Maria

 

“Before I take over the business, there are a few things I want to talk to you about,” I told my father as I reached down and grabbed papers out of the bag I’d been carrying around since I started finding bits and pieces of his paper trail.

 

“What are those?” he asked, like he didn’t already know what I was doing. Or maybe he did know, but he hadn’t expected me to be prepared.

 

While I was pulling out the papers, I grabbed my phone and checked to see if there were any missed calls. Sure enough, Brawn was calling again. I swiped to answer the call and put the phone down so he could hear the conversation.

 

“These papers show that you have been building almost exclusively for a man named Cory Banks, known to his friends and associates simply as Carlisle,” I said boldly. “Care to explain to me why you’ve been building office parks owned by a known member of the mob?”

 

His expression grew cold. His jaw tensed. He looked frozen, turned to stone.

 

“You can explain it to me, or you can talk to the police,” I threatened him. My nerves were eating a hole in my gut.

 

“I don’t have to explain anything to you. It’s business. He hired me to do those jobs, and he paid me for them. That’s how it works,” he said coolly, his voice emotionless in an attempt to cover up what I already knew.

 

“On the contrary, if I’m going to maintain certain business relationships you currently have with other businessmen, I’m going to need to understand the nature of those relationships, correct?”

 

A threatening little smile played across his face. “You’re not going to learn what you want to know by being so direct,” he said.

 

“If your relationship with Mr. Carlisle is legitimate, why can’t we be direct about it?” I asked, fighting the urge to laugh at him.

 

My father simply cocked his head and stared at me for a moment. I could practically see the wheels turning behind his eyes, and the smoke coming from his ears as his mind worked overtime to come up with an answer. I figured he would have been quicker on his feet, but it occurred to me that my father wasn’t a man who was used to being challenged.

 

“Did your biker boyfriend put you up to this?” he asked, his voice still calm, though I could hear a slight edge to it.

 

“I’m not talking to him, remember?” I replied.

 

“That wasn’t his motorcycle that left here with you on it?”

 

My heart sank. I tried not to let my reaction show in my expression, but I had to look down and away from my father. I couldn’t control my response. It felt like he’d punched me right in the gut, knocking the wind out of me.

 

“Now that we’ve settled that issue, tell me again why it is that you want to take the company over so badly. Or, better yet, why is it that you’re worried about my relations?” He took on a tone that told me he understood he had the upper hand again.

 

I wondered how he knew about Brawn coming to get me when he hadn’t even been home. He must have had someone watching, or he had a security system I wasn’t aware of. Anything was possible with my father.

 

He got up from his chair and buttoned his suit jacket. He walked over to the stone fireplace and seemed to admire the family photos on the mantle.

 

“I’ve seen the books,” I told him. I hadn’t seen the books I wanted to see, which were the ones detailing all the illegal money that came through the office, but I had seen the ones that made everything seem legit. Except they didn’t, in the end, under scrutiny.

 

He turned around and narrowed his eyes, looking my face over as if to see if I’d really said what he thought he’d heard, or if I was just bluffing. I was definitely bluffing, to see what he’d say, but I had counted on his response being quick enough to give me the information I wanted from him. “You haven’t,” he said, shaking his head. “You may have found my official books, but you didn’t find the ones you were looking for. They’re somewhere safe.”

 

I glanced down at the phone by my side, hoping Brawn was still listening. My father had just practically admitted to the existence of records detailing all the dirty money he’d received from guys like Carlisle.

 

“This is why you need to stay focused on the family business, Maria. You aren’t cut out for trying to figure all of this out on your own. I’m surprised you’ve come this far, but you have had help from that punk ass biker, so it’s not like you really did it on your own. You know, if you’d let me groom you for the job, you might understand what I do a little better.” He turned around and looked at me from in front of the mantle. His cold, hard eyes stared at me, emotionless.

 

“That’s what I was expecting you to do,” I told him, “but I started finding this information as I looked through your records, trying to sort everything out. There’s quite a mess in that office.”

 

“Maybe I left it like that so you would have to dig through it all, knowing if you did, you would eventually find out what you know now. Maybe I did that so I would see where your loyalty really lies. Does it lie with me, with your family? Or does it lie with that troublemaker you’re dating?”

 

“I’m not dating him. And my loyalty? If my father has taught me anything, it’s that my loyalty lies with myself. Just as you’ve done to cover your ass by hiding your tracks with your business, I’ve been trying to separate myself from men like you, men like Carlisle, men who always seem to have more money than they should. Yet, nobody knows what anyone else does to get that kind of money. It’s like it comes out of thin air.” I was standing, too, no longer content to sit down while my father literally talked down to me.

