Eye of the Storm (The Storm Series) (3 page)

“Here you go.” She dropped the keys in his hand and handed him some papers. “I printed out information on concussions. Make sure you follow what they tell you to do. If you have any symptoms that they list, come get me, and I’ll take you to the hospital. Lexi and Noah are still on their honeymoon. I’d appreciate it if you let me talk to her first before you go barging in there.”

“What makes you think I’d go barging in there?” When she didn’t say anything, just staring at him with a look of disbelief on her face, he continued. “Fine, I thought they were due back yesterday.”

“Do I want to know how you found out about that? It’s not exactly public knowledge.” She shook her head. “Never mind. They decided to stay a week or two longer. I’ll have a talk with Lexi when she gets back. This is something that has to be done in person and not over the phone. I’m not going to ruin her honeymoon because of Jeremy. He’s taken enough from her already. Now let me show you to the cottage so you can get settled and we can talk more, later.”

Very quickly she showed him to the cottage not saying much. Once he was inside she left quickly. The next thing Anthony knew he was left alone looking at the back of the closed door. He walked to the window and watched her walking back towards the main house. He wasn’t sure where this journey was going to take him but by the looks of it, it was going to be one hell of a ride.

Anthony’s head was feeling better but there was still a dull ache behind his eyes. He couldn’t believe that old lady knocked him over the head. He had hoped this would be a quick trip, find out what Evie was up to and talk to Lexi, then out. He knew that it wasn’t her fault he went to prison, but it still angered him that he wasn’t able to prove his innocence, that most people believed he was capable of something like that. He learned quickly who his friends were and who just wanted something out of him.

He’d spread out the papers on top of the small table off the kitchen in the cottage. He looked around wondering where else he could put them. He might have to go get some tacks and put things up on the walls. He wasn’t worried about any damage; he would pay to have them repaired.

He had spent hours going over everything his people could dig up on Jeremy Ellison. It wasn’t pretty. It seems that Jeremy was responsible for Tiffani’s murder all those years ago. He felt an ache in his heart thinking about her. He wouldn’t say he loved her, but he cared for her. But love? No.

As far as Anthony could tell, Jeremy had been following him for years, and possibly killing women that got too close or fit a certain description. His men were still going back through everything to see if there were any strange disappearances or murders in and around the time that Anthony was traveling.

He started pacing the room.
How could I have been so stupid not to realize someone was following me and murdering women?
He shook his head; he couldn’t dwell on that. He had to look forward to finding this bastard and giving him what he deserves.

His thoughts were interrupted by a knock. Scowling he went to the door and opened it. There stood Evie, the setting sun shining through the clouds behind her. He was taken aback by her beauty and more harshly than intended said, “What?” He watched as she took a step back.

“Dinner’s ready,” she said. When he didn’t say anything she continued, “It states in the rental agreement that dinner is included. So,” she gestured with her hand towards the house, “dinner is ready.”

He nodded. “If you don’t mind, I think I’ll skip it.” He started to close the door.

Evie stepped forward essentially blocking him from shutting the door. “You might want to reconsider. If you don’t, they’re just going to find another way to grill you. I’m sure The Trio is in your reports, and I can guarantee there is no way it could cover everything they’ve done. They will let nothing stop them until they get answers. Get it out of the way now and they might leave you alone. You really don’t know what they’re capable of.”

Anthony stood there and tried to remember what his research had said about the old ladies. He was beginning to think he should have paid more attention to that part. He sighed. “Fine, just let me lock up.”

“You don’t have to do that. We don’t have a lot of crime around here.”

“If it’s all the same to you, I will. Jeremy is out there somewhere and I don’t want him in there.”

“You’re right.”

Walking toward the house, he was happy she didn’t try to fill the silence with nonsense. He just wanted to get this over with and back to figuring out what Jeremy’s next step might be.

He wondered when she would bring up the e-mail she sent to him. It had kept him up many a night as he tried to figure out what to do. Now that he was here he just wanted to get started. He felt frustrated that Lexi wasn’t here.

