Chapter Seven

Hayes had one big-assed thought going through his mind.

He’d failed.

Well, mostly.

Jemma was alive and unharmed, and that was huge. Added to that, one of their attackers was dead. But the other, the sonofabitch sniper, had escaped.

And that fell firmly in the failure category.

Jemma and he had searched for him for well over an hour. Combing through those woods, looking for any signs of him. They hadn’t found squat, which meant they now had exactly that—squat.

If he’d managed to catch that asshole alive, then they might have answers as to who’d orchestrated this attack. But because the guy was in the wind, those answers weren’t going to be coming from him.

Not from his dead comrade either.

Once they had an ID on him, that might give them something. But that could take a while, what with every CSI and forensic tech already tied up with this shitstorm investigation.

Hayes finished up his call with Ruby, a multitasked conversation so he could fill her on what had just happened and also so he could find out Owen’s condition. And the status of the security worker who’d been shot. At least those last two updates were good news.

Well, good-ish anyway.

The worker had been shot in the stomach, but he’d been transported to the much bigger hospital in San Antonio and was in stable condition after surgery. Bottom line, he’d live, and despite the sheer number of bullets that had been fired, he was the only one of their team to have been shot in that particular attack.

There was some good-ish news about Owen, too. He had no serious damage from the wound to his shoulder and would be returning to duty at the inn. Of course, he probably shouldn’t be coming back this soon, but Hayes was going to let Ruby try to convince the man of that.

Hayes put away his phone, automatically scanning the dining room/office for Jemma. She, too, was finishing up a call. In fact, so were Reed, Declan, and Molly. Aiden was outside doing clean-up and damage control there, but that would likely include many phone conversations and updates as well. There’d already been way too many moving parts to this investigation, and now there were more.

Jemma made her way to him, snagging two fresh cups of coffee along the way, and she gulped down some of hers as if it would cure the throbbing headache that she no doubt had. It wouldn’t. Caffeine wasn’t going to help with an adrenaline crash from hell, but it could give them both a boost of jittery energy. Jittery was still better than brain fog.

“Duane obviously has an alibi for the shooting since he was here,” she volunteered. “FYI, he’s threatening to sue us.”

Yeah, Hayes had heard the asshole bark that out right after Jemma had given him the clearance to leave and return once he had his lawyer with him.

“Cordelia claims she was at the estate,” Jemma went on in between more sips of coffee. “And she’s on her way here to file a harassment complaint against me.” She sighed, shook her head. “Royce didn’t threaten me with anything, but he was clearly pissed when I asked him where he was at the time of the shooting.”

The anger didn’t surprise Hayes one bit. He had a bad gut feeling about Royce. Hell, about Cordelia and Duane, too, and Royce wouldn’t have cared much for Jemma doing her duty and treating him like the person of interest that he was.

“And Brooks?” he asked.

“He’s on his way here with his mama.” Her mouth tightened as if she’d tasted something extra bitter. “Interviewing them should be a barrel of laughs,” she added in a grumble.

The fatigue certainly wasn’t going to help with that, and while Hayes couldn’t fix that either, he thought Jemma could use a moment to try to level out. He motioned for her to follow him into the kitchen where all the windows had already been boarded up. If the sniper was still around, at least he wouldn’t be able to see them, and the kitchen had the extra bonus of being unoccupied.

“You’re going to tell me to take a breather,” Jemma said on a sigh. “That I need some rest.”

“I probably will get around to saying that,” Hayes admitted. He took her coffee and set it on the counter along with his. “For now, do that Christmas carol thing you did in the escape room.”

Jemma looked at him as if he’d sprouted an extra nose, and then he saw the realization of what he meant dawn on her. He maybe saw some embarrassment, too.

“It’s Jingle Bells ,” she muttered. “The Batman smells version.”

“That’s the one. You said it under your breath when you were getting a little panicked because the timer had gone off, and we hadn’t found our way out yet, and no one had come to get us.”

She nodded, continued to stare at him. Shrugged. Muttered something he didn’t catch. “It’s just something I’ve done since I was a kid.”

“Do it now,” he advised. “See if it works.”

