“It’s not enough.”

“Why not?” I demanded, gesturing to the recorders stacked on Brent’s desk. “It’s his voice on the digital recorders. I’d put money on it.”

“But you can’t prove it,” Jack said. “And there’s no fingerprints other than yours. The girl—Sadie—said that he threatened her so she agreed to push a button on a remote, but she didn’t know for sure what it did.”

“Bullshit! She had to have known.”

Brent frowned at me, but I didn’t care. I stared at Jack, daring him to contradict me.

“Of course, she knew. But if she’s not willing to testify to it, it does us no good.”

I growled in frustration, standing so fast that I knocked over the chair I’d been sitting in. Brent reached over to pick it up, watching me as I moved in the narrow space of his search-destroyed office, watching to make sure I didn’t step on any of his wayward papers.

“I know you’re upset about Bo,” Brent said.

“Wouldn’t you be?” I spun around to face him. “What if it was your girl West has issued a warrant for?”

He stiffened visibly as Jack reached for me, tugging me close to him. “Don’t take it out on us, kid. We’re here to help.”

“Then tell me what to do.”

Jack and Brent exchanged a glance that told me they had no idea what our next step should be. I had yet to inform them of the papers I’d found—I wanted time to go through them just to see how powerful a weapon they could be for us—but I wasn’t sure they would have let me run with them, anyway. We had no idea if they actually came from West’s house. Violet could have gotten them anywhere or, in her current mental state, she could have made them up herself. There was no way of knowing at this point. The only way to be sure would be to take them to West and have him identify them. I doubted he would do that.

But, again, if he didn’t know that was the goal…

An idea began to take root in my head. I stepped back from my brother, staring at the cluttered floor as I looked at the idea from every angle, trying to identify any dangers other than the obvious. But I couldn’t find any.

This might just work.

“Remy?”

“I think I should go down and check on Bo. He was pretty bored earlier.”

I saw them exchange another look, but I ignored it. And they seemed content to let me go despite it.

I went down the hall to Bo’s office and kicked around in the mess the cops had left on the floor, searching for a small case that held the communication earbud I knew he wore when he went out with a team. I found it under the corner of the desk, still intact despite its rough treatment. And nestled in the case with it was a teeny device that looked like the button from the collar of any of Bo’s dress shirts. I wasn’t sure what it was at first, but Bo—my super-efficient lover—had left the instructions tucked into the case that held the devices. And that told me this was a better choice than the earbud. This wouldn’t be detectible should West try to search me for a bug.

I took it out of the case and palmed it, continuing my rummaging like I was looking for something else. I knew there was a camera looking down on this desk, that Bo was downstairs monitoring the security monitors. If he saw what I’d just done he might figure out what I was up to and he’d try to stop me. I couldn’t let him do that.

When it felt like I’d been there long enough to seem as though I hadn’t found what I was looking for, I stepped out, half expecting Jack or Brent to be waiting for me, to stop me from leaving the building. But they weren’t there.

I found my car in the parking garage, left behind after my experience with the cop who pulled me over the day before—had it really just been a day?—no worse for the wear. I drove across town, my hands shaking and my eyes jumping to the rearview mirror every few seconds, expecting red and blue lights to be flashing there. But I made it all the way to my apartment building without incident.

My cell phone rang multiple times from the second I stepped over my threshold until the moment I walked out again, leaving it sitting on the kitchen table. I knew my brothers loved me, knew that they wanted to protect me. But they couldn’t protect me forever.

I was my own person and I was going to prove that to them. I could take care of myself whether they liked it or not. And once I proved that, maybe they’d look at me as an equal instead of the little girl they were constantly saddled with when we were all kids.

I wasn’t a mile from my apartment building when those lights I’d been waiting to see in my rearview mirror were suddenly there. I gripped the wheel tightly, saying a quick prayer under my breath.

I’d wanted this. But I wasn’t sure I was ready.

“Ms. Stone,” the cop said as he approached my open window, a twisted smile on his lips.

It was the same cop who’d stopped me before.

My heart was in my throat, but I managed to speak around it, to speak with stronger voice than I’d expected.

“Is my tail light broken again, officer?”

“More than your tail light will get broken if you don’t tell me where Ms. Mitchell is.”

“Why do you care?”

“He wants to speak with her. She has something that belongs to him.”

“Then why didn’t you just take her yesterday?”

“Because that wasn’t my orders.”

“And you just blindly follow orders?”

His eyes narrowed as he glared down at me. “You like to play with fire, don’t you, Ms. Stone?”

“What does he really want from me? Is it this?” I slipped a piece of paper through the open window, holding it between two fingers until he had a good grip on it. He studied it a second, frowning when he couldn’t decipher it. “Don’t worry, he’ll understand what it is. You should probably go tell him I gave it to you.”

He hesitated, clearly not the kind of guy who likes to think on his feet. This wasn’t going the way it was supposed to and he didn’t know what to do with that. Finally, he stepped away and I could see him speaking into a cell phone where he stood at the back of my car.

So far, so good.

He came back to my window a few minutes later, the phone gone from sight.

“Follow me.”

