She shook her head. “I called Quentin. Told him I wanted to mail you some pictures I’d found, asked if he had your current address.”
Of course Quentin would give it out. The guy was as honest as the day is long and the least suspicious person Sean had ever met. He was the only friend from Stanford that Sean had kept in touch with, they’d worked on some computer systems together—he’d even invited him to the wedding.
Sean was going to have a talk with him. He worked for one of the biggest computer gaming companies in Seattle. He should be more security-conscious.
“Madison, you don’t know—”
“Yes, I do. Something is wrong and I need you to find them.”
The last thing Sean wanted to do was go to Mexico to find his ex-girlfriend’s husband and son. Yet … they could be in trouble. Kane was itching for work. If this job seemed tame enough, Sean could ask Kane to do it. But he needed more information.
“How is your marriage? Are you separated? Divorcing? Any reason for Carson to leave the country with your son?”
All standard questions Sean would ask any potential client—even if he had no intention of taking the job. Kane would ask him, and he needed the answers.
“No, we’re fine.”
He raised an eyebrow. “Are you sure?”
“Yes! I’m positive.”
“Why are you coming to me? Your father can hire the best PI in the business.”
“Rogan-Caruso is the best.”
That was certainly true, but Ronald McAllister hated Sean, and he would never let her hire RCK. Still, there were a couple of other firms RCK could refer her to.
“Truthfully, if it’s a kidnapping, you need to talk to my brother Kane. He works south of the border. The best way to reach him is through JT Caruso. I’ll call him for you, but I don’t work for RCK anymore.”
Her lip quivered. “But I need you.”
“Madison, this just isn’t something I can do.” He wasn’t going to work for his ex-girlfriend six weeks before his wedding. Not only because it was awkward, but because he had a wedding to organize. And a honeymoon. He wanted—needed—to be home at night for Lucy, especially when she was working a difficult case like the one in Laredo.
Madison scraped off the last of the nail polish on her left thumb. “I think Carson got involved in something he can’t get out of, and now my son is in the middle of it. I’ll die if anything happens to him.”
Against Sean’s better judgment, he asked, “What exactly did your husband get involved in?”
She knew, he could see it in the way she avoided looking him in the eye.
“Madison, you need to be completely honest with me.”
She stood up and paced. Madison had always been a beautiful woman—the kind of beauty that was graceful, classic, almost like a porcelain doll. Age had improved her.
But he also knew her tells, the way she avoided his gaze, the way she wrung her hands, the scraping of the polish, so discreet, as if no one would notice.
She had a secret and she didn’t want to tell him.
Sean walked to the door. He didn’t have time for games. “I’m sorry you came all this way, but we’re through.”
She spun around, a flash of anger in her vivid green eyes. “Do you think this was easy for me? Coming here, asking for your help?”
“Then why did you?”
She tilted her chin up. “Carson is a lawyer for a start-up. But he made some bad investments a few years ago and refused to go to my father to bail him out. He has a strong sense of pride—a lot like you, Sean.”
That grated. Their breakup had been more or less mutual—he’d been expelled, after all, and moving cross-country. Long-distance relationships rarely worked, especially not as teenagers. And then there was his anger—that Madison’s father had forbidden her to see him and they snuck around, that he’d been expelled in the first place even though he’d done the right thing, that his brother Duke had made an agreement Sean didn’t want to sign, but had no choice because he was still a minor and Duke was his legal guardian. Sean had a lot of anger buried under his happy-go-lucky, partying lifestyle.
“Don’t compare me to your husband, Madison.”
“He took a freelance accounting job—before he went to law school, he was an accountant. He didn’t lie to me—he told me he was going to Mexico on business. I just think it wasn’t for the start-up—it was for this other business.”
“What other business?”
“I don’t know! I’m telling you the truth, Sean. I never asked. Maybe—I didn’t want to know. Carson is a good man, but over the last couple years he’s become sullen. We had more money than ever before, but it didn’t seem to make him happy.”
“Money doesn’t make anyone happy.”
“You don’t understand!”
“I understand a lot more than you think. He’s a lawyer and an accountant. Freelance? He was laundering money for someone. It’s as clear as day.”
“No.”
But there was no venom in her voice. She’d thought the same thing.