Total pages in book: 57
Estimated words: 53862 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 269(@200wpm)___ 215(@250wpm)___ 180(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 53862 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 269(@200wpm)___ 215(@250wpm)___ 180(@300wpm)
“There’s a match to the fingerprint,” he shared. “It’s matched to a Karl Rivers. Let me see if I can find a picture.”
Everyone gathered around, watching Magnus track down an image. When it appeared, Lyra gasped. “That’s Boyd! His name is really Karl? He’s so young there.”
“It looks like a prison mugshot,” Phoenix observed.
“It is. An eighteen-year-old Karl Rivers spent three years in prison for possession of an illegal substance,” Magnus said, reading the report.
“He was fingerprinted there.” Mind-boggled, Lyra tried to navigate the flood of questions and conclusions this piece of information provided.
“Did you know he’d been in jail?” Celeste asked.
“No. He told me he was raised in the Hamptons and had gone to the most exclusive schools. He got into managing musicians by chance. A friend of his asked for help booking performances. I never knew he had a different name.”
“His name change—is it legal?” Rocco asked.
“Yes,” Magnus said as he continued to click his mouse. “It looks like he buried Karl Rivers. He must have known someone in high places to get a fresh start without people finding out about his real past.
“My parents wouldn’t have investigated his background. They looked at the people he represented already before choosing him,” Lyra said, shaking her head.
“Running a background check on someone wouldn’t have been as common several years ago,” Kestrel murmured.
“And, of course, running a background check on him myself never entered my mind. He was a part of my life and career for a long time,” Lyra said quietly. Her emotions were all over the place.
Anger, sadness, feeling used, outraged, ashamed, and so much more battled inside her. She jumped when Phoenix wrapped an arm around her to tug her close to his side. “Running a background check wouldn’t have brought anything up for Boyd anyway. Not if he managed to completely separate himself from Karl.”
“How long was he doing this?” she whispered.
“I would guess that he started just about the time he stopped his role as your boyfriend and lover,” Phoenix suggested. “Perhaps there’s something inside him that told him he was doing something wrong, and he couldn’t be the doting fiancé and a diamond smuggler.”
“That may be giving him too much credit. There’s a note here that says he’s on a watch list for international diamond smuggling. This must be recent,” Magnus muttered, putting a short memo up on the screen.
“How did you get that from the federal government’s files? Surely that’s illegal,” Rocco said.
“Only if I download the file. I can look at it online as long as I wish,” Magnus clarified.
“So, what do we do about this message?” Lyra asked, waving her phone in the air to remind them. “And Boyd? We can’t just leave him there.”
“Let me see your phone, Lyra. Did Boyd enable a phone-locating service for friends?”
“I don’t know,” Lyra confessed, handing her phone to Phoenix. “I know he could track me. If you turn the tracking app back on, will they know where I am?”
“Tell me Boyd’s telephone number,” Magnus requested and typed it into the computer as Lyra reported it. “This could be fast or… Look! There’s Boyd’s phone.”
“Where is that? It looks like it’s just north of us,” Phoenix said, leaning over Magnus’s shoulder.
“Time to make some plans,” Kestrel declared.
Chapter Twenty
Sadie pushed the cart onto the elevator. She’d volunteered to take the dishes back to the kitchen for them. Before the door closed, she mentioned to all the Daddies, “You know the Littles are going to be mad at you for banishing them from the planning meeting.”
“Go upstairs with the others, Sadie,” Rocco told her sternly.
The men watched the elevator doors close, and then they all leaned in together. Phoenix cleared his throat to draw their attention. “Before we get started, I want to thank you all for helping protect my Little girl.”
“We’re in this together. Even if we didn’t have tokens to repay, I’d volunteer. I think I speak for all of us,” Kestrel said, looking around the group for confirmation.
Their nods told Phoenix everything he needed to know. “Let’s get started then. If we get the authorities involved, there’s a likelihood that Lyra will become a suspect. It will also slow everything down as they’ll need to confirm everything we tell them.”
“So, we’re the rescue force for Boyd, Karl, whatever his name is,” Caesar said, shaking his head. “I don’t suppose anyone has considered just leaving him there…?”
“Lyra would always blame herself.” Phoenix held up a hand to hold off their responses. “It doesn’t matter that the guy put her in danger over and over again.”
“So, we get him out of this situation, and then he needs to go to jail somewhere so he can’t cause Lyra any additional problems,” Kestrel stated decisively.
“Definitely,” Phoenix agreed. “I have no doubt that if we don’t respond before the deadline, they’ll come after Lyra next.”