Текст книги "Fear You"

Автор книги: B. B. Reid

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Текущая страница: 13 (всего у книги 21 страниц)

“It’s not your fault. I should have been watching my back.”

We each toweled off before making our way to the house. “Do you think they killed each other by now?” Dash joked. “It’s been mighty quiet.”

“Who are you talking about?” Quentin questioned as we entered the house.

“Some chick he’s babysitting as a favor.”

I made my way into the living room with Quentin and Dash following. Buddy had to go home and get ready for a date with a senior. I shook my head at the kid’s charm and ability to pull girls in any age group.

“Where is she?” I asked Sheldon when I looked around and didn’t see Diana. I was already fisting my car keys thinking she ran.

“She said something about using the shower to take a hoe bath.”

“Isn’t that a bird bath?”

“Not for her kind,” she sneered.

I blew out a breath and then wondered again why Dash had brought her here. From the look in her eyes, I could tell she wanted to stir shit up. She was pissed, and I couldn’t bring myself to care. I cared about Sheldon, but she was the least of my problems. For some reason, she thought she could get away with bossing everyone around. Including me.

“Stop being a royal dick, Dash spat”

“You’re one to talk. Why do you think Willow avoids you?”

The twins began to bicker and hurling insults between them while Quentin and I looked on. It wasn’t uncommon for them to fight. They rarely ever didn’t argue. I assumed it was a twin thing.

Just as I was about to intervene, I heard Di’s shriek of disbelief sound from behind me.

“Quentin?”

The twins stopped arguing immediately while Q and I whipped around to see her standing in the doorway. Her skin was as pale as a ghost. Not even when she told me about nearly being killed an hour ago had she looked so shaken.

My gaze bounced from Quentin to Diana before settling on Quentin’s confused expression. He didn’t seem to know her, but she knew him. She took in his confusion and curled her lip slowly. “What’s the matter? Don’t you recognize your childhood lover?”

“Diana?” Q took a step toward her, but Di quickly retreated. The tension in the room was stifling. My gaze shifted between the two as they stared at each other in anger, confusion, and wonder.

“I take it you two know each other?” Dash asked, stating the obvious while I mentally slapped myself for not making the connection sooner considering who Di’s father was.

“Yeah, we know each other,” Quentin nodded slowly. Anger was brewing in his eyes as they remained fixed on her.

“Mind sharing how?” Sheldon asked and crossed her arms. She shot me an accusatory glance as if I had planned this.

“Keiran, what is she doing here?” Quentin asked without looking away from Di.

“Oh, he didn’t tell you?” She grinned before I could respond. “He’s my new babysitter. You know how Daddy can get into trouble sometimes because of his business.”

“Jeez, is he still—”

“Don’t do that. Don’t pretend you care about what happens to me.”

“Diana—”

“You left. You found happily ever after and left me to pick up the pieces you left behind. Don’t worry. It’s kept me warm at night in all the places it cut me the deepest.”

The silence descending did nothing to help the tension in the room.

“I’ll kill him,” Quentin growled. That declaration was the first time he’d ever acknowledge his past. He’d gotten out before I did, but now I wasn’t so sure his salvation was what it seemed.

Could Mario be dirtier than he seemed? His story of being kicked out of the bureau because of corrupt practices always had a few holes, but I was willing to overlook them until now. I told myself his business wasn’t my concern, but that was before it jumped out at me in my living room and left me feeling like I’d just been caught with my pants around my ankles and my dick in my hand.

“No, you won’t and don’t pretend you care.”

“And why the fuck not?”

“Because he’s still Daddy.”

“Are the Burkin bags and shiny, diamond bracelets worth it?”

Her eyes narrowed to angry slits. “You don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.”

“Enlighten me, Diana. Because the last I checked, your father used you to make money. What am I missing?”

“Try the last ten years!” she growled and stormed out of the living room. Quentin started after her, but the hand I placed on his shoulder stopped him in his tracks. I ignored the hostile look he gave me, but after a moment, thought twice about it and took my hand down to rest at my side. Thankfully, he didn’t make for the door again.

