Paul almost believed the guy. Could go either way.

  “So why did you use her credit card?” Haley piped up, anger clearly burning through her at Thomas’s crude dismissal of Kelsey. Gladstone glanced at her and then right back at Paul.

  “You heard she was dead, right?” Paul kept up the pressure.

  “Yeah, I heard. Saw it on the news. The crash, the way the car caught fire...it was on all the stations.” Blubbering was generally a sign of telling the truth.

  Not always.

  “So answer the lady. Why were you using Kelsey’s credit card?”

  “What does it matter? It was way before any of that.”

  “It matters to her,” Paul said, keeping his gaze fully locked on Gladstone while he side-nodded to Haley who was still held to him hip to hip.

  His mind was racing. Thomas hadn’t hired the cop to stop them the night before.

  The realization bothered him almost as much as turning around to see Haley talking to Gladstone had done.

  “Do you know who I am, man? One crook of my finger and I can have you taken down and taken in...”

  “I know exactly who you are. I know that you have a gambling problem and that if your father knew about it, you might be singing up an octave by morning.” He didn’t have proof. But he knew. A few more puzzle pieces were falling into place.

  “After Kelsey went to my father... I swear, man,” Gladstone’s chin dropped a couple of notches along with his tone. “I swear, I thought we were acting out a movie we’d seen. This couple, they decided to spice up their sex life pretending rough sex, but Kelsey, she went and told my dad I’d hurt her. What the hell! I...”

  “The credit card,” Paul butted in as he felt Haley stiffen beside him.

  “Ever since Kelsey...the old man has had me on such a tight leash I’m choking,” Thomas said, in a tone more defeated than anything else. “He has someone go over every single one of my credit cards every month, checking where I am and what I’m doing. He didn’t know about the card Kelsey took out that I paid for. I’d insisted, since I was footing the bill, that I have a card to the account, too, and I used it sometimes.”

  “The cigar club...another high stakes game is hosted there...” Haley said from beside him, sounding numb.

  And Paul was thankful. For her sake. Numbness would get her through.

  “Whatever,” Thomas said.

  “What do you do now for money?” Paul asked, just in case the answer mattered to him for some reason.

  “I’ve got a couple of girls...they took out cards... I pay them, the card bills and the girls...”

  “Where do you get the money?”

  “Playing cards. The old man might think I’m a loser, but I’m actually good at cards.”

  He could afford to be, having all of the Daddy-approved expenses covered for him.

  “Why’d you stop using Kelsey’s card?”

  “I got a letter from some lawyer dude in Pahrump, warning me to cease and desist. I cut up the card. I mean, what the hell...she didn’t want me using it, why not just close the account? It wasn’t like I was sticking her with the bill. I was helping her build her credit which is why she wanted the damn thing to begin with.”

  Funny how people could justify their own wrong actions by making it seem like they were helping others.

  “What’s this lawyer’s name?”

  “I don’t know...” Thomas glanced at Paul and then said, “I swear, man, I don’t remember. Gilbert something. Or Gebhardt. Something with a G. What I do remember was the stationery. The envelope was brown. Not tan, or off-white, but light brown. Who has light brown stationary?”

  With one finger applying pressure to Haley’s hip to let her know they should go, Paul said, “Just one more question.”

  “What?”

  “You have any idea who Kelsey was seeing?”

  “I didn’t even know she was still in Vegas, man. I swear to God.”

  Paul nodded, intending to leave the other man standing there, feeling uncomfortable and unsure whether or not Paul would report what he’d learned to his father. That left Paul in the position of power if they ran into each other again over the next day or two. He took a step away and prayed that, for once, Haley would take his lead and walk with him without argument.

  And breathed a quiet sigh of relief when she did.

  “You did good in there.”

  Buckling her seat belt, Kelsey froze midaction, and stared at Paul. During the quick and watchful trek from the club to their vehicle, she’d been gearing up for the ire she knew he’d be showering on her as soon as they were in a safe space.

  She’d failed to follow orders—approaching Gladstone alone.

  And on their current project, he was the boss. A position they’d agreed upon. He started the SUV, seemingly oblivious of her perusal.

  “I’ve been preparing for a fight,” she told him, talking to the man she’d known, more than to the man he’d become. She knew the other one better. Knew where she stood with him.

  And how to resist him.

  Saying nothing, he pulled out into traffic and made a couple of quick turns. Driving them in circles, she knew, to make sure they weren’t being followed. After only a couple of days with him, she was already learning the basics of tracing those who didn’t want to be found.

  “I can’t believe you aren’t mad.” It used to infuriate him when she wouldn’t just accept what he was telling her, but needed to find out things for herself. Sometimes by learning them the hard way.

  “I admit to a few peevish seconds there,” he said, switching lanes and turning right at a red light.

  Rather than remaining still, waiting for it to turn green, she figured. Intrigued by the levels to which he took his job, by his focus and attention to detail, she had to remind herself that much of the time, the man drove her up the wall.

