She spaced out half a second and scowled. “He’s in protective mode and boiling hot mad. What did you do?”
Roark raised his hands. “I didn’t do nuttin’. Sounds like you the one been out swattin’ wasp nests.”
“That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you, oaf.” Reuben hit him with the notepad, then settled on the blanket beside Evie, who guilelessly inspected her sandwich’s interior as if she’d done nothing but paint fingernails all day.
Roark had only known Evie for six months, but even he knew better than to believe that innocent pose. “Don’ make me work when I’m eating. Just tell me what got y’all out here.” He sipped his beer and practiced outwaiting Jax. That was easier when he knew he hadn’t done anything wrong for a change. Or not too much wronger than usual.
Reuben wet his whistle with the beer before answering. “She stole a flash drive that contains what is probably the accounts for just one of Sunshine’s multifarious operations. Apparently Peterson, the ex-embezzler, is their bookkeeper, accountant, whatever. He enters their accounts into spreadsheets. I haven’t had time to dig, but the accounts on that drive add up to a few million bucks. They’re moving money into real estate, setting up investment companies, laundering cash into legit-looking operations.”
“So, what, we’re gonna bring down the mafia all by our little lonesome?” Roark grokked Jax’s grim expression now.
“Send the drive to the feds and back off,” Jax advised. “Gump is on it now. If you can’t get any more out of Marlene’s ghost, then you’ve gone as far as you can.”
Roark snorted. As if that would happen in Evie’s universe. White-hat Jax really didn’t comprehend the cosmos of witchy women. Roark had grown up with his grandma. He got it.
Reuben didn’t appear disturbed by the admonition. “If we’re not getting paid any more, I can buy handing it over. Larraine’s campaign is hitting full speed, and she can use more help.”
Even though he knew it wasn’t happening, Roark figured he could do his part to support a former officer who’d always had his back. “I could use some help in blowing up my da’s operation. I’m pretty sure the feds aren’t nowhere near him.”
Evie nibbled on a piece of chicken she’d pulled off the sandwich she was systematically dismantling. “I’ll do what I can to help you tomorrow, but I can’t see ghosts or auras through phones. I like your voodoo video though. Mavis said it wouldn’t fool an expert but it’s appropriately scary. She ordered some of those flash-on candles.”
Jax watched them warily. “Does that mean you’ll all back away from Sunshine?”
“I’ll send Stacey a bill. We answered her questions and got her insurance, even if we didn’t find her computers.” Reuben opened a chip bag.
“Mebbe we can write up a full report of our findings and send an invoice to the feds.” Roark wished he could read auras, but he figured Jax’s hadn’t left red hot simmer. He wasn’t buying the complaisance one bit. “Copy to Gump. We did a lot of work, saved them a bunch of time.”
Evie lifted her tomato from the sandwich, ate it, and licked her fingers.
Roark wanted to howl his laughter as Jax got more uptight, trying his damndest to steer Evie into compliance.
“Can you make your witch app say, ‘you got money’?” Evie asked.
Roark thought about it. “You have an evil mind,” he decided once he realized where she was going with this.
“A hex is a hex.” She shrugged. “They’re not illegal. They only work on people who are already superstitious and paranoid.” She got up and dusted herself off. “I’ll work on spreading a little paranoia.”
She walked back to the cottage.
Jax squeezed his beer can in two.
Roark cackled like his granny.
Only nerdy Reuben had no idea what had just happened here. Happily lost in producing reports and invoices, he looked up at the silence, shrugged, and finished his sandwich.
Twenty-five
Evie prowledCity Hall’s conference room Saturday morning, cell phone in hand. She couldn’t sit still while waiting for scammers to call the numbers forwarded to her phone. Pris had received one of the first scam calls and was busily messing with the caller’s mind in ways only Pris could do. Evie didn’t expect everyone to be as Machiavellian as her family, but Roark’s scripts gave the phone bank operators something to work with.
She’d much rather get in her new car and drive to New Orleans or wherever Roark’s father was and put the fear of damnation in him.
Well, Roark’s app might do that. She’d really like to be in the room as, one-by-one, the cackling witch shut down their phones and ate their money.
Dante had brought his laptop and was busily answering email as he waited for his phone to ring. Others were knitting or playing cards. They’d done a good job preparing everyone for a day of waiting.
Reuben had set up a study carrel on a table against the wall, essentially blocking him from the rest of the room. Evie stopped to lean over his shoulder to check on their own little scam. “Any luck yet?”
“Jax gonna kill us,” he muttered.