“Not saying that’s who I’m looking for but if it were, my client would think so.” The other man shook his head ruefully. “And as you pointed out to me, there’s other people here to ensure my client’s property is returned in a timely manner. If you help me, then you can be sure she will be delivered in one piece. I won’t harm a hair on her head. The others may not be so careful with her.”
A red haze developed along the edges of Rojas’s vision. “Leave.”
“So that’s a ‘no’ then.” The man looked from Rojas to Souze and back again. “Look, it’s best to stay way the hell away from this girl. Even if my contract ends here, they may have paid me very good money to locate her and possibly install a tracking device on her vehicle. My client’s not going to stop just because of one scary boyfriend and his killer mutt.”
Rojas took a step forward, letting Souze have some slack in his leash. The big dog took up the slack, his fur bristling until the GSD looked significantly larger than he had even a minute prior. “Tell me how you report in. What’s the contact number?”
The man’s eyes widened. He held up his hands, fingers spread wide. “No, man. No. I’m a private investigator. I guarantee my clients’ anonymity. You’d ruin my business.”
Rojas took another step forward. Then another. Souze was almost in snapping range, and Rojas wasn’t particularly worried about this guy making a run for it. He wouldn’t be caught running in front of his competition. No, he was going to try to keep up appearances.
“You can give me the number or I can hand over the security feed showing you tampering with Elisa Hall’s car to the police.” Rojas decided to keep his tone pleasant. It freaked people out more than rage. “After you spend a few hours explaining yourself to them, you can convince your client that you didn’t breach his privacy.”
The other man broke out into a sweat. Literally. Oh, he might be good at tailing spouses heading out for clandestine meetings with their illicit lovers. He might be good at tracking down the odd person trying to avoid a debt or fulfilling a contract. He was probably capable of putting on a good show, intimidating the run-of-the-mill person guilty enough to have something to hide. But he wasn’t someone who made his life in the business of real violence.
As Souze uttered another low warning growl, Rojas made sure he had a good grip on the dog’s lead. This man might piss himself in another five seconds, but if he did something stupid, Rojas didn’t want to sully his dog on this slimy bastard’s flesh. It was one thing to intimidate but another thing entirely to let Souze loose in an uncontrolled civilian environment.
Fortunately, the other man didn’t know that.
“Okay. Okay. Here’s the agency’s card.” With a shaking hand, the man fished a card out of his shirt pocket and tossed it to the ground at Rojas’s feet.
Rojas didn’t bend to pick it up. He kept his gaze steady on his target. “You can get in your car and drive away now.”
*
Rojas pulled in to Hope’s Crossing Kennels and put his car into park. “Why don’t you take Souze for a walk around the perimeter?”
Elisa looked at him, surprised.
He’d disappeared once he’d come to get Souze and she’d ended up waiting a decent amount of time for him to come back. It’d been awkward, actually, but the men training at Revolution MMA had been very polite and charming as they invited her to wait on the benches where parents usually sat to watch the kids’ classes.
Once he’d returned, Alex had hustled her into his car with little explanation. He’d also been silent on the drive over. The tension in the car upset her until she realized she was trying to make herself as small as possible as she sat in the passenger seat. Even then, she couldn’t bring herself to ask him what he was thinking about or otherwise break the silence.
Conversation was not one of Alex Rojas’s strong points.
“If you just took Souze for a walk, why does he need to go again?” He might not be used to someone calling him out, but she wasn’t going to just go do things without a reason. Employer or not.
Alex didn’t seem irritated, though, only distracted. “I’ve got a couple of things to talk to Forte and Cruz about before we start the day. Souze is a little worked up, so the walk would do him good.”
Elisa chewed on her lower lip and made a guess. “You went out to my car this morning. Did you find out anything?”
He hesitated for a long time. She got the sense he wasn’t going to lie to her, but he wasn’t ready to tell her what had transpired yet. “Some, but we’ve got a couple of facts to check first.”
But he’d found out some things. Several things, if there were facts to check. She didn’t want him to filter for her. “Will you talk about it with me there?”