Page 87 of Savage Ruin
Henley and I stand and walk to the door. “You’re free to leave immediately. Security won’t stop you.” I pause for a moment. “One last thing—David’s body is at the morgue, under the name David Perry Carlton. We put you down as next of kin.”
He closes his eyes for a second and a tear rolls down his face. “Thank you. I can’t tell you what that means to me.”
Henley wraps her arm around my waist and leans into me while we walk down the hall. “What are we doing now?”
“We’re going to the yacht to make sure everything is ready for the party tonight. Later, we’re meeting Thiago, Grayson, and… what’s that cheeky guy’s name?”
She punches me lightly on the arm. “Peyton. You’d better be nice to him. He’s my very talented friend and the only reason I’m going to look good tonight.”
I tilt her chin up and kiss her. “You always look beautiful to me.”
Mitch is waiting for us in the hallway, but he barely looks at us. Thiago said he threw a fit when Henley broke protocol to go to David in the middle of the street.
We pass the security office, and she turns to me. “What are we doing about the name and the license plate number?” She asks.
Some quick thinking guy managed to snap a photo of the license plate from the car that hit David.
“The team is searching SEI files for any mention of Worthington, but it doesn’t sound familiar. They’re also searching local hotels, car rentals and such, to see if anyone registered a room or a car in that name, but it’s going to take a while,” I reply, running a hand through my hair in frustration. “The license plate came back registered to Juan Morales, but he reported it stolen early this morning. We’ve switched our attention to the vehicle. If we can locate it on city cameras, we might be able to see where it went after it hit him.”
My phone buzzes and I answer. “Did you find anything?”
“Nothing. It’s empty. Looks like he left in a hurry, though,” Grayson says hoarsely.
He pauses. “I’m damn glad Henley didn’t come with us. There are pictures of her everywhere, from every angle, covering the walls. And those are just the images from Miami. He’s got stacks of photo albums filled with images of her when she was younger. Her picture is the screensaver on his fucking computer.”
I hear Thiago yelling in the background. “Is everything okay?”
“He fucking lost it when he saw this place,” Grayson reveals. “They recorded everything, but I’d advise against watching it. I’m going to have a hard time letting her out of my sight after seeing this psycho bullshit.”
With a weary sigh, I remind him where we’re going next. “We’re going by the yacht and will meet you at home.”
“Be careful. Fucker could be anywhere,” Grayson warns me.
Henley’s waiting for me to give her an update. “He’s gone. Looks like he left in a hurry.”
“That’s not all, is it? Your face is white,” she observes. “What happened? Are Grayson and Thiago okay?”
“There were pictures of you all over the place. It’s shaken both Grayson and Thiago,” I reluctantly reveal.
She swallows. “As long as they’re okay… I can’t think about the other.”
When we get to the yacht, I’m surprised to see all the workers rushing around in a panic. “Where’s Claire?”
“She never showed,” a young man tells me as he rushes by.
I motion to security. “How did all these people get on board? I thought we were keeping things contained, including the set-up.”
He points to his clipboard. “Everyone on this boat is on the list.”
“Who’s in charge here?” I shout across the deck.
A blonde-haired young woman pops her head up from behind the bar. “That would be me, I’m Alyssa. Claire called me earlier, told me to get over here and set everything up. Do you know when the caterers are coming?”
“Where is Claire?” I ask her.
“I’m not sure. She said she was on her way here,” she replies, quickly grabbing another box to unload.
“There aren’t any caterers. The food is coming from local restaurants. It should have been here by now,” Henley states quietly, not wanting to cause an even bigger panic.
