He sets his cup down and picks up his knife. "I am sorry, Rose."
"It's not your fault," I whisper, wiping the tiredness away from my eyes. "I don't… I don't understand what's happening."
"Neither do I." Kon's shoulders lift slightly. "Ethan has been trying to contact your mother and father. He sent people to their home but there was no one there. No one can find your brother either."
Mathew.
That motherfucker.
Just the thought of him is enough to make bile creep up my throat and I swallow rapidly to force it down.
Calvin moves around me to the coffee machine and starts brewing a fresh pot, all the while the steady chop of Kon's knife through the onions and mushrooms clicks in the air.
"I don't…" My breath hitches and my hands come together. "I don't know where they would be."
Kon nods once. "Do you perhaps know why your brother, Mathew, would be blackmailing one of my generals?"
I stop dead in my tracks, my heart frozen in my chest for a split second, and it only kicks back up when a cup slips from Calvin's grip and clatters onto the counter.
Luckily, it doesn't smash.
"What?" My voice doesn't sound like my own.
Kon doesn't move. He doesn't look at me either. He keeps chopping. "Before he died, General Zangier confessed some sickening facts about himself, and those facts were being used against him to force him to siphon information about me toothers. To Mathew, actually. So I ask again, do you know why your brother would blackmail one of my generals?"
Mathew… was blackmailing General Zangier? But why? What would he have to gain out of something like that? If he was desperate for information on Kon and had a direct line of communication from the general, why the hell did he even send me here?
"I-I don't…" My eyes dart from Kon to Calvin and back again. "I don't know. I can't… surely he was lying?"
"I thought so too," Kon replies. "But Ethan did some digging into his accounts and his messages, including saved voicemails. He was sending money to your brother and information, Rose. Information that I suspect made its way into the hands of the Italians. I want to know why." Kon finally looks up and there's a quiet pain in his eyes. "Why was your brother blackmailing my general? Why is your underage sister working in one ofmyclubs? Why, Rose?"
I'm exhausted. Stress has my heart flying a mile a minute and I suddenly feel adrift in the middle of nowhere with nothing to save me from drowning. I have to lie.
Until I know where my mom is, I have to lie, but my thoughts tumble together and nothing comes.
"Rose." Calvin's soft voice cuts across my chaotic thoughts. "You have to tell him the truth."
Kon stiffens immediately. "The truth?" He glances at Calvin and anger flickers in his eyes. "What truth?"
I gape at Calvin, struggling to breathe, never mind speak.
He can't seriously think that telling him the truth will help me here?
Not when Kon has just spent time apologizing to me and doing everything he can to ensure Beatie gets cared for.
The truth will rip all of that away.
"The whole truth," Calvin continues softly.
"No," I croak, and Kon flinches as if my word physically struck him. Pain surges through my body and settles in my chest so I lift a hand and press it to my breastbone.
I have no choice.
Deep down, I know this.
I lied and schemed and let all of this happen because I was protecting my family.
But Beatie is upstairs, high on heroin, and clearly she's been suffering for a long time.
