Page 47 of Off Limits (Alpha Billionaire)

“Let me talk to her. Put her on,” I demanded.

“No, I don’t think so. You took a good, long time to make this call. How am I supposed to be convinced you really care for her if you didn’t even try to call me for almost… Wow, it’s been three hours. And I thought you’ve been moving slowly on the proposal.”

“Where is she?” I snarled.

“Like I’m going to tell you.” He ended the call.

I stared at the display on my car’s dash as if it would suddenly give me a map location of the phone call. “Damn it!” I slammed my hand down on the steering wheel. What had I heard in the background during the call? I had no idea whether he was still driving, sitting in a bar, or in a hotel somewhere.

“Call Sarah,” I spoke loudly for the phone’s voice commands. I began driving around, still uncertain where to go or how to start looking for Jessica.

The ringing sounded through the car’s speakers.

“Hi, Dylan. Is everything okay? It’s late.”

“How would you find out if someone was staying at a hotel?” I asked, not even greeting her.

“Uh, I don’t exactly know. Most hotels these days won’t tell you if they have a guest there. Why?”

“What if it's an emergency?” I asked.

“I don’t know. I guess you could call and pretend you need to be put through to their room.”

“Good. I need you to find out where Ryan Carmichael is staying,” I said.

“Can’t you just call him and ask?” Sarah asked.

“No, I can’t.”

“Okay, where is he staying? Do you know if he’s in Monterey or Carmel, or…?” She let the silence hang, waiting for me to fill in the blank for her.

“I have no idea, but I need to find him.”

Sarah’s laugh filled my car. “You’re joking, right? Do you have any idea how many hotels there are around here? What if he got one of those vacation rentals instead of a hotel? You’re a good boss, Dylan, but that’s an impossible task.”

“Sarah,” I started.

“No. If you decide to fire me in the morning, I’ll still say no. You’re asking me to not only produce a list of well over five hundred hotels, but then call each and every one of them. Call the man, find out where he’s staying. You don’t have to tell him why you want to know.”

“Oh, he’ll figure it out. You’re right, that’s not a last-minute thing to ask someone to undertake. At least five hundred? You think that many? I won’t fire you in the morning. Good night.”

As soon as I ended the call, my phone started ringing again.

22

JESSICA

Ryan threw me ahead of him. I stumbled but managed to keep walking. What the hell was I thinking? What was I doing? If I had been stupid for falling for him and doing his dirty work before, what was I now? I had put myself in danger because I didn’t want him to hurt Dylan. Because I wanted them to stop fighting.

I put myself into Ryan’s control because I wanted him to leave me alone, and for some reason, this was all I could think of. Dumb, dumb, dumb. More than dumb. I had to be the biggest idiot on the planet.

Ryan grabbed my wrist again and dragged me over to his car. It unlocked with a quick beep-beep. He yanked the door open and tossed me inside before slamming it on me. The door locked before I could even think about opening it and running away.

Ryan slid into the driver’s side and looked at me. His expression was dark and frightening one second, and then the next, he burst out laughing. I had no idea what was so funny.

“Oh, man, did you see the look on his face? That was epic!” He continued to laugh loudly as he turned the car on and began driving.

“What’s so funny?” I demanded.

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