Page 156 of Five Mountain Daddies

“Exactly,” she says. “What if this job has something to do with whathappened?”

“It’s a stretch,” I say seriously. “A really bigone.”

“You saw the way Kristi was acting. And Jaxson threatening us like that?” She shakes her head, blowing on her coffee to cool it down slightly. “Come on, Wyatt. It doesn’t get moresuspicious.”

“I can’t deny that,” I admit. I was thinking the same thing. “But you want to stroll right into the lion’sden.”

“It’s his parents’ trailer,” she says. “What’s he going to do, murder us in front ofthem?”

I grin. “Sure, maybe. You know how those trailer park people can be.” She rolls her eyes at that and gives me a look. She didn’t like that joke. “Anyway, how do you even know that he still lives with hisparents?”

“Facebook. He doesn’t say it, but I’ve seen a bunch of pictures lately taken at a trailer. I’d bet anything that’s his parents’place.”

“It’s a stretch,” I say again, but this time I’m starting to consider it, despite myself. If he really is living with his parents, then it would be somewhat safe to show up there, though I don’t know how it’ll make him react. “A really big stretch. You want to take a big risk based entirely on aguess.”

“Yeah, I do,” she says earnestly. She leans forward and locks eyes with me. “Because you’re leaving soon, and this may be the best lead I get before you go. So I might as well chase this now, with you here to protect me, instead of doing it after youleave.”

I stare at her for a second, slightly annoyed. She smiles sweetly at me, batting her eyelashes, which just makes me groan. “You’re blackmailing me, you know,” Isay.

“I know,” she answers,grinning.

“I knew you weretrouble.”

“So you’ll doit.”

“We’re eating breakfast first,” I say, flagging down thewaitress.

I know I don’t have any other choice. She’s going to do this idiotic thing no matter what, and she’s right, I am leavingsoon.

The thought isn’t comforting, not at all. I don’t want to leave her, not when I’ve dragged her deeper into this. Jaxson saw us together, they’re staking out her house, and who knows what else. She’s in danger, and I’m going to abandon her, go back to my own life, and try to forget all aboutthis.

I doubt I can, which means I don’t know what the fuck I’m going todo.

For now though, we’re going to Jaxson’s house, the guy that threatened us. It’s totally stupid and irresponsible and yet I can’t say no to her, and that’s maybe the most dangerous part of this wholething.

* * *

We stopin front of the trailer and I kill the engine. “Listen to me. I have onerule.”

She looks at me with that cute, innocent stare, really playing it up. “Yes,sir?”

I roll my eyes. “Just listen, okay? If I tell you to run the fuck away, you run away. If I tell you to dive onto the ground and scream, you do it.Okay?”

“I’ll do what you say, Ipromise.”

“Good.” I pop open the glovebox and pull out my gun. She gapes at it as I check the slide and inspect the magazine. “Youready?”

I don’t say anything about the gun. I can tell it makes Cora uncomfortable based on the way she keeps looking away from it. “Let’s go,” Isay.

We climb out of the car and I slip the gun into my waistband. We walk up to the front of the trailer and I knock this time, taking thelead.

An older woman answers the door. She’s older than my mom, wrinkled with frizzy, untamed hair and golden brown skin like she spends hours in a tanningbed.

“Who are you?” shecroaks.

“Ma’am, I’m Wyatt, friend ofJaxson’s.”

She stares at me for a second. “You don’t look like hisfriend.”

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