Chapter 18
CHAPTER 18
K ane tried not to freak out when he came home to find the house empty. One quick text to Maggie and he found out why. He didn't know whether to be impressed or pissed that Damon took Waverly to see Nico Saccone.
"It's a good idea," Hunter told him, not looking worried. "He had ties to criminal organizations. He can find out if there was an information leak and help us decide which direction to look in."
Kane thought for a minute and then grinned as a thought developed. "Want to have some fun tonight?"
"You know I'm always up for a good time. What do you have in mind?"
"If Nico is looking into criminals, we can look into her office. One of her co-workers has a crush on her. Let's start with him. He'll be the weak link."
"I'll bring the surprise party supplies. Pick you up at midnight?"
"It's a date."
Damon arrived shortly after and Kane smiled when he saw his little sister step from the full SUV. "Pen! What are you doing here?"
"I have some time off and thought I'd visit the fam. Guess I came at the right time. I got to spend some time with your . . ."
"Girlfriend," Kane answered instantly. He saw the surprised look on Waverly's face but then saw the smile that told him she approved. They'd talked about a relationship, but he should have asked her first.
Waverly slipped her hand into Kane's and gave it a squeeze before turning to his sister. He loved the way she easily slipped into his embrace. "What exactly do you do?" Waverly asked her.
"A little of this, a little of that. Mostly I get to travel across Europe. That's the dream, right?"
"Who are you staying with?" Kane asked, noticing she hadn't brought her bags into the house.
"Rowan. So, I got caught up on everything going on with you. Now, what are my brothers up to?"
Kane loved his sister, but right now he wanted Waverly to himself. Instead, he took a seat on the couch next to Waverly and kept his hand on hers. Natalie excused herself to get to work. Maggie and Hunter were next. Finally, Damon took Penelope to Rowan's, all with the promise of getting together tonight for dinner.
"How was Nico?" Kane asked, getting right to the point once he had Waverly to himself.
"Not what I expected, but also what I expected. I have no reason to, but I think I trust him to look into it and be discrete. How are Lark and Quad?"
"They're good. I sent the contract to Olivia. In the meantime, Hunter and I are going to have a talk with Elwood tonight. If Nico is looking into the criminals, I'll look into the lab. The faster we can find the answer to who hired the hit and why, the better."
"I really don't see Elwood being behind this."
"I don't either, but he might know something he couldn't say with all your co-workers around."
Waverly nodded and let out a sigh. "I guess that makes sense. What do we do now?"
"Oh, I can think of a thing or two. Come here and let me show you."
Kane and Waverly walked into Harper's Bar that night to find the place in full swing. The Faulkners were spread out and the Townsends had their tables while the Langston family, along with Gator, Turtle, and Skeeter, were playing darts and pool.
"Hey!" a chorus of people called out when they saw Kane.
He had thought he hadn't wanted to go back to small-town life. He was so wrong. He had missed it. He loved walking around town and knowing everyone he passed. Gator spotted them, hooked his thumbs into his overalls, and sauntered over to them.
Waverly looked up with surprise as Gator stopped in front of her. "I hear you're the lady who turned Bubba's head. Couldn't wait to meet you. You're just a little bit of a thing, but you must have the magic touch."
"Waverly, this is Gator. He's the one that we usually have to call to remove the alligators from our yards."
"Any self-respecting South Carolinian girl can move an alligator."
Gator boomed out a laugh and patted Waverly on the back. "I like you. Let's get a beer."
Waverly was quickly introduced to Turtle and Skeeter. Kane took a backseat to let the conversation flow around him. After a moment of shocked silence as Waverly got to meet Turtle, see the picture of a snapping turtle dangling from his pecker, and after Skeeter told her what the pirate ghosts thought of her, Waverly fell into easy conversation with them. She talked about the possibility of theoretical physics that would allow for ghosts and the force of a snapping turtle's bite. Between the way she handled Bubba, commended Turtle for not losing his pecker, and trying to explain how ghosts could be real, Gator, Turtle, and Skeeter were in love.
"So what if she moved Bubba? I've surfed Bubba," Lacy Langston, the second oldest of Landry and Lydia's eight children said, crossing her arms. She was thirteen now and thought she was twenty-three. Her older brother, Landry Jr., was fourteen and stood there also not looking impressed.
