Page 152 of Chasing Shelter

I scowled at her. “Your dog just bit me. Shouldn’t you be tending my wounds?”

One corner of Ellie’s mouth kicked up as she reached for my hand. “You poor thing. Are you bleeding? Do you think we need to amputate?”

“You’re the worst.”

“I’m the best.” Ellie leaned in, her lips hovering over mine.

But then Grem leapt from my head to right between us, yipping and twirling.

“Seriously?” I groused.

Ellie laughed and snuggled Gremlin to her. “He was feeling left out.”

“Now I know why Linc’s always complaining about Brutus being a cockblock,” I muttered.

“Brutus is the bestest boy in all the land. He would never,” Ellie said of my sister’s dog. Grem nipped her chin as if to argue the point. “Don’t worry, Grem, you’re the bestest boy, too.”

My phone rang from my nightstand, and I let out a groan. “I hate everyone today.”

My plans to keep Ellie in this bed for a few more hours slipped away as I picked up the device and saw Gabriel’s name. A weight settled in my gut, spreading into my muscles like molten metal. “Hello?”

“Hey, man. How you holding up?”

I pushed up on the pillows but brought Ellie and Grem with me, even though the dog snarled slightly. There was no more cutting her out. No more holding things in. “I’m better. You find something?”

“I’m glad. Interesting development in one arena.”

“Putting you on speaker. Ellie’s here.” I moved to tap the screen as Ellie looked up at me.

Gabriel didn’t speak for a second. “Pretty early for a visitor,” he hedged.

Ellie’s mouth curved. “Now, Gabriel, are you looking for gossip?”

He chuckled. “Always.”

“You two can have teatime later. Tell us what you know,” I pressed.

“Got a call from one of Anson’s contacts at the federal level. He got some new intel on Bradley.”

Ellie tensed next to me, and I wove my fingers through hers, reminding her that I was there and always would be.

“We found out he was arrested for possession in the South of France a few days ago,” Gabriel went on. “He’s still in lockup, at least according to this guy’s source. And what’s more interesting is that it turns out he traveled there three weeks ago. It didn’t flag right away because he hopped a jet a friend owned.”

I frowned. It still should’ve been in the US Customs system, but who knew what sort of lags happened in the private sector. Or simple errors. Still, something ate at me. Maybe it was this, or maybe it was the fact that we still had no idea where my father was.

Ellie squeezed my hand. “Breathe, Chief. This is good. One threat off the board.”

“She’s right,” Gabriel agreed. “They don’t mess around with Americans bringing drugs in. He’ll likely do some time.”

I took that in. Ellie would get time and distance from Bradley. She’d be safe from him—as long as he wasn’t paying someone to do his dirty work. “Do you think we can get a search warrant for his phone records? See if anything pings for someone he could’ve hired?”

“I can try,” Gabriel said. “If we hit a brick wall, there’s always Dex.”

I grunted at that. The problem was, whatever Dex found wouldn’t exactly be admissible in court. “Any leads on Jasper?” I asked.

Gabriel sighed. “Nothing yet. But everyone’s looking.”

I took everything in. The good. The bad. The hard. The beautiful.

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