The staring continued for several long moments before she mouthed the words. He smiled. She didn’t. In fact, she huffed and would have turned away from him if Hayes hadn’t taken hold of her shoulders.

“I do square roots in my head,” he confessed. “Trust me, I was doing them right before I broke down that door in the escape room.”

Now, she smiled, and he was so relieved to see it that he did something stupid. He hauled her to him, and he kissed her.

Yeah, a mistake.

She tasted like Christmas morning and dirty sex, and that shot right through him, claiming his common sense and that brainless part of him behind his zipper.

Jemma made a silky sound of pleasure and sank right into that kiss. No objections. No hesitation. She was all in, and that wasn’t good. Because of the heat. It was there. Right there. In full force. And now it was mixed with the taste and feel of her. A heady combination that had certain parts of him clamoring for more, more, more.

So, he deepened the kiss.

While he inched her closer and closer to him.

His body liked that, too, having her breasts pressing against his chest. Having her in his arms. Taking her mouth as if there were no tomorrows. But there were tomorrows.

And consequences.

A kiss, no matter how good—and this one was damn good —changed the rules of the game. And that shouldn’t happen. Not when they were in the middle of an intense investigation.

Hayes eased back from her and didn’t bother going for an apology or a lame assed attempt to tell her they wouldn’t do this again. Because they would do this and more. That kiss had been a metaphorical kicking down the door of an escape room. There’d be no turning back.

Well, not permanently anyway.

They would have to put the pause button on the lust though and catch a killer. Hard to land in bed, or against the wall, or the floor when someone was gunning for you.

Thankfully, Hayes didn’t have to rely on his willpower to prevent him from diving right back in for another kiss. That’s because Molly came into the kitchen, and it was obvious from the woman’s expression that she had something to tell them.

“I printed this out for you,” Molly said, handing him several sheets of paper. She volleyed glances at them, probably picking up on that whole kiss vibe. “It’s the deep background check you started on Royce.”

“Thanks,” Hayes told her. He certainly hadn’t forgotten about it, but it’d sort of gotten placed on the back burner when they’d been attacked.

Molly shifted to Jemma. “The courier just now picked up the phones from your stepmom and dad, but I had a look at them while you two were searching for the sniper.” She shook her head. “I didn’t see any red flags, nothing to indicate that either of these two phones were used to set up the murders and attacks.”

Clearly, that didn’t surprise Jemma. Both Stefano and Cordelia had volunteered the phones, and they wouldn’t have done that had there been anything incriminating on them.

Molly headed out of the kitchen, and Hayes took a look at the background check on Royce. Jemma looked, too, but she stopped when her phone sounded with a text.

“We got the warrant to search Duane’s school and residence and to test him for gunshot residue,” she relayed.

The latter was probably an empty victory since Duane would have had plenty of time to shower, but that had been a long shot anyway. If the man was truly the killer, he would have likely taken precautions such as wearing gloves or long sleeves and then would have discarded those items.

Jemma checked the time and groaned softly. “Maybe we can execute the search warrant after we’ve finished talking to Cordelia and Brooks.”

Maybe. But considering that was where Owen had been shot, Hayes was betting Owen would want an entire team going onto the school grounds. That team might or might not include Jemma, especially considering it would be a good opportunity for a killer to go after her again.

Hayes didn’t point that out. He just continued to read the background on Royce as Jemma and he made their way back to the dining room.

“Royce Henry Bolton, aged forty-eight,” he muttered, doing the mental calculations. Fifteen years older than Jemma. While that wasn’t a huge age difference, it was still enough to make Hayes wonder why the man had pressed so hard in pursuing her.

But he immediately rethought that.

He was attracted to her, big time, and he shouldn’t be. Not considering his past. No way did he want to risk losing someone else close to him. Yet, he’d just kissed her and was still lusting after her. Maybe Royce hadn’t been able to shut off his feelings for her either.

“Owner of Bolton PI Agency,” Hayes continued aloud, forcing his mind back on the investigation and not this heat for Jemma. “Current address is…” He stopped and looked at Jemma. “He lives in one of the most expensive areas of San Antonio.”

She nodded. “Royce got a large inheritance from his grandmother about a year ago.”

