Defending Zara (Mountain Mercenaries #6)(89)

But Zara had all too easily reverted back to the lonely, scared little girl she’d been fifteen years ago. Alone and on her own, with no one to rely on but herself.

“Hang on, Meat. I’m comin’,” she muttered as she straightened her spine and vowed to do whatever it took to get him home safe and sound.





Chapter Twenty-Six

The next morning at breakfast, Ball frowned when he checked his email.

“What’s wrong?” Everly asked.

“I’m not sure,” Ball said, continuing to scroll through the email alerts he’d gotten. “Did Zara seem . . . off last night?” he asked.

Everly sat up straighter in her chair and slowly shook her head. “Not really, why?”

“She and Meat are still okay?” he asked.

“Yes,” Everly answered. “In fact, Zara was all excited to get home to show him some new lingerie she’d bought. Why? Talk to me, Ball.”

Glancing over at Everly’s sister, who wasn’t paying the least bit of attention to them and was sitting on the couch staring at her phone as she texted back and forth with her friends, Ball sighed.

“I’ve gotten a few alerts from the bank Zara has her money in. Meat used some kind of program he developed to track any large debits from her account, because none of us trusted her uncle as far as we could throw him. He made me a backup on the alerts, just in case—and I’ve gotten two notifications that were triggered sometime last night, late. The first was after fifteen hundred dollars was taken out of her account via ATM, and the second when another withdrawal was attempted, but because of the daily limits, it was denied.”

“She didn’t mention anything about needing money last night,” Everly said. “She did talk about what she wanted to do with her inheritance. Things like giving it to charity and starting some sort of clinic in Peru, but that’s about it.”

“God, Meat is a fucking genius. There’s even video from the ATMs that came through with the notifications. I have no idea how he does it. I definitely need some more lessons,” Ball muttered as he clicked on the video that was attached to the first email notification.

The grainy film showed Zara pulling up to the drive-through ATM. She seemed to struggle with the machine, jabbing the buttons almost frantically. She also looked stressed.

Very stressed.

“Shit,” Everly said as she watched over Ball’s shoulder. “Something’s wrong. First of all, she shouldn’t be driving, and secondly, she looks worried.”

Ball agreed. As soon as the video stopped, he clicked on Meat’s number. The phone rang, but Meat didn’t pick up. He then tried to call Zara herself, but she didn’t answer either. “Come on. Let’s get Elise to school, then we’ll stop by Meat’s house and see what’s going on.”

Everly nodded.

Within forty minutes, they were pulling up in front of Meat’s house, except it looked like no one was home. After ringing the doorbell and not getting any answer, and calling both Meat’s and Zara’s phones again, Ball really started to worry. He called Rex.

“What’s wrong?” Rex asked in lieu of a greeting.

“Meat and Zara aren’t answering their phones. They aren’t home, and Zara took fifteen hundred dollars out of her bank account late last night,” Ball said without hesitation.

Ball could hear Rex’s fingers tapping on a keyboard in the background, then he asked, “You’re sure it was Zara who pulled the money?”

“Positive,” Ball told him. “Meat set up a special alert on her account and added my email just in case. Saw a video of her at the ATM machine.”

“Okay, I’m tracking Meat’s phone right now. I’ll start with him. I’m assuming he wasn’t with Zara when she got the money out?”

“Not that I could see.”

“Okay . . . Hmm, that’s weird,” Rex said.

“What?” Ball asked.

“He’s not far from his house. The phone is pinging a few hundred yards east of his driveway, out on the road.”

Ball immediately headed for his car, Everly right on his heels.

“You’re sure?”

“Positive. I’ll wait while you check it out.”

Ball put the phone on speaker as he started his car and informed Everly of what Rex had said. He didn’t know what to think. Maybe their friend had been in an accident, but that didn’t explain why Zara would be taking money out of her account in the middle of the night.

Ball turned right out of Meat’s driveway—and almost immediately saw pieces of plastic in the road and a skid mark. He slowed down and could just see the back end of a car in the trees. “Rex, looks like we found his car. There was some sort of accident, I think.”

“Let me know what you find,” Rex ordered.

Ball grabbed the phone and got out. Everly immediately hopped out as well. He would’ve told her to stay put, but since she was a CSPD officer, he was probably the one who should stay in the car, and that wasn’t going to happen.

They walked toward the vehicle—and Ball tensed when he saw a fine spattering of blood on the roof of the car near the driver’s side.

Meat wasn’t lying injured or dead inside, which was good, but Ball definitely didn’t like that blood spatter.