It was from Lynn.
Lynn: Need you here. Got something going on.
I replied quickly and shoved the phone back into my pocket.
“I gotta go,” I said. “But I’ll see you tomorrow. Give me a call and I’ll give you directions to my place.”
Catori studied me for a long moment and then nodded. “Sounds good.” She paused. “But I don’t have my phone. I actually haven’t seen it since this.” She gestured toward her arm with her good hand.
I snapped my fingers.
“Oh yeah,” I replied sheepishly, reaching into the other pocket for her phone. “I found that outside when I went to go study the scene afterward.”
I pulled it out of my pocket, then placed it gently in her lap, causing her to smile.
“Your number already in there?” she asked curiously.
I shook my head.
“I would’ve but…” I hesitated. “Most people don’t like strangers going through their phone. And speaking of, you really need a password.”
She wrinkled up her nose. “Passwords suck.”
“Passwords are necessary and help, even if it takes a little extra time to enter them in,” I contradicted her. “Now, want my phone number or what?”
She rolled her eyes and reached for her phone, grimacing when she picked it up. Then proceeded to listen to me recite my number to her.
When she was done putting it into her phone, she did a few things, then I felt my own phone buzz with another incoming text.
I went to reach for it, but she waved me away. “Just me. I wanted you to know what mine was, too.”
I didn’t bother telling her that Hunt had figured that out for me almost the moment that I asked him for it over an hour ago, along with all of her family’s numbers. I put each and every one in my phone so just in case they called while I was away, I would know to answer it.
Because I rarely answered my phone.
People knew that if they wanted to get ahold of me, they were to text me first, and I would call them.
I just had way too many people calling at this point and wanting to talk to me about my ‘expired vehicle warranty’ or some bullshit telemarketer call like that to waste my time answering any longer.
“If you need me.” I winked.
Her face got a little color back to it as she said, “Then I’ll call.”
Thirty minutes later, I arrived at Lynn’s—my dad’s—place.
When I arrived at the front door, it was to find my father standing inside of the doorframe, staring at me approach.
A few months ago, when it came out that Lynn was my father, I hadn’t been all that surprised.
There’d been a whole lot of instances over the last couple years since he’d managed to get me out of prison, and then had brought me into the fold, that hadn’t made sense at the time.
I mean, why had he spent the time to help me?
Even Bruno, who he’d helped raise, hadn’t gotten quite the same treatment that I had.
And trust me, I’d done my level best to burn down the world with me in it when I’d gotten out of prison. But Lynn had given me chance after chance, opportunity after opportunity, to make sure that I lived my life the way I wanted to live it.
When his wife, Six, came into the picture, things started to make a whole lot more sense when the truth came out that I was actually his son.
I mean, other than the fact that I was the spitting image of him.
Same textured hair. Same green eyes. Same build and the way I stood. Hell, we even had the same damn nose.
When we’d been sitting in Lynn’s place, and the light had passed over my eyes, causing me to sneeze, I’d learned that it was a hereditary trait.
And when Lynn had all but refused to have his pupils checked, my suspicion had gotten even worse. Not to mention, a few weeks earlier, it wasn’t just me who’d thought that we looked alike, but Lynn’s own girlfriend.
Then, when he finally accepted the bright ass light in his eyes, he’d done the same sneezing fit that I’d done, and I’d known, without him even confirming, that my suspicions were true.
“She okay?” he asked immediately upon me, getting close enough that he didn’t have to raise his voice.
I nodded once. “She’s okay.”
He tilted his head slightly. “What’s wrong then?”
I found myself tilting my own head and straightened it with a grunt.
“We were at the hospital and there was an active shooter situation,” I explained. “Luckily, it was two rival gangs going at it, and nothing to do with Thor Thames.”
“That you know of,” Bruno said as he came up behind me. “But I have it on good authority that those two numb nuts weren’t there because they wanted to be. They were there because they were held at gunpoint and forced to be.”