He walked into the room and took a mouth-watering deep breath of what was sure to be pot roast. He readied himself for the lion’s den. The three of them stood together on the other side of the table, their hands folded in front of them, attempting to look demure.

“I take it the weapons are locked up?”

Leigh moved forward and held out her hand to him. “Hey toots, I’m Leigh, sorry I didn’t introduce myself earlier. Yes, Evie took them away from us. Some nonsense about hurting ourselves.”

Solemnly shaking her hand he said, “I’m Anthony. I’m glad you no longer look like you want to bash my head in.”

Marie came up to him and looked at him through squinted eyes. “You’ve got some good bones and nice muscles. We’ll see what the personality's like. I’m Marie.”

He didn’t know what to think of these women. Looking over to Evie he saw her trying to hide a smile behind her hand and narrowed his eyes at her. Suddenly his face was gripped by strong fingers and he was forced to look into the eyes of one pissed off grandmother.

Speaking in a soft tone so that only he could hear her Evelyne forced him to bend down so that they were eye to eye. “Listen buster, you’d better be nice to that little girl over there otherwise smacking you upside your head with a frying pan will be the least of your worries.” Giving his face a little shake, she let him go.

“Okay, let’s eat.” Evie said in an overly cheerful voice.

He walked over to the only chair that’s back faced the wall and sat down so the ladies couldn’t sneak up behind him. “Do I have to worry about the food being poisoned?”

Leigh gasped. “Don’t ever say such a thing! Wasting perfectly good food? Never.” She piled heap upon heap of food on her plate.

He still held back and waited until they all started eating before he began. He closed his eyes when he tasted the food. Being locked up for five years he missed real food, especially home cooked. It was something he wasn’t going to take for granted any longer. Among other things...

He looked up when one of the women cleared their throat. Looking at each of them, he couldn’t guess the problem. “What?”

“Well, why don’t you tell us about yourself?” asked Marie.

“What do you want to know that you haven’t already read in the papers?”

With a sly look towards Evie, Leigh said, “Well, we really don’t know much about you. Just the things that have to do with that nasty Jeremy, and of course, Lexi. But what about you, where did you grow up, what are your plans, you know, things about you.”

Anthony sighed. He really didn’t want to talk about his life with these women. Looking at their hopeful faces, he knew they just wanted to try and figure things out and why he was here. He looked at Evie and thought she just might be right; it
would
be easier to just tell them what they wanted to know and get it over with

Starting with the easy things, he went back to the past. “I was born in Washington D.C., but my parents spent a lot of time between the States and London. My family has been in the import/export business for generations. When my father took over he wanted to expand, hence spending time here.”

“So then you traveled a lot when you were younger?” asked Leigh. “I always loved to travel.”

“Yes, we were a family, just the three of us, and they wanted to make sure that we stayed together as much as possible. When I got older, I wanted to spread my wings so I spent some time in the Seattle area on my own.” He became quiet and reflective.

Softly Evie asked, “Is that where you met Tiffani?”

He looked deep into her eyes. “Yes. It wasn’t love. I was just enjoying myself, as she was also. We both knew what the score was. What we didn’t know was how seriously messed up her ex was.”

“Have you been able to find out anything about him?”

“Some. After Tiffani was killed I went back to London to stay with my parents for a while. I needed something stable. Sadly, I had some losses soon after that.”

He paused and looked down where Evie had reached over and grabbed his hand. His heart contracted at the simple, compassionate gesture on her part. Pushing away the thoughts as to why it meant so much to him he continued. “So I traveled more. Never staying in one place too long. I was lucky and Neil, the man who was running the family company was competent, so I left everything up to him.”

“Does he still run it?” asked Evelyne.

“As of right now he does. After traveling, I decided it was time I step up and take over the company. He retired and I had a good run, until the trial.” He paused, not sure how much to say. “Well, he came back and has been running things until I get this all cleared up.”

Leigh clapped her hands together. “All right, this is what I have been waiting for. What is your plan? What can we do to help? When do we start?”

