“It sounds like she might not want to be found,” Carson says, and Rizzo licks his lips.
Everyone is terrified of Carson.
“Maybe she skipped out with your man,” Julian suggests, knowing it’ll piss me off.
“She’s a foolish girl,” Rizzo replies, shaking his head. “I’m ready for her to be married, and she needs to come home. So I’ll pay your interest if you help me findEloise.”
Her name in his mouth makes me feral.
I could kill him and all of his men right now. It’s nothing less than he deserves.
But Julian still has his product and money to collect.
“I want the goods and the money within twenty-four hours,” Julian says. “Once that’s delivered, we’ll see what we can find out about your daughter. She may not even be in our city.”
“I suspect she is,” Rizzo replies.
“Why?” I ask, speaking for the first time. “Why do you think she’s in Vegas?”
He watches me for several long moments. “Call it a hunch.”
I don’t buy it.
He knows something. Once Julian has what he needs out of this asshole, I’m taking him out.
“Twenty-four hours,” Julian repeats, and the four of us turn to walk out of the warehouse.
“Oh, one more thing,” Rizzo says, catching our attention. “If I find out that one of you has touched her, that she’s not pure as fucking snow when she’s delivered back to me, I’ll kill all of you.”
Carson smirks.
“No,” Mateo says in a low voice so only I can hear, so I don’t raise my weapon and take him out.
Without answering, we leave and climb into our vehicles, then drive away. To say my fury is barely controlled is an understatement. The piece of shit who not only beat his daughter but sold her was right fucking there. Pretending he loves his “foolish” daughter. I could havegotten justice for my firefly. It can’t come soon enough. Christ, she survivedthat.
We reconvene at Julian’s mansion since it’s the closest, and once inside, we sit in his living room with some whiskey. This room is massive, but it’s lived in and not ostentatious. Julian built this place about five years ago, and we’ve all spent plenty of time out here, especially when we want to get out of the city.
“He knows more than he’s saying,” Mateo says, staring at me.
“Do we have a problem?” I challenge my friend.
“Maybe. I’m not convinced that your girl isn’t a fucking plant. I don’t care how well she cooks or how good her pussy is?—”
“For fuck’s sake,” Julian grumbles.
“She could be a goddamn spy, and you know it.”
I shake my head, impatience seething through me. “She’s not a goddamn spy. I’ve seen the bruises her father put on her. She’s told me about what that fucker put her through. She’s not trying to get information for him.”
“She could be lying,” Julian points out.
“Okay, I’m going to side with Rome on this one,” Carson says, shaking his head. “That girl is no plant. I really don’t think he knows where she is. He sounded almost desperate.”
“And not because he loves her,” I add. “Eloise told me about his plan to marry her off, but that she didn’t know the man. Had never heard his name before. Whoever it is, Rizzo clearly needs her for an alliance of some kind.”
“Did she tell you the name?” Mateo asks, but I shake my head.
“No. Just that she ran because she didn’t trust that they’d be any better to her than her father had been. If she was a fuckingplant, she wouldn’t have been living in that piece-of-shit motel. She wouldn’t have been so goddamn terrified.” I watch Julian and Mateo, and I can see that they agree with me, but they still don’t trust her. “What do you need to know to trust her?”