“We need to talk.”

“Later.”

“No,” I snapped letting my anger show for the first time since she called his name in shock. “We talk now.”

* * *

Dash left with his sister, and I wasted no time with interrogating Q. We were sitting at the table in the kitchen with shot glasses filled with the hardest liquor I could find.

“What just happened in my living room?”

He took a shot and immediately poured another. “You know most of it.”

“Then start with the part I don’t know.”

“First, tell me why you are still dealing with him, and why you didn’t tell me?”

“Because he is the only way I can find Arthur, and I needed to keep everything as low key as possible.”

Q released a hard breath and took another shot. I pulled the bottle away while giving him a pointed look. I wanted him relaxed, but I didn’t want him drunk before I could get any answers.

“I thought you would have given up on that now that you’re out.”

“I couldn’t even if I wanted to. I’m in too deep. He’s going to be looking to collect on his payment.”

“Do you really believe he pulled those kinds of strings to get you out on bail just to gain a worker? He can find someone like you on any street.”

He spit the words out harshly, but I knew he didn’t mean it as an insult. The fact of the matter was he was right. “I told him I would hand deliver his mole.”

“You’re double-crossing Mario?” His eyebrows raised in surprise as he studied me with doubt evident in his eyes.

“He was in on it. He wants to draw him out just as much as I do.”

“Why didn’t you stop all contact with him when he returned you to your uncle?”

“I didn’t hear from or see him again for years. It wasn’t until I went to juvie that I saw him again.”

“You saw him?”

“Yeah. He came to visit me.”

Q sat up straighter and ground his jaw. “He’s been keeping an eye on you the whole time, hasn’t he?”

“He’s been watching the both of us,” I clarified.

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Do you really think you would have wanted to know? You’ve spent the last ten years avoiding your past.”

His fist slammed down on the table before he ground out, “That doesn’t give you the right to keep this from me.”

“And Diana? What’s the story between you two? You never told me you knew his daughter.”

“You didn’t even know she existed before.”

“Exactly my point. You hid things, too.” We could have spent all night hurling accusations but we both knew it wouldn’t get us anywhere. “What did you mean he used her to make money?”

“Your golden boy isn’t clean. He’s as dirty as they come,” he spat.

“I know. He’s greedy, but he isn’t Arthur.”

“Then obviously you don’t know half of what you think you do.”

“Enlighten me, Quentin,” I snapped, using his words from earlier.

“Did Mario ever tell you why he broke his partnership with Arthur?”

“He said Arthur was becoming too suspicious, and his cover was in jeopardy when he started pressing the issue against child pornography.”

Quentin’s grim expression deepened as he shook his head and leaned forward. “That motherfucker wasn’t against child porn. He broke it off because he wanted a bigger cut.”

My mind raced from all the implications and before he could say more, I was already piecing together the rest.

I’d been played.

“Arthur was cashing in on the majority of the share because he was supplying the fresh talent. How do you think Arthur was so successful keeping his business undetected by the Feds? Mario was his eyes and ears, and for that, he believed it should have been a fifty-fifty partnership. When Arthur refused, Mario decided to break it off and start his own line of business while stealing from Arthur’s supply.”

“How do you know this?”

“Because I was his first recruit.”

Son of a bitch. “And Diana?”

“She was a convenience he made useful to get his business up and running.”

“He used his own daughter?”

“To him, he didn’t believe he was selling her. That motherfucker made us do sick shit to each other every day in front of a camera. We were just kids, man. We had no clue what we were doing. He coached us through it. Showed us what to do. When we complained too much, he beat us.”

“And then what happened?” I asked though I already knew.

“You showed up.”

“How did my appearance change things? I wasn’t there long before he brought me to the States.”

“Mario is sloppy as hell and isn’t as nearly as careful as he thinks. I overheard a lot of his business dealings. I didn’t understand much of it then, but I remember all of it. The bureau got word of him spending too much of his time outside of the United States jurisdiction. Arthur had business dealings in Canada, as you know, and within the States. They pulled him from the case because he had apparently failed to bring the bureau evidence that would allow them to convict or at least bring him in with a good chance of the charges sticking.”