That’s all he said and he didn’t wait for a response. I did as I was told, followed him through traffic as he navigated the city streets. He didn’t lead me downtown as I’d anticipated, but to an affluent suburban area where the houses went from clapboard to brick to imported stone.

He was taking me to West’s home. That was not the plan.

I almost chickened out then, slamming on my brakes and turning around, wondering what my chances were of making it back to Stone Security before the cop forced me off the road and fulfilled some of the promises he’d made during the first traffic stop. But then I remembered the tone of Bo’s voice when he told me he loved me this morning and knew I had no choice. I had to follow through on this.

The cop pulled to the curb and indicated I should pull into the driveway of a dark stone home. The front door opened as I pulled up behind a nondescript black sedan. It wasn’t West standing in the doorway but Sadie, Violet’s secretary.

That explained a few things.

I strolled up the front walk like I was in no rush, my leather backpack over my shoulder, my hands smoothing my brown skirt over my hips. Sadie smiled as I approached her, but I didn’t feel like I had to be polite to her anymore. I didn’t even pause as I brushed past her.

Another patrol cop—this one was smaller and less intimidating looking than the other, though that didn’t necessarily mean anything—was standing just inside the entryway, his stance cautious as he watched me come into the house. He gestured for me to hand him my bag, which he quickly searched, pulling out the three or four other pieces of Violet’s printouts I’d brought with me. Then he silently indicated that I should take a search stance. I glanced back at Sadie, who was watching with open amusement from the open door, before doing as indicated.

My arms stretched out, my legs slightly spread, I waited while the cop quickly patted me down, searching for devices he wouldn’t find.

“She’s okay,” he finally said, handing the papers he’d taken from my bag to Sadie. I reached for the bag itself, but he kicked it out of my reach with the side of his foot. “That stays here.”

“If you could just leave me my credit cards, I’d appreciate it. I hate having to call the companies to report them stolen.”

The cop didn’t respond except to shoot me a dirty look.

I followed Sadie down a long hallway that sloped subtly downhill, taking us into the huge basement of the large house. I could hear the sounds of pool balls being struck just before we turned a corner that led us into a large room that was designed to look like a neighborhood bar. There were a half-dozen men there, some cops I recognized from the invasion at Stone Security last night, others I knew from charity galas my family had supported since my grandfather was around. One was a cop who’d come up with Brent from the academy, a man I would have bet millions was a straight cop until that moment.

What a disappointment.

Some of the guys whistled as they watched Sadie and me walk by, even one of the female cops made a rude comment as she checked out my ass. I glanced back at her and she laughed, flashing me the middle finger to tell me exactly what she thought of me. I just smiled and flipped it back at her.

West was sitting on a leather couch in a big room behind the rec space, sitting expansively with his arms and legs outstretched. He had a drink in one hand and a cigar in the other, clearly enjoying the wealth of riches that came with his illegal activities.

“Ms. Stone,” he said warmly, gesturing for me to come into the room. “Welcome to my home.”

“Thank you, Mr. West.”

“That’s Chief West,” Sadie reminded me.

“Don’t worry about it, Sadie,” West told her with a wave of his hand as he sat up, regarding me a little closer. “Little sister will learn a few manners today if it’s the last thing I do.”

Sadie smiled, but the smile quickly disappeared as he gestured for her to leave. She backed away, her untrusting gaze raking over me before she disappeared behind the closed door.

“Sadie’s the jealous type,” West informed me. “A little disappointing after Violet’s near disinterest. If only she hadn’t suddenly got interested in what I was doing.”

“Too bad you had to use her deep secrets to hurt her.”

West shrugged. “I had to stop her from even thinking she might use that information against me.”

“And it worked.”

He smiled as he took a long drag from the end of his cigar. “Well,” he said, smoke slipping from his lips like it was emphasizing his words, “I do know what I’m doing most of the time. And I’m good at it.”

I walked around the room, looking at the pictures he had displayed on shelves beside books that were, in themselves, pretty impressive. I could feel his eyes on me, could feel the tension he was trying to hide. He didn’t know what to do about me, that much was obvious.

“You don’t scare easily, do you, little sister?”

“Should I?”

“The last time Officer Reynolds ran a traffic stop on a woman like you, she was a quivering mess for the next week and useless to the investigator who thought she might be able to help him take down one of my officers.”

“Yeah, well, I grew up with four brothers. It takes a little more than a few threats to get under my skin.”

He laughed, what sounded like genuine amusement flowing from his barrel chest. “I guess that’s true.”

I turned to regard him. “Why didn’t you just have him take Violet yesterday? I couldn’t have stopped him.”

“Violet is unstable and that causes her to act in unpredictable ways. If he’d tried to take her on a public street, no matter how deserted it was that early in the morning, someone might have noticed.”

“But they wouldn’t bat an eye to you rescuing her from Stone Security during the execution of a warrant.”

“Exactly.” He touched a finger to his nose with the hand holding the cigar. “You are as brilliant as you are beautiful.”

“Too bad you couldn’t find her.”

“We will. There are plenty of judges who will be willing to issue new warrants.”

“You’re just going to keep trying until you find her?”

