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I snort and flip a pen between my fingers. “Of course I told Hudson. He’s the first person I called, after I got her settled in.”
Pavel rubs a hand over his face, then peers at me. “Does her father know?”
At the mention of that soulless bastard, my mood instantly sours. “No. I don’t think he does.”
“You don’t ‘think’ he does?”
“Clara hasn’t exactly been on speaking terms with her father, from what I gathered.” I remember her mild threat this morning. She lobbed it at me like she really is Daddy’s Precious Angel, but I knew better then and I know better now.
There’s no way a doting father would allow his daughter to live in such a deplorable state. To be treated so terribly by any man, let alone one he works with.
That’s one of the first things I did once I left the compound: I took Clara’s threat to mind and ran background checks on both her ex, Martin, and her father, Detective Greg Everett.
The same Detective Greg Everett who arrested my brother.
He’s high in the ranks now, calling the shots at LVPD and taking huge, all-cash salaries under the table from various crime families across the city. The Italian dons I spoke with estimated a good ten thousand dollars per overlooked hit was the going rate; even more for circumvention around the skin trade. His protégé and now-partner is none other than Martin Patterson—Clara’s so-called “husband” and Willow’s deadbeat father.
Everyone she knows is tied up in this shit.
I haven’t met Patterson, but I already hate him. Iloathehim when I think of that kid and the hell he must have put her through. I hated Greg Everett from the moment he slapped cuffs on Tolya, but now that I’ve confirmed that he probably knew about what Martin was doing to his own daughter and looked the other way…
They’re scum, plain and simple. Both of them. Worthless fucking scum.
And when I’m done, they’ll meet the same fate as every other cockroach to wander under my heel.
“Easy, brother,” Pavel mutters. I follow his pointed gaze to where I’ve started to bend the pen in my fist.
I toss the pen onto the desk and sigh. “Even without Everett’s knowledge that I have his daughter, there’s still concern that his hold on her will prevent her from talking.”
Pavel nods. “Makes sense. What did Hudson say about it?”
“Exactly that. And that, without Clara’s retraction, there’s no other evidence that can exonerate Tolya and end his sentence.”
“So get her to recant.”
“In front of her father?” I narrow my eyes. I’ve thought about it, sure, but it never plays out well in my head. “He won’t let that happen. He won’t even let her get on the stand. And any formal approach requires taking her into the police station to write an official statement. Whichdefinitelywon’t happen.”
The government wonders why organized crime is so romanticized. This is why. I have all the money and legal resources in the world, and I still can’t get justice the “right” way.
It’s my way or no way at all.
Pavel purses his lips as he thinks it over. “So…” He drums his fingers on the arm of his chair. “I’m guessing we’re doing this the old-fashioned way.”
“Everett and his daughter need to pay for what they’ve done.” I stare out the floor-to-ceiling window of The Meridian’s mainoffice and mull over my options. “Everett will be easy, once we get the right distraction in place. Make him talk, make him confess, and then make him wish he was never born.”
“And the girl?”
I glare at him. “No one touches the girl.”
Pavel lifts his hands in surrender. “Got it. Got it. No one touches the girl. But I meant Clara,” he adds with a sly smile.
Shit. Fucker’s found me out.
“Don’t read too much into it,” I warn him. “I’ve got no beef with the kid. That’s all.”
“Uh-huh.”
I stare hard at him. “I mean it. She’s an innocent little girl who’s done nothing wrong. I’m not going to traumatize her for something her parents did. Or her grandparent. I’m not a monster.”
