Kiss of a Stranger (Lost Coast Harbor #1) (24 page)

It took him walking away for her to realize he was worth that risk. Now she needed to convince him she was worth it, as well.

In a voice that held neither anger nor uncertainty, she said, “Tell me about the payments Hastings made to our account.”

Chapter Twenty-Four

T
he house was silent. Instead of the magical setting it had been during the Winter Blues Ball, now it stood in the middle of the redwood glade like a sentry, observing all who dared approach. Gabe watched for a long time, waiting for any movement, but there was none.

The sun started to set and twilight covered the forest, but still he waited. Only when the sky was dark enough to hide him did Gabe begin his approach.

He didn’t know what he was looking for. That was starting to feel like the story of his life.

He’d come to Lost Coast Harbor looking for revenge, and instead he found Maddie. He wanted to rewrite his past, and instead he caught a glimpse of a future that turned out to be a mirage. It didn’t matter if he still had feelings for Maddie. He would never be able to look at her without seeing what she’d done—or more precisely, what she hadn’t done.

That insidious inner voice whispered to him.
She made a mistake. If anyone can understand that, it should be you.

Gabe shook off the thought, and he definitely shook off the memory of her soft body beneath him, or her warm mouth against his skin.

He prowled around the exterior of the Hastings home. Every second he was there, he risked being caught. They wouldn’t even need to screw him over again. Just charge him with trespassing and violating the terms of his release, and he would go back in. Years of planning, and he was about to give it all up because he couldn’t stop thinking about the way Maddie tasted.

Focus, you asshole.

At least he knew where he was going this time. He made a beeline for the outside door that led to Hastings’ office. Now that he knew how incriminating those documents were, he planned to photograph every single page.

And he only knew what was in those files because Maddie had cracked the code. Without her, he would have no more chance of clearing his name than he did the day he arrived in town.

Heavy footsteps ripped Gabe’s mind back to the present. This wasn’t the careful tread of a servant trained to be invisible.

It wasn’t one set of footsteps, either.

He was almost to the room. Gabe jogged the last few steps and turned the handle.

It was locked.

Hastings really didn’t want others snooping around his office.

This time, Gabe moved faster. He remembered the angle he needed to hit with his pocket knife, and soon he was rewarded with the click of the lock turning. He dashed inside, just managing to close the door and lock it before the footsteps could turn the corner.

A key turned in the lock, and once again, Gabe found himself hiding behind thick green curtains. It felt empty without Maddie there, in that sea-green dress that matched her eyes.

Goddamn it. It seemed a large chunk of his brain was permanently devoted to memories of Maddie, no matter how many other things demanded his attention.

And at that moment, something rather important demanded his attention.

“We took care of it. He’s in so many pieces the Coast Guard couldn’t find him.”

Gabe sat up straight and fought against the rush of anger. He knew that voice. Knew it well. He’d helped the man get drunk at the local dive bar and tried to wheedle information out of him. For the last couple weeks, Gabe followed every order the man gave him.

And Vince had tried to kill him.

The other man clucked in disgust. When he spoke, the words were slow and careful. Gabe recognized that voice, too. The last time he heard it, he’d been behind this same curtain. Maddie was right. It had been Peter Hastings all along.

“Don’t be a fool, Vince. You heard the gossip. Maddie Palmer bought condoms this morning. The two of them have been chasing after each other since he arrived in town. He’s probably at her house right now.”

Gabe struggled to breathe. They knew. Not everything, but too damn much.

“I tried,” Vince said. “It’s hard to kill a man and make it look like an accident.”

“I am displeased with your actions. When I learned the man was bound for Lost Coast, I said, quite clearly, that I did not wish to be involved. That means I didn’t want the man’s death connected to me. Instead, you arranged two accidents on my docks, neither of which were successful.”

“It’s the only place I was certain he’d be,” Vince protested.

“It was sloppy. In the future, there will be no more accidents at the harbor. Even if no one suspects, it’s bad for morale.”

Gabe stifled an incredulous laugh. Yes, trying to kill a fellow employee might make the others concerned for their future.