  He’d always driven her to emotional highs and lows that put her in her mother and sister’s world.

  Now, it was just her mother’s world.

  “If you were in my employ, you’d be fired,” he added, after another quick turn. “You got lucky in there, read the situation and helped the operation, but it could just as easily have gone the other way. Insubordination when lives are at stake is unacceptable.” He flashed her a grin that took her breath. It took her back to the days when he’d made her life so bright she could hardly believe it was real. That life could be that...full. That she could be that happy. “There, that make you feel better?” he asked, turning his attention back to his driving.

  No, she didn’t feel better.

  She felt...bereft.

  Confused.

  And glad to be sitting beside him.

  * * *

  Paul was hit anew with the reality of Haley’s beauty, her body’s sensuality, as they walked through the casino on the way to their room. Why that one woman, above all others, had the ability to lure him in, he had no idea.

  There was no logical explanation.

  Which pissed him off even as it fascinated him.

  Reaching for every internal defense he had in his arsenal, he said, “I’ve got some work to do. I’ll put on my headphones, in case you want to watch television, and will be on the computer so won’t need much light. I’d recommend that you get as much sleep as you can. We’ll be leaving first thing in the morning.”

  “Where are we going?”

  “Pahrump.” About an hour away from Vegas.

  “To seek out that lawyer that Gladstone mentioned.”

  “I plan to seek him out tonight. Figure out exactly who he is. Tomorrow, I plan to speak with him.”

  “On a Sunday?”

  “You want to wait until Monday?”

  “Absolutely not. I just don’t know how...”

  Another couple approached, a group of three women right behind them, and he was saved from saying any more as the seven of them rode the elevator up together, and the three women got off at their floor.

  As they entered the room, Paul stood there fighting disappointment as she immediately, and wordlessly, grabbed her bag and went into the bathroom, locking the door.

  Exactly as he’d have wanted her to do had she sought his opinion on the matter. He had no good reason to feel let down.

  Shaking his head at the traitorous enemy lurking inside him, Paul dismissed the small chink in his armor and, changing quickly into sweatpants and a T-shirt, was already at the desk with the lamp on the dimmest setting, headphones on and typing on his laptop when he heard the bathroom door open.

  Nothing was playing from the headphones. He’d yet to turn on the music he generally used to help him focus for work.

  And he sure needed to focus.

  In shorts and the T-shirt he’d seen on her the morning before, she shouldn’t have been as breathtaking as she’d been moments before, turning heads walking through the casino. She’d gotten rid of the makeup, too.

  His body paid more attention to her, not less.

  Bracing himself for whatever was to come, he started typing. Deleted. Concentrated enough to get the words down that he needed on the page, to continue the search he’d just barely started...and heard covers rustle.

  With the el shape of the room, he could only see the bottom of the bed. He saw the covers move, and then a foot-shaped lump appear toward the bottom of the bed.

  No lights came on.

  The television stayed silent.

  And Paul somehow managed to get himself back from the near abyss into which he’d almost fallen, and get to work.

  Chapter 9

  Haley hadn’t expected to sleep well, or much, but she lay down, listening to Paul type around the corner, feeling snug and secure. The next thing she knew, her phone, which she’d plugged in by her bed, read five in the morning.

  And the shower was running.

  Sitting straight up, holding the covers to her in spite of the perfectly respectable shirt she had on, she glanced over to the bed separated from hers by a nightstand. She saw the thrown-back covers, the wrinkled sheets and balled up pillow and knew that Paul had slept there.

  In a bed right next to her.

  He still balled up his pillow when he slept.

  Looking at the evidence, she smiled. Then she jumped out of bed, pulled her blankets up, as though to take away the evidence of her having been sleeping next to her ex-husband, and rummaged in her bag for the clean clothes she’d need for the day.

  The second he’d exited the bathroom, she’d enter, and they could vacate the room before anything exploded on her.

  Wherever they stayed that night, she was getting a separate room. Adjoining or not.

  Or she’d sleep in the SUV.

  Or...maybe...they’d find the baby and she’d be holding it tonight.

  A baby.

  Could it really be possible that her sister had had a baby? That a part of Kelsey, a tiny human, was alive and breathing?

  Uttering up a massive prayer that the baby existed and would be okay, she packed up her things and was ready and waiting when Paul opened the bathroom door.

  “There’s a fresh cup of coffee there for you,” she said, sipping from her own cup as she waited for him to pass and then, bag over her shoulder, ducked quickly inside the steam-filled room.

  He’d wiped a circle clear of fog in the middle of the mirror.

  Maybe to admire himself.

  But she knew it was for shaving.

  Paul may have grown up wealthy and privileged, but he’d never been vain.

  Or all that taken with his greatness.

  She shook her head as if to rid herself of the memories. Thinking about him constantly—the man she’d known, the man he’d become—was not good for her.

  For them.

