This time Connor believed him. Whatever game he was playing before, he seemed to get that Maddie needed the information. This wasn’t about being nosy. “Do you know where he is?”

“No.”

“What island did he come from?” Maddie asked, sounding a bit calmer now.

“Arnold. Didn’t get the impression he lived there because he needed directions both times I dropped him back off on Arnold.”

Every time he ended an answer, Maddie fired a new question at him. She didn’t back away from Dom’s gruff voice or the body language that flashed a keep out sign. “What does he look like?”

Dom looked Connor up and down. “Kind of like him.”

For the first time since he got to Whitaker, Connor didn’t mind having his ethnicity pointed out. “He’s Korean? Biracial? How exactly does he look like me?”

“None of those. I guess he’s nothing like you.”

Maddie let out a rough growl and turned away to walk back up the pier. “This isn’t helping. Let’s go.”

“Five-ten. Brown hair.”

Connor and Maddie both stopped moving and looked at Dom.

“Was smart enough to wear clothes that made him blend in. Informal. There wasn’t anything memorable about him.”

Now, that information helped. It at least set some parameters. Connor hoped Ben could work with those. “Did he say why he came to Whitaker?”

“He said he had a job to do.”

“Yeah, threaten me.” Maddie’s voice had flattened.

The lack of emotion in her voice tugged at Connor. “You don’t know that.”

“Are you willing to bet I’m wrong?”

Dom’s arms dropped to his sides and some of the gruffness left his voice as he talked. “Check the open house rentals. A man smart enough to hide and cover his comings and goings won’t go to Berman’s Lodge for a room. He’ll be keeping quiet. Probably paid in cash for an out-of-the-way place. Isn’t going out to dinner, so he’d be buying groceries.”

For a guy who didn’t talk much he suddenly had a lot to say. Connor guessed it had something to do with the lost and broken expression on Maddie’s face. He had to believe Dom wasn’t immune.

“How many houses on Whitaker fit that description?” Maddie asked.

After a few seconds of quiet, Dom handed out his final bit of information. “That’s your problem, not mine.”

Chapter 15

She finally knew she wasn’t alone, that all of her tricks and games and lying to her neighbors to figure out who visited Whitaker and who stayed had failed. She ran right up against her failure. Had it rubbed in her face.

She wasn’t so fucking smart now.