Ignoring his companion, Griff pulled out his phone. He kept the gun pointed toward Matthew as he hit his top speed-dial number. Seconds later Rylan was answering.
“Hey, Rylan, I have a change of plans,” Griff said. “I’m at a warehouse owned by Lawrence Jacobs. I’ll text you the address.” He grimaced as Rylan spent the next minute questioning Griff ’s sanity in a voice loud enough to wake the dead. “I’m not alone,” Griff grimly assured his friend. “I’m with Matthew Jacobs. He made an unexpected visit to my house. He claims he’s here to track down Ronnie Hyde. I’ll explain when you get here.” There was another furious tirade where Rylan promised to kick Griff ’s ass as soon as he arrived at the warehouse. Waiting until his friend had to take a breath, Griff intruded into his tirade. “Did you manage to find out anything?”
There was a long pause before Rylan revealed what he’d learned. Griff grimaced at the description of the three women and one man who’d been burned to a crisp, even as he accepted that the deaths were a copy of the Morning Star. The killers were here. And it was very possible that they had stolen Carmen from his bed.
His gaze locked on Matthew’s stiff profile. One way or another, Griff was going to find her. Or die trying.
“Do they have any leads?” he demanded into the phone. He hissed as Rylan shared what a witness had claimed to see pulling out of a parking lot near the bluff where the bodies were found. “A white van? Did she get a license plate number? Damn.”
Dread crawled through him like a living force. He could almost feel Carmen’s fear. As if she was reaching out to him, urging him to hurry. “Where are you now?” he demanded, his jaw tightening with frustration when Rylan revealed that he was headed to Los Angeles to meet with a contact who had access to a satellite. He hoped they might get lucky enough to have captured a picture of the van leaving the area. A fine idea, but Griff needed him at the warehouse.
“Join me here as soon as you can,” he said, ending the connection.
He didn’t doubt that Rylan was already leaping into his car and heading his way at breakneck speed. But he wasn’t sure that would be fast enough.
“Get out,” he commanded, crawling out of the car. He kept the gun at his side, his finger on the trigger. He didn’t want some nosy passerby calling the cops because a madman was walking around the streets waving a gun.
He quickly moved around the hood of the car, standing close beside Matthew as the younger man stepped out of the car and slammed shut the door.
“You haven’t told me why you think Ronnie would take Carrie,” Matthew complained.
Griff ignored the question, his gaze searching the warehouse for the best way to sneak inside.
“Is there a back entrance?” he demanded.
“Through the loading docks,” Matthew said.
Griff hesitated. It could easily be a trap. But what choice did he have? He couldn’t wait for Rylan. And he certainly had no intention of waiting for the cops.
“Tell me about the security.”
“We have basic fire alarms, motion sensors, keypad locks, and we have guards on duty twenty-four seven,” Matthew said.
Griff ’s gaze traced the fence with professional attention. This stuff he understood.
“What about surveillance cameras?”
Matthew lifted his hands in a helpless motion. “I know they’re inside. There might be a few in the parking lot. I’m not sure.”
Griff made a sound of disgust. Did this man know anything about the Jacobs business?
“What is it that you do for your father?” he demanded.
Matthew arched a brow, a hint of condescension in his expression. “I charm investors and grease wheels when necessary.”
Griff ’s lips twisted. It was easy to imagine Matthew schmoozing with the local authorities, trying to ensure they gave out extra tax breaks and turned a blind eye to any zoning codes that might be inconvenient for the company.
“Yeah, I can imagine you’re good at greasing wheels,” he muttered, moving so he could press the gun against Matthew’s lower back. “We’re going to circle the block and enter the warehouse from the loading dock. One wrong move from you and I’ll shoot a hole in your kidney,” he warned. “Got it?”
“Christ, I should have made Baylor come out here to take care of Ronnie,” Matthew groused. “No one would care if you put a hole in his kidney. Or anywhere else.”
Assuming that the younger man understood that he was deadly serious, Griff jerked his head toward the corner. He intended to avoid the front of the warehouse and the parking lot. If someone was inside watching the security cameras, he didn’t want to alert them that he was there.
They headed casually along the sidewalk, just two men out for a stroll. It wasn’t until they’d reached the empty lot at the back of the warehouse that Griff crossed the street to halt behind a stack of wooden pallets.
From his position he could study the two large loading docks. They were tightly closed, but there was a steel door between them. He leaned around the edge of the pallets, searching for any sign of the white van.
Nothing.
So what did that mean? His earlier fear that Matthew had been cleverly leading him on a wild-goose chase while Carmen was being taken far away returned with a vengeance. His fingers tightened on the gun.
If he’d been played, he really was going to shoot the bastard.
Then his gaze caught sight of something near the steps that led to the back entrance. It was long and dark, and at first Griff assumed that someone had thrown out a rolled-up carpet. The longer he studied the object, however, the more he began to suspect that it was something far more sinister than an old rug.
Beside him, Matthew heaved a sigh. As if he found being held at gunpoint a tedious way to spend his morning. Certainly not as exciting as lying beside a pool with half-naked models.
“Are we going in, or what?” the man demanded.
Griff frowned. “Do you see something next to the loading dock?”
Matthew glanced across the empty lot before giving a small shrug. “It looks like a pile of trash.”
“No.” Griff gave a shake of his head. “It looks like a person. Come on.”
Motioning Matthew forward, Griff used his companion as a shield as they slowly crossed the lot. If someone was going to get shot, it wasn’t going to be him.
As they neared the building, however, Matthew’s pace slowed as the younger man realized that Griff had been right. It wasn’t trash that had been tossed out the back door. Instead, a man in a dark uniform was sprawled at an awkward angle on the hard pavement.
“That’s one of the guards,” Matthew whispered, as if abruptly recognizing that this wasn’t some strange California game that Griff was playing. “Look at his head. It’s bleeding.”
Griff had already crouched down to inspect the man.
The dark uniform easily identified him as a rent-a-cop. He was middle-aged with thick streaks of gray in his dark hair and a flabbiness that might once have been muscle. His square face was unnaturally pale, emphasizing the nasty gash that split open his forehead.
It looked as if he’d been struck with something narrow. Like a steel pipe. Or a crowbar. Whatever it was, it’d done enough damage to fracture the poor man’s skull.
Reaching out, he touched the man’s neck. No pulse.
“He’s dead,” he said in a bleak voice.
“Dead?” Matthew stumbled back, nearly falling on his ass. “Are you sure?”
“Sure enough.” Griff straightened, urgency pounding through him. The guard’s skin had still been warm. Which meant he hadn’t been dead for long. There was still a chance that if Carmen was inside he could save her. “I need you to put your code into the keypad.”
Matthew was shaking his head, his eyes rolling like a horse who was about to bolt.
“Hell, no. I’m not going in there,” he rasped. “We need to call the cops.”
“There’s no time,” Griff snapped. “Carmen could be inside.”
“I didn’t sign up for this,” Matthew whined.
Griff stepped forward, placing the gun against the man’s forehead.
“Consider yourself signed up.”
Chapter Twenty-Three