AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Dad . . .” I stop, and take him in. He’s waiting for something. I just don’t know what. “Did he turn up? I don’t . . .”
“He isn’t here, but someone else turned up. Vince?”
I frown. Who the fuck is Vince? Mafia? Someone from my mom? My nerves skitter.
“He came asking about your car, about you. Sent him on a bit of a fuckin’ goose chase, Princess. Thought maybe he was someone from that illegal deal you kinda witnessed. But then he mentioned your daddy.”
My heart thumps.
I grab hold of the panic starting up. If it was anything to do with that, then I don’t think it would be a mention, and I don’t think Mack would have his anger focused on me.
Not if there was some kind of threat with my dad as the focus.
Besides, I’ve taken to looking up the local New York news online and there’s nothing about the politician or Eddie Manoli of the Mafia. The project they were wheeling and dealing with is still supposedly in the talk stages so it’s hard to see them sending someone after me.
I didn’t witness a murder, and the resources in tracking me down would cost.
Something my mom wouldn’t care about.
“What about Dad?”
“He said Daddy’s not going to be happy with you causing trouble, not with his new job.”
“Then Mom’s found me.” I’m half out of my seat before I sit down again. “What about this new job?”
“I didn’t get it from Vince. I looked it up. It’s with Alpine Energy.” At my frown, he continues. “The people giving the town, Dakota a hard time. Or were, and now, you turn up with some story and it just so happens your father is the new CEO?”
“You think I knew this, and I’m what? Some kind of plant? A spy? A scout?”
“I don’t know what to think,” he says. “Your face, you, everything I know of you, the woman inside that very pretty casing I can’t see her doing anything heinous. And how you look at me now tells me I’m wrong, but the lies, the omissions, everything else . . . help me, Princess.”
“If you can’t decide, then there’s no helping you.”
My mouth is stiff and hard to work. My throat burns as I say the words, but I have to.
Me, on the outside of this, can see how absurd it all is. But on the inside, the here and now? It’s horribly serious and overwhelming.
Because I did this. I got involved when I should have done everything I could to move on.
Now, he’s looking at me like a fuck up, like a spy, like a woman who has the kind of skills to pull off some sort of subterfuge about Dad for reasons I don’t even get.
“Why are you so important, Mack? I ask suddenly. “I’m here as some kind of advance spy for Dad, right?”
“Sidney, I asked what’s going on.” His face is a mask as he sits up.
“No, you accused me.” I’m angry. Very, very angry. “So, I want to get it straight.”
I start ticking things off on my hand.
“I came here with the express thought to get the lay of the land for Dad.” We glare at each other. “Best way? Get caught in a fire and crash. Make sure you can’t get the parts to fix my car. Decide you, who are so pivotal to your sister-in-law’s land she owns, are the one to go after and get all the information I can by not asking about any of it? Have I left anything out?”
He rubs his eyes and gets to his feet. So do I.
We face each other.
I’m breathing hard.
“Sidney, fuckin’ calm down. I asked for explanations, for what you might know. Even you have to admit it’s pretty fuckin’ convenient your dad’s the newest CEO.”
