Once Wally was seated, Cora placed her hands on her hips and gave him a hard stare. Today she’d pulled her blond curls into a high ponytail, which only served to accentuate her delicate features and guileless blue eyes. Liam wondered how often people underestimated her as a police officer. She looked neither formidable nor intimidating, but maybe that was her greatest weapon. No one ever expected the steely core of determination hidden beneath Cora’s sweet demeanor until it was too late.
Pride swelled in Liam’s chest for this woman who’d captured his heart. He’d loved her across lifetimes and would go on loving her, even after he was gone.Which will be soon, he reminded himself. He had only one month left to help Cora fall in love with her intended soul mate, Finley Walsh, and by God, he would succeed. After what the angels had shown him, he could not—no, hewouldnot—fail.
“Mr. Jensen, a lot of people are looking for you,” Cora said. “The Booze Dogs know you spray-painted over their security cameras the night their money was stolen. They’re hunting you down, as we speak.”
Wally tried to lurch to his feet, but Liam stopped him.
“Don’t bother denying it,” Cora continued. “After you went missing from the compound, they searched your room and found paint on your clothes that matched the paint on the cameras. Now you’re on their radar, but we’ve found you first. It must be your lucky day.”
“Luck?” Wally snorted. “My girlfriend took off, and now you pigs are breathing down my neck.”
“Aye,luck.” Liam pierced him with a glare. “What do you think those bikers would’ve done to you if they’d found you first?” The motorcycle club’s president, Eli Shelton, was not what anyone would call a merciful man. Rumor had it that the Booze Dogs took care of their own problems with a twisted sense of rough justice. Ever since Eli discovered someone had stolen almost two hundred thousand dollars from his compound, he’d been out for blood.
This seemed to sober Wally, and he sagged in the chair. “How’d you know where to find me, anyway?”
“We didn’t,” Cora said. “We were answering a domestic disturbance call. You and your girlfriend were partying a little too loudly in here and one of the maids saw your drug paraphernalia through the window. Guess it’s our lucky day, too.”
Wally dropped his face into his hands with a garbled curse.
“Tell us about the night you took the money,” Liam demanded. “Who were you working with?”
“No one,” Wally said. “Somebody paid me to take out the cameras. That’s it. That’s all I did.”
Cora raised her brows. “Good luck convincing our captain of that.”
The city of Providence Falls had suffered two murders in as many months: the first was John Brady, a prominent businessman, and the second was Lindsey Albright, a young college girl who’d been dating a boy from the motorcycle club. So far, the police had no strong evidence to connect the two deaths, but Captain Boyd Thompson was convinced the bikers were behind everything. Cora and Liam had a different theory, but they agreed to keep their suspicions to themselves for now.
“Two people may have been killed over this money, and we’re looking right at the Booze Dogs.” Cora paused to let that sink in, then shrugged. “Maybe we won’t have to look very far. Maybe it was you.”
“No way! I’m not a killer.” Wally’s face grew red enough to match the decor. “And I didn’t steal no money from the club, either. Only an idiot would steal from Eli Shelton. Do I look stupid to you?”
She refrained from commenting. “Who paid you to paint over those cameras, Mr. Jensen?”
“I don’t know.”
Liam scoffed. “You expect us to believe—”
“I got a text,” Wally wailed. “Said if I blocked the security cameras that night, I’d make a quick two grand, no questions asked.”
“So, you took a bribe to betray your own club,” Cora said. “Without even knowing why.”
“It wasn’t like that,” Wally said in frustration. “I figured one of the guys wanted the cameras out so he could sneak around with someone’s old lady. No harm, no foul. It wasn’t supposed to be a big deal. Look, my girlfriend and I have been on the rocks for a while. I thought if I spent some money on her and took her someplace nice like this, she’d stick around. I just wanted to show her a good time.” He looked at Liam. “You get that. Right, bro?”
Liam glanced at the mirrored ceiling above the heart-shaped bed. The Fantasy Palace had some interesting amenities, to be sure, but it wouldn’t have been his first choice to impress a woman.
“How did this anonymous person pay you, Mr. Jensen?” Cora asked.
“They left an envelope of money on my windshield the next morning. I thought that’d be the end of it, but then Eli found out all that money was stolen, and all hell broke loose at the compound. People started fighting and pointing fingers. I got spooked. So, I told my girl we’d go on a little vacation, and I took off.”
“And you came to the Fantasy Palace.” Cora looked skeptical. “This isn’t much of a hideout, Mr. Jensen. It’s not even outside the city.”
“I know, but my girlfriend always wanted to come here,” Wally said. “And I wanted to prove I’d do anything for her.”
Liam frowned. “Even risk your own neck?”
“My neck’s never been worth much.” Wally slouched in the chair, looking more miserable by the second. “Anyway, I love her. What good is my life if she ain’t in it?”
Liam had no answer. How many times had he asked himself the same thing about Cora? Poor man. Wally Jensen was on the wrong side of the law, his life was in danger, and he was in love with a woman he couldn’t keep. He’d made his bed and had to lie in it, but Liam couldn’t help feeling a stab of pity for the man. Fate was a fickle bedfellow, and every soul was just one twist away from either happiness or heartache.