Page 44 of Stay in Your Lane!

My stomach clenched.Oh no…

It clenched even harder when Colin paused, then nodded. “No. The guy’s name was Craig Meyer. Who’s Leon?”

“A friend of Ricky’s,” I said numbly. “Leon Taylor.”

At the sound of Leon’s full name, Colin swallowed. “I know who he is. The dead guy—Meyer—he was closely tied to both of them.”

“Oh, shit,” I said on a long exhalation. “Fucking hell.”

“Why?” Colin peered at both of us. “What’s going on?”

I raked a shaky hand through my hair and sighed. “We talked to Leon. Asked him about what happened. Who might have it out for Ricky.”

Colin sat straighter, renewed fear working its way into his expression. “Did anyone see you with him?”

“Maybe?” I said. “We met him in public. At a night club.”

“Decadence,” Everett supplied.

Colin shifted a little. “Shit.”

“What?” Everett asked.

Colin drummed his fingers faster. “There’s a drug ring that has people who spend a lot of time there. Which means there’s a very, very good chance there was at least one undercover there when you met with Leon. Probably more.”

“That’s not good,” I murmured.

“No, it isn’t,” Colin said flatly. “At best, you might’ve clocked as a client or a potential client. At worst, an associate.”

“Fuck,” I whispered.

Colin looked right at me. “Yeah. Fuck.”

“Whoa, wait a second.” Everett put up his hands. “I know there’s a lot of drug activity there, but wasLeoninvolved in that? Shit, was Ricky?”

“Leon was,” Colin confirmed. “Ricky—he’s been out of the game for a while. Based on the timing, I’d say he got out when he found out he was going to be a dad.”

“But was he still a user?” I asked. “I mean, therewasdrug paraphernalia at the scene. I have no idea if it was planted or not, and it’s not admissible, but itwasthere.”

“I don’t know.” My brother folded his hands in his lap. “Toxicology will take a few weeks to get back to us about any narcotics in his system. But he was a dealer, at least at one point, and a lot of dealers don’t use. So he probably didn’t fall back on a habit he never had, you know?”

Everett cocked his head. “Dealers don’t use?”

“Not usually,” Colin said. “The ones who last are clean as a whistle—they might drink, they might smoke the odd joint, but they know damn well what’ll happen to them if they use the stuff they’re selling.”

“They’ll get in trouble with the cartels and suppliers?” Everett asked. “Or they’ll get too messed up to function?”

“Both.”

“Wow. Nice guys,” Everett said dryly. “They know how much it’ll fuck people up, so they don’t touch it, but they do everything they can to get people to buy it.”

“Sounds like capitalism to me,” I muttered.

Colin scowled.

Everett shrugged and said, “Not wrong.”

My brother rolled his eyes. “Anyway. I have no idea of Rick Leighton was a drug user. It’s possible the paraphernalia in the house belonged to someone else. But it doesn’t matter because the scene has been released since there’s no active investigation into his death. There’s no chain of custody and by now, the place has probably been cleaned out by the family anyway.”

---