“He was found out.”

“Big time. The bureau began investigating Mario. He lost his job, but the only reason they weren’t able to convict was because he was never caught with anything illegal.”

“Meaning us.”

“Bingo. He brought us here to save his own ass. Being caught with us meant a conviction and time behind bars and becoming the bitch of a beefy inmate named MacDaddy.”

“Where was Diana being kept? I never met her.”

“With her mother, I assume. We were never left together long before and after sessions. He brought her in when he wanted to film and she always left after.”

“Why would he bring Diana here knowing you lived in the same city? He had to know I would find out.”

“He wouldn’t think you’d care.”

“Why do you say that?”

“You impressed a lot of people back then, Keiran. You were able to channel your emotions and throw away childhood possibilities and become what they needed of you.”

“Are you trying to say they broke me?”

“Didn’t they?”

“I wasn’t afraid. I didn’t show fear.”

“But how much did you let them take from you?”

Quentin was actually older than I was by two years. Without medical records, we were able to lie about his age. Somehow, even then, we knew the significance of staying together. Q spent months in foster care while the agencies and local law enforcement attempted to track down his parents, but after nearly a year, no one stepped forward to claim him. He was eventually taken into the care of a couple. We’d never spoken about it before, but I knew he had possessed a small ounce of hope that he would find his parents. The parents who likely sold him to buy a hit or a beach house in Malibu. It just all depended on how much they thought he was worth.

“You were there, man. You did the same as I did. You made the same sacrifices.”

“And when I was finally free, I was able to let go. Can you say the same?”

Letting go… I kept hearing that phrase. It’s like everyone got together to figure out how the hell they could get me to let go.

The last person to tell me to let go was Dash. I knew what to say to get him off my back, but this was Q. He knew what it was like and based on the story he had just revealed, he knew a hell of a lot more than I did. Mario had turned him and his daughter into child prostitutes. I swallowed down the bile and whatever feelings I had about the past. I dealt with it how it suited me, and all the Dr. Phil’s of the world could go fuck themselves.

“You said it yourself, right? I was in too deep, so there’s no salvation for me.”

“You know that’s not what I meant.”

“It doesn’t make it any less true. Now answer my question.” When he raised his eyebrows in question, I asked, “Why do you think Mario trusted me with his daughter knowing you were here?”

“Anything Mario is into right now, he’s thinking he could suck you into it. He’s going to try because if someone like you isn’t with him, then you’re against him.”

“I already know he knows I’m a threat.”

“Then what are you doing dealing with him?”

“I’m selling my soul to the devil.”

Chapter Twenty

Keiran

Quentin left to pick up his foster sister from dance practice, leaving me alone with Diana. I found her in the bathroom primping for some unknown reason.

“Are you hungry?” I gruffly asked. My reluctance to be hospitable was apparent.

She turned from the mirror to face me. “Wow. For a second there I thought I would have to ask.”

It was the first word she’d spoken since seeing Q again. Talk about a fucking blast from the past. Thinking about what Mario had done and all the lies he’d told and clever tricks he had pulled resulted in a lack of patience.

“I’ll be in the kitchen. Hurry up.”

I went back downstairs and prepared some steaks before throwing them in the oven. My uncle would be home soon, and I needed to prepare myself mentally for the confrontation that was sure to come.

Diana came downstairs ten minutes later just as my uncle walked through the door.

“I don’t know what you boys have been doing around here, but shacking up with girls in my home is out of the question.”

“My, my,” Diana purred. “Now I see where you get your firm hand.”

“Shut the fuck up, Diana.” To John I said, “She’s a guest. I’m doing a favor for a friend.”

His eyes narrowed suspiciously, and for a second, I thought I was looking at my father. I wondered if he was faced with the same problem when he looked at me. Is that why he could never look me in the eye for long?

“What friend?”

