“And the day after that ten thousand was transferred the attack on the village happened,” I finished.
“Where’d the money go to?” the guy I think was named Owen asked.
“I couldn’t find information on the account holder’s name. But the bank is in Dili.”
“And the pictures?” Gabe asked. “Those were all emailed to you?”
“Yes.”
Damn, this was going to piss Kyle off.
“All of the emails were threatening me. But the last one with the picture of Kalee in the…” I trailed off, unable to utter the words mass grave. “Well, that email threatened all of us.”
“Are you telling me someone threatened my wife?” Kyle thundered and I flinched.
“Yes. And that was when I stopped. I swear, Kyle, I never thought—”
Kyle’s temper flared and he shouted, “No, Evette, you didn’t fucking think!”
I expected him to be pissed but his anger still sliced deep. And when he stalked out of the room leaving me with a bunch of strangers I was worried he wouldn’t come back.
Damn.
A new man entered the room, though he wasn’t watching where he was going; his head was turned and his eyes were on Kyle.
“Who pissed in his—” The newcomer froze in the doorway, his gaze narrowed on the big screen, and he muttered, “Fuck.”
“’Bout sums it up. To bring you up to speed, Evette here has been looking into Timor-Leste and Kalee Solberg,” Zane explained, then went on. “Evette, this is Garrett. He’s going to analyze the files on the thumb drive. I don’t suppose you have anything else helpful hidden in that bag of yours?”
I fought rolling my eyes but welcomed Zane’s stupid question. What did he think I was hiding in a bag that barely had enough room to hold my now-empty wallet and tossed-out cell? I was going to miss that phone, it was the latest and greatest tech gadget and it’d cost me a damn fortune. Thankfully, it was backed up but my bank account would take one hell of a hit replacing it.
“Babe?” Gabe’s smooth voice once again pulled me from my thoughts.
Unfortunately, I stopped thinking about expensive cell phones and started thinking about how much I liked him calling me babe. I’d had boyfriends call me baby, one had even called me snookums which creeped me the hell out. Thankfully, he didn’t last very long—and yes, calling me snookums was my motivating factor for breaking up with him. That and the dude had a serious OCD about clean floors. Like, take your shoes off outside—which is cool I get that—but if I’d been wearing flip-flops or shoes with no socks he’d made me put on nylon footies. And, yes, he had a box of disposable nylons like a department store so “foot sweat” didn’t get on his floor.
That’s weird, right?
Totally cuckoo.
“Evette, babe,” Gabe called again.
Damn.
“Sorry.”
“No worries. There’s a lot going on, take your time.”
“Are you familiar with G2ware?” I asked Garrett.
I saw Garrett’s lips twitch but he quickly masked his amusement. “You could say I’m familiar with G2, yes.”
Gabe chuckled from beside me and I didn’t see what was funny about computer recovery software but I wasn’t in the mood to ask why everyone in the room seemed to find my question entertaining.
“Everything’s on that drive but I also have the rest of my computer backed up.”
Garrett moved to the laptop and finally, the horrendous image of Kalee disappeared.
It must be noted I could type quickly but Garrett’s fingers moved over the keyboard at least three times faster than mine. Impressive.
There was a C prompt on the big screen and without looking at me Garrett asked, “What’s your password?”
“Um, don’t you need my login first?”
“Nope. Just your password.”
“BeetleJuice06141969001. With the B and J capitalized.”
While Garrett typed it in and poked around, Gabe stared at me for a second.
“Seriously, babe? Beetlejuice?”
Gabe’s rumbly laughter sent an unwanted shiver up my spine. And I was too busy fighting the warm squishy feeling in my tummy to be embarrassed about my choice of passwords.
“I change my passwords every couple of days. I was on a Michael Keaton marathon. And Beetlejuice is better than One Good Cop or Multiplicity.”
“Batman?” Gabe suggested.
Which was absolutely appalling.
“Everyone knows Adam West was the best Batman ever. Second to Adam was Christian Bale. So say I was on a Christian kick, I would’ve probably changed my password to Batman. Michael Keaton, no way.”
Then I watched up close, with such extreme fascination that the rest of the room melted when Gabe tilted his head to the side and roared with laughter. I was so enthralled by the way his lips parted, exposing a line of perfectly white teeth I almost missed the way his eyes lit and narrowed, forming deep grooves at the corners. There was so much to see, so much to enjoy, I didn’t know what to look at next. My gaze roamed quickly—jaw, cheeks, Adam’s apple, thick corded muscle on the side of his neck. There was a lot there to admire but I went back to his smile. So beautiful. And contagious, seeing it made me want to smile, so I did.
I instantly regretted it when his laughter died and his eyes heated.
“I’ll give you Adam. But Bale as Batman is a negative,” Gabe said when his humor died down. “American Psycho is where it’s at.”
Um. I had to agree. Christian Bale was better in American Psycho than he was in Batman.
Damn.
“Fine, I’ll give you a point for American Psycho but only if you admit Michael Keaton was awesome in Beetlejuice.”
“He was but he was better in Birdman.”
Before I had to concede yet again Garrett cut in. “All right, Siskel and Ebert, if the two of you are done I need to ask about internet searches.”
My eyes went to the screen and my face heated. Right there on the big screen for all to see was my browser history. I contemplated the wisdom of including my internet data in the backup. And when I say the screen was big, what I really mean was it was huge. Ginormous. Obscenely large.
Shit.
“I was researching a story,” I blurted out.
“On penis enlarging?” Garrett inquired.
To his credit, he did this mostly with a straight face. Zane however didn’t hold back his amusement. Nor did any of the other men in the room.
Ivy gave me a wink and I wanted to crawl under the table and hide.
“Well, no. Not on penis enlarging exactly. I was doing a story on scams.”
“Scams?” Garrett smiled. “So you’re telling me pumps and creams don’t really work?”
Oh. My. God.
“I thought you mostly covered gang activity and crime stats,” Linc asked.
“I do,” I nearly shouted. “My editor felt I needed a break. A palate cleanser after back-to-back stories involving children.”
“So you chose penis enlargement as a palate cleanser?” Zane inquired, not allowing the topic to die. “My kinda woman.”
“It’s not about penises. The story was about scams and the psychological reasons people fall for them. You know like, five-minute abs, miracle skin tightener, breast enlargement pills, penis cream. I mean, who falls for that? Did not one man who purchased the cream stop and think “gee, if this enlarges my penis what will it do to my hand?” The cream needs to be applied; common sense would say if it makes your penis bigger it would also make your hand bigger. I pulled the company’s financials. They sell a lot of it so it got me thinking, then I started looking and I’ve yet to see a man walking down the street with an abnormally large right hand.”