Gone missing, p.1
Gone Missing, page 1
Gone Missing
Gone Missing Investigations
By Jami Davenport
THIS BOOK IS A PLACEHOLDER, AND DOES NOT CONTAIN THE UPDATED CONTENT.
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Copyright © 2018 by Cedrona Enterprises
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The Seattle Sockeyes™, Seattle Steelheads™, and Seattle Skookums™ are fictional sports teams. Game On in Seattle™ is a series of sports romance novels The names and logos are created for the sole use of the owner and covered under protection of trademark.
This book is a work of fiction. While reference might be made to actual historical events or existing locations, the names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
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Blurb
With a missing father, a murderous brother, and a marriage of convenience, Becca Gatlinburg's life is one hot mess…and it's about to get hotter.
After overhearing her brother and fiancé plotting to kill her, Becca runs away the night before her wedding. Desperate to save her life and find out the truth behind her father’s disappearance, she enters into a bargain with the devil in the form of a gorgeous, irreverent soldier turned PI. She’s in over her head and sinking fast.
The last thing Bronson Warner ever wanted was to be a groom. The second to the last thing he ever wanted was to be a dad. Through a weird twist of fate, he's now both within the span of a few weeks. His solitary life has been upturned and stomped on by a wife who’s his exact opposite and teenagers who have their own tragic secret, and it's his responsibility to keep them all safe.
As Bronson strives to protect his new family, he realizes not only are their lives in danger, but so is his heart.
Chapter 1—What Goes Up
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A man about to win his second Super Bowl should be a lot more excited about it.
Like a well-programmed robot, Tyler Harris zeroed in on his receiver, instinctively calculated the distance, and hurled the ball into the air. The second the football left his hands he knew it’d be a touchdown catch.
His cousin and the Seattle Steelheads top wide receiver, Derek Ramsey, blazed into the end zone with his lightning speed, spun around at the exact right moment, and caught the ball.
Ty waited for the smugness, the confidence, the satisfaction to surge through him. He waited for the greatest natural high on earth to engulf him, a high better than the best sex, and that was pretty damn, fucking good.
Usually.
But nothing happened. Absolutely nothing.
Two more minutes to glory. The defense took the field and held the Bruins. The clock ticked off the last seconds until the scoreboard displayed: 00:00.
The stands erupted. Confetti blinded Tyler in a snowstorm of red, white, and blue. The stuff swirled through the air and stuck to his sweat-soaked uniform. Teammates slapped his back. Coaches hugged him. The roar of the fans deafened him. Sportscasters crammed microphones in his face and barked questions at him. Rabid reporters yanked on his Number Eleven jersey and fought for his attention.
He stood frozen in place, staring at the scoreboard. He felt more like a shell-shocked soldier than a conquering field general who’d led his troops to victory in the final battle and won the war.
Except he wasn’t a general. He wasn’t a fucking hero. He’d never risked his life to save others. He’d never tramped through the desert or the jungle not knowing if his next step would be his last. He’d never sacrificed so others could have a better life or even have a life. He was just a guy gifted with an athletic body and a no-quit attitude.
He didn’t deserve this: the adulation, the money, the fame, none of it.
But since when did he give a shit if it was deserved or not?
What the fuck was wrong with him?
Every football player lived for this moment from the first second he gripped a football in his hands. It should’ve been the happiest time of his life, a defining moment in a career of defining moments; two Super Bowls under his belt and a sure MVP of the game. He was a future Hall-of-Famer with a lot of gas left in his tank, still in his prime, not yet thirty years old. The press touted him as the hottest QB in the league.
Nowhere to go from here but—
—down.
Nothing had been the same since his teenage buddy Ryan died after a painful battle with cancer. Try as he might, he couldn’t resurrect his passion for the game, for life, for anything. Hell, not even for sex.
Like a disembodied spirit, he observed the scene, detached and way too fucking melancholy in the midst of the celebratory mayhem engulfing him. Jostled around by the sea of humanity, he barely felt them. He stood in the middle of the crowd, numb, apathetic, and alone. The emptiness smothered him, gnawed at his gut, consumed him.
Regardless of his apathy, he wouldn’t rain on his teammates’ parade.
Forcing a grin he didn’t feel and adopting his cocky façade, he faced the television cameras and gave them what they’d come to expect from him, an arrogant, yet entertaining, recap of his performance. Then he stood on the podium, and made one of his typical fist-pumping speeches laced with wry humor. After which he did every post-game interview with his usual brash panache. No one noticed his mechanical movements or the dead smile.
Was this all there was?
What had happened to his legendary enthusiasm for the game, his penchant for living life on the edge? What happened to him? He’d lost himself somewhere between college jock and superstar athlete, yet it hadn’t mattered before. He’d lived in blissful ignorance until that fateful night when Ryan died.
