Page 86 of Date With Danger

Too late for that.

“I’m sorry, I can’t take you seriously with your face glowing red behind that mask. It’s really creepy.”

She plants her hands on her hips. “This thing is going to keep me beautiful forever, Mr. Agent Man.”

“You look much better without it.”

“Thank you.” She peels the mask off and drops it on top of an open box balanced precariously on the two inches of space left on the counter. The box tips, dropping its contents over the floor, and her face thingy lands on my shoe.

But I don’t move to pick it up because I’m focused on something else that fell out of the box. A phone. A burner from the looks of it.

“Was this his cell phone?” I ask, picking it up and pushing the power button.

Amelia looks at it and shakes her head. “I’ve never seen that before.”

The screen powers on and I search the contents.

My eyes land on a familiar-looking app. “That’s weird.”

“What?” Amelia shoves her face over my forearm to see the phone.

“He was on the same dating app as you.” I click on it.

She pulls back abruptly. “Yeah, that’s where he met his lady friends behind my back.”

He doesn’t have any matches though. No messages to other people either.

I close out of the app and open his texts. It’s empty. There are three calls in the history, all to the same number. The first was dated six months ago and lasted twenty minutes. The second was from last Wednesday at nine p.m. That was the night I followed Justin out of the bar. The last call was placed yesterday. Approximately forty-five minutes before Justin was killed.

I take a breath and press the call button then put it on speakerphone. It’s answered on the first ring.

“Who is this?” comes a deep, familiar voice.

“Who’s this?” I ask.

Click.

Our eyes meet and Amelia swallows, her voice coming out a whisper. “Liam.”

That’s what I thought too. “Are you sure?”

She nods, then chews on her bottom lip. “How did he know you weren't Justin?”

“What?”

“When he answered the phone just now. It was Justin’s number that called him, but he asked who was calling.”

“He knows Justin’s dead,” I say. Was Liam the boss Justin mentioned? The boss that killed him?

Amelia lets out a shaky breath. “You were right. He did it. Liam’s the bad guy.”

This was the link I was looking for. A connection between the two of them. But having Amelia caught in the middle doesn’t make me feel any better about being right.

Chapter 35

Amelia

“Stay,” Caleb says before he turns the radio on high and gets out of the car.