DONOVAN (Gray Wolf Security, #1)(165)

Jacob turned away and dragged his fingers through his hair, pacing as he considered what I’d said.

“How do we know that Lynn being here has anything to do with what’s happening, then? Maybe the note was just that. A note.”

I nodded slowly. “But Adrienne saw something on the video—”

“Maybe Adrienne misunderstood what Lynn was doing.”

“I don’t think so. Adrienne knows her stuff.”

Jacob glanced at me. “I think you might be letting your feelings cloud your thinking.”

I shook my head. “Adrienne knows this case in and out. She would know if there was something relevant.”

I turned and checked the alcove outside our offices, looking for Ruben and his men. But they were all still in my office. I crossed to Jaime’s desk and began searching through it for whatever it was she’d taken. There was nothing obvious at first. But then, tucked into the back of a drawer, I found a small envelope with my name written across the outside in Lynn’s handwriting. I took it back to Jacob’s office and quickly tore it open.

Lucien, it began, I wanted to apologize for my behavior the other night. I never should have shown up at that restaurant the way I did. I don’t know what I was thinking. But I guess that I wasn’t thinking. I miss you and Jacob and everyone else, and I just… Well, there are no words for what I did. Thank you for your grace in handling the situation, and I apologize if I caused any trouble for you and your new girl.

It was signed simply with a large, cursive L.

I handed it to Jacob, who read it quickly and handed it back.

“Why didn’t she just leave it at the front desk or send it with a messenger?”

Jacob shrugged. “That’s not the way Lynn does things. She wants the personal touch. Maybe she was hoping the security guards would tell you she was here.”

I shook my head. “It doesn’t make sense. Lynn is sneaking around, Jaime’s hiding the note. And then Adrienne—”

“Whoever took Adrienne had to have known you were in San Antonio. That person had to have followed you there.”

“Then it couldn’t have been either Lynn or Jaime, because we left my place at a little after ten.”

“Did anyone else know you were going?”

“Just Adrienne and me. It was a last minute decision.”

“Then somebody was watching the house. Or followed you from Dad’s.”

I hadn’t thought of that. “I didn’t see anyone.”

“Doesn’t mean much.”

“The house is behind a gate. If someone had been sitting outside the gate, or if they had gone through the gate, the security guard would have noted them.”

Jacob began to nod enthusiastically. “He would have. Call him.”

I tugged my cellphone out of my pocket and dialed the security gate outside my housing community. When the phone was picked up, I simply asked if a strange car had been noted outside last night or if anyone had come through the gate between the time Adrienne and I arrived and when we left.

No one. Nothing.

So much for that.

“But that’s good news,” Jacob said.

“How is that good news?”

“It means that whoever followed you to San Antonio knows you. It means whoever it was knows about the security gate and knew to wait far enough back to not be seen. It means whoever it was is probably someone we know.”

“How is that good?”

“Because we can call the hotel where you stayed and get a list of guests who checked in after you. And then we will likely recognize the name, even if they thought they were being smart and used a false one.”

Jacob pulled out his own phone and began to dial.

“Who are you calling?”

“The hotel.”

“How do you know which hotel it was?”

“You stay at the same hotel every time you go to San Antonio.”

I nodded slowly, my thoughts moving a thousand miles a second. “What if the person who did this, what if they figured out where I was going and checked in before us?”

Jacob just nodded, but the line must have been picked up on the other side, because he began speaking.

“Yes, this is Detective Wallace from the Houston police department. We’re looking for a suspect in a robbery. I was wondering if you would be willing to give me a list of your guests who checked in between ten o’clock and six on Monday night, Tuesday morning.”

He listened a moment, said something about getting a warrant, and then he gestured for a pen. When I handed it to him, he began to write quickly in this shorthand that I’ve always teased Jacob for using. It’s not a sort of shorthand that anyone else can read. It’s something he devised himself in high school that he’s never explained to anyone. He wrote quickly then thanked whoever was on the other end of the line.

He didn’t speak immediately.

That told me more than any words he could have spoken.





Chapter 32


Adrienne

She came back a little less than an hour later.

“This isn’t about the Alzheimer’s drug?”

She ignored me in favor of cleaning up the rest of the oatmeal mess she’d left behind before.

“What is it that you want? Why are you doing this?”