Page 108 of The Love Destroyers

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

EMMA

Text conversation with Seamus

Is everything okay?

I haven’t heard from you all day.

Shadow’s worried. She was promised two homes, and she hasn’t even seen your apartment yet.

Seamus? Nicole said she sent you home for tripping Jeffrey. What’s going on?

My eyes are bleary from staring at my computer screen all day, examining the files from Ellie’s phone. I’m exhausted, working on a few hours of sleep, four cups of coffee, and sugar. Shadow, who’s curled up in my lap after a long morning of chasing nothing, seems exhausted too.

“There’s nothing here,” I mutter to my mother, who’s sitting next to us at the parlor table, sipping a drink and reading a bodice ripper. Anthony and Rosie were here for breakfast this morning, but they left hours ago, with Chuck departing minutesafter they did. I told my mother she didn’t need to keep me company if there was something she’d prefer to do. She’d surprised me by saying she wanted me tonab that no-good scoundrel by the ballsas much as anyone, and she’d prefer to be there to see it, thank you very much.

She sets down her book, which has a silver-haired gentleman with a bared chest on the cover and is titledSilver Balls, the words scrawled across where his assets would be.

“You’ll keep looking,” she says fiercely. “And if we can’t find the smoking gun, we’ll just have to go with Plan B and plant one in his belongings.”

“Really?” I ask, giving her a half smile as I pet the soft fur between Shadow’s ears.

My mother stiffens her spine. “I’ll always regret that I didn’t protect you kids from your father the way I should have. I certainly won’t allow anyone else to do you harm. Still…it would be preferable for him to be the architect of his own undoing. My understanding is that Damien would be searching his room today. Perhaps he’ll find something of interest.”

I doubt it. Ellie’s the one who has what we need—I’m convinced of it—but where was she hiding it?

I start playing another video, this one of Ellie applying lipstick. Glancing at the bar on the bottom of the screen, I grit my teeth. It’s fifteen minutes long.

“Take a break,” she says in her most commanding tone. “You’re going to give yourself unnecessary wrinkles if you keep squinting at the screen for hours without rest.”

“I need to check on Seamus.”

She slides her hand across the book’s titles, her fingers skating over the hero’s silver balls. “You know, when I told you to find a young man, I wasn’t referring to Rosie’s brother.”

I pause the video and look at her. “Mom, Seamus is working for you. It makes sense that I’d go see how he’s doing.”

“I wasn’t born yesterday. It’s very clear to me that he’s been doingsomethingfor you. Those nice children Jake and Lainey—”

She’s referring to the couple who live next door to Declan and Claire. They are decidedly not children, although my mother refers to anyone below the age of forty as a child.

“They helped me set up a superior security system at the house. I turn it on every night before bed. It sends me alerts whenever there’s activity near the house, and if I don’t respond, the alarm will go off. I saw him climb the wall the other night.”

“Oh,” I say softly, glancing off. “Don’t you think you should have told me that? What if I accidentally set it off in the middle of the night?”

“I was hoping you would,” she says with her typical candor. “It would be a sign there’s some life left in you.”

I don’t bother to comment. I suppose she’s right.

“Anyway, I happened to notice that your friend didn’t come back out for many hours.”

I meet her gaze and hold it. “We just talked.”

“Nothing is more fatal to a woman’s heart thanjust talkingto the right man,” she says primly. “Or the wrong one. Which is he?”

“I like him,” I say, feeling heat gather behind my eyes. “It’s complicated, though. There are a lot of factors to consider.”

“I’ll say.” She gives me a thoughtful look. “I thought I was done with men after Mark died…”

---