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He sounds coy, but no one else is in the room. Lesley slides over to the edge of the booth, so she’s looking over my shoulder. I wave him over and he hands me his phone.
“I’ve continued tracking him since he staked out your place and abandoned the car. I was able to track through security cameras that, eventually, he took the night ferry. So I thought it might be a good idea to flick through the cameras from the last month to see if it’s a regular occurrence. That maybe he’s not from these parts,” he says.
I swipe through the various images with different dates of him boarding the ferry.
“I still can’t get a clear image of his face. He’sgood at avoiding the cameras. And he always wears more coverage around his face after he’s approached our members with beanies, hats, stuff like that. But since he’s not from here, I was able to track the general area he lives in through street security. It’s harder though, because the security cameras really begin to dwindle in that area. But I’ve narrowed it down.”
My finger stops on a picture of the man leaving the ferry. My eyebrows scrunch as I zoom in as best as the graphics allow before pixelation. Henry stops talking as he looks at what I’m so intently studying.
My throat constricts as I stare at the purple wristband tattoo. I flick back through other images, and it’s always concealed by the suits and dress shirts he wears. But in this one picture, it’s visible, and it dawns on me who this fucker is. Old wounds resurface as I scan through the narrowed-down suburbs. It turns out that no matter how much I thought I’d run away from my past, they’d find a way to get to me. I go back to the photograph with the purple wristband.
“I know who it is,” I say, and my hand drops into my lap with the phone. “His name is Timothy Lett.”
“Are you sure?” Henry asks as he grabs back his phone, excited by this breakthrough.
“I want you to track him and find his address. Will the name help?” I ask.
“Yes.” He nods excitedly. “It might take me another day or so to track him because he is good at keeping to the shadows. But I’ll get you to him.”
“Make it no more than a day,” I grit between my teeth.
Henry nervously nods before excusing himself.
“Who is he to you?” Lesley asks over my shoulder.
I glance over my shoulder at her. “The past,” is all I say.
Because I don’t trust even Lesley with my past.
It was buried, and an empire was built on top of it.
Or so I thought.
CHAPTER 50
Honey
Daphne is squealing in delight. “Yes, yes, and yes! Oh my gosh! If you open a café and bakery, it’ll be so cute.” She grabs my hand. “Can I be a barista?”
I give her a skeptical look. “Do you know how to make coffee?”
She waves her hand around in a ‘never you mind’ fashion, and I raise an eyebrow. “Okay, fine. I’ll just take the money from the customers. I’m good at that.” She winks.
We walk, arms linked, wearing heavy jackets as the cold sets in for the season.
I laugh. “This is progress, though, with you and Dawson, right?” We’re walking through the city to a tattoo parlor she booked three months ago. Today is the day, and she’s dragging me along because she’s scared of needles. Again, I don’t even know why she’s getting atattoo considering her fear, but who am I to judge the journey of Daphne.
“Maybe, but my father still can’t stand Dawson,” I reply.
She laughs again, still delighted by the faceoff I told her about. “I must confess, I love the idea of Dawson not being able to charm the pants off your dad. It must have come as such a shock to him.”
We enter the tattoo parlor, and a small bell jingles over the door. The woman at the reception desk smiles and tells us to sit and the wait time is ten minutes. The walls are covered with marvelous creations—admittedly, it’s the first time I’ve stepped into a place like this.
“It’s not an ideal situation, but baby steps, I suppose,” I confess as I continue to look at the art on the walls. The pieces vary in size. There are some full-sleeve tattoos ranging from dragons to geishas, but I prefer the smaller, daintier designs.
“Maybe not, but I’m starting to think your dad is a hardass. It’s pretty damn hot, to be honest.”
“Eww.” My skin crawls at anyone calling my father hot. She rolls her eyes and giggles. If only she knew the harsh reality of how deadly my father is. I’d left out certain parts of my story to cover that fact.
