Desperate Girls (Wolfe Security #1)(24)

Hayes had him pinned against the SUV, his face pressed against the window. At Erik’s sharp command, Hayes released the guy and stepped away.

The flush-faced waiter shot a panicked look at Brynn and then Erik.

“Are you all right?” Brynn reached out, but he jerked away.

“Yeah. Jesus.” He looked at Erik as he smoothed his shirt. “You forgot your to-go.”

“Thanks.” Erik snagged the bag off the ground.

“I’m so sorry,” Brynn said. “Thank you.”

The man hurried away, darting a scowl over his shoulder as he reached for the door.

“What the hell was that?” Brynn demanded.

“Get in,” Erik said, helping her.

Batting his hands away, Brynn climbed into the back seat. Erik closed the door, cutting off further conversation.

Hayes slid behind the wheel. As soon as Erik closed his door, they were moving. Erik stashed the to-go bag on the floor and calmly fastened his seat belt.

“Um, hello? Someone want to explain what just happened?”

Hayes glanced at her in the rearview mirror. “He rushed up to you.”

“Yes, and thank God you were there.” She looked at Erik. “You think you guys might want to take it down a notch?”

“He was doing his job. He intercepted the threat.”

“Threat?” Brynn leaned forward between the seats. “That kid’s barely out of braces. He could press charges for aggravated assault.”

“I hardly touched him,” Hayes said.

“You shoved him against a vehicle.”

“ ‘Aggravated’?” Erik gave her a skeptical look.

“Hayes is armed.”

“His weapon wasn’t out. The guy didn’t even see it.”

“His body could be considered a deadly weapon,” she said. “So could yours.”

Erik set the thermostat to seventy degrees. “Well, if he presses charges, you can represent us.”

“Ha! You couldn’t afford me.” Brynn leaned back and folded her arms over her chest, not just pissed but rattled. She’d nearly jumped out of her skin when she heard Hayes’s booming voice behind her.

The ride back was silent and uncomfortable. Hayes seemed embarrassed. Erik seemed tense. Brynn stared through the tinted back windows at the downtown streets, trying to get her head around this new reality. She’d thought going to Otto’s would settle her nerves and help her feel normal on the eve of a big trial. But nothing was normal when she was surrounded by armed men twenty-four/seven.

Brynn closed her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose, feeling a headache coming on. She thought of Jen and wished she and Erik hadn’t talked about her. Ross was right. She shouldn’t have talked to that homicide detective, because now she had all the lurid details of Jen’s murder filling her mind.

She took out her phone and sent a message to Faith. Reggie’s assistant had known Jen from the law firm’s early days up in Dallas, and she was shocked by the murder. Everyone in the legal community was, from both sides of the aisle.

Brynn told Faith about the anonymous note and asked her to overnight it to Dallas. Faith was the only other person at the firm who understood Brynn’s haphazard, somewhat alphabetical filing system. The note she’d received on the one-year anniversary of Corby’s conviction was in its own manila envelope within a file marked “D Com” for defendant communications.

You believed it was important, or you wouldn’t have saved it. Brynn looked at Erik in the front seat, and she knew he was right.

Hayes pulled up to the front door of the building to drop them off before heading to the parking garage. The whole door-to-door service thing made Brynn feel spoiled. But Erik kept insisting, and she needed to pick her battles with him.

She swiped her way into the building with her key card and strode past the gurgling marble fountain in the lobby. Growing up, Brynn had lived in a series of apartments, none of which had a posh lobby or a rooftop pool or a fitness room. Brynn wasn’t footing the bill for this place, but still it seemed wasteful.

She and Erik rode the elevator up without a word and went straight to Ross’s to deliver the to-go bag.

As Erik let himself into the apartment, Brynn got a text from Bulldog: Meet me in the lobby.

She stared down at her phone. Where r u?

Downstairs.

Brynn glanced around. Ross and Skyler were both on the sofa with their laptops out. Erik leaned over Skyler, pointing at something on her screen. Hayes was in the hallway with Brynn, his shoulder propped against the wall as he checked his phone.

“I’ll be across the hall,” she said.

Hayes looked up and nodded.

Brynn slipped out and returned to the lobby, where she found Bulldog waiting beside the fountain.

The PI was short and stocky and proportioned like a bulldog, hence his name. He wore his usual cheap suit, no tie. Twenty years as a cop and five as a private detective had put a permanent frown on his face, but he looked especially unhappy tonight.

“Where’s Ross?” he asked.

“Upstairs. What are you doing here? I thought you were in Las Vegas.”

“I’m on the red-eye out of DFW. Had to catch you before I left. It’s important.” He glanced over her shoulder. “You got a problem, buddy?”

Brynn turned to see Erik standing behind her looking like a thundercloud. Good, she’d ticked him off.