 

“So you went into business with Mickey ‘Brawn’ Johnson, little brother of one of the top members of The Twisted Ghosts. Mickey’s older brother is one of the heads of the MC. He doesn’t have an official title, but everyone treats him like he’s up there with the president and VP. Have you noticed that? That gives Mickey a unique position within the organization.”

 

“I don’t know about any of that. I don’t get involved with his brothers in the MC,” I told him.

 

“No, of course not. After all, you’re not officially his old lady, just his business partner. And I guess you wouldn’t understand just how much guys like that have in common with men like me. You see, there’s a lot of shady money in that organization, as well. You see, they all run businesses. Mickey’s older brother runs a strip joint, but he pays most of his money out to his girls while he still manages to support a pretty extravagant lifestyle. Mark, one of the MC’s enforcers, is a contractor. He does pretty much what I do, and he serves a lot of similar customers. Mickey’s little brother, a kid they call Hero, does tattoos. Where do you think they get their ink?” He paused and looked at me, as if waiting for it all to sink in.

 

“I know what you’re trying to do, or what it is you’re trying to say, but it’s not working,” I told him defiantly. “Brawn isn’t like the rest of them.”

 

My father laughed. “You’re right. He’s not. He tries to do as much as he can outside of the MC. I know what they think of that. They don’t like it. They think he does it because he thinks he’s better than everyone else, but I suspect he probably does it for the same reason you do.”

 

“And what is that?” I sighed.

 

“Because he’s stubborn and ungrateful.”

 

“What the hell are you getting at?” I snapped.

 

He looked around the room and made a sweeping gesture with his hand. “All of this. Look at what the other members of the MC have. Look at what I’ve provided for you. And, yet, instead of being thankful and embracing the life you’ve been given, you want to run off with someone like Mickey to do things on your own? You don’t have to do anything to maintain the lifestyle you’ve known all your life.”

 

“Nothing except turn my life over to the mob,” I countered.

 

“What’s that supposed to mean? I haven’t turned my life over to them,” he protested. “I’m not connected. All I do is work for individuals who pay generously for the work I do.”

 

“Right, until you decide to tell one of them no. You should try it sometime and see how it works out for you.”

 

“This isn’t about me, Maria. This is about you and the decisions you’re making that are going to ruin your life. You’re walking away from everything, and you’re going to end up with nothing. You’re getting mixed in with the wrong crowd. Their days are numbered, and you should be aware of that.”

 

I made a show of yawning and sat back down. His threats were empty. What he didn’t realize was that at any moment, Brawn and the rest of the MC could storm the house and end his little game. He thought he was above it all just because he’d managed to get names and information on most of the guys in The Twisted Ghosts. He probably understood how most of the local organizations worked, from the street gangs to the MCs. I was certain that was part of the reason he’d hired so many of them to work for him over the years.

 

“So, if you’re not part of the mob, what is your job? Who are you to them?” I asked.

 

“I’m not anything to them,” he said. “I run a construction company. We build whatever we’re paid to build. Nothing more, nothing less.”

 

“Odd, because for a minute there, you were talking like you had some real connections with these guys. You were making threats and throwing out information about members of the MC like you knew something. So I was just wondering. Either way, so far, you’ve admitted to me that you work for guys like Carlisle. You’ve admitted that you’ve accepted dirty money for the jobs you’ve done. But you haven’t told me what that money is really for, and what you’ve had to do to get paid so much. I mean, you certainly can’t afford all of this on what I’ve seen you do,” I challenged him.

 

I felt like we’d just talked in circles, bringing the conversation right back around to where we’d started. He didn’t answer me, presumably because he was thinking the same thing I was. Instead, he pulled his phone out and started sending a message to someone, tapping on his on-screen keyboard.

 

“What are you doing?” I asked.

 

“Responding to a message from one of my clients,” he said absently. “Or is that something I shouldn’t be doing now?” he asked, looking up from his phone. “All of this talk has made my throat dry. I’m going to grab something to drink. Would you like anything?”

 

“No. Thanks,” I said, flashing a fake smile. His whole demeanor had changed after he sent the message on his phone. Suddenly, he didn’t seem angry or threatened by my questions. He seemed relaxed, almost downright comfortable, as if he had the whole thing under control.

 

I glanced down at my phone again. The screen had gone dark, so I wasn’t sure if Brawn was still listening or not. I reached down and pressed the button on the side of the phone to turn the screen on. He was still there, still listening. I wished there was something I could have said to let him know I needed his help.