Page 7 of Trick's Trap

Chapter 4

Six months later

Trick dodge Liam’s fist and pivoted on his feel, somehow managing to keep his balance while hopping a few feet away. He was back to back with his brother, as planned. Blood pumping in his ears, he reached out, taking hold of Liam’s gi. He used it to get a better grip before flipping the much larger man over his shoulder.

Liam crashed to the floor with a grunt. He rolled and was back on his feet in a flash, but he couldn’t dodge Trick’s fist.

He hit him hard, and Liam went down again.

“What the hell, man?” Liam’s heavy brows drew down as he frowned at him.

Trick relaxed his stance, backing away. “Sorry,” he muttered.

His brother stood, cocking his head at him. “It’s okay, but what happened to the light workout you wanted?”

“Upset I got in a shot?” he asked, circling Liam cautiously.

It wasn’t all that common for Trick to get the upper hand in a match. Technically, he was faster than his brother, but not by much. With his superior body mass, Liam could use raw power to overwhelm his opponents, although he rarely used brute force indiscriminately. He was too skilled for that.

“No.” Liam’s lips thinned. “I’m just wondering what’s eating you. You’ve been quiet lately. And you were short with Hector yesterday when he came into the office to clean out the trash cans.”

Trick sniffed. “I was not.”

Liam crossed his arms. “Well, you didn’t snap at the guy, but you barely looked at him. You hardly speak with any of the staff anymore, even though it’s part of the job. All you do is hole up in your office, taking calls from your poker buddies. Have you even checked on the architect on the Sydney renovation yet?”

Shit. “I’ll do that after the service.” Trick scratched his head. His mind wasn’t on his job, but he’d believed he’d been covering better than this.

His brother didn’t move. “Is that what’s bothering you?”

Trick leaned back in his chair. “What?”

“The memorial service for Maia’s friend,” Liam said. “I know it’s sad. But we didn’t know the girl. Did you even meet her before she went missing? Was she here with Maia or Peyton?”

Maia MacLachlan was the wife of Liam’s oldest friend Calen. Her friend Tahlia, another graduate student at Harvard, had gone missing months ago. Today some of Tahlia’s friends and colleagues were gathering at their hotel at Calen’s behest. Though there was still an open investigation into Tahlia’s disappearance, Calen thought having a service would help his wife with deal with her loss. Maia, on the other hand, thought getting Tahlia’s friends together might spark something in their memories that would help find her.

“No. I never met Tahlia,” he said, a guilty flush creeping up his neck. How could he tell his brother he was upset over someone he’d encounteredoncemonths ago? Especially today.

“We better hit the showers,” he said, changing the subject. “The service starts in less than an hour. Peyton will have our hide if we’re late.”

His brother grimaced. “Yeah, she already read me the riot act about the decorations earlier. Said it was too funereal.”

Trick couldn’t blame Peyton and Maia for their reaction to the arrangements. It must have been difficult for them to accept that their friend was gone, especially since a body had never been found.

He and Liam parted, each heading back to their own suites to shower and dress. They met back up twenty minutes later in the hall outside the hotel’s smallest salon, the one that was usually used for conferences and small reunions.

This afternoon, it was decorated in muted tones, a few tasteful sprays of flowers along the walls. The somber display was affecting. Trick fiddled with his tie, checking each group for familiar faces.

Peyton, his sister’s best friend and a member of their IT team, walked over from a cluster of people near the freesia.She is spot on.It did look like a funeral.

“You’re late,” she hissed.

“Sorry,” he mumbled, tugging at his collar.

“Let me,” she said, reaching up to adjust it with her typical efficiency.

She narrowed her eyes at Liam as she worked, but his brother didn’t even glance at her. Liam’s eyes were fixed on his phone. It was rude, but Trick knew he wasn’t really working. His brother hated funerals more than he did—ever since their own parents died when they were kids.

But Peyton knew his brother as well as he did. Liam would work straight through the entire event if he wasn’t stopped. She took his phone out of his hand, silencing his growl of protest with a single warning finger.

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