Yes, that was in the report, but it had Hayes shaking his head. “A year,” he muttered. “He’s worth several million, but he continued to work as a dispatcher until four months ago. Why?”

Jemma gathered her breath. “He wanted to be a cop, but he couldn’t pass the exam because he has some kind of heart problem and has to wear a pacemaker. He said a couple of times that he just wanted to be near the action.”

Hayes glanced through the background and saw the part about a pacemaker that’d been needed because of some congenital defect. That would have definitely stopped him from being a police officer, but why hadn’t Royce waited until the last four months to do PI work? Maybe because he hadn’t had the money to open his own agency until the inheritance?

“Personally, I think Royce’s medical issues make him feel that he has to overcompensate to prove that he’s a real man,” Jemma added, and she put those last two words in quotes.

Hayes was considering if that played into Royce’s pursuit of Jemma, but he had to put that aside when he heard the voices at the entrance. Cordelia and a man, probably Brooks. Jemma must have heard them, too, because she sighed.

“Showtime,” she muttered.

They went into reception and immediately saw Molly frisking Cordelia while Aiden was doing the same to Brooks. It occurred to Hayes that Brooks seemed to be aiming for a young Godfather look with his dark suit and slicked-back black hair. He was missing a key component though, a dangerous, in-charge vibe.

Nope.

There was zero trace of it. In fact, he seemed to be looking at his mother for cues as to how to handle the search.

Cordelia gave him a barely noticeable nod and did something that surprised Hayes. She cooperated with the frisking, all without whining or mentioning her favorite word, harassment.

Since Hayes had read the background on Brooks, he knew the man was twenty-six and was essentially a mama’s boy screw-up. He’d flunked out of three different colleges and had failed at the real estate business his mother had set up for him. A business that was investigated for money laundering before it was shut down. He was in the process of failing at business set up number two, a trendy pub in downtown San Antonio.

Those failures made him financially dependent on Cordelia, and it meant he was likely very loyal to her. Loyal enough to kill for her? Maybe. Brooks certainly fit the profile for that.

“He’s not carrying,” Aiden announced once he’d finished searching Brooks.

“Same,” Molly concluded when she was done with Cordelia.

So, the pair hadn’t come armed, but considering all the crap that’d been going on, Cordelia would have likely anticipated a pat down.

“Jemma,” Cordelia greeted once Molly had moved away from her. Her tone didn’t exactly hit the friendly mark, but it wasn’t overly hostile either. “You’ve been pressing hard to talk to Brooks. Well, here he is. Does he need a lawyer?” she quickly tacked onto that.

“Do you want a lawyer?” Jemma asked the man.

Again, Brooks looked at his mom for a response. “I think for now we can hold off on the attorney.”

Another surprise, and it made Hayes wonder if Stefano had had a word with his wife about cooperating with a murder investigation.

Jemma tipped her head for them to follow Hayes and her into the dining room, and she led them to a table in the far back corner that had already been set up for interviews. They sat with Hayes positioned so he could keep watch on the door. He doubted a killer would come charging in and get past Aiden and Molly, but he didn’t want to take the risk.

“I have to Mirandize you,” Jemma said to Brooks, “so that you know your rights. It’s legal protection for both of us.”

Brooks’ face tensed, but he didn’t verbally object as Jemma recited the warning. Once she was done, she turned on a recorder and fed in the required info of time, date, and those present.

“Brooks, I need to know your whereabouts for the past twenty-four hours,” Jemma stated.

But it wasn’t Brooks who responded. It was Cordelia. “We thought you’d ask that so we brought this.” She retrieved a USB drive from her purse. “It’s a compilation of feed from the security systems at the estate, Brooks’ office, his home, and his place of business. Each part of the feed is time stamped so you’ll be able to see him coming and going.”

Brooks jumped in to add, “You’ll also be able to confirm that I was at the estate from three pm yesterday through to about seven this morning. After that, there’s footage of me in my office.”

Jemma bagged the USB drive and then motioned for Molly, who was in the doorway. “I need this examined,” Jemma told the tech.

“It’ll prove Brooks had no part in those murders,” Cordelia concluded.

“Maybe, but there’s more than one way in and out of the estate,” Jemma reminded them. “And there are some blind spots with the security cameras cover. For instance, if you go out the library door and stay low, you won’t be detected.”

