Her head pops up from where she’s buried in paperwork, and when she sees me, she smiles. “Detective Holtz, I was not expecting you today.”
The man gestures for me to go in, and I step through, smoothing out my tie, but stop short in the doorway, caught off guard. Hell. This looks less like an office and more like a Christmas party threw up, drunk from the night before. Garland coils off every edge, looping around a lamp and hugging the perimeter of her desk. It’s entwined with strings of blinking fairy lights—no doubt flashing to some cheerful song I can’t hear. A sequined stocking dangles off the filing cabinet, crammed with pink candy canes, and snowflake decals decorate the rest of the drawers.
A sugary scent drifts through the air, pulling my gaze to a squat candle on her desk labeled Sugar Cookie. Even the mug holding her black ballpoint pen collection is themed with the words Santa, Define Naughty scrawled on the side.
I blink, trying to reconcile the rumored ruthless leader who has Boston by the balls with the room draped in glitter and bows.I don’t know whether to laugh or roll my eyes. How the hell can her office look like a candy-coated daydream?
“Thank you, Ronan,” she says, offering another smile and standing from behind her desk.
“I’ll be outside.” The door slams shut behind Ronan with athud, louder than necessary. Aoife rolls her eyes and crosses to the compact beverage fridge next to an olive-green leather loveseat. A retro ceramic Christmas tree squats on top, its glossy paint dusted with fake snow. Red, blue, orange, and green plastic bulbs jut from its branches, glowing faintly but overshadowed under the fluorescent lights above.
When the refrigerator door shuts, the tree shakes. “Water?” Aoife asks, extending a bottle toward me.
“Thank you.”
She plops down on the love seat. “Any information on Finn?”
I shake my head, pulling out my notepad. She eyes it but doesn’t ask if I found her note. “I retraced his steps, even spoke to your Aunt Lizzy, but I lost him after he left the grocery store a few blocks from here.”
She leans her head back, closes her eyes, and whispers, “Where were you, Finn? Who did this to you?” Her head tilts back, exposing the delicate line of her throat. A thin, slim column that looks impossibly smooth. She swallows, and every tendon shifts, her pulse fluttering beneath her jaw.
I look away, offering her privacy as she talks to herself. A digital photo frame scrolls through on her desk. In one, a young girl—Aoife, judging by the wide blue eyes and blonde hair—sits with her cheeks stuffed full of food and a grin spread across her lips. In the next, it’s of her a little older, posing on a yacht that screams money no one but crime bosses could afford. Her arms are wrapped around a man’s neck while another woman with short dark hair makes bunny ears behind him. Aoife witha motorcycle. Aoife is on the beach somewhere. Another with a blonde woman in New York City.
“So, what can we do next?” She stands, cracking the top of her water bottle open and moving back behind her desk. She turns the photo frame around, and it’s then that I realize I’m still staring at it.
“Uh, I—” I clear my throat. “I think the best move formeis to work on identifying our second victim. That my help us string together some information. If the victims knew each other, all frequented the same gym?—”
“Finn didn’t go to the gym. He worked out here.”
“Okay. But do you understand what I’m saying? Is it a coincidence the last two victims were mafia men?”
Aoife winces.
“What?”
“I wasn’t sure if I should show you this …” She opens her laptop, brows pinched tight, bottom lip trapped between her teeth as her fingers move over the trackpad. “Here it is.”
She turns her computer toward me. On the screen is an email with five headshot-like photos of men, yet all taken from different angles in different locations.Surveillance, I think to myself.
My focus narrows on the sender. Luka Morozov.
I shake my head. “What is this? I can’t use this. You got this from the Bratva.”
She shrugs. “So? I’m the Irish Mob. We work with the police all the time. Ask your chief.”
“Just because you work with the police doesn’t mean I’ll work with you. I took an oath.” I shift in my chair.
“Your sanctimonious attitude will only get in the way of your job, Grayson.”
I hate the way she says my name, and I hate how, while unfair, she’s right. My family already excludes me because ofwhat I do with the law; why should it matter what I use outside of it.
She sighs and places her elbows on her desk. “Law enforcement’s been in bed with organized crime for decades. We work below the law, above it, and in every shadow it casts, but don’t get it twisted. We keep the bigger picture in focus. We have families and blood ties and things we aren’t willing to lose. We keep this city running for them. So, if there’s someone out there trying to erase us, they’ve got it wrong. They’re not cleaning up the streets of Boston, they’re only ripping out the foundation.”
She spits her last words, and it’s crazy how such a beautiful woman can sound so vicious.
I contemplate her words. “You sound about as self-righteous as I do.”
She chuckles, then shoves the computer at me again. “Just look. I think you might be interested in photo four.”
