My eyes snap to Izzy when she says, “Ophelia Whitney Petretti was only nineteen years old when the car she was driving was struck by a B-double truck that veered onto the wrong side of the road. She was killed on impact.”
I swallow several times in a row to force down the bile scorching my throat before taking in the photograph Isabelle is convinced is Ophelia Petretti more diligently—brown hair, light brown eyes, and the tiniest heart-shaped mole on her neck. I’ve seen them all before, however, this woman’s name isn’t Ophelia. It’s Olivia. Isn’t it?
Isabelle must be mistaken. She’s confusing a woman once under protective custody with Isaac’s deceased girlfriend. A mishap is understandable. I almost had a coronary when I ran into a woman I was convinced was Olivia during my first consignment at Ravenshoe. The resemblance was uncanny, but thankfully, she was years too young to be Olivia.
That doesn’t mean I didn’t search her credentials to back up my claims. The stranger’s name was Emily McIntosh. From the polite apology she gave when she bumped into me, I wondered if she had any clue on how closely tied her family is with the Italian cartel. Her father could have been as high as Col in the Petretti entity if Col’s father had granted birthrights to the children his whores birthed. Since he refused to acknowledge Emily’s father in his family hierarchy out of respect for his wife, Emily’s grandmother refused to give their son his last name.
Although Emily is Dimitri’s first cousin, I couldn’t locate any evidence that they had met. They live one town apart but have starkly different lives. Emily’s family lived close to the poverty lines when she was a child, but I’m confident in saying it was Dimitri who got the short end of the stick. He grew up thinking blood and gore were normal. I’m shocked he’s as stable as he is.
A sob rumbling in Isabelle’s chest returns my focus to the present, and has me stupidly saying the first thing that pops into my head. “I read the police report on her accident over the weekend. It’s always sad when you hear of any life being taken too soon.”
I’m not lying. I did read the report on Ophelia and CJ’s accident. It just wasn’t because I felt sorry for them. It was because the officer on the incident report was the same officer who was killed during a routine traffic stop years ago. He was another connection that proves how tightly woven the mafia entities are that we’re chasing.
The crazy notions filtering through my head double when Isabelle hands me a second photograph. It’s a picture of Isaac and Olivia together. It’s time-stamped a few hours before the time cited in the traffic incident report of Ophelia’s death.
“Isaac and Ophelia were a couple?” You have no idea how hard that question was for me to articulate. I worked it through my head a million times, and I still nearly said Olivia instead of Ophelia.
When Isabelle nods, I think with my rational head instead of the one spiraling out of control. “You have to tell Alex you’ve unearthed the connection between Isaac and Col Petretti. This will get you off coffee and filing duties in an instant.”
Always end every hard truth with a joke is something my mom always suggests. It’s supposed to smooth out any awkwardness before you leap into the bigger hitting stuff. I don’t see it working quite as well for me this time around, but when you’re drowning in shit, you take any life raft offered.
Eager to practice my swing, I leap up from the ground before spinning around to help Isabelle off the floor. The adrenaline surging through me has me yanking on her arm a little too sharply. Her chest slaps mine, producing an unexpected moan from her O-formed mouth.
Horrified by her body’s response to our closeness, she takes a step back before straightening the crinkles in her blouse. Once she has everything in order, her eyes stray back to the copier only capable of scanning one page at a time. I felt sorry for Isabelle when Alex shunted this task on to her, but in a way, I also understood his objective. He has a compromised Honey Pot. That’s a death sentence for some supervisors.
“I don’t have time to type up a report on their relationship. This scanning will take me months as it is.” When Isabelle shifts on her feet to face me, I wipe the riled expression off my face. “You spent your weekend going through Col’s file. Eventually, you would have discovered these photos yourself.” She gives me a pleading look, having no idea how much she’s asking. “If you’re willing to type up the report, I’ll let Alex believe you discovered the photos.”
“I don’t want to take your credit, Izzy.” It also isn’t a conversation I want to have with Alex until I have all my ducks lined up in a row.
“You’re not taking my credit, Brandon,” Isabelle assures, stepping closer. “You’re helping me out. I’m snowed under here.” She waves her hand across the stacks of boxes she still has left to scan. In a normal office, a task like this would take a day or two at most. But since the copier here requires manual loading of each page, Izzy will be stuck in here for months. “This isn’t even a small dent in the boxes left in the conference room.”
I take a few minutes to deliberate on a response. In all honesty, my initial reply is hell-to-the-fucking-no, but a bit of pondering breaks a small ray of sunshine through the thick cloud hovering over my head. If I disclose the information Isabelle unearthed to Alex while revealing I could have a possible connection with our target’s past, I won’t have to include my discussion with Dimitri in our conversation. It’s a win-win really. I get to keep an informant’s identity undisclosed while ensuring the Bureau continues hunting the right man.
Relief floods Isabelle’s eyes when I jerk up my chin, approving her suggestion for me to compile the report to present to Alex. “But you’ll get the credit for finding the connection between Isaac and Col.”
I leave the supply room like I have a rocket strapped to my back. I should go straight to my desk to commence drafting my report, but instead, I head to the roof for some privacy. And perhaps to assure myself I’m not going crazy.
When several long minutes of sucking in fresh air doesn’t budge the elephant from my chest, I dig my cell phone out of my pocket and dial a number I rarely use.
“Petretti’s Restaurant, are you making a reservation or placing an order?”
I swallow the lump in my throat before saying, “I wish to order the Peking duck. I heard the orange glaze is divine.”
The hostess says nothing. She just patches me through to the private number I’m requesting. When Dimitri answers two rings later, I crack like a teen under pressure. “Can you send me a photo of your sister?”
“What?”
“I need a photo of your sister. A photo of Ophelia. The Bureau has some on file they believe are her. I want to double-check that they are her. They make fuck-ups all the time. This could be a fuck-up.”
“All right. Calm down. Which contact?” Dimitri’s tone reveals he’s only doing this because of the heads-up I gave him about the IRS. If it were for any other reason, he would have hung up by now.
After sweeping the area to ensure it’s free of nosy-parkers, I say, “The secure email server Grayson set up two years ago.”
“The one you told me to only use in dire circumstances?”
“Yes!” I run my fingers through my hair when my voice ricochets off the rooftop. “This is an emergency. I need a photo as soon as possible.”
Since nothing but sheer desperation is echoing in my tone, my phone pings two seconds later before Dimitri advises me to check my emails. I fumble so much I almost drop my phone when I lower it from my ear. Fear isn’t something I readily feel, but I’m certain it’s the cause of the shaking of my hands when I log into my email to download the image Dimitri attached to an email that will disappear within thirty seconds of me opening it.
