Page 14 of Call Back

“You know where it is?” he asked in a mocking hopeful tone.

“No, I wish.” I leaned over my legs and took a moment, worried Colt would be pissed that I hadn’t told him this right away. Or that it might be a mistake to tell him at all. “When you broke the dog statue, I found a note mixed in with all the filler paper.”

“What?” His eyes pierced into me. “What did it say?”

“It was addressed to me,” I said slowly. “It was from my father.”

“Your father left you a million dollars in a plaster dog?” Anger washed over his face. “Did you know that when you found the damn statue in your mother’s garage? You just used that sob story about how it looked like the statue you gave your father, might be the same one, so I’d haul it to your apartment?”

“No, Colt! I swear!” I protested. “I had no idea the gold was in there until it broke.”

Strangely enough, that seemed to appease him. “Okay.”

“Let me get this straight,” I said, getting irritated. “You were pissed when you thought I knew about the gold, but you don’t care that I kept the note from you?”

“Yeah, because in the first instance, you would have been using me. But in the second, you were just withholding information you weren’t ready to share. It’s all about intent.” His eyes lacked their usual glint of humor. “You have your secrets and I have mine. We’ve respected that about each other. I see no reason to change it now.”

I didn’t know much about his past beyond that he wasn’t proud of it. That it had cost him the only real relationship he’d ever had. Belinda had told me that he’d been arrested for grand larceny, but the charges had been dropped and the records were sealed. That had given me a moment of pause. Ultimately, though, I’d come to the conclusion that even if I didn’t always trust my own instincts, I trusted my mother’s. Trust didn’t come easily to her, and she trusted Colt implicitly.

“The note told me to trust no one, which is part of the reason I didn’t show it to you.” I paused. “Colt, the note I found with the gold was left by my father, but you said some of the serial numbers were issued four years after his disappearance.”

He watched me for several seconds. “You think Lopez lied about killing him? That he’s alive?”

“Lopez never specifically said he killed him, but he did admit to killing Morrissey and others.”

“You’re reaching, Mags. Don’t you think Lopez would have asked you where your father was?”

“No, he was more interested in the gold. Besides, I’d already gone to him looking for information about my father’s disappearance. He knew I had no idea where he was.” I put my hand on Colt’s knee. “Even if my dad’s . . . gone, I don’t think he died the year he disappeared. I think he was still around four years later to put the gold in that dog.”

“The gold was minted four years after your father’s disappearance. It could have been put in that dog a month ago, for all we know. Roy put the statue in the garage. Maybe he hid it in there for safekeeping.”

“With a note from my dad? Roy would have destroyed it on principle alone. He hates me because he thinks our father loved me more, not to mention I can’t see Roy leaving a million in gold in a plaster dog in my mother’s garage. But how did Roy even get ahold of the statue? Last I knew, it was in my daddy’s office when the police confiscated everything. Belinda said the furniture in Momma’s garage belongs to Roy’s old friend who moved abroad, but if that’s true, why did we find Christopher Merritt’s notepad in there?”

Colt shook his head and leaned over his legs and stared out onto the playground for several seconds. Finally, he sighed and sat up. He grabbed my shoulders and turned both of our bodies so that we were facing each other. “Maggie, as much as it pains me to admit that Owen Frasier and I agree on something, we do agree on this—if you continue looking into this, it could get you killed.”

I tilted my head in suspicion. “How do you know Owen?”

Surprise flickered in his eyes, but he quickly covered it with annoyance. “He’s a Franklin police detective. With my past, I made sure to keep tabs on the detectives in this town.”

I didn’t quite buy it, but I’d accept it for now.

“But you’re evading my point. Look, I think we should just find the gold, hold on to it until your mother . . .” He grimaced. “Um . . . is no longer working at the Belles . . . and then take off for some non-extraditing tropical country. Like Vietnam.”

“Vietnam?”

He shrugged. “I hear the beaches in central Vietnam are gorgeous, and it’s cheap to live there.”

My eyebrows rose. “Together?”

A sly grin spread across his face. “I’m not proposing marriage or anything like that, but we get along well. We could go as friends . . . or more.” He winked.

Colt was a good-looking man, and Lord knew he could pour on the charm. The thought of lying on a tropical beach with him made me hot in places that had no business reacting to him. My head told me that Colt Austin was trouble with a capital T—good for a fling and nothing more. Still, something about him tugged at me. My ex-boyfriend had stolen all my money, ruined my career, and made me homeless, but I suspected Colt would do him one better. He was capable of stealing my heart.

I laughed, playing off his suggestion. “Let’s just find the gold; then we’ll figure out what to do with it. And yes, I’m going to keep digging into what happened to my father, and Geraldo Lopez knew more than he told me.”

“Geraldo Lopez is dead, Maggie. He’s not going to tell us anything. Dead men don’t talk.”

“Not necessarily true.”

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