Total pages in book: 127
Estimated words: 127715 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 639(@200wpm)___ 511(@250wpm)___ 426(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 127715 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 639(@200wpm)___ 511(@250wpm)___ 426(@300wpm)
Something to think about if Lillian continued to push toward getting his dick, which was something, it didn’t have to be said, was hard as fuck to deny her.
“Cin knew her in school,” Rus told him. “She was a couple years ahead, but she said Lillian was one of the ‘smart kids’ when she could have been one of the ‘popular kids’ because of how pretty she is. She entered writing competitions and worked on the school paper and the yearbook. They didn’t run in the same crowd, but Cin liked her then, and she still does, even if they still don’t run in the same circles.”
None of this was surprising.
After sharing that, Rus rose from his chair, probably chomping at the bit to get some wheels in motion after two meaty cases finally landed on his desk. “Look forward to meeting her.”
“Look forward to introducing you to her.”
Rus inclined his head and said, “I got paperwork to fill out.”
With that, he left, and Harry returned to his own work.
He was at it for half an hour before his phone on his desk lit up with a text from Lillian.
At store. Do you like farro?
He smiled because of her question and because, in about an hour, he was leaving to go home, change, get his dogs, then return to town to go to her house to make dinner with her.
It was her idea to invite the dogs.
Yes, he answered.
She came back with, Salmon?
Yes, but you don’t have to get fancy.
I’m on a mission. Do you like macerated cabbage?
“Fuck it,” he muttered, smiling through his words and calling her.
“Hey,” she greeted.
“Hey back. Yes, I like cabbage. But salmon is expensive.”
“Don’t mess with my mojo,” she bossed. “I saw a recipe I want to try. Do you like ginger?”
What she meant was, she looked up recipes for food he’d want to eat.
Christ, she’d been just down the block from him.
For years.
“Yes, honey, but—” Harry tried.
“A little heat? The recipe has red pepper flakes.”
Harry started chuckling. “Yes, Lilly, though—”
“Persian cucumber?”
Harry stopped chuckling because he was laughing.
“I’m thinking yes on the cucumber and carrot,” she mumbled into his laughter.
“Yes,” he pushed out through it, just as his phone vibed in his hand with another call. “Hang on, a call is coming in.”
“Okeydokey.”
Okeydokey?
Christ.
Just down the block.
Fuck him.
He took his phone from his ear, looked at who was calling, and the blood suddenly flowed sluggish through his veins.
He pushed through it to go back to her and forced a light note into his voice. “Gotta take this. You going home soon?”
“Right after I check out.”
“See you there, sweetheart.”
“’Kay, Harry. Bye.”
“Later, Lilly.”
He disconnected from Lillian and quickly took the call coming in before it went to voicemail.
“Moran,” he said.
“Harry?” a woman asked.
“Yeah, Lynda. You get word?”
“I’m sorry, Harry,” Sergeant Lynda Westwood of the Coeur D’Alene Police Department said. “They’re yours. Parental DNA links to the sample you sent. We have Simon and Avery Rainier’s bones in our morgue.”
God damn…
Fuck.
SIXTEEN
Idaho
Harry
The first thing Harry did was quickly walk to Rus’s desk and ask him if he’d go to Harry’s house and let the dogs out after he left work and before he went home.
Rus took one look at his face, his lips thinned, then he asked, “Idaho?”
“Idaho,” Harry answered.
“I’ll let them out and bring them over to ours. That way, you won’t have to worry about them tonight. As you know, Maddie loves them.”
Maddie was Cin’s daughter, and she did love Lucy, Linus and Smokey, and they loved her.
“Thanks, brother,” Harry muttered. Then he tipped his head to Rus’s computer and said, “Hit enter.”
Rus nodded.
Harry went back to his office and got right on his phone.
Jason answered in two rings.
“We got shit,” Jason said as greeting. “But we got so much shit, we’re compiling it at the same time we gotta—”
“Those bones are Sonny’s and Avery’s.”
“Fuck,” Jace bit.
“So give it to me fast. What you got?” Harry demanded.
“We think we’re onto something. Few days, we’ll be home. Before that, just so you know, and Lillian probably didn’t know this at the time, but the Rainier place in LA was broken into when Avery was home, Sonny was at work and Lillian was at school. She was okay, it was just a junkie looking for something to pawn so he could get his fix, and she reported she thought she scared him more than he scared her, but still, it tweaked her. Friends say Sonny wasn’t much of a city boy, and the rat race of LA was beginning to wear on Avery too. They said the break-in was the last straw for Sonny. They had their place on the market within a week of the incident and took off the day it closed.”
That was an explanation, but not a full one.
Before he could dig into that, Jace kept talking.
“Needless to say, property values in LA are a lot higher than in MP. The equity they had in their place, plus the fact it was known both Sonny and Avery didn’t live beyond their means and regularly set money aside in savings, it’s not a stretch they could buy a small two bedroom in Misted Pines.”