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“Just giving an update about what went down.” And he flashes the JM smile that I want to knock right off his gorgeous face.
“Malone.” I snap his name out at him.
He sighs. “I don’t know who the fuck that was. And until you decided to go completely berserk on him—which was one of the hottest fucking things I’ve seen, apart from you naked and tied up—I was working on getting information out of him.”
I sidestep the whole naked and roped thing. “I still don’t technically trust you,” I say, “but you’re right that if I’m going to get my cousin back, I need you to help me. And you owe me. I still want explanations. I need to know who you are and what you’re up to and?—”
“Scarlett, c’mon, I know you trust me a little.” His gaze shifts over me. “And I told you all you need to know.”
“I need to know everything.”
“You can’t.”
His phone lights up and he answers. “Smith? Talk.”
Who the fuck is Smith? He’s watching me while he listens.
“So we didn’t get a good look?” Whoever it is answers and I can just hear the tones of a male voice from his phone, but that’s it.
I need something—anything. Right now, finding a way to believe and trust he’s truly on my side is hard. I know he’s my best bet. Grabbing my phone from my bag, I frown when I see there aren’t any missed calls. Not from Uncle Grant and not from Dad.
Then I remember the message from the foreman… Amelia being taken means Grant’s head isn’t in the work game. I mean, he hasn’t even contacted me after I left that message.
“Hold on.” Malone lowers the phone. “What’s wrong, Scarlett?”
Hell, am I that transparent? I’m so attracted to this man, and he’s right about the tangle of trust in me, but he misses the bigger picture, the complexity. I trust him with my body, with our sex games, and I know that’s rooted in something I can’t get close to.
But the rest of it?
I don’t know.
I want to be able to trust him. What if whether I trust him or don’t is the deciding factor in Amelia’s fate? If I trust him and he betrays us? Betrays her?
Or if I don’t and that loses her forever?
“I need to send my uncle a message.”
“About?”
“The foreman called me earlier, okay? There’s a problem, a delay with shipment number DDa4, I think?”
“Did you hear that?”
Malone has his phone held out, and he must have hit the speaker because the male voice answers loud and clear. “Yeah.”
“Has Grant or Dale turned up at the dock?” he asks.
The guy Smith answers. “No. Malone, whoever took Amelia Hanlon’s probably a hire. And they left through the back, where we don’t have a feed. I’m doubting they left on fucking foot.”
I suck in a breath. “Uncle Grant complained a few years ago about how someone had broken into the building. There’s CCTV cameras in that alley, just in case someone tries to do it again.”
“I’ll get on that,” Smith says. “Grant Hanlon only wants to speak to you, Malone.”
Malone’s eyes are still on me. “Tell him I’ll contact him when I get the chance, and to fucking hand over anything, and I mean anything, that might be relevant, no matter how small. Amelia’s friends, teachers, people who’ve been in contact that he doesn’t know.”
“I know how to do my fucking job. I’m on it.” Smith’s voice says pretty clearly that he’s not a subordinate to Malone.
Maybe an equal, or someone with a position above him. But I can tell by the tone they’re also friends.
