Page 23 of Her Intense Protector

“I’ll tell you what she means. My wife came up with a cockamamy idea to have Samantha play in a high-stakes poker game with her asshole of a brother in hopes of him not blowing his life’s savings. It was supposed to take place at Goldy’s club, but at the last minute, they decided to change venues. Sam called Toni and told her she would be following someone to an unknown location and would text her when she got there. That was two-and-a-half hours ago.”

“Fuck!” Ezio bit out.

“You’ve got it in one,” David agreed.

Ezio gave Asher a hard look.

“Kane’s training a bunch of recruits tonight. They’re on maneuvers, but I already tried to get ahold of him so that he could track Samantha’s phone,” Asher said.

“You can’t do that,” Toni protested. “You have to be on a friends and family phone plan.”

Eden rolled her eyes. “They have their ways. At least they would normally if Kane were available.”

Ezio pulled out his phone and pressed a number. Gideon Smith answered on the second ring.

“Yo, you coming back?” Gideon answered.

“No, and I don’t have time for your flirting tonight.” Ezio knew his voice was tight, and it would get through to his old friend.

“What do you need? Name it.”

“Kane McNamara isn’t available. Need you to trace a civilian’s phone ASAP. She’s in over her head at a private high-stakes card game. None of us know where it is.”

“Give me the number.”

Ezio did.

“I’ll call you back in a few.”

“Who was that?” Asher wanted to know as soon as he got off the phone.

“His name is Gideon Smith. He’s our comm guy on Omega Sky. He’s brilliant. Might not own his own software corporation, but if Kane found out how good he is, he’d want to recruit him.”

“Are you sure he’s that good?” Eden asked. Ezio saw the fear in her eyes. He put his hand on her arm.

“I’m sure. He’s going to be able to trace her phone.” He saw both women sag with relief, but that was only one of the next steps.

“Okay, Asher, what do you have planned?”

Asher ran his hand through his hair, then nodded toward David. “I didn’t introduce you properly. This is former Sergeant First Class, United States Marine Corp, David Ross. He definitely wants in on this.”

“Perfect. Let’s move this into the kitchen, shall we?” Ezio asked.

“Are you trying to get away from us?” Toni asked. “Because that’s not going to happen. I want to hear every detail of what you have planned.”

“Nope, not trying to get away from you, ma’am,” Ezio said. “As a matter of fact, since you’re the one who wrangled Samantha into this, you have the most information. We’re depending on you to fill us in on her plan.”

“I’m at fault too, guys. I saw Samantha shopping for this little expedition. I really didn’t press her enough to find out how hairy it really was. I blew it off. This could be bad; she bought a real sex-on-a-stick outfit.” Eden frowned at Toni.

Sex-on-a-stick? Ezio thought his head might explode. “Explain.”

“I met her at the mall and she had quite the sex-bomb red dress that she’d bought, and she was looking for shoes and lingerie to go with it. Now that I know it is for this event, I think she’s going to be trying to distract all the players with everything she has. Not that she will need to, she’s a really good poker player.”

“She’s not there to win money, she’s there to talk my brother into quitting the game,” Toni protested. “I just needed someone who looked real to play. We still don’t know that this is a bad situation,” she protested.

Ezio knew he was going to lose it, and he didn’t think David would appreciate him raining terror down on his wife.

His phone rang and he put it on speaker.