This was her mother.
“You’re Mrs. James.” It wasn’t a question.
“I am. Who are you to call my daughter, Georgie? How well do you know her? Why has she been staying with you?”
“Is that really what you think is important right now?”
She sucked in an outraged breath. Ed could care less if he’d pissed her off.
“It’s not,” one of the men said. His gaze pierced Ed. “What is important is why squirt hasn’t answered any of our calls in the last twenty-four hours.”
“Do not call her that,” Mrs. James said.
“Not important, Mother,” said the man she’d shot an angry look at before. “I’m Gareth. Georgina said she was staying here. But she promised that she would check in once a day with me. Now she’s not answering calls. And then when we got here, we asked some questions and found out that she’s fucking missing. Oh, and that she’s been living with you.”
All of her brothers scowled down at him.
“Language,” Mrs. James said primly.
All the men shot her a look.
“Georgie has been kidnapped,” Ed confirmed. “Along with two other women.”
“Kidnapped!” Mrs. James screeched. “How can she do this to me again? It was hard enough on me to deal with this the first time. What are people going to say? This is why I never wanted her to become an FBI agent. Because she is always getting herself in trouble.”
“Is that really what you are concerned about?” Ed asked, standing. He was aware his voice had a dark edge to it
.
But he didn’t give a fuck. His woman was missing. Two other women under his protection were missing. And this bitch was concerned about herself?
“We barely kept all of that nonsense out of the press last time,” her mother continued on. “What am I going to do?”
“What you’re going to do is sit down, shut up, and stop annoying me.”
Mrs. James just stared at him. Then her face went hard. “I’ll have your job for that, sheriff.”
He grinned. “Like to see you try, Catherine.”
“That’s Mrs. James to you.”
“That’s very formal considering I’m going to marry your daughter.”
“Over my dead body would she marry an uncouth, inconsiderate, likely poorly educated sheriff.”
Oh. This cow.
“What happened?” Gareth demanded. “When did she go missing?”
“Last evening. By a gang member called Saber Mason.”
All of the men looked devastated at the news. Something inside him relaxed to know that at least her brothers cared about her. Even if her mother was a selfish bitch.
“I’m Marcus. I run a private detective firm. I’ll get my guys onto this if you can give me all the information you have about my sister.”
He could refuse. But he wouldn’t. Unlike her mother, he knew this wasn’t about him and his ego. It was about finding his woman.
“Appreciate it.”