“We will figure it out; don’t worry. I’ll make sure you’re taken care of. Let’s just figure out how to catch this guy. For the time being, I don’t want you going back home. He’s dangerous and so is his brother.”
“If I don’t go home, he will know something is up. I need to go back if we are going to catch him.”
“No. Absolutely not.”
“In case you forgot, I’m an adult and make my own decisions. Call me when you have a plan. I’m going home, and I’m making sure my life is protected.”
Rose stood up and gave me a hug before she turned to leave. I knew I couldn’t stop her, and I wouldn’t try. She had a lot at stake and was a strong woman. If she insisted on going home, there wasn’t much I could do about it.
“I’m going to call you later tonight. We will catch him,” I said as I ran after her.
“You do what you can, but I’m going to do what I can, too.”
“Deal.”
I hurried back over to my attorney’s office to meet with the guys and fill them in on everything. We really needed to come up with a plan to catch Carlos. I had a feeling he was already starting to suspect something was going on and would jet out of town at the first sign of real trouble.
We had him where we wanted him. So far, Carlos had to feel like he had the upper hand. His plan was working. Rose had come to me with the papers; Del had been afraid to talk to me because she thought I was a criminal. Now, it was just a matter of figuring out how to get the solid proof of what he was doing.
If we were going to catch him red-handed, there couldn’t be a question about his motive. I wasn’t about to do all this work just to have him tell the police that he really did find that legal document and I really owed Rose the money. We needed the proof that he’d broken into the online system with Dating the Rich, the proof he had frozen my accounts, and the proof he’d been breaking into my house looking for something.
“So how are we going to get the proof we need?” I asked everyone when I arrived back at Dick’s.
“I think you need to use Del and Rose,” Josh said.
“Hell, no! Why would I use them?”
“He trusts Rose and he thinks Del is angry with you a
nd believes you are a criminal. You can use those relationships to get him to confess.”
“I don’t see how? And, I’m not putting the two most important women in my life in danger.”
“They are already in danger, Brandon,” Billy said flatly. “Rose has the man in her home, and Carlos knows how much Del means to you. He went after your relationship with Del because he knew it would hurt the most. Don’t fool yourself – she’s already in danger.”
His words hit me like ice water as the realization of what he was saying washed over me. I’d left Del at her house without any security. What if Carlos found out we were getting close to figuring everything out? He certainly was going to use Del to force my hand, I just knew it.
“I’ve got to go find Del.”
“No, we need to make a plan. You can use her to contact Carlos and say she has more information. She’s your best asset in possibly taking him down.”
“I won’t put her in danger!”
“Let’s call her and talk about it calmly. She’s an adult. Let her decide for herself if she’d like to be involved or not. You want to catch this guy, don’t you? You don’t want him running off with all your money, right?”
“Of course, I want to catch him.”
“Then, call Delilah and let’s figure this out.”
Chapter Twenty-One
Delilah
“I’m helping, that’s all there is to it. I’ll be right down.”
Brandon didn’t sound all that happy to be asking for my help in dealing with Carlos, but I was more than happy to have something to do that was useful. I felt horrible about my role in giving Carlos and his brother access to Brandon’s credit card information. This was my opportunity to fix things, or at least help out a little.
When I thought about Antonio and the pure size of his arms, I knew he and Carlos were capable of hurting me, Brandon, and anyone else. I liked the plan the guys had come up with and was pretty confident it was going to work. The biggest thing was that we needed to make sure Carlos didn’t get a whiff of what we were doing. If he got spooked, then he was going to freak out and none of us knew how that would turn out.