Page 30 of Declan's Dove

“Are you out of your fucking mind?” she hisses. “What did a favor like that cost you?”

“We haven’t settled on a payment plan yet.”

“Declan is going to lose his shit when he finds out you left town, and with who.” Skyler sounds like she’s freaking out which makes zero sense since I’m the one who is standing in the penthouse in Baron’s Edge while she’s safe at home in Oakridge.

“He can’t find out, Sky,” I plead. “Declan can’t find out anything about this. Who I am or where I came from. Vin—our uncle said he would help keep those things hidden from certain prying eyes.”

Skyler lets out a long sigh. “And how does he plan on doing that?” She gasps, “Shit! Sadie!”

I don’t confirm or deny because I don’t honestly know, and I’m certain the less I know the better off I am at the moment.

“What are you going to tell Declan, then? Because he and Ethan were both pretty worried when you left and didn’t give anyone a heads up. You sort of left a note and a kid behind, Vi. That’s not going to be explained away easily.”

“I don’t know yet. I figure I’ll get back to town and deal with Declan then.”

“Yes, but what are you going to tell him?” Sky pushes.

“I’ll tell him I’m the next of kin for a friend and had to pick her up after she was in a bad accident or something.”

“How badly hurt is she?” Skyler asks. “What happened, Vi? The truth.”

“She was … jumped … and she’s stable, but in pretty bad shape. She’s getting medical attention now and then we’re going to head home. She’ll have to come home with me for a while because she can’t be left alone. Which means I’m going to need some time off.”

“Don’t worry about work. I’ll talk to Ethan. Everything will be fine here for a few days,” Skyler reassures. “Shit. Ethan’s home. I have to go. Be careful, Vi.”

“I will. Thank you, Sky.”

We hang up and I’m left sitting on the bed to ponder everything alone. Bad things like this don’t just happen. People who want to send messages to others rarely give up on the first try. Especially if they want to be certain their message was received.

Which leaves me to wonder, what’s next?

CHAPTER EIGHT

Declan

The next morning, Carter got up and got ready for school with no issues. I drove him to school in my truck, which come to find out he wasn’t too happy about. He wanted his friends to see him rolling up on the back of my Harley and earn himself some ‘cool kid points.’ Whatever the fuck that means these days.

After dropping him off, I came straight to the clubhouse. I planned on talking to Pres before church, but Hawk met me as soon as I walked in the doors looking like he’d been up all damn night.

“We need to talk.” Hawk turns on his heels and I follow him to his room, where he has his computers with TVs as monitors set up.

“Someone is erasing Violet’s trail.”

“What the hell do you mean?” I ask, frustrated at the thought. “I thought you could follow any electronic footprint. We already know she’s using an alias, so follow that trail.”

“That’s just it,” he says, sitting in front of his computer. His hands fly over the keyboard, and I watch as an image of Violet’s birth certificate pops up on the screen, only to vanish as if someone was burning the corners of a piece of paper. It takes seconds, and the certificate turns into a black screen, then it quickly flickers to life again. Two pixelated ducks fly across the screen. Then a pixelated hunting dog pops up from the bottom of the screen with his paw over his mouth, laughing.

“Is that …?”

“An old Nintendo game?” Hawk replies. “Yep.” He pops the p, obviously not amused.

“How the fuck did that happen?” I ask, taken aback.

“I don’t fucking know. But someone is fucking with us.” Hawk scrubs his hands through his hair. “I’ve been going over everything I can for both Violet and Carter Dupree, and every goddamn time I start to get somewhere, this shit happens.”

“What about Trident Elite? Were you able to find anything on them?”

“Yeah. They’re a legit security business. They help with search and rescue and various other security details similar to Garrison, but?—”

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