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I’ve secured Salvatore’s freedom.
My heart beats in double time with anticipation, with intensifying hope that I’ve done it. I’ve saved Salvatore from what could be years in prison.
Stitches insists on coming inside with me. He sits two tables over while I join Sasha at the one by the window. She’s wearing sunglasses indoors and a hoodie that swallows up her frame. Bryce is wiggling in his carseat that she’s perched on the edge of the table. He’s gnawing on a chunk of watermelon with his only two teeth.
I’d be melting at the sight of him if not for such severe circumstances.
“Are the sunglasses really necessary?” I ask.
“They are when I don’t know who you’ve got with you. I’ve got to protect Bryce first.”
I glance over at Stitches, who’s flirting with the barista. “You mean Francis? He’s my security. He’s as trustworthy as trustworthy gets.”
“Hmm.”
“Sasha,” I say, sighing. “This better not be a false alarm. I don’t have time for games.”
“It’s not. Everything I said was true. See for yourself.”
She slides her cell phone across the table. A photo is up on the screen of Polk holding a newborn Bryce.
“That was days after he was born,” she says as the baby fusses in his carseat. She feeds another watermelon chunk into his puckered mouth and then turns back to me. “Polk hates that I have that photo. It’s proof he’s his son.”
“Not exactly. He’s holding a baby. That’s inadmissible to say the least. Did you do a paternity test?”
She shakes her head side to side. “But I’m willing if it comes down to it. Keep swiping to the left. Look at the other photos. See those screenshots? Those are our text conversations. He had me use an app that erases the messages hours after they’re sent… for discretion. But I screen-shotted them anyway. For protection.”
My eyes widen reading message after message. Often their exchanges were short and hostile with Polk initially demanding she have an abortion. When that didn’t happen, he demanded she give the baby up for adoption, or that she accept a payout from him to sever all ties forever.
“I’m confused. I thought you said he made you believe he wanted a relationship?”
“He did… at first. But I think it was to… to smooth things over, or because he figured I’d be easy to control. He realized that wasn’t true when I refused to get an abortion.”
“And you thought he wanted to be with you?”
She hangs her head and scrunches her face as if racked by a headache. “I was confused. I had just spent the last couple years of my life at the Mill. Polk ran circles around me. There’s stuff I’ve left out.”
I slide her phone back across the table and lean closer. “If we’re going to take down Polk, you have to tell me every last thing that will be of use. Are we clear? No more cherry-picking certain details.”
“They had me on drugs at the Mill. Those party favors people take at the clubs. It made me fight back less when dealing with customers. Try going a couple years high on those almost every night and come back and tell me if you don’t have substance abuse issues afterward.”
“I have a feeling where this is going…”
“Polk knew that,” she continues, shaking her head. “He used it against me. He kept me drugged, insisted on supplying me more, and set me up for things that got me into trouble in the eyes of the law. Finally, I refused to keep using. I wanted to get clean. But then I was suffering through bad withdrawals.”
“Before or after the baby?”
“Before… a-and during. I’m not proud. He got me mixed up in a bunch of stuff, and then when shit hit the fan, he made sure I was arrested.”
“Your grandfather is worth over six hundred million dollars. You’re an heiress to a large fortune. There was no one in your circle you could go to?”
“You mean the family and social circle that’s abandoned me? Excommunicated me years ago? You don’t get it—Polk knew I had nowhere to turn. No one would believe me. And he was right. Your firm is the first place that’s taken me seriously.”
The distress wears her vocal cords thin. She dabs at her face with a square napkin from our table.
It triggers an immediate empathetic response out of me. Not just to do this for Salvatore but to right the wrongs done to Sasha.
“We can use this to our advantage,” I say. “Polk will pay for what he’s done. Send me the images on your phone and any other evidence you have. I’ll handle it.”
