If You Know Her: A Novel of Romantic Suspense

Carter or Roz.
    But three minutes later, he was standing in the doorway of her empty office, Ezra at his back.
    Remy scowled and headed toward the back of the house, taking the longer way around. He looked out the windows, but he didn’t see her in the garden or on the private patio there, either. Just before the hallway split again, there was a door—it opened to yet another hallway, one that would lead to the private upstairs bedrooms, Carter’s library. It also circled back to Roz’s office.
    As the door swung shut behind him, Remy called upstairs. “Roz, Carter?”
    There was no answer. Swearing, he turned around. “Guess we need to check the kitchen.”
    But Ezra wasn’t listening to him.
    He was crouched on the floor just a few feet past the stairs, staring at something on the smooth, dark wood.
    Something that gleamed even darker than the wood. Something that made Remy’s gut clench.
    “What is that?”
    Ezra slanted an unreadable look in his direction. “It looks like blood.”
    The fist-sized circle was already drying, starting to go tacky.
    “Doesn’t mean anything,” he said, shaking his head. Ezra cocked a brow. “Blood? Doesn’t mean anything?”
    “Hell, this is a restaurant. One of the staff could have cut themselves.” He swallowed and told himself that was a perfectly logical explanation. Perfectly. And it
was
.
    One of the kitchen staff cut a hand—came to look for Roz. She took them to the emergency room
, Remy told himself. He passed a hand over the back of his mouth. Tried to buy more completely into that idea. It wasn’t completely whacked, right?
    “Denial is a river in Egypt,” he muttered as he stood at the door and waited for Ezra.
    “Huh?”
    He shook his head. “Nothing. Just talking to myself. Now what?”
    “Can you call Roz?”
    Remy nodded. He shot that hideous red another look as he reached for his phone. He squeezed it tight, the casing biting into his fingers. “I want to make sure she’s not in the kitchen. Hell, one of the staff really could have cut themselves, you know. Maybe she’s running them to the hospital and—what?”
    Ezra just shook his head. “You go check the kitchen and then call Roz. If it will make you feel better to look at the hospital, go ahead.”
    Something that might have been pity flashed in the other man’s eyes—it fucking pissed Remy off. Glaring at him, he turned around and shoved through the door.
    Before he headed to the kitchen, he shot Ezra a dark look.
    “Fuck, no, I’m not going to the hospital. I’m going with you, wherever you’re going. You’re so fucking certain Carter did something—fine. You think that. Seems to me I should stay with you to make sure you don’t go planting evidence.”
    The second the words left his mouth, he regretted it. But damn it if he could take them back.
    A muscle twitched in Ezra’s jaw. “If that’s how you want to play it, Jennings, so be it. Hurry it up, though.”
    His gut was already tied into knots, fear burning a metallic trail down his throat. Now he had guilt on top of that. Wasn’t this just fucking perfect?
    “Fuck.” He headed for the kitchen. With every step, he said a silent prayer.
    Let Roz be in there. Let Carter be in there. They’re both in there, and everything will be fine …

CHAPTER
TWENTY
     
    E ZRA WAITED JUST OUTSIDE THE KITCHEN FOR R EMY .
    Tammy, the hostess, almost crashed into him on her way out. Frazzled and flushed, she gave him a strained smile. “Sorry, Sheriff. We’re a little crazy around here today.”
    “Everything okay?”
    She shrugged. “Yes—well, no. I can’t find Roz. She always takes shipments and we had a shipment, but she couldn’t take delivery, so I had to do it, and then one of the kitchen guys got sick and had to leave … hell, it almost feels like Monday.”
    “Where did Roz take off to?”
    “That’s it, I don’t know.” Tammy lifted her hands helplessly and shrugged. “We don’t
know
. She didn’t tell anybody anything. She was just … 
gone
. Nobody’s seen her since this morning. She talked to Nia and Law, and that’s it. Nobody has seen her since.” She shifted from one foot to the other, chewing on her lower lip. “It’s not like her … I’m getting worried, too. She’s not even answering her phone—she
always
answers.”
    Remy came out at just that moment and he frowned as he heard Tammy. He gave Ezra a narrow look, butEzra wasn’t about to waste another two minutes here. They’d