If you stripped away all the hype and his public image, he didn’t have a fucking clue who lived underneath.
All this deep shit rattling around in his brain was way too much introspection for him. He shook off this momentary lapse into deep thought, took a deep breath, and squared his shoulders. In a week, he’d start the relentless pursuit of winning all over again because losing, for Tyler, had never been an option.
Glancing at his watch, he followed his teammates out of the locker room via a back door, down the long hallway leading to buses waiting to take them to the airport. A couple hours and a few glasses of champagne later the team plane touched down in Seattle. Security hustled them past the large crowds to waiting limos.
Waving and grinning, he acknowledged the hordes of fans crammed into every spare inch of terminal space. He paused and breathed in the crisp Seattle air. His teammates shouted to each other, planning parties which would last well into the morning.
Cass, his long-time fiancée and even longer-time girlfriend, would expect to attend every one of them. She’d already texted him with her location at a teammate’s home on Lake Washington. The Vegas line against them ever getting married had once topped out at fifty-to-one and dipped to fifteen-to-one after he’d set a date for two weeks from today.
Claustrophobia set in, smothering him. He was trapped, trapped in a career he no longer had a hunger for. His self-created, bad-boy image pigeonholed him in a role he wasn’t sure he wanted to play. His upcoming wedding in two weeks weighted him down with doubt. Cass and him were fire and ice. Hot as hell one moment and barely speaking to each other the next.
He needed to escape, clear his head, gain some clarity.
Tyler slid behind the wheel of his sports car and accelerated out of the underground parking garage. His wheels spun on the rain-slickened streets as he turned a corner too quickly. Instead of heading toward I-5 and Mercer Island for a night of celebration, he turned in the opposite direction, dodging in and out of cars on the four-lane street. The light ahead turned yellow, Tyler punched the gas.
And slammed right into the back of a police car.
Chapter 2—Must Come Down
Lavender Mead sniffled and rubbed her puffy eyes. They burned like hell from crying most of the night and into the morning. Hugging herself tight, she bli nked back more tears.
All around her, fellow islanders hunched their shoulders against the incessant February rain, as they gathered in clusters near the shore of Outlaw Bay. The protected bay had been named for all the smugglers, rum-runners, and various other criminals who’d sought refuge there, not to mention the Harris family of the 1920s, renowned for their bootlegging, among other things.
Behind her, Art Harris’s decrepit mansion clung to the slope above the rotting marina, like a stubborn old lady refusing to surrender to the ravages of time.
Dang, but Lavender was going to miss the old bachelor.
She’d met Art eight years ago, shortly after moving next door to Twin Cedars, his run-down estate. At nineteen she’d just dropped out of college with no future plans, an island-sized chip on her shoulder, and a fondness for self-destruction. Madrona Island was one of Washington’s San Juan Islands, nestled between the Olympic Peninsula and Vancouver Island and a fitting refuge for someone who wanted to disappear for a while. With only a few thousand full-time residents, Madrona was home to billionaires, artists, recluses, and nature lovers.
The crotchety old man had chewed her ass for feeding his fat cat, who was on a diet. How the heck was she to know? The cat had bitched at her door, and she’d assumed he was a stray, a very fat stray. Art’s cantankerous attitude hadn’t fazed Lavender in the least. Impressed he couldn’t intimidate her, he’d invited her to sit on the marina bulkhead with him and fish. They never caught anything, but they talked a lot.
The next day Lavender had cooked her five-alarm chili and carried it over to him. One bite and two glasses of water later, he declared it the best damn chili ever. From that point on, they forged a lasting friendship, a lonely old man and a lonely young woman. Art filled a hole left by a dad who chose football over his daughter. In exchange, she became his family. At least, the only family who gave a shit about him.
Now her one rock in the storm was gone.
Another sob welled up in her throat. Funerals were supposed to give closure, help people move on.
Not working so far.
She yanked a tissue from her pocket and blew her nose. Mrs. Malacotty handed her another tissue and patted her arm. Lavender managed a weak smile but nothing eased the ache inside her.
Art died in a nursing home. Alone. She should’ve been there. Instead she’d stayed on the island, kidding herself he’d recover enough to come back home, but he hadn’t. No amount of praying and singing gave a person closure on that kind of guilt.
A gusty wind blew in off the water, pelting Lavender’s face with rain. The big, fat drops mixed with her tears and left salty trails down her cheeks. Good thing she hadn’t bothered with makeup. She pulled up the hood on her raincoat and hunkered down, teeth chattering. In front of her, the minister droned on like a stubborn mosquito buzzing in her ear. His bright yellow raincoat squeaked every time he shifted his fat body. Lavender hiccupped and covered her mouth with her hand.
Meanwhile, Art’s only nephew stood at the head of the marina dock, not appearing the least bit grief-stricken, and most likely counting the hours until the reading of the will.
