Nash and Lucian were on their feet too.
“Someone was here. Someone broke in. It’s a mess. It’s going to take me forever to clean this up.”
“Get out of the house,” I snarled.
Lucian was shrugging into his jacket, and Nash was doing his best to pull a shirt on over his sweats. I tossed him his sneakers.
“They’re not here. I checked,” Naomi said in my ear.
“We’re gonna have words about that,” I assured her grimly. “Now get back in your fucking car, lock the fucking doors, and drive to Liza’s. Do not get out of your fucking car until your dad comes out to get you.”
“Knox, it’s the middle of the night—”
“I don’t give a shit if it’s the middle of his colonoscopy. Get in the car now. I’m hanging up and I want you to call Nash. Stay on the line with him while I call your dad.”
“Knox—”
“Don’t argue with me, Naomi. Get in the damn car.”
I heard her grumbling under her breath and then the telltale sounds of an ignition starting. “Good girl. Call Nash.”
I hung up before she could say anything else and scrolled through my contacts to Lou’s number.
“Cottage?” Nash asked. His phone lit up. Naomi’s name was on it.
“Yeah.”
“I’ll drive Nash,” Lucian said, snatching the keys off the hook by the door.
“You can’t drive a department vehicle, Luce,” Nash argued.
“Watch me.”
“Yeah, Lou?” I said when Naomi’s dad answered. “We got a problem.”
We came in hot, looking like a high-speed car chase with me in the lead, followed by Lucian and Nash, lights blazing in a Knockemout PD SUV.
My hands tightened on the wheel when I saw everyone, dogs included, out on Liza’s porch. What part of “stay the fuck inside” didn’t they understand?
I slammed on my brakes in front of Naomi’s cottage. Lucian slid in next to me.
I turned to him. “Do me a favor and get everyone inside so they’re not standing around waiting for someone to start picking them off.”
Wordlessly, Lucian nodded, and melted into the night.
“Backup’s on the way,” Nash said as we jogged up the porch steps. The screen door was hanging by one hinge, the door beyond it wide open.
“Naomi said no one’s inside.”
“And she knows that how?” Nash said, sounding almost as pissed as I felt.
“Because before she called me, she walked through the house holding a bread knife.”
“And you’re gonna have words with her about that, right?”
“What do you think?”
“I think you’re gonna have words.”