Stalking back to the bed, Tansy picked up her phone. First step was to stop being a coward.
Detaching her emotions, she read both emails from James with a clinical eye. He wanted money. And he needed her to get it.
Reading between the lines, she wondered if James had already promised the tech to the kind of people who didn’t take broken promises very well.
She pulled up a few of the deleted emails, but they were all the same.
I’m sorry.
I have interested buyers.
I can make us rich.
Over and over again.
The more she read, the more she became convinced James had got himself in deep with people better left alone.
Which meant Sam might be right.
There could be people searching her out in order to get her work for themselves.
Which changed everything.
Sam knew it was Tansy even before she spoke. Who else would knock at his door at three in the morning?
If he’d been able to sleep, he wouldn’t have heard either her knock or her voice.
“Come on in, Tansy.”
Sam was sitting up in bed, leaning back against the headboard, trying to find more dirt on James Stephens. He put the phone down as she opened the door and peeked around.
The lodge had large windows, and the moon provided enough light to see her shadow as she walked in.
“I’m sorry. I just realized how late it is. It can wait until morning. Sorry.”
The shadow started to turn, but Sam didn’t want her to go. “Wait.”
She paused and lifted her face to his.
“I wasn’t sleeping. Come on in. What’s wrong?”
“Nothing’s wrong.”
Sam sighed. “It’s the middle of the night. If nothing’s wrong, you should be sleeping.”
“So should you.”
He chuckled. “I’m not the one who said nothing’s wrong. I’m not convinced of that yet, that’s why I’m still awake. I’m digging.”
Tansy let out a soft sigh and walked over to the window. From what he could see, she hadn’t changed or made it into bed yet.
Tansy with a focus was an immovable object.
“What’s kept you up, Tansy?”
That got him a soft laugh. “So many things.”
“Does your brain ever rest?”