While he worked, he kept his fake Facebook page open to see if anyone posted about his thieving cousin Omer but nothing came up. A minor arrest would go unnoticed by city newspapers. He did a quick check of newer social media, but his kin hadn’t progressed beyond the old programs. No gossip anywhere.
He’d have to hope the officials he’d sent sniffing would follow through—not something he trusted them to do from his experience. He figured the Whitesville cops were well paid to leave his da’s operation alone, so he’d set the state to snooping. But they were limited in local cases.
He sent Jax a query about the feds. If his Gump client was federal, would he be interested? Probably not. Damn.
Even if he caught everyone in da’s gang tomorrow red-handed, he couldn’t arrest them. All Roark could do was annoy the devil out of the asshats and slow them down.
A text came in from Evie. His eyebrows soared at the message:hex the scammers
Evie was weird, but she usually had a clue. How did one hex his dad?
He’d question why the hell he was doing this except Pris’s mom nagged at his conscience, and he wanted to keep his brothers clean.
Follow the money then. He opened up Ariel’s files and applied his mechanical mind to dollars and cents instead of gigabytes.
While investigating the scammers’ profits, he stumbled on a way to replenish his own bank account—if only he had one.
Twenty-three
Evie returnedher doggie clients to their homes, then did her stint at the Psychic Solutions shop, giving her mother a chance to grab an early lunch and enjoy her gossip routine. She sent Loretta off to her very first sleepover to plot her first day of school—and probably her birthday party. Jax and Reuben were busy with their own projects.
Which gave Evie the entire afternoon to herself. She ought to be wearing herDanger Will RobinsonT-shirt. Instead, she poked through Great-Aunt Val’s sixties wardrobe and found a perfectly respectable dress that hit her knees—Val was considerably taller and the dress would have been far less respectable on her. The dress dripped with lace and came in an ice blue that Evie would never have worn on her own, but for her purposes today, it was perfect. She brushed her hair into submission, tied it back, then pinned and combed it tight. She even wore her new baby heels.
Then she mapped out her targets. She’d not had the opportunity to drive in Savannah often. She sometimes drove her aunts’ cars to take them to medical offices or shopping, but Mavis didn’t own a car and had no interest in doctors or stores. So Evie had to plot the order of her visits.
First up was the used car dealer to return the car they’d let her keep overnight. The Honda was pretty, but the luxury model made her uncomfortable. She didn’t need leather seats.
She’d loved driving the Subaru Jax had sold. It had been small, and she could easily adjust it for her short legs and height. The mechanic she’d consulted had assured her the unique engine got better horsepower and matched acceleration with some of the priciest cars on the market. And the dealer had a used one in stock—in black. Black could look sexy. Loretta would love it. And it was cheaper than the Honda, so she wouldn’t owe as much.
Yeah, the Subaru wagon had a few miles on it, but Evie settled behind the small wheel, smiled, and drove it off the lot later than she’d anticipated. She might have to cut the remainder of her visits short, but she could justify this car in her head far better than the fancy one.
Andit had heated seats for winter, so there—plus cargo room in back for hauling groceries and dogs.
The next address in her phone’s GPS was Sunshine’s home care office. She had to assume clients would normally call for services, but she needed toseepeople, not hear them. So she marched in the front door holding a folder of fake resumes she’d printed out in her mother’s shop. Since the majority of Sunshine’s employees seemed to have fake IDs, why not?
Inside the lobby was an assortment of hospital-type supplies: walkers, beds, wheelchairs, and things she’d rather not think about. She went up to the counter but no one appeared. Swell. Behind a stack of brochures advertising the agency’s products, she found a bell and tapped it.
Eventually, a lank-haired young woman looking in desperate need of sleep or a cigarette appeared. “Yeah?”
Evie didn’t waste energy checking this one’s aura. It was probably dead. “Yes, Mrs. Stanislaus said you might have an open position. Is the manager in?”
“Nah.”
Narrowed eyes indicated otherwise. Having checked the employee charts Reuben had drawn up, Evie already had the manager’s name. She’d seen a high-end BMW in the parking lot. It wasn’t as if she had anything to lose by making an idiot of herself.
She rapped the counter and called, “Mr. Peterson? Mrs. Stanislaus sent me.”
Lying Girl snarled. “He’s busy.”
“He’d be less busy if he hired me.” She didn’t add “instead of you.” She didn’t want a bar fight. Yet. Evie pulled out her phone and opened her contacts. “I’ll call him, shall I?”
“Wait here. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
Not being of a trusting nature, Evie slipped around the counter and followed at a distance.
“She says Ursula sent her,” Lying Girl whined from an office at the end of a long hall. “If I lose this gig, I can’t pay rent.”
“You know you can always come home, honey,” a masculine baritone said, a trifle impatiently. “I’m sure Ursula doesn’t mean to take your job. Send her back.”