her catching on. Especially now she’s on the tour with you. There will be questions if we need to gut the buses to make sure. And there’s nothing to say that when we kill one device she won’t plant another.”

“So what are we going to do?” Bronx asks. He buries his fists in his pockets. “Because I’m not okay with this bitch listening.”

“For now, we’ll make sure our phones are clean,” I say.

“I’ll handle that.” Rook nods and leaves the room.