Eat Crow (Cheap Thrills 6)

Throwing my bag across my seat and into the passenger’s side, I scowled at him over my shoulder. “I like my car, and I’m keeping my car. It reminds me of one of the Decepticons in the Transformers cartoons.”

Rolling his eyes, he motioned at me to get inside. “Go back to the motel and lock yourself in the room, okay? I’ll text you when I know what’s going on.”

Searching his eyes, I saw his concern clear as day. I could give him this. “I’ll do just that and text you to let you know I got there.”

“Thank you,” he whispered, giving me a lip touch. “Stay safe, and I love you.”

“Ditto, honey.”

I’d just gotten into my seat and was reaching for my seatbelt when he added, “And give the babies a kiss for me and tell Miracle I’ll see her tonight.”

Jesus, this man, and those kittens. “Anything you want me to tell Doyle?”

With his hand on the door to shut it, he smiled and winked at me. “Yeah, tell him to look after all of my girls, and if anyone comes that he doesn’t like, he’s okay to attack them. If he doesn’t get the memo, throw one of my t-shirts at the person and let Doyle go to town on them.”

He might have slammed the door shut after he said it, but there was no way he didn’t hear my laughter, even over the purring of my baby.

Chapter Twenty-One

Logan

“What have we got?” DB shouted as he jogged into the building, waving us all into the conference room. “Dad’s out with Kapono at the school. I’ll update him when we’re done.”

“Fingerprints haven’t come back with a hit so far, sorry,” Alejandro said, sounding pissed and tired. “They’re still running, but we don’t have any of the Kirkwoods prints to include them in the search.”

“No, I don’t imagine you do,” DB growled, standing with his hands on his hips. “Wouldn’t do to have the mayor and his sons' prints in the system if you’re a corrupt bastard.”

“Your call to Ramsey opened a door for us. We took everything over to him and explained it all, and he’s going to issue the warrant. There was an important call while we were there from the governor, so we had to leave,” everyone snickered now that we knew the connection to the Townsends when I paused. “But his secretary called to say it was ready to be collected five minutes ago.”

There was a gentle knock on the door before DB could reply to what I’d said, and when I moved to open it, Naomi was standing with her hand raised like she was about to knock again.

“Um, there’s been a call from the Kirkwood mansion. His wife said they need police assistance.”

Moving to stand next to me, DB looked at me and then back down at her. “Did she say why?”

“No, she just said she needs assistance and that she’ll be waiting for you.”

DB waited until the door was closed before barking out orders. “Make sure you have all of your gear on and stay vigilant. This could be real. It could also be something he’s set up and dragged her into.”

We’d soon find out which one it was.

And it definitely wasn’t either of those options.

Jumping out of the cruiser, I followed the direction that DB was looking in to see four dark Ford Explorers parked to the side of the house. That wasn’t exactly weird, but the men who looked like they were members of the Texas Capitol Police milling around were.

“Stay vigilant,” he reminded us, moving toward the front door.

I was right behind him, so when one of the men came up and held his hand out, I heard it all clearly.

“Chris Kelly, Texas Capitol Police. We were in the area, and Governor Dahl decided to pay a visit to Mayor Kirkwood after hearing about the shooting at the school.”

“David Bell, you can call me DB. We had a call from Mrs. Kirkwood requesting assistance at this address twenty minutes ago. She didn’t indicate that it was anything serious, just that she’d be grateful for us to ‘stop by.’”

The man’s face had been blank, but when he heard this, it cracked slightly like he was fighting a smile. “I’ll just bet she did. Go on in.”

Meeting DB’s confused look, I walked past him into the house and looked around slowly. The first thing I saw was Governor Dahl, sitting on the couch with a cup of coffee and talking to Mrs. Kirkwood. There was no missing her, she was stunning.

“Oh, good, you’re here,” she called, getting up and walking towards us in heels that looked like assault weapons.