Page 54 of Declan

That wasn’t in the cards for me.

At least that’s what I’d been telling myself over the last week.

I watched my father walk out of his office, make his way to his car, and get in. I hoped he was going straight home, I wanted to get this done and move the hell on.

An hour later, I broke into my dad’s small two-bedroom house. Actually, I didn’t break in, he hadn’t locked his side door, and he didn’t have an alarm. And once I entered his home, I understood why. There wasn’t a damn thing worth stealing.

When I was growing up, my family was firmly middle class, inching toward upper-middle class. My sister and I still needed scholarships to go to college. We’d worked to pay our own auto insurance and gas, but Mom and Dad had not been hurting for money. We had a nice house, not luxury but comfortable. I knew my dad was now one hundred percent owner of the insurance company he’d once owned with Stanley James so I knew he could afford better than this shithole. I also knew he’d given my mother everything when they divorced.

But still, my father made good money, so the neighborhood, the house, the lack of furniture, even the car he drove surprised me.

Then suddenly there he was. He’d changed out of his suit and stopped dead when he saw me standing in his living room.

Confusion bled to sorrow and I watched my dad crumble.

He looked up at me from his position on the floor, eyes full of tears, and choked out my name.

One word. So broken. So full of pain.

“Dad,” I returned.

His eyes drifted closed and I wasn’t sure if it was the sight of me or my voice that had caused this new wave of hurt. Maybe both. I knew I looked like shit, I felt it.

I was dead inside.

I found the old Autumn. The woman I’d become to block out the violence of my deeds. The coldness I needed to endure my life. The primal need to survive.

I wasn’t human, I was an animal. Any goodness I had left inside of me I’d given to Declan, it was his. And by now, I was nothing but a memory.

“I’m sorry,” my dad cried. “I’m so damn sorry.”

“Did you know?”

Justin Pierce was a big man, so it took him a moment to get himself off the floor, and when he did, he silently made his way to the couch.

My heart thudded in my chest when he sat much the same way I’d seen Declan sitting. Elbows to his knees, tears streaming down his face. The difference was, my dad hadn’t taken his eyes off of me. And when I’d found Declan, his head had been hung. Big, hulking Declan Crenshaw brought low. I hated thinking about it. I hated knowing that his grief was so heavy it weighed him down. And for a man as strong as Declan, it had to weigh a ton.

“I knew he had a gambling problem,” my dad started. “I’d bailed him out before. A couple of hundred dollars turned into a couple thousand. The last time he came to me, I refused. Not only because I was tired of my business partner coming to me for money, but I didn’t have it. Hell, the business didn’t even have the kind of money he needed to cover his debts. But, no, I did not know the type of men he owed money to and I didn’t know he’d taken you. I would’ve protected you. I would’ve protected you and Emerson both. I would’ve taken my family and disappeared had I known.”

I believed him. He’d loved us. My mom was his whole world. His girls. That’s what he’d called the three of us.

“How’d you figure it out?”

“After you came home from the hospital, I mentioned a business meeting I had to go to. The moment I mentioned Stanley’s name, sheer terror washed over you. I waited a week, then brought his name up in front of you again. You shook so violently you couldn’t get control of yourself, then you took off upstairs. That’s when I knew. Or I thought I did, so I started to dig. You refused to speak and I needed answers. I hired a PI but he got nowhere. So I hired another, then another, until finally, I found one that had the right connections and I got the answers I needed.”

“Was this man’s name Tex?”

“No. Though close, he was from Colorado. Good man. He found everything I needed and he did it fast.”

“What’s his name?”

“Not gonna tell you, Autumn. I’ll tell you everything else but that. The work he does requires anonymity and because of what he did for me, I owe him loyalty.”

“More loyalty than you owe your daughter?”

“With this? Yes. I’ll give everything else but his name.”

“So you had the confirmation you needed and you killed Stanley.”