When Hector started to make a dash for their car, Noelle stopped him with a shouted, “Let’s find out which car belongs to Gordman. I have an idea.”
Without asking any questions, he pressed the bruiser’s limp hand into every ID panel on every car parked on the street. Took ten minutes, and they were soaked to the bone, but finally their efforts paid off. The locks to a black BMW automatically unlatched.
“Thank you,” Noelle said, sliding inside. Dirty water pooled around her, probably staining the seat, definitely leaving a ring. Hector couldn’t say he was sorry. The stupid bastard had cracked one of his ribs. He deserved this and more. “You can lock him in our car now.”
He did, with no finesse whatsoever, and returned to Noelle. “What are you doing?”
She’d already ripped the console apart, hooked her cell phone to the appropriate wire, and was currently scrolling through… something. “I’m checking his GPS. He has no known address, and I’ll bet that means he’s been living with his boss. Neither of them would have wanted that on the record, you know. Anyway, that’s the address he would have visited the most.”
A moment of silence as Hector absorbed her words. “Smart.” And damned impressive.
“I know.”
He grinned. Adrenaline still pumped through his veins, but his arms were chilled out, and that was good. Being worked over by Noelle before the fight had probably saved that building and everyone in it. Not that he could ever let something like that happen again.
His grin faded. “Can you record every address he’s visited in the past year?” His voice was harsher than he’d intended. “Maybe we’ll find where other women are being kept.”
“Now who’s the smart one? I’ll send each one to Mia.”
A few more minutes passed, the rain hammering at his bruised body. Damn, but Gordman had iron in his knuckles. Worth it, though. Had the guy gone for Noelle, Hector wasn’t sure what he would have done or how he would have reacted. He’d had only one thought: protect her. And he’d been willing to kill—and die—to do so.
“Most visited place is indeed a residence,” she said. “Wealthy side of town, two streets over from my mother.”
One step closer to the truth, to closing this case successfully. Saving lives. “Check and find out who owns the house—”
“Done!” Silver eyes sparkled with glee as she whistled. “We have a name. Xavier Phillips. I’ve never met him, but I’ve seen him around and I know his reputation. He’s respected, a real hardass in the import/export business. Blond… like the superhero sketch.”
And yet another step, because of Noelle. He couldn’t believe that he’d once thought she would ruin every case she worked. Without her, he wouldn’t have gotten far. He owed her, in more ways than one.
Thirty-six
XAVIER PHILLIPS. SHIT.”
Hector and Noelle sat in Mia’s office. Biggest office in AIR HQ, but small nonetheless. The ceiling was painted to look like a bright morning sky. Her desk was cluttered with equipment and weapons. A holoboard consumed one entire wall, photos and notes from all ongoing cases like tiny neon signs throughout.
“He’s as rich as I am,” Noelle said, “and we won’t be able to book an appointment to see him. Well, we will, we just won’t see him. We’ll flash our badges and his employees will pretend to cooperate. His attorneys will call us back—they’re always on site, guaranteed—and inform us that Phillips is out of town. An emergency. We’ll make another appointment, but there will always be something keeping him away.”
“Plus, we don’t exactly have any hard evidence against him,” Hector said. And he doubted Gordman, who was currently in lockup, sealed tight and being kept unconscious—just in case he had a cyanide pill they hadn’t found or had a way of contacting his boss—would give them anything.
The GPS from the car was considered circumstantial. Gordman could have been threatening Phillips, an attorney would say, visiting his property without permission. Or even that Gordman had been working on his own, without Phillips’s knowledge.
“So what do you want me to do?” Mia leaned back in her chair and folded her arms over her middle. She’d pulled her hair into a high ponytail and looked as young and innocent as kindergartener, not at all like the stone-cold killer she was.
“There’s a charity gala this weekend, and I’m betting he’ll be there,” Noelle said. “Tickets are two thousand a pop, and I have two.”
The reminder of her status made him uncomfortable, but nothing like before. She’d made her feelings for him clear. Respect. Desire. She was, by far, the world’s most amazing woman.
Mine. I want her to be mine. Only, ever mine.
He rubbed the back of his neck. “We can question him there. Try to trip him up, maybe get him to say something stupid that we can use against him later.”
“He’s too smart for that,” Mia said.
“We have to try.”
“Maybe. But around a crowd of rich people? I don’t like it.” The head of AIR frowned. “He’s a ruthless murderer, and if he strikes there…”
“With Gordman under arrest, and our agents raiding his warehouses”—already eight otherworlder females had been found, drugged out and awaiting auction, but they still couldn’t prove Phillips had anything to do with it yet—“he’ll know we’re hot on his trail,” Hector said. “We have to strike now.”
Heavy silence. A heavier sigh. “I had a holophoto of Phillips the moment you gave me his name. We showed it to each of tonight’s girls. Nothing. Gordman, on the other hand… they went hysterical at the sight of him.”
“Don’t you want to nail the man who put such a tool in charge?” Noelle asked, sly, so sly. “The party will allow us to gift-wrap him for you. But, okay, fine. You’d rather wait, give him time to hide evidence and kidnap more girls, that way—”
“God, you’re annoying.” Mia waved a hand through the air. “Fine. Go to the charity thing. Talk to Phillips, but no casualities or I swear to God you’re both fired.”
Noelle blinked innocently, and Hector had to stifle a laugh. No one mentioned her taking someone else, and for that he was grateful. He knew Dallas would have been a better choice. Smoother, able to suck up with a smile. Hector would be prickly and out of place, but no way in hell would he let Noelle go in without him.