“One of the guys from the team. Her parents kicked her out, and his parents don’t have room in their house. As Captain—”

“You aren’t on the basketball team anymore so are you referring to the same team that kicked you off?”

I ignored his blatant attempt to remind me that I had screwed up. At least in his eyes I had. I didn’t care that Trevor and Anya were dead, and it was amazing anyone could expect me to be after they both set me up. It wasn’t exactly a secret after Trevor attacked Monroe in the gym bathroom. “I told him she could stay here and she will.”

I watched his jaw work. I was challenging him, and he knew it. Common sense told me to stop while I was ahead, but my anger toward him wasn’t going away anytime soon.

“I want her gone.”

“Fine. If she goes, then so do I. Have fun explaining to the authorities how you helped me become a fugitive.”

“Are you threatening me?” He took a menacing step forward, but as usual, I held my ground.

“I’m simply reminding you that after all the strings you pulled keeping me out of jail and in school, I’m sure it wouldn’t be easy to prove your innocence. I mean… why wouldn’t you help your nephew disappear? You did it before.”

Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed Diana perk up at my admission. I needed to remember to censor what I said around her. She could very well be a mole he put in place to keep eyes on me, as he was known to do with Arthur. Mario and I were cut from the same cloth, which meant we didn’t completely trust each other.

Trevor and Anya died while in Mario’s care. Even though I gifted them to him, it was with the strict instruction not to kill them. Simply disappearing was cleaner than killing them. Killing them left a body to be found, which is how I landed in jail.

Her dad had yet to explain how Trevor and Anya were murdered, and though I haven’t pushed the subject, it was always at the back of my mind. First, I had to take down Arthur and find Mitch all before my trial, which was scheduled to take place in less than two months. For that, I needed Mario, so making an enemy of him wasn’t the smartest move.

“That has nothing to do with a teenaged girl living in my home without my consent. How do I know she didn’t run away from home, and her parents aren’t looking for her?”

“Um… actually, I’m twenty so legally, I’m an adult, Daddy O.”

My patience was now completely gone.

Her throat was in my hand, and I was marching her backward out of the kitchen before John could respond. My firm hand around her neck was the only thing keeping her up and from tripping over her feet.

“Hey, hey, hey! I only like the rough stuff when I have nothing on,” she giggled. It turned into a nervous broken sound after the look I gave her, warning her not to fuck with me.

She was quickly becoming a pain in my ass along with being an inconvenience. I didn’t have time to babysit. However, after learning the things I had about Mario, maybe it was his plan.

Having his daughter in my care could have worked to my advantage, but now I wasn’t so sure of his paternal feelings for his daughter. If I never met Dash’s parents or even Monroe’s aunt, there would be nothing to convince me that good parents existed.

“You know the way to the guest bedroom and, by the way, he’s my uncle, not my father, so either you were stupid enough to come here without doing your homework or your father was just stupid enough to send you here period.”

I shoved her toward the stairs and disappeared back inside the kitchen without waiting for a response.

“I didn’t raise you to treat women like that,” my uncle barked. He was standing by the door as if to come to her rescue. It was all I could do not to roll my eyes but then I caught on to the first part of his statement.

“Raise me? Is that what you call being gone three hundred and sixty-five days out of the year?”

“Regardless of how you feel about me, you will not treat women that way.”

“Treat women like what?”

“We don’t manhandle a woman the way I just saw you do.”

“No, we threaten to take away their child.” His lips thinned out in a hard line as he glared at me. Once again, I’d backed him into a corner. He had been gone for far too long after making too many mistakes to step in and be a parent now. “Look…” I released an aggravated breath, feeling myself giving in partially. “I won’t bring trouble to your doorstep, and I can’t toss her out, so you’ll just have to trust me.” I turned on my heel and left him to mull it over.

The hallway was clear so I assumed Diana did as I ordered. I followed after her to the guest bedroom. It was next to mine so if she ever tried to sneak out, I would hear her pass. I wasn’t taking any chances.

