“I don’t want to hear.”
“I didn’t kill him. I cut him off, made sure everyone knew not to do business with him—he wants to get his jollies by hurting girls, he can fucking do it somewhere else. And she was here. In the lobby. Just sitting there as if she were waiting for someone. She saw me, smiled, and walked out. I couldn’t sleep, couldn’t eat, and then I called you a hundred times on Sunday and you ignored me!”
“You’re sure it was her?”
“Yes.”
“And she didn’t say anything?”
“No.”
He narrowed his eyes. “No? You’re holding back, Mona. If you want me to help you, you need to tell me everything.”
“I wasn’t going to call you again, I was so angry that you fucking wouldn’t pick up your phone, then this morning I found a note.”
He was really getting ticked off by Mona making him ask for everything. “What note?”
“See for yourself. My desk.”
Mona walked into the kitchen. He watched her, made sure he could see her at all times, before crossing the room to her desk.
The desk was bare, except for a laptop computer. “What game are you playing?” he asked.
“Top drawer.” She poured herself a Scotch and downed it.
Sean opened the drawer. Paper, pens, pencils, bills, a couple of flash drives. He saw an envelope with a childish scrawl that might have said “Mona.”
He held up the envelope. “This?”
She nodded.
He took out a single piece of folded paper. In block letters, a short threat:
Mona:
You abandoned me two years ago. I don’t forget or forgive. You will be the first to die. Today? Tomorrow? Next month? You won’t know when, you won’t know where, and I’ll have so much fun making you squirm. You can’t hide here—you can’t hide anywhere.
Love,
Your Worst Nightmare
It sounded like Elise Hunt. Sean could almost hear the singsong laughter of her voice. Her brother Tobias was a vicious gun and drug runner who was killed nearly two years ago, thanks to Kane. Nicole Rollins was Tobias’s cousin, a corrupt cop taken out by SWAT at the same time. Elise was their psychopathic half sister. She’d landed in juvie for only two years, walked away three weeks ago when she turned eighteen, slate wiped clean.
At that time, Lucy had been informed of her release and told that Elise was relocating to Los Angeles, where she’d inherited property.
“You’re positive you saw Elise?”
“It was her.”
“Where did you find this?”
“On my desk. She got in here. In my fucking apartment, Rogan!”
Sean shouldn’t have touched the envelope, but he’d only touched the letter by the corners. He found another envelope in the back of the drawer and put Elise’s threat inside it. “You need to take this to the police—”
“Bull fucking shit. I’m not going to the police. You think they’ll protect me?”
“Don’t shout at me, we’re on the same side here.”
Shit. RCK should have been on top of this … they should have been monitoring Elise from the minute she was released. Clearly her trip to Los Angeles was short-lived. But she had a purpose. That little bitch did nothing without a purpose, as twisted as it might be.
Los Angeles … her father Jimmy Hunt had been extradited from Mexico to the U.S. and was in prison in Los Angeles, so that was the likely connection.
Had Elise and her father concocted a scheme for payback?
“She’s going to kill me,” Mona said. “You have to stop her.”
“You need to file a police report.”
“And say what? That I ran girls in San Antonio and was supposed to take her out of town when this asshole PI who’d already broke into my apartment and trashed my computer told me to leave or he’d hurt my sister and nephew?”
With every word her volume increased and he finally said, “Shut up!” He forced himself to calm down. He couldn’t lose his temper with her. “I never threatened anyone,” he said through clenched teeth.
She rolled her eyes. “Right.”
“I told you I would tell your sister where her trust came from, and it wasn’t from your fucking death. Don’t go and twist things around when you asked me to come here and help you. I have plenty on you that the cops would be interested in knowing, Ramona Jefferson.” He spat out her real name—a name that had a death certificate attached to it.
“I’m sorry. I’m sorry! I’m just so freaked out. She scares the living hell out of me.”
That he believed. “First, you need protection.”
“That’s why I called you.”
“I can’t stay here and protect you.” If Elise was in Texas, he needed to protect his family, first and foremost. “Call the police. They will follow up on this threat. Elise is dangerous—”
“Then why the fuck did they let her out of prison?”
“You have money. Last time I saw you, you had a bunch of bodyguards.”
“I have a couple guys I hire, they don’t live with me! But—Elise isn’t like normal people, you know? She has a screw loose.”
That Sean knew.
“I’ll track her. Find out where she is and what she’s doing and maybe I can get someone to put the fear of God into her.” He couldn’t do it, not knowing where she might show up next, but he could hire a PI to follow her, make sure she wasn’t doing something illegal. Encourage her to get out of Texas, he hoped.
First he had to locate her.
But Elise Hunt … shit. She was as unpredictable as she was insane.
Not insane. Sociopathic, violent, remorseless, but not legally crazy.
“You think she’ll listen? That girl is a fucking mess. You don’t know the half of it, Rogan.”
Elise Hunt was planning something. Once she took out Mona, she probably had a list of people to go after, not the least of which was Sean and Lucy. Lucy had testified against her, Sean had stolen her family’s drug money and turned it over to the feds. Elise might not even be planning on killing Mona. She might just be playing with her, scaring her, which she’d clearly already done.
Sean looked at his watch. He had to get going, Lucy would be home by eleven, and he needed more information before he told her what was going on.
“I’m going to give you a list of things to do. This is important, Mona.”
She opened the refrigerator and took out a bottle of American beer, put it on the counter.
“I don’t want a drink.”
“Fine, be that way. Just tell me what to do.” She took out her phone and opened up the note app.
Sean rubbed his eyes. Okay, she was scared. He got that. Hell, Elise was only eighteen but she scared the shit out of Sean because she was unpredictable. And Mona had helped him and Lucy when they needed it. She was a criminal, but she wasn’t all bad. No one was all bad.
Except anyone with the last name of Hunt.
He picked up the beer and twisted off the cap. Took a long swallow. “I’m going to find out where Elise is and what she’s doing, but you need to protect yourself. I still think you need to take that note to the police, but I get it. You don’t want to go to the police. So, first thing, get a full-time bodyguard…”