Page 90 of Anything for You
A beat of silence. “Who, now?”
“Dove Jensen. I believe you know her brother, Hawk Jensen. Her friend, Catherine Hewitt, was with her. Don’t lie to me, Smith.” The edge in my voice emerged in a gritty tone.
“Hold up there, bud. I don’t know no Dove or Catherine or nobody, and I ain’t keen on the way it sounds like you’re accusin’ me of something I ain’t even heard of let ’lone done.”
Jaws, and now Barbie, who’d arrived a few minutes ago, modeled taking a deep breath, so I did just that.
“My girlfriend and her friend are missing. I have reason to believe they’re at the commune. I understand you probably don’t want the police to obtain a warrant to search thepremises, but they will begin working on getting one if you can’t help me out here.”
The ambient noise in the background of the call muted and all of us waited. This was the moment of truth when he’d either double down that he didn’t know anything or he’d cave to avoid police involvement. Little did he know, there was going to be police involvement either way.
After an interminable wait, the line crackled and Pole’s voice came through. “The nurse is here. They both came willingly. Nobody steps foot on the property or we stand our ground.”
The call went dead and more than one person swore.
Jaws spoke into a phone. “That they did, Chief, but they’re saying she went willingly.”
A few minutes later, his face was a mask of resolve.
“Chief said they can’t go without probable cause she was abducted and that he’s saying she went willingly complicates matters. He’s going to work on a warrant to search the place, but since it’s a Sunday, it’ll take longer than we want to wait.” He blinked, looking at the circle that’d formed around him. Next to me stood Barbie, Cookie, Oak, Eddie, Saint, and Elizabeth. Beast was still working the computers, likely trying to figure out anything else he could to give us intel.
“So, what? Are we going in to get her?” Barbie asked, verbalizing the question I hadn’t managed to voice.
Jaws heaved a sigh and gave a nod to Saint, who held his gaze, then turned to me. “If you think she’s there under duress, we go. We do it smart, we do it fast, and we do it as aboveboard as we can so they can’t prosecute for trespassing even if we get proof they took her.”
“Technically illegal.” This from Oak.
“It is. But so is kidnapping,” Elizabeth said, jawflexing. “And frankly, I think they’ve messed with the wrong women.”
“Damn right they have,” Eddie said, nodding in agreement.
“Can’t say anything but thank you, then. I was going in to get her with or without you guys,” I admitted.
Beast slung an arm around my shoulders and squeezed briefly. “No, brother. Not without us. We’re with you, no matter what.”
CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE
Dove
I’d slept no more than forty minutes since yesterday morning when I’d woken for my Saturday. Now it was Sunday at some time past noon. They’d taken my watch for fear it was connected to my phone, I guessed, and so I only ever knew what time it was when I was seeing a patient in one of the rooms fitted with a clock.
Where are you, Dorian?
Was it pathetic how my heart was crying out for him? I couldn’t blame anyone for this but Hawk and his crap friends, but I desperately wanted mygreatfriends to be the super soldiers they were and come find me!
They’d done it before. They’d do it again, right?
“Ms. Jensen, we’re ready for you.”
Jeb’s voice called to me from another room, and my skin crawled for the nth time since I’d met him.
I trudged into the room, bracing. I’d started doing that adozen patients back, after I’d helped Violet deliver her baby. Thank goodness I’d seen enough births in the ER or I wouldn’t have been able to help her, but her baby boy, though a bit on the small side, was healthy.
Should they get to the hospital? Yes. Would they?
Hopefully after the police get here, yes.
Not that I had any illusions Jeb Johnson was a good guy, but when he’d insisted on staying in the room as I worked with Violet, my uh-oh meter had shot off the charts. When I’d nestled the baby into his mama’s arms and asked Jeb if he wanted to get the father, he’d given me a quizzical look and said, "He's here."