"Can you gator surf?" Landry Jr. asked Waverly. The Langstons had become protective of the Townsends since, at one point or another, they'd all babysat the eight Langston kids, and Hunter had rescued their father overseas.
Waverly crossed her arms and looked down at them smugly. "I've been gator surfing since before you were a twinkle in your parents' eyes. I once surfed a fifteen-foot gator for over a hundred yards."
"Wow," Lacy gasped, impressed.
Landry Jr. cleared his throat. "I guess you are one of us."
Waverly smiled and dropped her hands from where they'd been crossed. "Born and raised right here in Charleston."
"Maybe you could give me some tips. I've been having trouble balancing on Bertha since she's a little shorter," Lacy said, no longer in snotty teen mode.
"I'd love to as long as your parents are okay with it."
"Mom! Dad!" Landry Jr. ran off calling for his parents.
Kane watched Waverly fall into easy conversation with the Langstons, the Faulkners, and the rest of the town. She even got Leah excited about the physics of gator surfing. Tonight, Kane felt at peace. It was as if everything he'd been searching for came together and settled. He looked at Stone and he looked at Hunter. They had the same look he figured he had. Happiness. Love. Belonging.
"Sorry, guys. It's time we head home," Kane said, putting his arm around Waverly.
Waverly said goodbye and promised Lacy that Lark would love to meet her and show her around campus. She promised to bring an article to Skeeter on the science of ghosts and gave some tips to Gator on how to use physics to move alligators. By the time Kane escorted Waverly from the bar, the town was as much in love with her as he was.
"I had so much fun tonight I forgot someone was trying to kill me." Waverly sighed and Kane stopped her to give her a tight hug. "We're getting to the bottom of it. If we don't get answers soon, then I'll shake the nest and see what comes flying out."
Kane slipped from the bed. He didn't bother turning on the lights as the light from the kitchen cast enough of a glow down the hall that he could get dressed. They'd made love after getting home from the bar and he'd wanted to tell her how he felt, but it didn't feel like the right time. Kane wanted time to share together after he told Waverly he loved her. He didn't want to have to leave and go interrogate a man.
Kane didn't bother with a weapon. He wouldn't need it. Elwood didn't seem to be the type of man who would hold out information after a little twisting of a bone or two. Besides, Hunter would be armed.
Kane stepped from the house to find Granger and Hunter waiting for him outside talking. "Thanks guys," Kane told them. Granger was going to protect Waverly while Kane and Hunter were having a little talk with Elwood.
"I don't want to know anything illegal, so don't say a word to me about whatever this is about." Granger pushed off his sheriff's SUV. "But good luck."
Granger strode off into the night to do a perimeter search.
"Let's go have some fun." Hunter smirked and got back into his truck and they were quickly on their way to Charleston.
Elwood lived in a condo in the city. Hunter reached into his bag with his gloved hands and pulled out duct tape. "Ready?"
Kane slipped on his own pair of gloves and tugged his baseball cap down low in case of security cameras. "Let's do this."
It didn't take long to figure out which condo was Elwood's. They didn't go through the lobby. Instead, they pulled down the fire escape and stealthily climbed up to the third floor. Hunter wiggled his knife under the window latch and popped it open. They climbed into the hallway that showed four condos on the floor. Two on each side of the hall.
"This one," Kane whispered as he went to work picking the lock. It didn't take long for the lock to tumble and they moved quickly inside. The house was spotless and filled with plants. "How does he keep them all alive?" Kane whispered in awe. He'd tried like hell to keep plants, but they all died.
"He's actually home to water them," Hunter replied as he pulled a pair of zip ties from his back pocket. "You want to be the nice guy or the bad guy?"
"Both. You be silent unless I give you our signal."
"Party pooper."
Kane smiled into the darkness as he made his way to the bedroom. It wasn't hard to find since it was a one-bedroom condo. Elwood was snoring to the sounds of whales. The whale noises hid any sound Kane and Hunter might make, not that they made any.
Elwood was sprawled out on his stomach in pajamas covered in microscopes. He looked completely harmless, but that wasn't going to stop Kane from doing what needed to be done.
