Ripper (Hunter #1)(15)

I sat down at the kitchen table and dug in with gusto. “It’s not like I’ve been sitting on my ass.”

Sloane set a cup of coffee in front of me and then settled his big body onto my dining table chair. The morning light was kind to him, softening the hard planes of his face and making what was almost certainly a tough man look a little gentle. “Jamie thinks you should start working with us.”

I laughed. Sloane was the only person Jamie worked with on a regular basis and even then, it was only when Sloane brought him in. Grayson Sloane was a certified badass. That’s the only way to describe a real Texas Ranger. “Yeah, I bet I could pass whatever test your captain gives to contractors.”

He shook his head, setting down his coffee. “Probably not, but then I’m given an enormous amount of latitude when it comes to who I work with. I answer to the B company captain, but that’s technical. He doesn’t want to know what I do. He wishes he didn’t have to deal with me at all. It’s why he doesn’t question the reqs I put in for Jamie’s services.”

I took a long drink, the caffeine starting to work in my system. I supposed it was hard to be the Mulder of the Ranger world. Sloane handled all the “weird stuff,” meaning anything even vaguely supernatural. He was probably an outcast among his own peers. It made sense that he and Jamie were friends. They understood the same world.

“Hey little sister,” Jamie said, walking into the kitchen. “I like the new paint in the living room. How are you feeling?”

“Like shit,” I replied before polishing off the toast. Yeah, food had done wonders for me. “But I still have a job to do so I’ll suck it up. I’m sorry Nate felt like he had to call you. Last night was…a slipup. I ended up in a tense situation with a wolf and he apparently knew Dad.”

Jamie let out a deep breath and slumped into the chair across from me. My thirty-two-year-old brother seemed so much older as he thought about our father. “I’m so sorry, Kels.”

I sat back in my chair. “Do you run into many people who knew him?”

“I do,” Jamie acknowledged. “The bastard cut a wide swath. There’s no getting around it. He hurt a lot of people, and they don’t forget that he’s still out there. But they get used to me and if they don’t, I kick their ass. I won’t lie to you. If you want to work in this world, you’re going to have to make them accept you. Believe it or not, Nate can help you more with that than even I can. Nate has some powerful friends.”

I laughed at the thought. “Yeah, well, I probably won’t be meeting them. I met one of his gamer geek friends last night and I’m sure he’ll run the next time he sees me. I kind of hit on him.”

Jamie laughed but Sloane didn’t. He got up and poured himself another cup of coffee.

“Tell me about this case of yours,” Jamie said.

I shrugged, looking at the clock. I needed to get out of here soon if I was going to make it all the way to Dallas. “It’s a missing person case. She’s a shifter, lost her college scholarship and went on the game. Unfortunately, I’m pretty sure she’s in trouble. I’ve got an appointment with one of her professors in two hours. It’s probably a dead end, but she’d been spending a lot of time with him according to her roommate.”

“Hey, aren’t you working some missing person cases?” Jamie asked Sloane as he settled back down.

“Yeah,” the Ranger replied. “We have some missing supes. It’s not a bunch, four cases, all young women, but considering how small the community is, I was asked to look into it.”

“Were they hookers?” I asked, getting that tingle in the back of my skull that told me I was on to something.

“Not exactly,” Sloane prevaricated. “Look it’s an open case. I really shouldn’t talk about it.”

Something about the way he spoke had me sitting up tall again. He was hiding something. It was there in the way his eyes tightened. If not hiding something, he was definitely blowing me off when he shouldn’t be. If he was working missing persons, he should want to trade notes. “But if I could get a look at your files I could maybe see a pattern. Were the girls all in college? Were they all from Dallas? What do you mean not exactly? How do you not exactly prostitute yourself?”

“Whoa, slow down, sweetheart.” Sloane turned to Jamie, his eyes wide.

My brother chuckled. “I told you. She’s a bulldog when she’s on a case. She really might be able to see something you missed.”

Sloane seemed to consider it for a moment and a little thrum of excitement rode through me at the thought of looking through Sloane’s files. The puzzle would be there, laid out for me to solve. Just for a second I thought I could do something, something important.

He turned his blue eyes on me. “How about we make a deal? You promise to not get trashed again like you did last night and I’ll let you have a peek.”

Humiliation swept over my body like a wave, and I watched Jamie tense. He was waiting for me to explode, but I was done wasting energy like that. Sloane wanted to be an *? Who was I to stop him? I certainly didn’t have to take it though. I stood up. “Keep your files, Sloane. I don’t need ’em. Lock up when you’re done, Jamie. I take it Nate’s looking for drugs?”

I ignored Sloane’s stare and focused on Jamie, who relaxed a bit when he realized I wasn’t going to make a scene. “You know how he is. Someday promise me you’ll throw him a bone and leave a little bag of parsley or something hidden in your underwear drawer for him to find.”