“I wanted to hear directly from the two of you if it was true about dad,” I said. “Is he really gone?”
Both Vincent and Anton looked up at me like they were truly shocked to hear that. Vincent narrowed his gaze and a frown came upon his face. “Where did you hear that?”
“Word travels fast,” I said. They exchanged a look, but I couldn’t tell if their surprise was from hearing it at all, or just that I knew. “What? Shocked I found out so fast?”
“A little,” Vincent said. “Do the rest of your new friends know as well?”
“They do,” I said. “It’s anyone’s guess what you hoped to gain from that act.”
Vincent just shrugged. “We didn’t entirely have a need for him anymore.”
So theydidkill him.
“So that was it? You couldn’t send him to Florida to retire or something. Just kill him off?”
“If we did that, we’d be expected to pay for it. He has no money, but well…” An evil smile returned to Vincent’s face. “You knew that.”
I shifted my gaze to Anton. “I’m surprised you went along with it. I know you gave Vince your leash, but I’m surprised you wouldn’t refuse to help.”
Anton’s fists tightened. “I did what had to be done.”
“Is that really all you wanted? You could have texted me this,” Vincent said. “Or did you think you were gonna use your little gun on me?”
Anton laughed. “All that training you’ve been doing. You thought a few weeks’ practice with Merrick Raines’ wife was enough to kill us both?”
Now I was the one confused.
How did they know I was training with Tamryn? “I’m definitely notthatstupid. I’m also not a monster like the two of you. I prefer my family members alive, even if they are some of the worst people I’ve ever known.” I pulled my hand out of my purse and stood up from the table.
Vincent looked up at me with an honestly confused look. “That’s really all you wanted?”
“I just needed to hear it from you. Allow me to officially say that I hope you both rot in hell.”
Moving quickly so as not to be stopped, I made my way out of the coffee shop. I expected that my brothers would follow me, but they already seemed suspicious of my actions, and with the police nearby, there were more than a few reasons not to react, at least not immediately. Whether or not they realized it, the conversation with them had afforded me a significant amount of enlightenment, and I had a couple more things on my to-do list now.
To start, I started up the car and drove away from the coffee shop, being sure to watch and make sure I wasn’t followed. I did some nonsensical driving, go up one street and then turning around and coming back, taking four turns to end up back where I started, all the things I already knew as a politician's daughter to check for prying eyes, then I found a densely populated parking lot and pulled over to drag out my phone.
There was something that my brothers didn’t know I had; something I’d been very careful not to alert them to.
A tracker on my father’s car.
There were plenty of times when I was expected to be the one to drag him out of a bar or some random woman’s house, and it was difficult to get him to tell me where he was. In those circumstances, I could use the tracking app on my phone to find his car and hopefully figure out where he was. It wasn’t foolproof. My dad liked to take a ride share from time to time, or climb in the car with complete strangers, but something told me to check it. I didn’t even consider using it before, because I believed he was dead and figured he probably wouldn’t be in his car, but the conversation with Vincent gave me a weird feeling.
Almost like it was news to them that Curtis was dead.
Why they would take credit for killing him if they hadn’t, I wasn’t sure, but it also meant that perhaps he wasn’tactuallydead. Maybe he just made a run for it somehow.
So I powered up my app and used it to track my father’s location.
And sure enough, the dot was moving.
I took a deep breath and turned the car back on, setting my navigation to follow that pin.
It wasn’t far from where I was, and especially once it stopped moving, it was easy to catch up. It brought me to a hotel on the outskirts of the city, and a smile came to my face when I saw my dad’s car parked in the lot, still with the headlights on. I pulled in and watched as the man who had sold me for half-a-million dollars climbed out of the car and started taking hastened strides towards the front of the hotel.
I floored the gas and cut across his path, coming to a screeching halt just centimeters in front of him. I stepped out of the car feeling an odd combination of relief and fury.
“Avion,” he said breathlessly.
