She saw no trace of deception in him, though, only a bit of frustration in his heavy sigh.
Forgiveness.
“No,” Tristan muttered. “You’re making it worse.”
Dixon looked down at his notepad and scratched out the word with his pencil, drawing line after line after line. Eventually, he pulled the page out of his notebook, crumpled it into a ball, and tossed it onto the floor.
Lila watched it bounce away. “I don’t understand how you’re going to help me. Toxic and Reaper are fine at what they do, breaking into buildings and finding a few records here and there, but they’d be lost—”
“Humor us. Perhaps you just need a fresh set of eyes.”
Lila sat up. The couch had begun to get a little too comfortable. She couldn’t afford to fall asleep now, not until she found her quarry. She was too tired to think of the implications and too exhausted to worry if it was the right thing to do. Perhaps Zephyr wasn’t the only one who had begun to panic. Two men’s lives and reputations hung in the balance, for Shaw and her father would be hanged, or at least ruined and exiled from Bullstow, if her part in the investigations came to light.
Not to mention her own career, her own place in the Randolph family, and her own neck.
In a faltering voice, Lila talked about things she shouldn’t. She told Dixon and Tristan everything she’d learned about the Sun Leasing Company, about Zephyr, about the Liberté bank accounts, about her father’s file.
Tristan listened, flipping a silver medallion forward and back around his knuckles as she spoke, occasionally snatching it up to type into his palm. “I don’t think you need new eyes on it,” he said after she was done. “I think you just need a new approach. You need to stop all this sneaky highborn shit and do what we would do.”
“What’s that?”
“Confront him.”
Lila snorted. “If I could find him, then I wouldn’t be in—”
“You don’t need to find him. You just need to find someone who knows him, then get that person to draw him out. You said Natalie Holguín is on that list, right?”
“Yes.”
“Has she been arrested?”
“Not yet. Bullstow hasn’t completed their investigation.”
“Good. I know Natalie, or, at least I did.” His eyes darted to Dixon. “I think we should hire a new hacker, Dixon, don’t you? Since ours are only fine at what they do.”
“I didn’t mean it like that.”
“I didn’t either. Where is Natalie living these days? I know she’s not staying at the family vineyard.”
“Why do you want her address?”
“Because I’ll need it if I’m going to turn up on her doorstep, with cash, asking her to set up a meeting with her most capable hacker.”
“What if she tells you to get lost?”
“Then we’ll threaten to turn her in.”
Dixon shook his head so quickly that Lila thought it might swing off. He started scribbling on his notepad faster than Lila had ever seen before.
No. Natalie is trouble. She’ll do something. We’ll get caught.
Tristan clapped Dixon’s shoulder. “It’s going to be okay. We’re not going to get caught.”
Dixon pushed him away. He snatched up his notepad and moved to the corner of the room, his gaze fixed on a point outside the window.
Lila watched him go. “What are you going to threaten her with?”
Tristan smirked. “I’ve had a few of my people following her the last few months. Natalie loves selling Sangre to people she shouldn’t.”