Hastings continued. “Everyone thinks he’s dead. Shoot him, stab him, I don’t care. Only be sure to get rid of his body when you’re done.”

The moment of morbid humor passed in a hurry. Gabe was running out of time.

A drawer opened and closed, and it sounded like a stack of papers was dropped on the desk. “The day after the party, I found two files ordered incorrectly. There were scratches on the outside door handle, and the external cameras clearly show him entering this hallway. It’s impossible to know how much he got.”

The sound of someone rifling through papers. “What am I looking at?”

Hastings voice was hard as iron. “The bank accounts of every contractor Hastings Enterprises ever engaged. A few shell companies.”

Vince was still confused. “But that’s not a secret. It’s why you pay us openly, right? When I complained, you told me the easiest way to hide money is to pay taxes on it.”

“Taxes, yes. Openly? Hardly.” The other man sounded disgusted. “Over the years, payments have come from dozens of different subsidiaries. They’re almost impossible to track without these documents. However, a fed with access to this information would have a whole new list of people to interrogate, and I have it on good authority that Agent Glover continues his witch hunt. Now someone with reason to dislike me has at least some of these files, and you haven’t succeeded in eliminating that threat. Please remember, Vince, that if this operation is exposed, everyone involved goes down with it. Do you wish to spend your final years behind bars?”

Vince cleared his throat. “If Reyes is alive, I’ll get him. The Palmer girl’s taken care of. Someone’s picking her up this evening.”

Gabe’s fingers curled into his palms. They were talking about Maddie. Because he’d been seen with her. Because he stayed at her house and followed her around and couldn’t hide his desire whenever he looked at her. Now they believed he’d told her everything—and they were right.

He might as well have painted a bullseye on her himself.

If not for him, Maddie would be safe. She only agreed to look into Hastings Shipping because he was convinced Oliver was involved, and she was so loyal she insisted on proving her friend’s innocence. She ordered boxes of archived files from six years ago, which practically sent up a flare that she was helping him. When he needed to hide, she offered him her house.

All because she was brave enough to do the right thing when it mattered.

Yeah, she’d screwed up, but she was a lot more than her worst mistake. Everyone was, including him. He should have tried seeing past her mistakes—ones she made because she was young and desperate. Because she was scared to lose everything again.

Instead, he chose to hurt her. Gabe knew how to be angry, but somewhere along the line, he forgot how to forgive.

Someone was trying to kill Maddie, and he wasn’t there to protect her.

Maybe it was already too late, and the last thing she heard him say was he didn’t need her. It was the worst lie he’d ever told.

The thought of her dead made his chest lock so tight he could barely breathe.

Hastings’ office was on the ground floor, and though the window had a sturdy lock, it would be easy to unlatch it from this side. Gabe would be forfeiting any chance at secrecy, but he’d given that up the minute he entered the house. He had no idea how often security reviewed footage from the exterior cameras, but they could be making a phone call any minute.

But that was his own problem, and at the moment he didn’t give a fuck about whether he was in danger. All that mattered was keeping Maddie safe.

Decision made, he sprung the lock and jumped through the open window. Behind him, he heard shouts of surprise from the older men, followed by loud cries for help, but it was too late. He’d spent years working out every damn day. They’d never reach him.

Gabe raced for the trees with only a vague idea of his direction. He headed down, away from the house. Then he needed to sprint toward town and hope like hell Maddie was still holed up in her living room, surrounded by people who could protect her.

Never in his life had he so hoped a woman’s friends were comforting her and telling her what an asshole he was.

He reached a two-lane road and didn’t look before crossing. A second later, Gabe was knocked across the road.

He struggled to move. The wet road soaked into his jeans while he lay on the ground, shuddering from the pain.

A car door popped open, and he heard a man’s panicked voice. “Gabe?”

He knew that voice. With shaking hands, he pushed himself to kneeling just as Oliver reached his side.

“Oh god. I’m sorry. I didn’t see you. Are you hurt?”

