Page 59 of Target Acquired

He looked a little taken aback at the abrupt topic change, but she had no desire to hear any more about how he wasn’t interested in relationships or romance.

“And I’ll grab my computer out of the car and start looking for Hamilton,” he finally said.

“Meet in the den?” She was so proud of how steady her voice was when she really wanted to go have a good cry and let all the stress out.

“Yes ma’am.” He headed for the door.

As soon as it shut behind him, Kenzie gasped and bolted for her home office. There, she shut the door and let the tears flow. But only for a short time. Finally, she pulled herself together, sucked in a deep breath, and cleaned her face in the bathroom. Thankfully, she didn’t go all blotchy and red when she cried, and within a few minutes, she was satisfied there was no evidence of her little breakdown.

With a steadying breath, she grabbed her computer and headed out to the den area to act like nothing was wrong and she was fine.

But she wasn’t. She wasn’t fine at all.

Because with everything else going on, the last thing she wanted to deal with was admitting she was in love with Cole Garrison.

And she had no idea what she was supposed to do about that.

WHEN KENZIE WALKED into the den with her laptop in hand, Cole was already seated on the couch and scrolling. He had Esther working on finding Hamilton as well, but the man seemed to have dropped off the planet.

“Or was he paid to disappear?” he murmured.

“What?” Kenzie dropped into the recliner opposite him.

She sounded a little stuffy. “Are you okay?” he asked.

She sniffed. “Fine. Allergies, maybe. Lingering smoke inhalation. Whatever. It’ll pass. Now, what do you mean? Who was paid to disappear?”

“Cliff Hamilton.” He narrowed his eyes at her. Something was going on with her.

“What makes you say that?” she asked without looking at him.

“Because it’s like he never existed. Two weeks after writing that report, he resigned and disappeared.”

“So how do we find him?”

“We keep looking.” He rubbed his chin. “Well, Esther is looking, but I know someone who works at the lab. Someone who was there before Tabitha got there.”

“Who?”

“Sherry Templeton. I’ll call her.”

“How’s that going to help?” She finally looked at him and there was a new distance in her eyes.

He frowned. What was that about? “She’s been there forever,” he said. “She was there when Hamilton was. Maybe she can tell us what the man was thinking and where he went.”

“Okay, you do that and I’ll try to get ahold of Tabitha.” She rose, walked onto the sunporch, and shut the French doors behind her.

Cole could hear her muted voice on the phone before he even dialed Sherry, his contact in the lab. With one last lingering look at Kenzie, and a sneaking suspicion he’d upset her but she didn’t want to admit it, he tuned into his call, realizing Sherry was calling his name. “Oh, sorry. I’m here. Hey, I have a question for you.”

“Sure.”

“It’s an odd one.”

“I work in a crime lab. I believe I’ve seen odd. Go for it.”

“You’ve worked in the lab basically since it opened—”

“Careful now. You calling me old?”

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