Page 45 of Luke

“That’s both great and terrifying at the same time.” Lauren laughed.

“Do you need to put someone else on her instead?” Cade asked Ryker.

He shook his head. “No. I added a second man to give us full coverage on her at all times, but she gave him the slip too. At this point, I should be paying her for the training she’s giving the team. I’ll swap them out in a week or so with a few more guys just to give everyone some rest.”

Ashley was the first job for Ryker’s new security team and she was challenging them at every turn. She was an adult in grad school and acting like she had the sense of a 16-year-old.

“I’ll talk to her again,” Luke told him.

“I can as well if you think that would help. I know we only met once really and I didn’t know we were related, but happy to throw my hand in where I can.” Cade stood next to Luke now, both men with a hand on the backs of their necks as they thought it over.

Luke realized the mirrored pose and dropped his quickly.

Catherine rolled her eyes. “I think I’d have better luck than either of you. Has she set a date to come out here?”

“Not yet.”

“Then let me give her a call and see what I can do first. Besides, I would genuinely like to meet her.”

“Okay,” Luke said and shared the contact with her.

With that settled, they went back to thinking of ways his father could mess with Paisley.

“I’ve got something,” Matt shouted, interrupting everyone. “It looks like his lawyer, who should be disbarred by the way, contacted Paisley’s sister. I’m digging further but I think it’s a safe bet that he’s going to use her against Paisley somehow.”

“If I were him, I’d have her call me, tug on my heartstrings for a place to stay to get clean, and then have her do something that could either be blamed on me or on my poor choices for having an addict around.” Paisley’s leg bounced nervously as she spoke.

“Matt, can you get contact information on her?” Luke asked, already forming a plan.

“Easier said than done. She’s staying at the homeless shelter on the edge of the city. It was sheer luck that I caught him talking to her on a camera outside of it. If he had gone in, I wouldn’t have seen it,” Matt explained.

“Did she look like she agreed to anything?” Paisley asked.

“Can’t tell. She looked nervous but I didn’t see them make an agreement, I don’t think.”

“Let’s go pay her a visit,” Luke told her. “We can offer her state-of-the-art facilities to get clean if that’s what she wants, and if not when we can at least get her away from you and Garrett until she makes that decision.”

“Okay,” Paisley quickly agreed.

“I don’t think that direct is the best way to go,” Cade interrupted. “I’m sorry, but we don’t know if she’s agreed to help him, and if you are spotted down there, there’s bound to be questions about what is going on and that could impact Garrett.”

“How? It’s not a secret that she’s my sister and that she used to stay with me. Offering to get her clean isn’t a problem and I can pass a drug test.” Cade started to interrupt her, and she hurriedly continued, “I don’t think she would react well to another man in a suit offering her things that are too good to be true.”

The room seemed to marinate over that thought before Ryker spoke.

“She’s right. I’d be suspicious as hell that people I don’t know keep showing up and offering me things.”

“I see your point, but I think we should at least go as a group. Or more than just you two,” Cade pushed.

“I agree with that. I don’t think going alone makes sense with Father out to get all of us. It would be great if we had someone that wasn’t one of us there,” Cade said as he took over pacing where Luke had stopped.

“What about Mr. Smith?” Paisley asked.

“How does she know him?” Cade asked Luke.

“We met him at dinner last night.” Luke took a second to think about it and had to admit it was a good idea. “It could work. He has more pull than our father and I doubt that anyone would argue with him.”

Paisley flashed him a grin before turning back to Cade. Luke was beginning to get annoyed that Cade’s word was all that seemed to matter here. This was his house and his choice in the end. It wasn’t lost on him that this was the big-brother relationship he’d always wanted but at the wrong time.

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