“You hit me,” he said stupidly. He glanced past Oliver, finally seeing the Tesla. The expensive car’s electric engine was so silent he hadn’t heard anything until the car almost ran him over.

“Let me get my phone. I’ll call an ambulance.”

“Don’t call anyone.” Gabe staggered to standing. He was bruised and unsteady, but that seemed to be it. Oliver had good reflexes.

Oliver kept his hands out, ready to catch Gabe if he fell. “Everyone thinks you’re dead. However you survived the explosion, I’m not going to let you live through that, then die of internal bleeding.”

Gabe had a fraction of a second to make up his mind. The man was still a Hastings. Still the CEO of a company that ran one of the largest criminal enterprises along the northern Californian coast. Still Peter’s son.

Gabe decided in a second. Oliver might be all those things, but Maddie trusted the man. Plus, he seemed pleased Gabe was alive and was even trying to help him.

“Maddie’s in danger.”

Oliver didn’t hesitate. He helped Gabe to the passenger side, then got in, turned the car around, and punched the accelerator.

Maddie rushed back as fast as Bree’s truck allowed, Charlie’s words turning in her mind. It was so much bigger than she’d ever guessed, this enormous web of guns and drugs, bribery and corruption—and he believed he’d only seen one or two threads. Her ex was a tiny piece of the puzzle, and even so he knew more than she ever imagined. If he’d chosen to cut a deal, he could have escaped with probation. Charlie was also certain he’d be dead.

There was a dark world just under the surface of her small town, one she’d never known existed.

Her phone rang. Maddie searched through her purse with one hand, finding her cell on the fourth ring. Bree’s number showed on the screen.

“What’s up?” She put the phone on speaker and dropped it back into a cup holder.

Bree got right to it. “I finished tracing the documents in Gabe’s file. There’s something really weird about one of them. It’s a transcript of his interrogation, the one where he kept saying he was innocent.”

“I remember it.”

“Well, it shouldn’t be here. He pled guilty. This information should never have seen the light of day. The only people who would have access to it would be his lawyer, the feds, and the local cops if they’re sharing information.”

“I’m not following.” Maddie turned onto the two-lane road that led back to Lost Coast Harbor.

“Well, no one at Hastings is his lawyer or in the FBI, are they? It gets worse. There’s a footer on the transcript, the IP address for whoever printed it off. It’s the address for a computer in the LCH police department.”

Maddie swallowed. Gabe and Adam suspected a fed was involved, but this was so much worse. This was a local cop. One of their own. “They’re protected.”

“Looks like. And someone really didn’t want you to figure that out. It would explain how they knew the feds were watching the main road. Why no one looked too closely at what happened in the shipping depots. And I bet it explains why they’ll find no evidence that a bomb blew up that ship. Maddie, this has been going on for years. It might not have mattered if you went to the cops. Nothing would have changed.”

Maddie felt a brief moment of lightness. It wasn’t much, and it didn’t absolve her from any culpability, but it was more than she had several hours ago. “I’ll be home soon. We’ll figure out how to handle this. Wait, Erin’s dad is the police chief. I know they don’t talk much, but what if…?”

When Bree spoke, there wasn’t even a hint of laughter in her voice. “What if she calls him? Or what if he’s dirty? Those are two very different things. Until we know, we’re leaving him out of it. Be safe. And if you see any cops…don’t say a fucking word.”

Maddie pressed the accelerator to the floor. The truck grumbled, its displeasure clear, but Maddie didn’t care. She’d pay for any repairs and happily, so long as the beast got her back to town.

It made it, but only just. As soon as she hit the Lost Coast town limits, the truck sputtered and began to smoke. Maddie wasn’t even surprised. It tended to break down once a week. Grumbling, she hopped out of the truck and began the short walk to town, her mind churning.

Peter Hastings. His family founded the town, and now he was trying to destroy it from within.

Charlie never dealt with Hastings directly. The patriarch of that great family would never be caught handing drugs to low-level street criminals. But for all his flaws, Charlie could be clever, and it wasn’t hard to connect the people he worked for to Hastings, especially when those people turned the money around to be laundered through Lost Coast businesses.