She cracked a smile, and something in my chest lightened. “Call me Adrianne, Foster, please,” she said. “I’m not a big fan of formalities.”
Callan snorted. “Fosterinventedformalities.”
My lip drew up in a sneer, even as I tried to keep my face neutral. Adrianne's eyes, like warm honey, studied me. “I don’t think you’re as buttoned-up as you want me to think,” she said.
Her words weren’t a challenge. They were calculated and straightforward. Like she was trying to figure me out. A flush crept up the back of my neck, and I couldn’t tell whether I liked it or not.
“Could we focus?” I asked. “There's a hole in the front door that we need to address.”
Thatshuttered her expression. Damn it... it had been my intention to get us all back on track, but I hated the fear that was stamped into her eyes and twisted the corners of her mouth.
“Nice going,” Callan snarked as we walked through the living room and into the foyer.
There were glass shards everywhere, and I threw an arm up to stop Adrianne from coming too close. “Glass,” I said. “Be careful.”
Adrianne smiled with soft amusement. “I know.” But when her eyes drifted back to the mess, that smile dropped away. “What are you going to do?”
“Take pictures of everything,” I said. “Then, we’ll very carefully pick up the brick and figure out what it says.”
“You sound like a cop.”
Callan chuckled. “He almost was,” he said. “He was taking classes at the police academy when Ethan tracked him down and told him about the security firm.”
Adrianne hummed. “I guess I thought that you had all left the SEALs together to start the firm.”
The air was sucked out of the room. “No,” Callan said carefully. I could feel his eyes on me, but I refused to look at him.How much would he actually say?“We all left for different reasons,” he said, going for the diplomatic answer.
It was impressive, really.
Generally, Callan had the problem of running his mouth and revealing too much when it came to our collective private business. “Ethan brought us all back together.”
Adrianne was curious, we both knew, but she didn’t press for details the way some people would. “Should we call the police?” she asked, dropping the matter entirely. “About all of this?”
Callan nodded. “We will,” he assured her. “But we want to get our take on the situation first, and I wanted Foster to see it first.”
“Why?”
“He’s good at reading situations,” Callan said. “Ethan’s our tactician. he makes the plans, but Foster gathers intel.”
While he explained the delicate balance of our little group, I looked at the damage. The brick was thrown with some force—it shattered the window almost entirely. “They got close to the house,” I told them. “Too close.”
Callan looked grim. “The security system didn’t alert her phone.”
“The security system was ripped out.”
Adrianne’s face turned grey. “It was ripped out?”
I wanted to reassure her without lying to her. I was shit at that. “Security systems that don’t have a person actively on scene are meant to offer... comfort over actual security. They’re fine if you’re out in the ’burbs, but—”
“But I should have just gotten over myself and hired a bodyguard sooner, right?” She was mad, but it wasn’t directed at me or Callan. She knew that she’d been naive, and it was a hard truth to grapple with.
I kept expecting her to have a tantrum, like some of the celebrities I’d worked with before Ethan stopped assigning me to the Hollywood crowd, but so far, she hadn’t.
Maybe stop expecting her to and see what happens, I told myself.
I pulled out a pair of gloves from my pocket and put one on. Carefully, I reached down and picked up the brick. Touching it as little as possible, I peeled off the paper that was wrapped around it. The letter was short and advised Adrianne that, “incredible beauty” that she is, she should keep herself “worthy” of the role of Dr. Maria Falconi.
Adrianne wrapped her arms around herself, shivering like she was cold. Callan and I reached for her at the same time.