Page 102 of What a Wolf Wants
“She might be afraid Kroner would come for her if she talks.”
“Right. Which means we need to make sure she’s safe too.”
“Yeah, I agree.”
“We’ll have lunch and then decide who goes first to question Oakley’s great-aunt,” Ethan said.
“Should we have lunch with the guys and then you can decide on who goes?”
“Yeah, let’s see what everyone wants to eat,” he said. “I can grill burgers.”
“That sounds great to me.”
Ethan called Noah and said, “How do grilled burgers sound for lunch to you and Renault?” He smiled at Charlene. “Okay, see you at eleven.” He ended the call and half an hour later, they arrived home.
A few minutes later, Renault and Noah showed up at the house. Ethan finished grilling the burgers while Charlenebrought out the french fries. They ate their burgers on the deck to enjoy the beautiful summer day while the ocean breeze whipped around them.
“So who is staying here and who is going?” Charlene asked.
“I’ll go with Ethan,” Renault said before anyone else could say anything.
“That works for me,” Noah said, “if Ethan and Charlene are good with it.” Then Noah got a text, and he checked it out.
Was the text from one of the three she-wolves Noah had been talking to?
“Sure.” Charlene suspected Renault wanted to be in on the action.
“We need to have a celebration when we catch Kroner,” Renault said.
“That’s for sure,” Charlene said, thinking it would be a great idea for the four of them so that this time Renault could enjoy the camaraderie.
Noah was quiet, contemplative, and Charlene wondered what was going on with him. She wondered if he was a little put out that he would be left behind watching her and not there to help take Kroner down if he was at Oakley’s great-aunt’s house.
After they finished eating, Ethan kissed and hugged Charlene before he left with Renault.
She sighed as she shut the door on their departure. She figured they would be gone a couple of hours, but what surprised her was when Noah said, “Grab your gun. We’re going to be Ethan’s tail.”
She was all for it, though she was surprised that Noah had wanted to do it without talking to Ethan about it first. Then again, maybe he suspected they would find Kroner at the great-aunt’s house, and he wanted to be there to help arrest him. Knowing Noah, that was the reason.
She grabbed her purse and her gun. “So why are we following them? Do you really feel like Kroner will be at the great-aunt’s house?” She climbed into Noah’s car.
“I want to be there just in case Kroner is. Ethan and Renault will need more of a backup, but I want you to stay in the car in case this goes down when we get there.”
“Sure. That sounds good.” Still, she was surprised Noah hadn’t just asked Ethan about doing it this way. She figured he didn’t want Ethan to say no, worried about Charlene being in the area if they had a fight to capture Kroner. “I take it you didn’t want to ask Ethan about doing this.”
Noah let out his breath. “I don’t know. I–I just want to make sure Renault is on the up and up.”
“Wait a minute. You still think he might be involved with Kroner?” Now that changed the situation entirely.
“I just want to make sure that everything is all right.”
She knew Noah better than that. “You have to have some reason to suspect Renault.”
“It’s just everything. The roses he ordered for you and sent anonymously. Renault taking Ethan to the warehouse without notifying the police or Grainger of what he thought they might find there. So then I tried to get ahold of Ferret to see if he told Renault that Kroner was at the warehouse. I learned Ferret was already in WitnessProtection which means no one could have asked him where Kroner was—as far as the warehouse location went. So how did Renault know? He had to have lied to Ethan about how he knew of it.”
“Ohmigod, when did you learn this?”
“Just after we ate lunch. That was the text I got. I didn’t want to bring it up in front of Renault.”