In all the years she’d been Art’s neighbor, never once had his nieces or nephew visited him, which branded them as despicable people in her book. Senior citizens deserved to be surrounded by family and friends in their golden years, not discarded and forgotten.
Even worse the nephew happened to be Tyler Harris, a jock to rival all jocks and an entitled asshole.
Tyler stood to one side of the preacher and surveyed the crowd with stony indifference. Dark circles settled in the hollows of his cheekbones giving him a haggard look. Most likely, he’d been dragged out of some party at 3 a.m. and hauled to the island.
Tyler’s detached gaze settled on Lavender. Turquoise blue eyes drilled into her until she squirmed. She’d never seen eyes that color before, like a South Pacific lagoon, but not nearly as inviting. Regardless, she couldn’t look away, couldn’t shake the spell he’d cast on her with one hot, unnerving gaze.
Several locks of dark, wet hair fell across his high forehead. His brows drew together as he squinted through the rain. A day’s growth of stubble darkened his cheeks and strong jaw. One corner of his mouth lifted in a half-hearted bad-boy smile. Her heart, already woozy from grief, flopped over and begged for mercy.
Mentally she slapped herself for admiring a piece of eye candy during Art’s funeral. What kind of a sorry soul did that? Even if it had been a while. Everything had a proper place and time, and this wasn’t it. Wrenching her gaze away, she faked complete attention to the service, all the while fidgeting under Tyler’s shameless scrutiny.
The preacher stumbled through his eulogy as raindrops smudged the ink on his handwritten notes. Finally finished, he nodded to a group of Art’s cronies who’d christened themselves as the Island Yankee Brotherhood. They shuffled forward in their military uniforms, buttons bursting and fabric straining around their shoulders. Except for big Ed. He’d draped his too small uniform jacket over his shoulders.
Homer, the leader of the Brotherhood, lifted a trumpet to his lips and blew out the first notes of what had to be Taps. The Brothers stood at attention, while the other guests held their hands over their hearts. Even Tyler Harris placed one big hand over his chest, most likely to call attention to the Super Bowl ring on his finger. The diamonds on the gaudy thing cut through the gloom like a light in a lighthouse.
Halfway through Taps, Homer hesitated. His eyes glazed over. He repeated da-ta-da once, twice, three times, over and over like a broken record stuck in one spot. The Brothers didn’t budge one muscle, while the rest of the guests glanced at one another. Finally, Jim Miller elbowed Homer in the ribs. He woke from his stupor after one last ear-splitting, off-key note and lowered the trumpet.
All eyes turned to the dock and Tyler Harris. Lavender averted her eyes to avoid another round of disturbing eye contact. Her gaze fastened onto his impressive body. Even hidden beneath a raincoat, his broad shoulders and wide chest were visible, along with his long legs. The rain plastered his wet pants to his muscular thighs. His strong calves and ankles ended at big feet. Really big feet. Which from her experience meant—
Big mistake. Mega big one. This would never—ever—do. Jocks were not on her recommended diet, no matter how delectable they might appear on the outside. She’d sworn off any man with the channel numbers for ESPN worn out on his remote.
Lavender scrubbed her face with her hands and banished her current line of thinking.
The preacher handed Tyler a football-shaped urn, courtesy of a local ceramics shop. He stared blankly at it and wrapped his long fingers around it. After giving it a few practice tosses, Tyler spun on his heel and lurched down the rickety dock. The rotted structure rocked from side to side with each step causing Tyler to stagger like a drunk on a three-day binge.
He stopped near the end and braced his legs apart for balance. The dock groaned and creaked as waves beat at the pilings. His athletic body countered every jolt with ease. He stood in profile, his head thrown back, staring out to the water, like a defiant conqueror. His strong chin jutted out, accentuating a slight cleft. His unruly hair, in need of a haircut, plastered against his forehead, but he didn’t bother to pull up his hood.
Cat, Art’s orange tabby, rubbed around Lavender’s legs and meowed, demanding attention. She ignored the prima donna so the tabby head-butted her legs. She pushed him away with her foot. His green eyes bored into hers. He twitched his tail from side to side. “Shhh.” She held a finger to her lips.
The cat yowled again. She bent down to grab him, but he eluded her. When she took a step toward him, he streaked toward the dock, weaving in and out of the crowd like a running back heading for the end zone.
“No!” Lavender scrambled after the cat but stopped short of the unstable dock.
Tyler hefted the football urn over his head and cocked his arm. An orange flash darted between his legs. He stumbled in an attempt to avoid stepping on the tabby cat. His front foot couldn’t find purchase on the slippery planks and shot out from under him and off the edge of the dock. The urn smashed onto the dock, shattered, and sent gritty gray ash flying everywhere, coating the preacher and anyone within several feet. Tyler’s ass followed his foot, skidding across the dock and off the edge. His big body crashed into the icy cold water.