The bedroom door was unlocked so I pushed my way in. She was centered in the middle of the bedroom, leaning back on her hands, wearing a playful expression. “It’s about time you came. I’m ready now to test out those rough edges of yours and ruffle some bed feathers if you are.”

“Just… stop. I need you to start talking. Why did your father send you here?”

“I told you—”

“I want the truth, not the rehearsed bullshit he told you to say. Q told me what happened between you two ten years ago. Is it true?”

“I don’t see why Q felt the need to tell you any of that.” Her eyes lowered with what might have actually been shame. She sat up and crossed her legs, letting her hands rest in her lap.

“He didn’t go into detail.” I had no clue why I wasted time reassuring her. I didn’t care about her feelings. I cared about what was inside her head—her knowledge, her memories… her plans. The daughter of Mario had to have a plan. I just wondered who was meant to suffer. “Just tell me what I need to know. Make this easy on yourself now because I will get it out of you.”

Her eyes narrowed as bitter resentment shone through. “If you knew me at all, you wouldn’t waste your time on threatening me, but since you don’t, I’ll spell it out for you—I don’t care about what you can or are willing to do to me. The life I’ve lived isn’t one I will miss.”

“Then maybe we can help each other.”

“How?”

“Your father… how attached to him are you?”

* * *

I was taking a huge chance walking into this place, but after what I had learned last night, I was quickly running out of chances. I managed to turn every head when I walked in, and word would likely get out that I was here, but it was a risk worth taking.

Mario was dirtier than I’d thought, and he’d been playing me all along—right from the fucking beginning.

He toyed with my hate for the syndicate to use me as a pawn in order to take over Arthur’s organization. His plan was to either kill me or recruit me once Arthur was out of the way.

He would never get a chance to do either.

I was going to beat him, my father, and Arthur at their own game. Sooner or later, someone would have to be the victor. I just had to ensure that it would be me.

“Mr. Masters, how are you?” The detective with the thick mustache who had arrested me weeks ago greeted me as he walked into the room. Another man, who I assumed was his partner, followed, and they each took a seat in front of me.

“Can we cut the formalities? I have school in an hour.”

“Yes, that’s right… For a high school boy, you sure have your hand in a lot of jars. What can we do for you today?”

“I have information you’ll want to hear, but it comes with a price.”

“Are you here to confess.”

“Yes. I am.”

The looks on their faces were priceless.

* * *

After carefully arranging all the pieces of the puzzle, phase one of my plan was in play. I pulled into the school parking lot with twenty minutes to spare. The coach including the entire team called a meeting this morning, and for some reason, I was expected to attend.

I’d already resigned myself to never playing on the team or any college team after. College scouts were no longer interested after my status as the only suspect in a double murder went national. There was even a petition to have me removed from the school, but it never generated more than a few signatures. The murders would always hang over my head like a dark cloud.

As I stepped from the car in the mostly empty parking lot, my gaze zeroed in on a familiar form entering the school.

What the hell is Fitzgerald doing in town? Better yet… Why is he at the fucking school?

He had no family here or any real friends other than Monroe, so if he was in town, then he was no doubt here to see her. Had she called him? If she had, then Monroe had bitten off more than she could chew. Fitzgerald was a no safe zone. I didn’t know him, and I damn well didn’t trust him.

I rounded the corner to find where the shit had disappeared to, and I was nearly knocked on my ass.

Fitzgerald was pinned against the lockers by Q as they devoured each other’s lips. Fitzgerald is into men? I didn’t even know Q was into men. I’ll be damned if that didn’t explain a lot including the day Q brought him to the jail.

I still didn’t want him anywhere near Monroe. There was no give where she was involved. I realized I was being completely unreasonable and selfish, but I couldn’t bring myself to care. I backpedaled around the corner and tried to erase the last thirty seconds out of my head. I wasn’t homophobic or anything, but some shit I just didn’t care to see.

If Jesse played for the other team, then that meant I could put Quentin on him, though it looked as if he might have been way ahead of me. I made a mental note to ask Q about his relationship with Jesse and why he had never mentioned it before. The last thing I needed was any more cards being dealt under the table along with my own.