“What is it?”
“Mac doesn’t know about that, does he?”
“It wasn’t worth trying to track him down. And my stepdad took care of it.”
Anger glittered in Adair’s eyes. For a so-called actor, he wasn’t very good at hiding his feelings. “Mac would have wanted to know.”
“Why? So he could feel bad but not bad enough to come to Boston to check on me?”
“He would have been there in a heartbeat.”
The old hurt flared. “You don’t know shit.”
Adair stepped into my space, his spicy cologne distracting as the heat and size of him threatened to surround me. I tilted my chin up, refusing to back down.
“If you think so little of Mac, why are you here? We don’t need your help.”
“Well, you have it,” I snapped, losing my cool. “I’m helping my father. What is your problem with me? Because you’ve been a bastard from the moment I got here. I’m the one who should hate you, not the other way around.”
His nostrils flared. “Hate me? For what? You don’t even know me.”
“Because of you, I rarely saw my father. He missed birthdays and graduations and all because he was protecting your ass while you gallivanted around the world as Mr. Big Shot Hollywood Actor. Guess a skinny, boring little kid from Dorchester couldn’t compete with that.”
Adair stared at me in utter disbelief. “How can you even think that?”
I shrugged, trying to cover my pain with nonchalance. “Whatever. It’s done now.”
“It’s done? Clearly, it’s not done.” He studied me like it was the first time he’d really seen me. “It’s not my place … but I suggest when he’s up to it, you have an honest conversation with Mac about your relationship. And about your mother’s part in the lack thereof.”
It was automatic to want to defend my mother. But this wasn’t the first time he’d mentioned her. Uneasiness shifted through me. “I … I plan to. But for now, I have a new case to work on.” I motioned with the laptop.
Adair nodded and moved toward the door. But before he opened it, he looked back at me. “I don’t hate you, Robyn. I don’t know you.”
“Then what’s with the attitude?”
“I don’t trust outsiders. And I’m protective of my family.”
Aggravated, I nudged past him and opened the door myself. “Not a good-enough excuse for being an asshole. Now … have you got places to be, or do you have time to take me around the estate? I want a tour of every crime scene.”
9
Robyn
“And this is why Mac’s convinced the messages are for you?” I bent over the laptop as it rested on the small desk in Adair’s private suite.
We’d spent the last hour walking around the castle. There’d been five incidents in the past eight weeks. That actually wasn’t a lot considering how quickly it had escalated to Mac’s attack.
There was a dead deer, mutilated and left outside the trade entrance, along with a threatening and creepily cutesy message. A housekeeper had discovered Lachlan’s “stage office” trashed two weeks ago. The message, “Why won’t you see me?” was handwritten on hundreds of Post-it Notes and placed around the office. According to Mac’s findings, there were no prints on any of them, so the person wore gloves.
A few weeks before that, the mews (an old-fashioned word for the castle garage) was broken into, and three of the Range Rovers vandalized. Painted across the body of one was the message, “You aren’t you without me.”
And finally, roughly two months ago when Adair had returned from a trip to Glasgow, he’d found his suite filled with wilting roses. Someone had removed his clothes from the closet and scattered them over the bed in a way that made it appear as if they’d rolled around on them.
I studied the photographs on Mac’s laptop, trying not to think about anything but the case and not how surprised I was that Adair’s suite was fairly humble, or how reluctant he’d been to allow me into it.
The wall behind his bed was recently re-wallpapered because a message had been painted across it. I stared at the message in the photos Mac had taken: “You’re everything to me. I have to be everything to you.”
Adair bent over the desk, too, staring at the photos. My breath caught as I turned my head to find his face next to mine. He scowled at the photograph. “It was the first message. The first violation. I think we can be pretty certain this is about me.”
As he spoke, I found myself unable to tear my gaze from his lips.
A flutter in my stomach shocked me, and I abruptly stood, moving away from him and the computer.
He slowly stood, frowning.
Grateful that hot, embarrassed cheeks never translated to red cheeks for me, I pretended to study his suite again. “According to Mac’s notes, there were no prints. Nothing else in the room seemed broken or touched.”
“That’s right.” Adair sat on the desk, crossing his arms over his chest, his long legs sprawled out, one ankle over the other. “There are no cameras in the hallway here, so no footage of anyone breaking in. We checked the cameras in the security booth where all our extra key cards are housed, and no evidence of anyone stealing a key card for my suite either.”
“Tell me about security on the estate. How do you ensure privacy at Ardnoch?”
“We have antidrone technology, which is our biggest defense against the tabloids or threats. A large security team who patrol the twelve thousand acres. Cameras in and around the estate … even some hidden in the woodlands. The security booth is manned twenty-four seven.”
I frowned. I’d only read some of Mac’s notes as we wandered around the castle, but surely it flummoxed him how someone could gain access to their security system. “Cameras have been wiped, turned off …” I mused over this. “While we have to consider there might be an issue from within your security team, we also should consider that we might be looking at a hacker.”
“A hacker?” Adair stood, his brows pulled together in concern. “A stalker who is also a hacker?”
“Or a stalker with access to a hacker. If I were you, I’d talk with whoever installed and maintains your security system. They should be able to tell you if your security system has been hacked. Increased data usage will be a big giveaway.” I exhaled slowly—what I had to ask next would likely not be well received. “What you and I need to do is narrow down a list of suspects from within the club. Because it has to be someone who can move freely around the estate.”
“I’ve already given a list to Mac and to the police. It’s a short list. I’m not in the habit of making enemies.”
This comment surprised me. “Haven’t you been the subject of stalker-like behavior before?”
“It comes with being in the public eye.”
And being major eye candy.
“And what did all those people have in common?”
Adair gave a slight shake of his hand.
I gestured to him. “They didn’t actually know you.”
His expression hardened as understanding dawned. “It could be someone I don’t even realize I’ve snubbed or pissed off.”