“I stay with your father because I was raised Catholic, Cross Evangeline Carlson, and despite his flaws, he’s my husband. Don’t you dare disrespect me—”
I bark a laugh. Disrespect her? I c**k one of my brows. “If you think I give a damn about respecting you, you're wrong. You don’t deserve it. Either of you.” I clench my jaw so hard it pops. My head feels hot, the way it used to when the Dilaudid would first kick in. “You deserted me. You didn’t even visit me.”
I watch a vein pulse in her forehead and I know I've gotten to her when her face screws up and she tosses her hands into the air. “It was too painful!”
Bullshit. “You were a coward.”
She whirls and then she's gone, stalking through the dining room and in the direction of the stairs. I hear a low murmur, followed by my father's voice at regular volume, followed by my mother's strangled sob.
Fuck her.
I stride into the dining room, my heart pounding despite the cold, detached feeling that's taken over my chest. A second later, I'm staring my father down from across the massive Georgian table. He's wearing a Zenga suit and the same clean, in-control expression that got him elected, and I'm surprised to see that, unlike my mom, he looks better than the last time that I saw him.
As soon as he meets my eyes, his voice rings out. “Did you come here just to upset your mother?”
I grit my molars. I can ruin him. I can turn him in. I really can.
When I find my voice, it's soft. “Do you think that's why I came?”
“Is it?” He arches one black brow.
“I came to talk to you.”
He spreads his hands before him, like he's got nothing to hide. “Let's talk.”
“Are you sure you don't want to go into your office?”
Without missing a beat, he motions toward the hall. “Anything to make you comfortable, son.”
Anything to make me comfortable. For half a heartbeat, I'm going to slam my fist into his phony face. But before I can, he turns and walks into the hallway that runs behind this room. His caviler, unaccountable, uncaring attitude is so stunning that it takes the steam right out of me. I couldn't punch him if I wanted to. Then I almost laugh as I remember I'm a leftie. I'm not even sure I can take a swing with my right hand.
For a weird moment, as my legs stride after him, the hallway spins and I feel like I might fall down. I can feel the awful burn of gravel in my forehead. I can feel the roar of pain that starts in my neck and runs from the ruined spinal discs down my shoulder, exploding in an inferno through my hand. And, oh God, I can feel my f**king hand.
My neck's so tight I think it might pop off my shoulders, and as we step into his office I can feel the curtain falling, the curtain of badness that always leads to darkness, fear, and pain.
I knew this would happen.
My father steps past me to shut the door. I hear the click through the agony of my pain. I feel his hands on my elbows as he thrusts me down, into one of his leather chairs, and leans over me.
“I hope you didn’t come here to threaten me.”
I shove him in the chest and he slowly wraps his hand around my neck, somehow finding just the spot where the vertebrae were crushed and wired together. Just where all my pain begins. Fucking surreal. I blink up at him, breathing so hard I can barely find my voice. “You gonna finish the job?”
He loosens his grip, steps back. I'm pleased to see his shoulders are heaving just like mine are. “What do you want from me?”
“Did you know about it?” Ignoring the pain, I stand.
“Know about what?” He's rocking on his heels.
I swallow, using all my energy to focus on my words and not the pain that's still lighting up my neck and arm. “Did you know about what they did to me,” I rasp. “To my bike.”
“No,” he snorts, “I don't know the first thing about your bike.”
“Jim Gunn—” one of my father’s former body guards and Priscilla Heat’s partner in crime— “loosened the oil filter so oil got all over my back tire and f**ked the steering.”
“The night of your accident? When you were drunk?”
“The night Jim Gunn f**ked up my bike.”
His hands come up, palms out, like he's flabbergasted. “Do you think I would murder my own son?”
That’s rich, coming from a man who just had his hand around my throat.
I had to move, in secret, into Lizzy's childhood home because Jim Gunn had some rough-looking motherfucker follow me. That was before what happened with the bike, at a vineyard party last November, but after my father told Priscilla Heat that I’d found out what had happened to Missy King.
“I don't know what you would do,” I tell him bluntly, “but I know what I'll do.” I burn him with my gaze, as if my arm isn't roaring with pain, and I tell him, “I'll tell everyone. I'll tell the world what I know.”
I watch as my father's eyes narrow to slits: a monster cornered. “What do you want from me, Cross?”
I stand there, just breathing, thinking what do I want? I’m surprised to hear myself say, “I want you to find her.”
“You’re serious.”
I nod. “Find Missy King. Whether it was your idea or Priscilla Heat's—” and I know it was Priscilla's— “the girl got sold as a sex slave, Dad.”
He waves a hand, like it's no big deal, and then he says something that surprises me. Shocks me, really. “Cross, there is no Missy King.”
I frown, having trouble following; the pain in my head and neck and arm is getting worse. “Don't bullshit me. I want to know where she ended up. I want to find her. Help me or I’ll talk to the press. Unless you really would kill your own son.”
He regards me for a long moment before reaching behind him and grabbing a small flask. He takes the top off and I want to jump him, steal the liquor, douse my pain.
“Missy King is just the name she used as an escort. Her real name was Meredith Kinsey,” he says quietly, “and they sold her in Mexico. Same place you were when Priscilla lost her mind and hauled you and Lizzy down there a few months back. Sold her to a tall guy by the name of Cientos. It's all drug-runners down there, Cross. Cartels. There'll be no point. She's probably dead already.”
“You’re sick,” I whisper.
He looks defensive, then annoyed. “She wanted me to leave your mother. When I refused, she wanted money. She threatened to go to the papers with our relationship. She wanted to ruin me. Priscilla offered to take care of the situation. I didn’t ask how. I ended up finding out, but by then…” He takes another drink, then shrugs. “It was too late.”