Page 64 of Deadly Forever

“Ah, that,” James teased, rubbing his nose against Mandy’s cheek. “Yes, well, I like to have a blonde attached to my hip whenever I do anything.”

“Oh, puke,” Grady muttered.

“She was fine,” Sophie said, pinching Grady’s thigh to quiet him. “She’s had a crush on you for a long time so I think it’s hard for her to join the real world and realize that you’re not going to suddenly come to your senses and leave Mandy.”

“I’ll never leave my Mandy.”

“No, that’s what I told her,” Sophie said. “I think Marge’s biggest problem is that she lives in a fantasy world. She’ll have to figure her own way out of it, though. We can’t help her.”

“What about Kaspar?” Peter prodded. “I’ve got men looking for him, but so far they’ve come up empty.”

“You’ve got men looking for him?” Ally asked, surprised. “How come? I would think you’d leave something like this to the police. It’s not as if it affects your business.”

“Yes, but I despise rapists and child molesters,” Peter responded pointedly. “I want Kaspar off the streets. In fact, if my men were to find him first, I would be doubly pleased. We could take care of the situation with minimal fuss.”

Mandy involuntarily shivered as she snuggled closer to James. Despite outward appearances, she could never forget what Peter did for a living. He had a strange moral code that benefited her family on a regular basis, but he was cold and calculating when need be. “I wonder if he fled the state,” she mused. “He seemed surprised when we showed up on his doorstep. It was almost as if he thought he was smarter than everyone and would never get caught.”

“He definitely seemed surprised,” James agreed, stroking the back of Mandy’s head. “I’ve got this mostly figured out and I’m sure Kaspar was involved with what happened to Darcy. My guess is that, like most sexual predators, Kaspar went out of his way to groom the boys as much as the girls.

“He wanted the boys to do his dirty work,” he continued. “The boys found Darcy and isolated her. Kaspar probably supplied the drug, but the boys dosed her. The other kids didn’t even know he was at the party.”

“It sounds almost diabolical when you put it like that,” Emma said.

“He is diabolical,” James said. “He’s a sexual predator with no conscience. He’s a sociopath.”

“What about Kaspar’s son?” Mandy asked Sophie. “Did the press release say what happened to him?”

Sophie shook her head. “No. I have no idea if he left the kid when he ran or if the kid is with him. That’s the first thing I’m going to track down tomorrow morning.”

“Kaspar is in the wind and he knows people are going to be looking for him,” Grady said. “Once the evening news hits, his photograph is going to be plastered everywhere. Where can he run?”

“I’m not particularly worried about him running,” James said. “I think he’ll be caught eventually. I’m sure he probably had a contingency plan should he be discovered, but in the technology age it’s virtually impossible for someone to disappear.”

“He did it before,” Mandy reminded him.

“Yes, but he wasn’t openly wanted then,” James said. “He was simply a parolee who took off. He’d already served his time. This is different because so many people are actively searching for him.

“The sheriff’s department wants to talk to him because that mall attack is still dominating the news cycle,” he continued. “We want to talk to him because he’s an asshat. Peter has men on the street looking for him.

“Before he had one parole officer looking for him, and those guys are so overworked they can’t focus on one person because they’re usually dealing with hundreds of them on any given week,” he said. “Kaspar cannot outrun all of us.”

“So what is his plan?” Ally asked, resting her hand on Jake’s thigh as he slipped his arm around her shoulders. “If he knows he can’t run, where is he?”

“That’s a very good question,” James said. “I think the easy answer is that he’s not far away. If we put our heads together – and our resources – I’m hopeful that we’ll be able to track him down tomorrow.”

“That would be nice,” Peter agreed, bobbing his head. “Tomorrow night is the bachelor and bachelorette parties, yes?”

James nodded. “Yes.”

“Well, then we definitely need to clean up this mess tomorrow afternoon,” Peter said. “I don’t want anything to ruin my Sophie’s wedding week. If anyone deserves a perfect wedding, it’s her.”

Sophie rolled her eyes. “Oh, geez. You’re kind of a sap sometimes. You know that, right?”

Peter shrugged, unruffled. “You’re my only child, Sophie. Even though I find him annoying at times, I happen to think that Grady is the perfect man to give you eternal happiness. You’ll only get married once. I want to make sure everything is perfect … for all of you.”

“I can drink to that,” Ally said, beaming. “I say we drink to all of us.”

“That sounds like a good idea,” James said. “We’ll all have a drink … and then you can get out of my house. I have plans for my wife and they don’t include any of you. You should be focused on one another anyway. These are your last three nights of being single. They’re special and shouldn’t be ignored.”