Page 28 of Lord Have Mercy Part Four: Big Son

“Has a man named Harlan Boyle been here the last few days?” When that earned a blank look, Ava said, “About six feet, crew cut, tac pants. Cop vibe. Asshole.AgentBoyle?”

Her eyes widened.

“Should I take that as a yes?”

Nod.

A thrill skittered up her back. Jesus. He’d been here. Jesus Christ.

“Is he still here?”

Headshake.

Goddamnit. The voice in her head sounded a lot like her dad’s.

The next question threatened to stick in her throat, but she thought of Boyle here, of Regina – picturing a younger, healthierDee – and let the quiet fury power her through. “Did he have a little boy with him? Has there been a little boy here at all in the past few days?”

The girl’s eyesbugged. She made a choked sound.

“Was there? Is he still here? What did–”

A quick, soft series of raps sounded at the door, and a hissed, “It’s me.”

Damn it. But she hustled to the door and threw the locks. Tenny in turn threw himself into the room, slammed the door, and relocked it.

“What?” Ava demanded.

Tenny was a little out of breath from hurrying, but didn’t appear panicked. Did hegetpanicked? Probably not unless it involved Reese.

“I checked everywhere,” he said. “Walked in on more than a few scenes I’d rather scrub from my memory.” He shook his head. “Even the attic. But unless there’s a trapdoor in the floorboards somewhere, Remy’s not here.”

“What about the carriage house?”

“We’ll have to check it later, because I also found their security setup. They’ve got cameras in every room. I incapacitated the man on watch, and nicked the tapes.” He held up a handful of flash drives. “We can go.”

For the first time all afternoon, Ava grinned. “Damn. You’re good.”

“Yes, I know. But we should go, and out the window and across the roof, because there are five guys as big as your husband on my heels and they–”

Someone pounded on the door.

“We should go,” Ava said. “Right.” And they went.

~*~

“Have they texted?” Alex asked for the fifth time in twenty minutes. “They were supposed to text the second they got back out on the street.” He’d never paced so much in his life, moving back and forth across the hotel room now, hands on his hips, whole body tight with nervous energy.

Reese held up his phone to show the blank screen. “Not yet.” He didn’t sound bothered.

“It’s a delicate operation,” Maggie said, doing a valiant job of sounding calm. He could see the faint tremble of her lower lip, though, and thought she was fighting not to bite down on it.

“Yeah, and Ava’s number one, not a spy, and number two, in a very delicate state of mind.”

Colin’s brows jumped in silent agreement.

Maggie said, “Hey.”

“Maybe ‘delicate’ is the wrong word,” Alex allowed. “Maybe I should say ‘out of her goddamn mind.’”

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