Some annoyance, maybe even anger, went through Cordelia’s eyes. “My son has no reason to kill you or those other cops.”

“Your son probably loves you,” Hayes quickly pointed out. “And while I doubt he could personally carry out the murders, he could have maybe used some of his former contacts from his now-defunct real estate business. Definitely some shady characters in on some of his deals.”

“I didn’t do this,” Brooks snapped. And that seemed to open the verbal floodgates. He continued despite Cordelia clamping her hand on his arm. “Yes, I despise my stepsister, but I wouldn’t kill her. I just have to sit back and wait for her to destroy herself. Stefano won’t put up with her bullshit forever. A fuckin’ cop.” He snorted. “That’s got to be eating away at him. He’ll soon see Jemma for what she is and disown her sorry privileged ass.”

Cordelia’s grip tightened to the point that her knuckles turned white. She also glared at her son, and that hard look finally got him to hush. So, not all was well between Cordelia and her son, and it made Hayes wonder if there were other tensions between them. Such as, was Cordelia pissed that maybe the murders and attacks had indeed been Brooks’ plan?

“Stefano loves his children,” Cordelia remarked as if to soothe ruffled feathers.

But Jemma didn’t seem the least bit offended by what she’d just heard. Just the opposite. It’d snagged her attention and let her know that her stepbrother had plenty of venom for her.

And that disowned comment?

Well, it could be that Brooks believed with Jemma out of the way, that his own position in the family would be solidified. Stefano had a lot of money and power, and it could be that Brooks wanted some of that for himself.

“Your mother handed over her phone to me earlier,” Jemma said to Brooks. “Will you do the same?”

Brooks had clearly been coached on this because he immediately took out his cell and gave it to Jemma. “You won’t find anything on there about me being involved in the murders.”

“Probably not,” Jemma conceded. “But sometimes there are other contacts that can lead to clues or information.”

That put some alarm on Brooks’ face, and he gave his phone a long look as Jemma bagged it. Hayes seriously doubted there was anything to do with hired killers and such in the man’s contacts, but there could be indications of other criminal activity.

“Will you also consent to a search of your office, business, and residence, along with letting us test you for gunshot residue?” Jemma asked Brooks.

The alarm went up several notches for Brooks, but Cordelia answered before he could. “Yes. Full cooperation,” the woman added.

Since Cordelia had made the offer, it likely meant she had or would have those places scoured before the CSIs could search them. But scouring didn’t mean all things incriminating would be removed.

“Molly can do the GSR test,” Hayes let them all know. In other words, it would be done here and now, before either of them got the chance to try to wash it away.

Cordelia gave a crisp nod. “Are we done then?” she asked, already standing.

“One more thing,” Hayes said, looking at Brooks. “Were you at the estate the day Jemma’s mother died?”

Judging from the stares he got from them, including Jemma, no one had been expecting that question. Jemma probably didn’t know that Hayes had spent some of his so-called downtime in his room pouring over Jemma’s background. That had included her mother’s suspicious death of an overdose of pain meds for her cancer.

“I don’t remember,” Brooks claimed.

“Really? You don’t recall something that significant as your mother’s friend dying? The Rattler’s wife,” he emphasized. “Certainly, your mother talked about her and the Salvetti family.”

“I’m sure she did, but I don’t know if I was at the estate or not,” Brooks insisted.

Hayes shrugged. “All right then, I’ll get the techs working on that. You’d be surprised at how much traffic cam footage and eyewitness accounts there are even after three years.”

“Brooks was possibly there,” Cordelia snapped, and she aimed another glare at her son. “It was a traumatic day for me, and it’s possible I asked him to come so he could be with me.”

Bingo. That was proof positive that Brooks the weasel had been around, but Hayes was betting he had been. And administering an overdose of pain meds would be right up his weaselly alley. That way, he eliminates the Rattler’s wife so his own mom can take her place.

Win, win for Cordelia and him.

A big assed loss for the Salvetti family.

Cordelia made a show of checking the time. “Can we get those residue tests done now? I have another appointment.”

“Certainly,” Jemma said, “Interview end,” she added for the sake of the recording.

