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I turn on the widescreen in my loft office and flip through local channels. An action so mundane feels foreign to me, the simple act of staring at the TV screen ratchets my anxiety, as if precious time is being wasted.
This could be the result of running on pure adrenaline for the past ninety-six hours—or the fact I have to make a crucial decision soon.
I stop on a news station and force myself to sit. And watch.
For round two:
The second and hardest part of the scheme was actually getting my switchblade with Ericson’s DNA into Brewster’s penthouse at The Plaza. The high price tag on the attic unit ensures the best security measures, and I couldn’t just walk the weapon in myself and plant it.
I had to have one of Brewster’s thugs walk it in. Fortunately, my weeks spent stalking Ericson during his revenge job coincided with Brewster’s crew’s schedule. I knew of at least three gentlemen’s clubs where his guys liked to frequent.
I hesitated a moment before I wiped the knife hilt clean of my prints, then one sexy and meticulous lap dance with the right thug placed the switchblade in a briefcase that was soon on its way to the penthouse. Just in time for the two-day search of Brewster’s penthouse and financials.
Once the connection to Ericson’s murder was made, the detectives had an easier time linking the other victims to Brewster via their bank records and metadata.
Records and metadata I fabricated.
Like Reilly Stafford, who had a known drug habit. Reilly paid for his supply by middle-manning one of Brewster’s college drug rings. And Caleb Foster, a financial adviser at another firm who Ericson placed in charge of one of Brewster’s offshore accounts. And Christopher Monroe, an owner of a high-end car dealership that Brewster used to launder money through. And the dealership’s adviser? One Ericson Daverns.
Which looks something like this: Ericson was stealing a gross amount of money from his client, giving Brewster motive to have Ericson killed. The other murders were cleanup on Brewster’s end, to make sure any questionable connections between Ericson and Brewster were removed.
If this was one of my revenge jobs, I would have titled it Ring Around the Gangster.
Maybe I would’ve come up with something better back then. My sense of humor has taken a hit since the inception of my emotions.
Although, according to Vanessa, she prefers the more delicate and expressive version of her daughter. As Vanessa Vaughn will not be ran out of her city, she refused to leave when I pleaded with her. So instead, I kept a close watch over her, which included a dinner that saved a lot of unnecessary money flying toward legal teams. All I had to do was convince herher waywas what was best for me, and take her advice.
I promised her my lawyer had convinced me to lay low until the investigation was over. I looked her right in her eyes—the hard green gems that mirror my own—and admitted what happened in the alleyway was self-defense, that I was finally coming to terms with the truth.
After I agreed to see her therapist, all was right again in the world of socialites and their murderous offspring.
It seems that’s all a mother truly wants, for her child to be safe and…happy.
Strange, all these years with uncomfortable discord between us, and all I had to do was take some random guidance from my mother and let her see how grateful I was.
Becoming closer with my mother was, honestly, the strangest part of this whole nightmare. Don stripper gear and give a lap dance to a gangster? No problem. Have dinner with my mother and tell herthank you? The world tilts off its axis.
The newswoman on screen grabs my attention as Brewster’s name appears on the caption. I click the button to unmute the television.
“Today an arrest was made of one of the city’s most notorious playboys and philanthropists. Shane Brewster was charged in the murder of chief financial adviser, Ericson Daverns. Brewster is also being indicted on several counts of racketeering, bribery, and money laundering, as well as charges of organized drug sales.”
I click off the TV.
The shopping list of charges the DA is tacking onto Brewster’s prosecution is simply to make sure he goes down for something, while getting the max time.
Brewster can get out of a murder charge. He’ll pin it on one of his guys to take the fall. It’s the money he can’t—ironically—buy his way out of.
The government wants their tax dollars.
As the pieces fall into place, a sense of justified rightness settles over me. I was never in the revenge game for justice, no matter what Alex claims. My business was self-serving.
Yes, I was cruel.
I had a sickness inside me.
I feared the day that sickness devoured the last dregs of my humanity and I became a real monster.
But it was always that fear, that awareness of my nature, which kept me inline and the consuming darkness at bay. It was always in my power. Even as a psychopath, I harbored fear of myself.
