Shatter (Unbreakable Bonds 2)

Snow’s hand tightened into a fist in his lap.

“It’s hard to say what he’s been doing over the past several years.” Gidget hit the remote again, pulling up what appeared to be a pair of police reports. “I found one hit of him in Boston in 2012 and another of him in L.A. in 2013, but the rest of the time is unknown. I think he might have been overseas, maybe Europe, because I can’t find anything else here in the U.S.”

“Has he been in contact with Jagger since returning?” Snow demanded, struggling to unclench his jaw.

Gidget turned back to him and frowned. “Not as far as I can tell. I’m still digging, but I’ve gone back through three months of police tapes, voice recordings, and notes. They haven’t been in contact, either directly or through Jagger’s flunkies. I’m still checking though. I want to look through a full year. Jagger plans things far in advance, years out even. From what I can tell, he’s a brilliant strategist, but right now, it doesn’t look like Gratton is working for Jagger.”

“What’s that mean?” Andrei asked, drawing Snow’s attention to him for the first time in several minutes. “He’s a loose cannon with his own agenda? But he was at that auction last night.”

Snow slouched in his chair, opening and closing his fist. Gidget’s information wasn’t making him feel any better. It should have been good news that Gratton apparently wasn’t working for Jagger, but he obviously was. He’d heard Rowe brag about Gidget often, so she should have been able to find something. Jagger kept all his dogs on a leash. “He was, so I don’t know about the loose cannon. Maybe. But Jagger always has his fat, nasty fingers wrapped around everything.”

“Anything else, Gidget?” Andrei asked. “You know where he’s staying?”

“No. I’m having a heck of a time tracking him. I’ve hacked into many security cameras around the city, but he’s been laying low. I didn’t even have an updated shot if he has a prominent scar.”

“What about in the Village or at my house?” Snow asked.

She shook her head. “There are like zero cameras in the Village and very few near your place. If you could spot him downtown or up in Kenwood, then it would be cake tracking him, but Cincinnati has been slow about installing cameras everywhere.”

“Do what you can,” Andrei murmured.

“Andrei, I’ve been working on that other thing you asked me to find. Tracking the vehicle that hit Melissa,” Gidget paused, her hands tightening around the remote. “I’m not sure this is it, but there was a delivery truck left in the parking lot of a repair shop and it’s in rough shape. Was reported stolen.”

Snow slid to the edge of his seat, his heart picking up its pace as he tried to follow their conversation. “Are you tracking down the driver who hit Mel?”

“Trying,” Gidget grumbled. “But not having much luck. Unless this truck is it and my gut is saying it is. I’ll print off the location.” Putting the remote back on the desktop, she walked over and pulled the jump drive from the TV. “Actually, I did have something strange come up. In one of those weird cosmic coincidences, I did run across another name.”

“Yeah? Whose?”

Snow watched as Gidget refused to look up at Andrei, her fingers turning over the tiny memory stick again and again. She was stalling and it didn’t set him at ease. “Chris Green.”

Snow’s gaze snapped back to Andrei to find the young man’s only reaction was a tightening of his jaw. Chris Green was the bastard who’d threatened Lucas in an attempt to steal some property. Green had tortured Andrei and very nearly killed him. And Lucas had just admitted to pulling the trigger.

“Green is tied to Gratton? How?” Snow demanded when Andrei didn’t speak.

“Green was arrested with Gratton on extortion and assault charges years ago. Chris Green was a minor at the time so I had to dig into his sealed records.”

Snow’s mouth fell open in shock. “You got into sealed juvie records?”

Andrei groaned, rubbing a hand over his face. “Don’t. Just … don’t ask.” Taking a deep breath, he looked up at the young woman who could have easily passed for a kindergarten teacher. “Any other mentions or ties between the two?”

“Or ties between Jagger and Green?” Snow added.

“I did a quick search and there’s no mention of Green and Jagger in the past during the same years Gratton worked for Jagger. The only thing was that Green was represented by Jagger’s lawyer, same as Gratton. That’s about it.”

Snow could see the questions in Andrei’s dark eyes, but he wasn’t speaking. Gidget was trusted with chunks of information, but it was clear that Andrei wasn’t willing to connect all the dots for her in an effort to protect Lucas and even Snow.