Brooks and Cordelia didn’t rush out, but they certainly didn’t dawdle either. They went straight to Molly, who then in turn led them to a table with some kits to do such tests. In fact, Owen had well stocked it with pretty much anything they might need when it came to an investigation.

“That went far better than I thought it would,” Hayes muttered, keeping his eyes on their visitors.

“Yes, it did.” And there was plenty of suspicion in her voice about that. She looked up at him. “You really think Brooks could have killed my mother?”

“What do you think?” he countered.

Jemma sighed. Then, huffed. Then, nodded. “But if he did it, he likely would have been acting on his mother’s orders.”

“Agreed,” Hayes said just as Reed came their way. He was carrying a laptop that he set on the table.

“Got a minute?” Reed asked. “Because I think I might have found…something.”

“We’re listening,” Jemma assured him.

“I just got through briefing Owen about this on the phone, and he thinks it’s worth pursuing.” Reed took in a long breath. “I’ve been going through the files that were recovered from the water damage and the ones that you digitized into the storage cloud. I’ve merged all of that data with info from county sources and any mention on social media of anyone listed in the files. It’s created a sort of composite, and I’ve found something that doesn’t fit.”

“What do you mean?” Jemma asked.

Reed pointed to three names on his laptop screen. Jacob Worthington, Kyle Furst, and Hailey Trainor. “Do you recognize any of them?”

Jemma leaned in, had a long look and shook her head. “No, I don’t. Who are they?”

“Missing persons. Jacob went missing two years ago when he was twenty-two. Kyle, aged twenty-three, disappeared a month later. And Hailey, who was barely twenty-one, disappeared sixteen months ago.”

“I wasn’t a deputy then,” she muttered. “But I don’t recall the sheriff or deputies mentioning them.”

And that in itself was sort of a red flag. In a small town, any and all cases got some buzz.

“All three were called in as missing persons by their family members or their boss,” Reed continued. “I have the recordings of those 911 calls since they’re stored on the county database. But there’s no record that the cases were ever investigated by Outlaw Ridge PD despite them being in their jurisdiction.”

Jemma stayed quiet a moment. “Maybe those files were destroyed by the sprinkler?”

“I considered that, but you’d digitized all the files from this time period, which means the missing hikers should have been there.” Reed paused. “The county sheriff vaguely recalls seeing notices about the three, but since it wasn’t his jurisdiction, he didn’t follow up to see if any of them were ever found.”

“Could a dispatcher have screwed up?” Hayes asked.

“Maybe,” Reed admitted. “If so, that points to Royce.”

It did indeed. It might also point to more than a screw-up if Royce had tried to conceal these incidents.

“There’s something else about all of this.” Reed pointed to Jacob’s name again. “His mother reported him missing after he failed to come home from a hiking trip. She was killed in a hit and run within hours after she made the report. Jacob’s father and no other close relatives were in the picture so no one else pushed on him being missing.”

“Hell,” Hayes muttered. “What about the others?”

“The people who reported Kyle missing are dead, too,” Reed confirmed. “His parents died in a suspicious house fire.”

Hayes cursed again. This was more than a red flag, but he didn’t know how it fit into murdering an entire police force.

“What about Hailey?” Jemma asked.

Reed shook his head. “She has no parents, they were killed when she was a toddler, and she ended up in a string of foster homes. No close family. Her boss at a diner where she worked part-time is the one who reported her missing, but he didn’t follow up on it, probably thinking that she’d just quit without letting him know.”

That was possible. And the fact that he hadn’t followed up was probably the reason he hadn’t been killed. Someone had obviously wanted no one asking questions about these missing persons.

“There’s one more coincidence,” Reed added. “All three were on a hiking trip.” He shifted the image on his laptop to a map and motioned to a county park. “All three of the missing hikers posted on social media or left word or some indication that they’d be in this area.”

Jemma sucked in her breath, and Hayes knew why. They both knew the location of that particular park. And better yet, they knew what was right next to it.

Duane’s school.

In fact, some of the trails were mere feet away from the fence that surrounded the school.

Jemma looked at him and voiced exactly what he was thinking. “I think we need to have another chat with Duane and Royce.”