Kane reached down, grabbed a wrist, and jerked it behind Elwood's back before grabbing his other wrist and zip-tying them together. Elwood had blinked his eyes open when Kane wrenched the first wrist behind his back, but he'd been frozen in fear to do anything other than stare with wide eyes into the darkness.
"Wha, wha, what's going on? Who are you?" Elwood's delayed reaction was all Kane needed to secure him and take a seat on the bed beside where Elwood was trying to roll over with his arms tied behind his back.
"Stop moving," Kane ordered and Elwood instantly complied. "I want to talk to you about Waverly Davenport."
Elwood fought then. "What did you do to her? I'll kill you if you hurt her!"
That wasn't the reaction Kane was expecting. "Knock it off, Elwood. I'm not the one who took her."
The fight instantly left him. "You're not? Then why are you here?"
"Because I think someone in the lab knows where she is."
Elwood's eyes got big. "You're Kane Townsend. I remember you."
Hunter snorted in amusement from the other side of the bed and Elwood freaked out realizing there was someone else in the room besides Kane. "Shut up and be still," Hunter snapped.
Elwood stopped struggling. "Are you going to hurt me?"
Kane rested his clasped hands on his leg and looked down at Elwood. "That would depend on you. You worked on the project with Waverly, correct?" Elwood nodded. "Tell me about the rest of the team. What did they do and how did they react to Waverly being lead?"
Elwood began talking. There weren't as many people involved as Kane had thought there would be and the only person who caused any trouble was Kelvin. That tracked with what Kane had seen when he'd visited the lab with Lark."
"How much money does Kelvin have?"
"Money? He's right out of college. He doesn't have much that I know of. He lives with two roommates. He always bitches about them. He complains about everything, including Waverly. He is not a team player and thinks way more of himself than he should."
"What about your boss, Garvey?"
Elwood snorted. "He's a co-owner of the company. He has a lot of money, but he's treated Waverly like a daughter. He's a huge team player."
"What about security? Who outside of the people you've mentioned would know about the project?" Kane asked.
"We've never had a leak, but it's possible we could. Any of those people could tell someone else. When we get to the testing phase, it's also at the pre-order phase. Garvey will contact companies that would benefit from our project to gauge interest. Of course, there are NDAs, but anyone at those companies could talk too," Elwood explained.
"Do you know who Garvey had talked to about the project?"
"Yeah, several government agencies and the military. Do you think she was taken because of the project? I thought it was a group ransom. Am I in danger?"
Elwood wasn't a fighter, but he had a brain and could put two and two together. "Do you own any IP rights to the project?"
"Not really. I'll get a small royalty on each sale for my contribution, but the actual ownership goes to Waverly since she came up with all of the math and science behind it. She's the owner of it." Elwood paused. "If someone found out what she had developed and kidnapped her to prevent her from finishing the project, they screwed up."
"How so?"
"It's done. The project is finished and in working order. All that's left is paperwork and the in-house attorney will file for the patent whenever it's been deemed Waverly isn't coming back. And if you can find her, then she'll tell them to file it. There's no stopping her project from being manufactured and sold."
"How well do you know Waverly?" Kane asked. It wasn't out of jealousy. He knew her personally, but he needed information about those around her.
"Really well. We go out every couple of weeks. We go to the movies together, stuff like that. She's my best friend."
Kane felt bad. Elwood was about to get his heart broken. He knew Waverly hadn't realized Elwood had a crush, and she said she'd never wanted him as anything other than a friend. But Kane still felt bad. "Can you think of anyone around her who would want to do her harm in any way?"
"No. Everyone, well, not Kelvin, but everyone else loved her. Loves her."
Kane nodded to Hunter who stepped forward and cut the ties. "Thanks for your help, Elwood."
They slipped from the condo even as Elwood was calling out his own questions to them.
"Could the government be behind this?" Hunter asked.
"Why? They could just pay for the contract. They do that with everything else."
"Then we're back to square one unless you think it's that Kelvin person."
"I'll see if Peter can check Kelvin's finances, but I think he's just a spoiled kid. Not someone who would have contacts to hire a hit."
"Then we're back to square one."
Kane clenched his jaw. Now, he had to hope Nico found something. Right now, it was just dead end after dead end.