Page 47 of Devious Madness

“I saw Elana leaving as we pulled up; is she staying here now?” I follow Alexander into the living room.

“She stays here when Kaz annoys her, then she leaves when she decides she wants to be closer to the city.”

“Doesn’t she have her own apartment?”

“She does. I’m not entirely sure what’s happening with that. I’ve been distracted lately.”

“With Megan.” I nod, completely understanding how one woman could disrupt an entire world simply by walking into it.

“Kaz told me about Megan’s ordeal at the hands of the DeAngelos. She seems to have come out of it all right.”

“She’s a tough woman, much tougher than I gave her credit for. Marco hasn’t been seen in over a week, but I don’t trust that fucker to stay hidden much longer.”

“The money he thinks Mira owes?—”

“He gets nothing,” Alexander cuts me off.

I’ve seen this look in his eyes before. The man is ready to go to war.

“I wasn’t suggesting to pay him, but we need to deal with him. And the detective still trying to get a hold on Mira. She’s been flagged as a person ofinterest.”

“We have a connection in the department, we’ll tap him to figure out what’s being done with the investigation. But if Marco thinks she’s a danger to him, he won’t stop coming for her.”

Messages from Sasha start coming through, and I scroll, reading what I already suspected.

“Sasha finally got to the bottom of the girls’ messages not getting through to each other,” I say. “Megan’s phone has been tampered with. Any call that comes through from an unknown number is rejected. She doesn’t see it come through, and the caller just gets a ringtone.”

“Same with the text messages, I assume.” His jaw tenses.

“Yes. He’s still working on the money that was wired, but I think he’ll find the same thing.”

“The detective?”

“That’s my thought. He’s trying to draw Mira out, and when she wasn’t using her phone to stay in contact, he tried to find a way to force her hand.”

“So he could find her location.”

I nod. “Right.”

“You know, they’ve been pretty smart the way they’ve managed to keep all this handled,” he says, a hint of admiration in his voice.

“Hmm.” I repocket my phone.

“The cut on her neck?” Alexander questions, now that we’re alone.

“I had to make a stop on the way here. It couldn’t be helped.” The image flashes through my mind,and my blood heats again. “She has a problem with listening to directions and found herself being held at knife point.”

If he’d pushed a little harder, he would have cut right down into her carotid artery. She would have been dead before I could get to her.

“What are you going to do with her now?” Alexander’s obvious amusement with the turn of events underlines his light tone.

“I’m going to take her home until we get the detective off her ass and take care of Marco.”

“And then?” His lips curl at the edges.

“We’ll get married.”

“She didn’t seem all that interested in that,” he points out.

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