“Or until we’ve destroyed Stone Security’s reputation well enough that Jack gives in.”

“He won’t do that.”

“You’d be surprised the kind of pressure we can put on a business with just a few warrants. If he wants to stay in business, he might do just about anything. He might even hand over that boyfriend of yours.”

I blushed a little, hating that he knew so much about me. Hating everything about this.

“You don’t want Bo. You want me.”

“I want Violet.”

“But I have what Violet took from you.”

He sat up a little, taking a large enough gulp from his drink that he emptied the glass in that one swallow. He set it on the table in front of him and took a drag from his cigar before setting that in an ashtray on the same table. Then he stood and walked toward me. I had to concentrate hard to keep my feet from moving back, away from him.

“Reynolds did say that you showed him some piece of paper. And Sadie left these…” He backtracked and picked up the other papers the cop had taken from my bag. He looked through them, his dark eyes turning to steel as he clearly recognized them. “You got these from Violet?”

“Does it matter?”

He put them back down and casually crossed the room, pausing in his step a few feet in front of me. He studied my face, clearly struggling with what his next move should be. “Do you know what they are?”

“I know Violet thought she could do real damage to you if she took them to the state attorney general’s office. And you were worried enough that you tried to drive her crazy.”

He inclined his head slightly. “You’re a smart girl.”

“I have my moments.”

He actually smiled at that. “So, what do you want?”

I shrugged a single shoulder. “I want you to leave Violet alone. I want you to drop charges against Bo and back off of my brothers and their company.”

“That’s a big order.”

“I think it’s more than worth it to you.”

He stepped close to me and touched my chin, chucking it like a coach or father might do to a successful athlete. His eyes moved down the length of my white blouse, lingering at the place where it disappeared into my skirt, moving further down, down to the turn of my calves and the taper of my ankles as they wound down into the simple brown heels I was wearing. He moved closer, his eyes still moving over me like he was searching for something obvious, something he could spot with just a glance. But he wasn’t finding it.

He suddenly snatched the front of my blouse and ripped it open. A few buttons when flying across the room, the sound they made slapping against furniture and the walls something that would have fit better into the soundtrack of a porno flick than this frightening scenario. I stood perfectly still, refusing to flinch. It was one of the hardest things I’d ever had to do.

“Couldn’t allow you to record this little exchange in any way. You understand.”

I tilted my head to indicate I understood. He turned and went back to the couch, picking up the cigar he’d left in the ashtray.

“What do I get if I give in to your list of demands?”

“You can have the copies Violet made. And Violet will disappear, never to bother you again.”

He inclined his head as he took another hit on the cigar. “And all I have to do is let her go?”

“And drop the charges against Bo.”

“Yes, we can’t forget your lover.” He glanced at me, his eyes moving over my nearly-bare breasts. “Lucky fellow.”

“And you leave Stone Security to its business.”

“That could be a bit of a problem. They tend to put their noses in my business a little too often. Can’t let them get away with that.”

“They’ll back off of you if you’ll back off of them.”

“Are they aware you’re here negotiating for them?”

“Do you think I’d come without their backup?”

That caused him a slight pause. He rolled the cigar in the ashtray, knocking off the excess ash as he thought about what I’d said. His eyes came back to me, again moving slowly over my body, my hips and the turn of my skirt.

“Too many people are involved in this scheme for me to allow you to keep those papers. If they got out, if someone who knew what they were looking at got ahold of them, I wouldn’t be the only one to go down. And I wouldn’t live long enough to go down.”

“Then I guess it’s in your best interest to make a deal with me.”

“I suppose it is.”

One more hit on the cigar and then he set it down, resting his hands on his knees as he studied me again. “Normally, I would let the boys out there have their way with you and never think of you again as they buried you in some deserted field somewhere. But you, my dear, strike me as the kind of girl who would not go quietly. And I can’t afford any more fuck-ups this month.” He stood and came toward me, a greedy look crossing his face as he once more took in an eyeful of my breasts. “The money is too good, business much too good. And the money laundering was a brilliant scheme until Violet figured it out. So, I guess I have no choice but to make a deal with you.”

I inclined my head. “Good.”

“But,” he said, taking my hand and yanking me close to him, “if I find out you made more copies or you try to screw me over somehow, I promise me or one of my loyal guys will find your boy toy and make sure he disappears. Do you understand?”

My heart stopped beating for a long moment, fear gripping it so hard that it felt like actual fingers were holding it still in my chest. I did believe him. And that frightened me more than anything that had happened up to this point.

“I understand.”

“Good.” One more look. “Fix yourself up and go home, get those papers and hand them over to Reynolds.”

I must have made a face when he mentioned the cop’s name. He tilted his head slightly. “I promise he won’t touch you.”

“Okay.”

“And, if everything is there and it looks in order, I’ll have the charges dropped on your boy tonight.”

“Thank you.”

He studied my face for a long moment. “You have huge balls, Ms. Stone. Just be careful they don’t get you in trouble one of these days.”

I smiled. “I will.”

I walked out, my knees like rubber, but my heart soaring. It was done. I’d done it.