Missing in Mudbug (Ghost-in-Law #5)(28)

“No, and it’s not from lack of asking.” Jadyn looked over at him. “You don’t think it has anything to do with Raissa and Zach, do you?”

He shook his head. “I don’t see how, and case or no, Luc would have said something to me if he thought there was crossover. I’m positive he would have told me to be on the lookout if something he was working on was happening in Mudbug, especially given that his family and friends live here.”

Jadyn looked out the window as they drove up to the dock. “So it sounds like Luc is specifically worried that someone will come after Maryse because of him?”

“That’s what it sounds like to me.”

“And with Raissa missing, he can’t help but think it has something to do with her and Zach’s work. So now, he’s probably doubly stressed. His worst nightmare is staring him directly in the face.”

Colt nodded. “I’m sure it’s crossed his mind more than once.”

“That’s got to suck.”

“Especially when you’re married to a woman like Maryse. She probably hasn’t given him a moment of peace since the first edict.”

“I’m sure she hasn’t.”

“You know, based on everything we learned yesterday, I’m leaning toward Raissa’s disappearance being unrelated to her being an FBI agent. I was going to give Luc a call last night and bring him up to date, but I got sidetracked with a local crime spree and forgot.”

“Crime spree?”

“Yes, one of Old Man Humphrey’s many nonworking vehicles disappeared from his front lawn.”

“You think someone stole it? Doesn’t sound like the type of car people are clamoring to own.”

“Something big is gone from that spot in the yard. The problem is Humphrey’s ninety years old if he’s a day and likes his whiskey. For all I know, he could have sold it and forgotten or even driven the darn thing off himself.”

Jadyn smiled. “Sounds like a real mystery.”

“Yeah, but I’ll take drunken seniors with questionable missing cars over this mess with Zach and Raissa any day.”

“I bet,” Jadyn said, trying to figure out a way to tell Colt that she and Mildred had visited the diner the night before. It had been Colt’s idea to question the diner employees, and she wasn’t sure how he’d take her and Mildred beating him to the punch.

Finally, she decided to simply blurt it out. “I had a night adventure myself. Mildred and I went to that diner up the highway. I knew we’d be in the swamp all day today and a good part of tomorrow, and Mildred was itching to do something…”

“Makes sense that she would be,” he said, not sounding remotely irritated at their action.

“We played it off as the worried aunt and cousin, figuring the family angle would get us more.”

Colt nodded. “That’s smart. Did it work?”

“Yes and no. I mean, we got information, but nothing that helps us find Raissa.” She relayed the conversations with Dee and the biker to Colt.

He started frowning as soon as she got to what the biker said, probably running through the list of scenarios just like she had.

“Sounds like a crime of opportunity,” he said.

“Yeah, that’s what I think, too, but why take Raissa? I don’t like it.”

“Neither do I,” he said as he pulled up to the dock. “Hopefully, we can find something today. The longer this goes…”

Jadyn nodded as she grabbed her backpack from the backseat of the truck. He didn’t have to say it out loud. She’d already processed every horrible possibility.





[page]Chapter Seven


Maryse stomped across the hotel lobby for the hundredth time that morning and flopped onto the lobby couch. “What good is a day off if you’re held hostage?”

Mildred looked over the counter, one eyebrow raised. “Don’t see any handcuffs from where I sit, but if you keep throwing yourself onto my lobby furniture, I might find a pair.”

“If you’re looking for something to do,” Helena said, “one of the cooks at the diner pulled a blackberry cobbler out of the oven about ten minutes ago. I wouldn’t mind eating a blackberry cobbler.”

“You mean a slice of cobbler?” Mildred asked.

“No, I meant the whole thing, but you and Maryse are welcome to a slice…a small one. That is if Maryse will go buy the cobbler.”

“I’m not buying you a cobbler,” Maryse said. “After what you made me do to my daddy’s urn, I’d see you starve to death first...or whatever happens when you’re already dead and starving.”

Helena threw her hands in the air. “How many times do I have to apologize for that? Hardly anyone can see me, so I didn’t think about how the outfit would look to you. And I’d forgotten that you’re not a very good shot.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about. If you’d been a real person, those bullets would have hit you center mass.”

Helena stuck her lower lip out. “I am a real person.”

“A real live person.”

“Well, you don’t have to be rude about it.”

“That’s a matter of opinion.”

Helena glared. “If that’s how you’re going to be, I’ll just head upstairs and see if that FBI agent who stayed behind is talking to anyone on the phone.” A couple seconds later, she stomped up the stairs.