Page 92 of The Kings of Kearny

I latched onto the distraction. “Tomorrow is supposed to be even hotter.”

Winston made a face that would have made me grin if not for the fact that I could still see Redding watching me out of the corner of my eye. I was just about to tell Winston the heat would break in a few days when my phone rang inside my purse.

I feigned embarrassment. “I’m so sorry. I’ll tell whoever it is to call me back, and then I’ll silence it.”

Winston nodded, understanding written across his features. Redding continued to stare at me, expressionless but utterly fixated, and my unease turned into full-blown fear.

I broke his gaze and glanced at my phone’s screen. It was Jakob. Thank God. I swiped right to answer and brought the phone to my ear. “Hello?”

“WHERE THE FUCK ARE YOU?” he roared, loud enough for the whole café to hear him.

I yanked the phone away before he blew out my eardrum. Across from me, Winston’s brows climbed up his forehead in shock.

“Um... will you excuse me for a second?” I asked the men, rising from my seat.

I took the phone outside, face turned down to hide my features from view, and walked away from the coffee shop, leaving Redding, his lawyer, and an FBI agent together inside. I could almosthearthe cameras snapping across the street.

“Jakob?” I said.

“Where the fuck are you, and why has your phone been off for three hours?” he ground out.

“I’m having coffee with a friend,” I said. Technically it wasn’t a lie. “We bumped into each other while I was out. I turned my phone off inside the drugstore and must have forgotten to turn it back on. I’m sorry.” Now that was flat-out bullshit.

“You just bumped into your friend, huh?” Jakob said, his tone as dry as the Sahara. “All the way down in Hermannsburg?”

I stopped dead in my tracks. How the hell did he know where I was? “Hermannsburg?” I asked, struggling to keep the panic from my voice.

“According to the GPS tracker on your car.”

Oh shit.

“You put a GPS tracker on my car?” I said, picking up my pace again. The feds must have microphones trained on the coffee shop, and I didn’t need them to hear any more of this conversation than they already had. “That isnotokay, Jakob.”

“I didn’t put it there. Dad did.”

Fucking Liam. “But you still used it to track me.”

“Yes, after I spent two hours trying to get ahold of you and Dad finally told me what he’d done, I used it to track you. I thought the fucking Jokers or Redding grabbed you. Why didn’t you text me telling me you were okay?”

Because I had planned this. I was no better than Liam, manipulating his son, intentionally scaring the shit out of him, banking on him calling me over and over, so that when I finally turned my phone back on inside the café, his call would give me an excuse to leave it.

Guilt wracked me. I felt terrible for not only betraying his trust but for—

Hold up. He’d freaked out for two hours before his dad told him about the GPS? But he said he knew it had been off for three. What had he been doing in the hour he’d been tracking me?

My stomach sank.Sweet Jesus, no.

“Where are you, Jakob?” I asked.

“Taking the Hermannsburg exit off the highway.”

Fuck! Not even Nick could have predicted shit goingthissideways.

“Turn around,” I told Jakob.

“Tell me what you’re really doing there,” he countered.

“This is not a negotiation. You can’t come here.”

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