Page 28 of Searing Passion

“I heard some, but not to do with me being here.”

“So, Karlee?”

“A precaution,” he says.

It’s a slight amendment, but I let it slide.

“She escaped through the kitchen window.”

He stares at me a moment, then laughs. “Karlee isn’t one to sit quietly. Way too independent. But she tries.”

“It’s almost spring break. I can arrange a trip for her.”

“No. No, not a good idea.”

Shit, she has to stay in town, and I can hazard a guess why.

She’s a sort of collateral.

We talk a little longer, but I’m only half in the conversation. Whoever Fallon took the fall for to protect, he isn’t giving up.

I drive to my next meeting, someone desperate to do a fucking favor for the De Lucas and me, Nicolo and Diego inparticular, since we hold his fate and wellbeing in our hands. It’s a bit of a drive, and the traffic is bordering on annoying, so I let my brain drift to what Fallon said and didn’t say.

It’s a hell of a lot safer than thinking about the kiss with Karlee. When she?—

I grip the wheel tightly.

There’s definitely something Fallon has, something that might be in Karlee’s things, and something that I think only he knows what to look for. Hidden in plain sight is a particular Fallon skill.

But whoever’s looking might not know he has anything. I’m leaning toward this weird Genesis and Smith Group. The gang he got into, to the point of a fucking tattoo, would have been a way in to whatever he was looking into. And not taking Karlee away? I’m betting that might put her life in actual danger.

I’ve got a whole lot of maybes and what-ifs.

“Precaution,” I mutter, hitting the indicator and turning. “He said fucking precaution.”

Karlee’s under some kind of threat.

Now, all I need to do is find out what.

Fuck.

Johnny the Hamster gives hamsters a bad rap, but I lean back at the bar, a no man’s land pocket of Dallas, as a girl shakes her wares on the pole.

His eyes are sliding all over her as he gulps back beer, and I barely contain my revulsion.

Do these low-lives have anything better to do than hang out all day at cheap strip joints?

I tap a coaster on the sticky bar, kind of shocked this place has coasters. “Johnny?”

“Yeah.”

“Fucking look at me when I speak to you.”

Even in the low light, the color visibly drains from his face. “Sorry.”

“I asked about new activity.”

He shifts in his seat, and I take it as a yes. “Who?”

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