  They needed to focus. Their goal was to find that precious little baby who could be waiting for them.

  She’d showered the night before, to rid herself of all vestiges of the part she’d played in the club, so took just a few minutes to wash and brush, put on her foundation with sunscreen, dress in the blue shorts, blue-and-white-striped tank top, slip on the white flip-flops and be ready.

  Paul was waiting at the door, his duffel on his shoulder.

  “You found something,” she said, in lieu of good morning, or asking how he’d slept.

  Both nonwork thoughts. Both forbidden.

  “I found the lawyer. Marcus Grainger. From what I can tell, he only has a few clients. I’ve scoured public records and there’s very little. A couple of small things—a DUI he defended. A small claims court suit. All wealthy clients.”

  They were out the door and heading down the hall as, heart doing double time, she asked, “You think he’s Kelsey’s guy? That she had an affair with him?” A new beau, in protective mode, wouldn’t hesitate to intimidate a former abusive partner...

  “He’s in his sixties.”

  She nodded. Age wouldn’t have mattered to her sister. As long as she respected the guy, enjoyed being with him. And if he was loaded and willing to marry her.

  “He’s also gay.”

  Probably not Kels’s Prince Charming, then.

  “Either she hired him herself, or he represents someone who hired him on her behalf, is my guess,” Paul was saying as they waited for the elevator.

  “Either way, they’re protected by lawyer/client privilege.”

  “Unless the executor and heir to her estate can convince him to share. With the help of someone who might be able to convince him that there could be a crime involved. And a life at stake.”

  He was looking at the elevator door, and up at the lights above it, indicating that the car, while moving downward, was still three floors above them.

  But she heard his message loud and clear.

  And while it was businesslike in nature, the olive branch he’d just offered her most definitely was not.

  Paul was treating her as an equal, fully including her, trusting her, which was nice.

  He was also telling her he needed her.

  And that made her weak in the knees.

  Pahrump, a small town west of Las Vegas not far from the California/Nevada border, had a history all its own. Phone lines didn’t arrive until the 1960s, along with its first paved road. The town—and access to Vegas—grew, but it was still a unique entity with a very distinct personality.

  Including wineries and the successful and legal brothel ranches that boasted, at any one time, as many as twenty prostitutes taking clients.

  Paul had done his homework on the place. And he hoped to God that he didn’t have to tell Haley that her sister had switched from using her looks to gain a rich husband, to selling her body to support herself.

  If Kelsey was employed by one of the brothels, and had gotten pregnant, the baby very well could be in danger. Especially if the father was someone who had money and didn’t want it known that he’d paid for sex. Or if he didn’t want his wife and family to know that he had an illegitimate child.

  He also wasn’t looking forward to Haley figuring out that if the baby had disappeared and was “in wrong hands,” there was a chance it had been sold. Human trafficking, especially of babies, was a far more prominent business than a lot of people knew. He’d traced a trafficker once and knew much more than he wanted to on that subject.

  Paul let all the pieces he had regarding Kelsey Carmichael roll around in his mind.

  With one currently on constant repeat.

  Marcus Grainger’s largest, most publicized client was Sister’s Ranch, a luxurious brothel just outside town. Almost every case that had come up, and most internet mentions, of the prominent attorney were linked in one way or another to the sex ranch.

  He didn’t plan to tell Haley that unless he had to.

  She’d react emotionally.

  He didn’t blame her. He just couldn’t do the job she’d hired him to do if he was focused on how Haley was feeling.

  He’d found a blog on Grainger’s own website that talked about the man’s penchant for a round of golf after church on Sunday mornings—there’d been a point to the story, Paul just hadn’t bothered to remember it—and that’s where he was headed. To the golf course.

  As he told Haley when she asked how he planned to get to the attorney on a Sunday morning.

  He knew how to play. She didn’t. Neither of them was dressed for a round. “We’re going to be there long before he is,” he told her. “I’m hoping to catch him in the parking lot, preferably alone, and ask for just a minute of his time. Usually showing my credentials is all it takes to at least get that. In this case, I expect him to comply, if for no other reason, than to make certain that I don’t have something on a client that he’s going to want a heads-up on.”

  When she met his gaze, those big brown eyes of hers speaking their own language to him amidst soft features lined with worry, he wanted to tell her about the brothel. To let her know where they were most likely headed, but as a tracer, he knew he couldn’t.

  “What do you think our chances are that there’s really a baby?”

  Her question took him by surprise. “I have no idea.” It was his professional opinion. He just didn’t know yet. It was a piece of information sitting on the “table” in the form of knowing about the note that had been left on Haley’s door. The possibility was figuring into every other piece of information he had. But...

  “Just your opinion, Paul, not a professional assessment. Do you think there’s a baby?”

  Considering what he knew about Sister’s Ranch? “I think there’s a good chance that there is.”

  She nodded, and sat beside him silently as they waited in the parking lot for the lawyer to show up to play golf.