Anthony glanced over at Evie who was trying not to laugh. “
My
plan is to meet with Lexi.” Hearing Evie’s gasp he quickly continued, “Of course, I would want to talk to Noah first, let him know what I want to do and help prepare Lexi for seeing me.”

“Excuse me? Talk to Noah first? Why? Because she’s a weak little woman and wouldn’t be able to make a decision on her own?”

“No, you can get down off of your chair and stop pumping your fist at the injustice towards women. I want to talk to Noah first because I feel that it would be better coming from him than me just showing up at their door one day.”

Watching as she crossed her arms across her chest, he appreciated how her breasts pushed up and stretched her shirt tight against them.

“The reason I want to talk to Lexi is to see if there is anything else that I might be able to say to her that might trigger something that she forgot from her two meetings with Jeremy. She is the only link that I have to him. I have to find him. He has to be stopped.”

“Well, you’re certainly right there. Now what can we do to help? You know we want that bastard caught just as much as you.” Evelyne had a truly scary look on her face and Anthony was happy he wasn’t on receiving end of it.

“
You
ladies aren’t part of the plan. I can do this all on my own.” Looking at their faces he thought it would be best if he added, “But thank you. If I need anything, you’ll be the first people I call.”

“You’d better call. Just because we’re old doesn’t mean we can’t kick some ass.” Leigh got up and proceeded to showcase her high kicks. Unfortunately, she was looking at Anthony more than where she was kicking and ended up kicking the bakers rack. “Oops. Well, in a fight I’d be more focused.”

“You know Anthony, we’ve all taken self-defense classes. After what happened to Lexi we felt it was something we needed to know. We don’t get as much practice as we’d like, but Evie here, well, she’s really good. In fact, she goes every week and is so good, she helps teach other women.” Marie said.

“That’s very wise, ladies. You always need to be prepared.”

“Well, we would go more, but for some reason they like to have women teach the classes. If there are guys, they’re under all that padding. So now we just go whenever they’re having a guest instructor that just happens to be a hot guy.” Evelyne licked her lips.

“Oh Evelyne, remember the last one. Oh my. I didn’t think I’d be able to make it through the class without combusting. He was so cut, and when he took his shirt off, his vee, oh my, I thought I was going to have an orgasm just looking at him.” Leigh fanned herself.

Anthony was taking a drink and almost spit his water out across the table. Instead, he ended up swallowing wrong and coughing.

Evie started thumping him on the back, he looked at her out the corner of his eye when she started laughing. Catching his look, she just shrugged.

Evelyne stood up and walked over to the counter. “Speaking of orgasms, who is ready for dessert? My world famous strawberry shortcake, guaranteed to please you.”

“Umm… thanks, I think. But I really should be going.”

“Oh come on honey, live a little. We’ll give you some extra cream.”

“Seriously, I really need to go.” He stood up and walked quickly to the door. Turning towards them he said, “Thank you for an interesting meal.”

He didn’t close the door quick enough before hearing one of them say, “Damn. You were right, Evelyne. He does have a nice ass. I’d love to smack that.”

~*~

After dinner, Evie was enjoying a glass of wine while swinging gently in the hammock looking up at the stars. Thinking about the ramifications of Anthony showing up and what that would mean to Lexi and why he hadn’t said anything about her e-mail.
There has to be something I can do to help.
She would do anything for her family and friends even if it meant working with someone whose face haunted Lexi’s nightmares. It was going to take some work, but she would have to keep Anthony and Jeremy separated. Because she would do anything to help her friend and if she projected Jeremy’s evilness onto Anthony that wouldn’t be good. He was his own man.

Could she really do it? Would he allow her to help? What would it be like to work closely with him? All the different scenarios went through her mind trying to think of every possible angle before forcing him to let her help. It was a shame he was so hot, it sure was going to make things interesting.

Chuckling to herself at what the Troublesome Trio said to Anthony over dinner, she didn’t hear his approach.