“And a straw horse is all you’ll have when you’re done. There are real living people who need you more.” She turned and glared at him. “But because you are quite probably genetically connected to a man who was apparently about to turn his own partner in as a criminal fraud, I’m going to make a wild guess that the man in the mountain did not die by accident. And that there’s more to this story.”
“Yeah, I think so too.” Jax sighed in relief that they were back on solid ground. Evie had a flaky mind that took paths his more straightforward one couldn’t. “I’ve been digging through records. Aaron Ives and Franklin Jackson were partners in the Glass Mountain mining operation. They both graduated high school here and went to Stanford together. Aaron was both engineer and lawyer and ran his father’s mining company. Franklin inherited his father’s practice. Apparently both their fathers died decades ago, and I’ve not been able to trace any other family.”
“Except Mr. Oswin.”
“Conan found me, or his sister-in-law did. I sent my DNA in, hoping to find relatives. If she’s using that sample and my local inquiries, she’s working with a private database and a spy network larger than Roark’s.”
Evie hummed in appreciation but didn’t comment. Jax understood. He could see where an obsessive-compulsive like Oswin’s sister-in-law might be handy to know. But Evie was ADHD. Dog-walking with a side of shop clerk, while running for mayor and helping his team start a detective—solutions—agency was simply one minor example of her eccentricity.
Roark and his military partner Reuben had dishonorable discharges preventing them from obtaining the licenses real detectives needed, no matter what they called themselves.
And Jax was pretty sure mayors and detectives were a conflict of interest, without throwing in the psychic bit.
He continued. “I don’t have DNA samples from either Ives or Franklin to prove any genetic connection. I have birth, marriage, and death certificates with the name Franklin Jackson on them because he was presumed to be my father. Obtaining legal certificates on Aaron Ives is taking more time since I don’t even know his birth date or if he was ever married. There is only his obituary in the local newspaper.” Jax steered the car off the road into a dirt yard in front of a tin shack.
Evie stared out the windshield. “This the diner?”
“This is Marge’s house. The diner is over there.” He gestured at a ramshackle cabin across the road made of leftover plywood and aluminum siding haphazardly tacked together. “Marge has a... heck if I know what she calls it. A teepee? She rents to idiots who think it would be cool to spend the weekend in a desert and gaze at stars.”
Had Evie been any of the ambitious women Jax had dated back in Savannah, she would have shoved him out the door, taken over the car, and driven straight back to LA and swimming pools. Instead, she pondered the shacks without blinking—which meant she’d gone into one of her trances again.
When she returned to the moment, she nodded and climbed out without argument. Loretta was already out and examining the bottle tree in the yard.
Jax had stayed with Marge his first night here. The facilities weren’t as bad as they appeared from the outside. Marge didn’t like just anyone stopping by.
Evie produced a cellphone. “You werethree milesfrom a signal. You deliberately camped out there with no signal.” She tapped into the phone.
It was weird watching Evie with a phone. When he first met her, she’d said she didn’t want one, that it distracted her from her observations. But once one had a kid—they became essential. Nice that she was willing to adapt for Loretta, but Evie wielding technology... was almost scary.
Jax figured she was notifying Ariel that he was alive, and she hadn’t killed him yet. Or they were plotting to box him up and ship him home.
With grizzled hair stuffed under a purple ball cap with a golden eagle on the front, Marge plodded down the concrete block stairs. “Lawyer man, you’re back, with friends.” She eyed his group with curiosity.
“They tracked me down. Are you booked tonight? Evie and Loretta aren’t accustomed to camping rough.” Jax and Roark had spent over a year in Afghanistan, not all of it at headquarters.
“Sure thing. You boys heading back out or want to park your vehicles here?” She waddled down the rock-lined path to her fenced-in backyard.
“Roark?” Jax turned to the inked Cajun who’d provided the military with protection and intelligence before Roark had been booted for insubordination. Jax knew better than to order his friend to do anything unless he was being paid.
Roark shrugged. “Ça va. Got a spare blanket? Desert gets cold.”
“I got quilts,” Marge called back. “You’re welcome to use them.”
“Merci beaucoup,” Roark called after her. In a whisper, he added to Jax, “You paid her well, didn’t you?”
It was Jax’s turn to shrug. “It’s a wooden wigwam in the middle of nowhere with a hot tub and good wine, neither of which Evie or Loretta will appreciate. Want to have them sleep in the cars?”
He was trying hard not to wish he could share that tub and wine with Evie.
“Want me to take the kid back to LA and Harry Potter World?” Roark asked cynically, reading his mind.
“Yeah, I do, and you deserve that fate for encouraging them. But it won’t happen, so let’s get quilts for you. I have a sleeping bag.” Knocked out of the rut he’d been digging, Jax trudged after the women, wondering how he’d got into this ludicrous situation.
Leaning against the cabin, waiting for the quilts while Roark explored their surroundings, Jax decided asking Evie to hunt for ghosts had been his mistake. The perceptive genie squirmed into any opening offered. He didn’t need more baggage. That’s why he’d sold his house and his Jag and headed west.
Before he could ponder the error of his ways, Evie emerged with an armful of covers. “Loretta and I are heading over to the diner. You need that tub.” She shoved the quilts at him just as the kid emerged, jabbering about wigwams and Marge’s distorted bubble.
“Marge is old enough to be your grandmother. She has a muddy aura and ulterior motives for living on the edge of nowhere. She’s not poor. Watch your back.” As if she hadn’t blown a hole in his peace, Evie took Loretta’s hand, and the two of them wandered off.