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“Explain,” I bark out.
“We’re all too hasty in our younger days. Don’t you agree?” she asks. “Unfortunately for me, I let my men get away with much more than I should have. Accidents happen. I had to be okay with my men killing whoever stumbled across them, just to keep things quiet.” She shrugs as if to say it’s no big deal. My blood goes arctic-cold. “When you’re up against Broderick Stephens, wanting that kind of power, there are always some kinks to work out.”
“Don’t say it.” I want to hear it all but I’m terrified that when I do, I’ll hesitate more than I do now.
“Sadly, I will always remember a handsome man.” Jade rounds the desk before cocking her hip to the side and leaning heavily on the wood. “A handsome, strapping man murdered by one of my men just outside a convenience store.”
Her words land like bombs.
“I figured the unnecessary death could be a test. So I left a lighter.” She studies her nails.
“A lighter,” I repeat numbly.
“One of Broderick’s lighters. I knew having it would be handy one day. A real get-out-of-jail-free card. His murder went practically unnoticed. To all but a little girl who happened to be on the scene and stole my lighter. You still have it, don’t you? I saw you using it to smoke a cigarette in the back one night.”
I’m shaking, and it’s not from fear anymore. Or pain. Fury takes over. “You’re lying.”
“Oh?” Jade pouts, which only increases my doubt. I hope it doesn’t show on my face. “Come now. Your father was simply collateral damage. He died for nothing. Not one reason. Doesn’t that make you feel better? He wasn’t some drug lord or dealer. He was just a pathetic man. An alcoholic taking care of his dead wife’s daughter who isn’t even his own blood.”
I freeze. I know my mother’s story. I know the truth.
But hearing it from Jade’s lips?
I lock my arm with the gun still pointed at her. “You shut your mouth,” I order.
“Didn’t he ever tell you?” She’s taking particular pleasure in each biting word, as though the realization will somehow demolish my resolve. “Your mother wasraped. Beaten and left for dead by some nobody. She kept the baby but killed herself once you came along. Your father—or step-father I guess, whatever he was—cared for you anyway. It’s romantic, really. When you think about it.” She shakes her head, her gaze pitying. “Think about how many issues it must have caused him.”
She just earned herself a messy, painful death rather than the bullet through the brain I’d first considered. And the small part of me that wished for Gabriel before, despite the beating, has grown so that it’s the only thought in my head. Vengeance…and the reaper.
I scoff. “If you’re done with story time, maybe you can enlighten me on why I should care what you say. Why should I care about your pathetic grab for power? No one knows who you are, Jade. Some two-bit club owner.”
She stares at me with her head cocked to the side. My hits lack the power of hers and we both know it. “That’s not true, darling, and you know it.”
“So you want to be a drug kingpin when you grow up?” I ask in an attempt to regain some control. “Or would that be queenpin…”
“I want to bepowerful,” she insists. “Untouchable. I’m practically there. I only have two tiny loose ends to tie up. You…and Gabriel.”
I tighten my grip on the gun but a solid rock of a body slams into my back.
The man hits me right in the place where Gabriel got me, and I get a glimpse of him from the corner of my eye.
The bald man from Docks on Markee.
A heartbeat later, his hands wrap around my throat, cutting off my air.
TWENTY-NINE
gabriel
Layla paidme back for several of my punches with the butt of her gun and my temples throb as I slam on the brakes, screeching my SUV to a stop in my usual parking spot within sight of the club. Driving had been a mistake. Half the time I’d struggled against double vision.
Please let it not be too late.
The gut instincts that have guided me all my life push me out of the vehicle with the keys still in the ignition, hustling toward the back door. Gun in hand. Knife at the ready.
Hurry.
I take the stairs two at a time and stride into Jade’s office in time to see her bodyguard wrap his meaty paws around Layla’s neck. Her eyes bulge, surprise making her a second too slow to stop him. Seeing Jade’s lackey touching the broken detective I love snaps my last vestige of sanity.
