Ari shuddered as her blood froze in her veins and she barely registered Lance pulling her onto his lap and cradling her in his strong arms.
“You’re shivering.”
She nodded numbly. “What do I do?” After months of complete radio silence from her father, she now had contact. Six months ago she would have texted back; now she wasn’t sure.
Her brain told her to hand the phone immediately over to Lance and let the feds work their wiretapping, tracing magic, but her heart whispered that this was her father who’d simply texted a birthday wish to his only daughter. Did it make her an awful daughter to use the birthday message against him?
She looked up at Lance, expecting to see Mr. Letter of the Law holding his hand out for the phone, but he sat cradling her with sympathy on his face. “It’s totally up to you, Ari. If you want to keep the text a secret from the FBI, I won’t say a thing.”
Her eyes widened and tears entered them at Lance’s total loyalty to her. He’d said she could trust him, but those were just words. Agreeing to keep the text from her father a secret broke down her barriers like nothing else. He was willing to break the law for her, or at least stretch it a little, which for Lance was the equivalent of committing murder.
“The FBI probably already saw the text, since they’ve been monitoring my phone for weeks, but I’ve received dozens of birthday calls and texts today. They won’t know to pay special attention to this one unless I tell them, right?”
Lance nodded. “I’d like to say they’re on it and you don’t have to do a thing, but there is a bit of backlog in the wiretapping business. There’s a lot of contracted labor and they can’t follow up on every phone call and text. It could be days before that text is noticed and by then your father could be in a new location.”
She nodded sadly, knowing what she had to do. “I need to delete it, then.” She scrolled through a few screens, gauging Lance’s reaction. Was he truly going to let her delete the best possible clue to her father’s whereabouts? Though his lips compressed into a tight line, he made no move to stop her.
She stood up, shaking out the skirt of her dress, and made her way to the front door of the skate park, where she knew her FBI followers waited in the shadows of the parking lot. She’d invited them in to the party, but they’d declined.
“Where are you going?” Lance asked, rising and following.
“To hand this over to the feds, of course.”
“But I thought you were deleting it?” He scratched his temple.
She gave him a wry smile. “No, I was testing you.”
He frowned. “Did I pass?”
“With flying colors. Of course I’m handing over the phone. How could I look Kevin or any of the victims in the eye if I deleted the text?”
Her breath squeezed out in a rush as Lance scooped her up in a big bear hug.
“God, I love you.”
She hugged him, not quite ready to give him the words back yet, even though her heart burst with emotion for Lance. An alluring part of her brain screamed to accept him and take everything he had to offer and reciprocate it tenfold.
He released her and held the door open for her to make her careful barefoot way through the parking lot and over to the black American-made sedan. At her approach, the agents opened their windows, releasing a blast of icy air-conditioning into the steamy June night.
If they were surprised at Lance’s appearance, they didn’t mention it. “Ms. Rose,” the driver said. “Ready to call it a night and head back to your hotel?”
“Not yet,” she said. “I have something that may interest you.” She passed the phone through the open window and leaned her elbow down on the doorframe. “It’s from my father. He texted about two minutes ago.”
The agents glanced at each other, then looked over to Lance, who responded with a curt nod. He stepped over to put a supportive hand on her lower back. “It’s for real.”
She released the phone into their care, and took a deep breath and leaned farther into the car to pass another message through the open window. “When you catch him, tell him…” She broke off, not sure what message to pass to her criminal, escapee father. “Tell him, he’s got a wedding to pay for.” She stood back up and smiled at Lance. “Ready to go home?”
“With you? Always.”