Page 104 of All the Missing Pieces

RIDLEY

My gaze kept wanderingto the man next to me as if it had a mind of its own. But Colt’s never strayed from the pavement ahead of us. His hands held the wheel in a death grip. His jaw wound tight, the muscle along it twitching every so often. And those eyes—they somehow managed to be even darker than before.

I pulled a leg up, my arms curling around it and my chin resting on my knee as my sundress billowed around me. “Stop glaring at the road. It didn’t do anything to you.”

That twitching was back, quicker than before. “Bad ideas piss me off.”

I sighed. “Colt. We’re going to a bar. A public place with plenty of people. I get that I need to be careful, but I also need to see this through.”

For so many reasons.

His grip on the wheel softened ever so slightly, and he cast a look in my direction. “I don’t want anything to happen to you.”

I froze. Everything in me tightened, warring between fighting and fleeing, while another part of me wanted to do something else altogether. That part of me wanted to roll around in Colt’s words, to read promises in them that weren’t even there. Wehadn’t once discussed the possibility of this being more. And even if we had, I might be too terrified to reach for it because I knew what it meant to lose someone you loved, and I wasn’t sure I could survive that again.

I released my hold on my leg, dropping my foot back to the floorboard. “I’ll be careful. Promise.”

“Good,” Colt said, though it was more of a grunt, that gruffness coming right back around.

“You can keep an eye on me from the bar?—”

“The hell I am. I’ll be right next to you.”

“Colt—”

His gaze jerked to me as he stopped at a light. “By your side.”

“Baker’s never going to trip himself up if you’re right there. I need to get a good read on him. And we have some things to settle.”

Colt’s dark gaze held me for one beat and then another. “You don’t go anywhere else with him.”

“Not without you, Law Man.”

He let out a long breath as he eased off the brake. “This is a horrible idea.”

But he was going along with it anyway. Because Colt knew how important it was for me to have control over this area of my life. Not to give it up, no matter how many threats loomed.

As if my thoughts conjured the subject, my phone dinged.

Dex

Did a deep dive on your IG. The accounts are part of a bot software. It’s expensive, but anyone can purchase it. It hides the user’s IP address and creates a variety of accounts and comments that then spam the victim. There are a few options for the actual software so I’ll keep digging, see if I can break in and find out who used it.

Damn.I’d hoped he’d be able to come back with a name. And if I was honest, I didn’t think this sounded like Baker. He might like the outcome of more attention on the podcast that threats like these could bring, but tech was not his thing. He had his own Instagram profile, but it was a mixture of mirror selfies and photos with people he thought would improve his clout.

“Who was it?” Colt asked.

“Dex. My contact. He figured out the profiles were created with software that hides the actual user and spams people. Just like you thought.”

Colt’s jaw simply worked back and forth as I quickly typed out a text to Dex in return.

Me

Thank you. I really appreciate it.

Dex

Be careful until we find out where this asshole is.

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