Page 64 of After The Storm
“Who’s that? Another one of your aliases?”
He handed her the phone and nodded. “Yeah. That’s one of my names. Here you go.”
“At the rate we’re going, you’re going to go through all your names by the time this is over,” she joked as he stood up to open a can of soda he’d brought back from the store.
Turning to face her, he smiled and shrugged. “No worry. I have a lot more. We’d have to be on the run for years to go through all of them.”
That statement right there made her more curious about him than anything else he’d told her about his job or his life, but she didn’t bother to ask him about it. Maybe later or when they were finally safe. For right now, she had to call Jasper.
One of her oldest friends, she felt certain they could rely on him to help them and keep it all quiet. She just hoped he was back in the city.
“I’m going to need my old phone to find the number.”
She watched for any sign that Roman still didn’t trust her, but he handed her the phone without a second thought or a single word. Scrolling through her list of contacts, she found the one she wanted and typed the number into the burner phone.
Jasper Carrollton. She’d known him since middle school, and they’d been friends from the first day he sat down at her table in the cafeteria and asked her if she wanted to be friends. After a few seconds of staring at him, she’d said yes. The rest, as they say, was history. If anyone could get her into the governor’s campaign office, it was Jasper. He knew everyone, mostly because he’d slept with so many people, male and female.
In matters of love and lust, Jasper didn’t discriminate.
On the second ring, he answered in his heavy southern drawl and she said, “Hey, Jasper! It’s Kate. I need your help with something.”
“Katybird! Baby girl, that’s no way to begin a proper conversation. Don’t I at least warrant a how do you do, Jasper?”
“I’m sorry. I’m a little distracted today, so I forgot my manners. How’ve you been, Jasper?”
“I’m fine, as always. Thanks for asking. I’ve been out of town for a couple weeks and just got back home this morning. What did I miss that got you into trouble?”
“How do you know I’m in trouble?” she asked.
With a chuckle, he answered, “Let’s just say I know you, Katybird. So what do you need?”
“I need you to promise you won’t breathe a word of this to another living soul.”
He inhaled sharply, like what she said surprised him. “I can’t believe you would even say that. You know me. I’m a vault. I think I’m insulted.”
“Okay. I need to get into someone’s office. The governor’s campaign office downtown. Tonight.”
Kate waited a moment before continuing. “And I need to get into one of the computers.”
Jasper didn’t say anything at first, and she wondered if he’d had some religious conversion or something while he was gone from town. Normally, he’d be perfectly fine with helping her on something like this.
“Interesting. Okay, give me a few hours and come by my house tonight at ten. I’ll have what you need by then.”
Relieved, she let out a big sigh. “Thanks, Jasper. I’m going to owe you huge.”
“I’ll add you to the list of people I can blackmail. It’s a pretty prestigious group, so you should be honored.”
“I love you. Thanks! I’ll see you at ten. And Jasper?”
“Yeah, honey?”
“Thanks for being there for me.”
“Always. Friends to the bitter end, right?” he said, saying the exact words they used to say to one another back in those middle school days.
“Right. See you tonight.”
For the first time since she messed up by calling Eve, Kate felt like she was doing something that could help Roman instead of hindering everything he was trying to do for her. She tossed the phone onto the bed and smiled at him standing across the room near the door.