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She glanced in their direction and sighed. “Babysitters?”
I glanced away, cognizant we remained out in the open. “Did you forget you were almost apprehended, likely killed?”
“By you? How could I forget?”
As I crowded her space, she did everything but look into my eyes. “While I understand your continued level of defiance, I’m at that point I’ve grown weary of your contentious attitude. I assure you that as of now, I’m the only man who can keep you alive. People now know of your existence, which means you have a target on your pretty little head.”
“Because of you.”
“Let me ask you a question, Jade. You’re a highly intelligent woman, perhaps too much for your own good. You’re well aware that I have enemies. That’s the nature of my business. Whether you agree with what I do or not is of no consequence. In this brutal world, which is one of the things you’ve called it, men will stop at nothing to get to me. Given it was easy for an associate of mine to find you, what makes you think that someone else wouldn’t have decided to use you in a very dangerous game?”
She seemed taken aback. “What purpose would that serve?”
I removed my sunglasses, staring her in the eyes. “There are methods of torture that would have you singing opera tunes if that’s what you were told to do.”
“They’d force me to testify with lies.”
“Yes, providing you with very creative stories to tell that would have me sent away for life, which would force me to watch as they dismantled my family.”
“But you killed a man.”
Laughing, I realized she just didn’t get it. “What you saw that night almost nine years ago was payback to a man who’d shorted me on a shipment of goods.”
“You mean weapons.”
The woman was amazing. “As I’ve told you, I have several businesses. Dominick Montoya was also a pig.”
“According to you.”
“You’ll soon learn that no one fucks with my family. The fact the man had a powerful family similar to mine was the reason the case had been brought front and center. The retired prosecutor believed he could take down two dangerous regimes at the same time. He failed. So you know, if brought in front of the grand jury again, the story you’d be forced to tell would have me murdering children and innocent women in cold blood if not an entire fucking city.”
“There’s a difference to you?”
“Yes, Jade, there is.” I took her by the arm, guiding her toward the awaiting SUV.
“I wish I could believe you,” she said, her contempt lessening.
“I also believe you have an enemy determined to hunt you down.”
She tried to jerk away, using enough force she slipped from my fingers. “Why? Who? I’m no one unless I’m used against you. Your weakness.”
“That is very true, but you said you were threatened by Fast Eddie several times, followed? Phone calls?”
“Yes. I told you the son of a bitch was a horrible man.”
“That’s not his style, nor is it anyone in his profession. Who is your father, Jade?”
“Back to my father again. He’s nobody.”
“Except you have a hefty trust fund waiting for you. Did you know that?”
She opened her mouth to immediately retort then shrank back. “That’s not true. My father left me nothing.”
“Evidently, he did.” I waited to see her reaction. She knew nothing about it.
As she looked away, I noticed her lower lip was trembling. “I’m not lying to you, Constantine. I was told little about him.”
“Whoever he was, his identity connected us together almost a decade ago. It’s come back to haunt us both once again.”
