“What do you want?” he snapped, and I leaned against the counter, rolling my scalpel between my thumb and index finger as I watched him. “You want money? How much? I’ll give you anything you want!”
I feigned excitement. “Anything I want?” I gasped, and he nodded frantically, either not picking up on the sarcasm or refusing to acknowledge it.
“I want to live in a world where children like Caleb aren’t beaten within an inch of their lives by sick fucks like you.” I smirked, though this time, my smile didn’t reach my eyes. “Can you help me with that?”
He narrowed his eyes on me and snarled. “I did no such thing!”
Rolling my eyes, I pushed up from the counter and made my way over to my laptop, which I had set up on the kitchen table. Vox had already screenshot several still frames from Kyle’s security camera footage that showed him hitting his son.
I turned the laptop around to show him, and his face blanched.
“This is going to be perfect backup footage for the email you’ll be sending later to all your colleagues explaining how you were blackmailed and needed to leave town.” I gave him a dark smile, and his face went from white to green.
He knew what I meant by‘leave town.’
Strolling back up to him, I leaned over again, tracing the tip of my scalpel gently down the side of his face.
“Now, we both know you’re going to die today, Kyle. That’s not up for discussion. However, if you answer my questions quickly and honestly, I might make it quick for you. If youdon’tcooperate…” I leaned in close to his ear and whispered, “Ever wonder what it would feel like to have an eye cut out of your face while you’re still breathing? I’ve been told that it’s fuckinghorrible. I can’t speak from personal experience, though. You’ll have to let me know.”
He whimpered. The bitchwhimpered.My nostrils flared, and the scent of urine filled my nose. I pulled away from him, disgusted.
“You can beat a little kid up, but you piss yourself the second someone threatens eyeball removal? Pussy.”
“Please. I’ll tell you anything.” He was literally crying now, and I wiped away one of his tears, mocking him by pouting my bottom lip.
“Aww. Krusty Kyle’s gonna cry. So sad,” I crooned before jamming the scalpel into his thigh, making sure to avoid any major arteries. He screamed bloody murder, and I grinned.
I watched him writhe and scream in satisfaction for a moment when my phone buzzed. I glanced at my conversation with Vox, which now just had several of those big red exclamation point emojis. I frowned and slipped back over to the laptop to see what he had found.
I scrolled through the pop-ups of what looked like…ownership papers?
I narrowed my eyes at the screen.
Jesus fucking Christ…
I had seen papers like this before. These were drawn up and usually heavily encrypted in the human trafficking industry. Rich people with more money than morals exchanged these slips to solidify the sale of literal human beings on the dark web.
What was the Honourable Kyle Bradshaw doing with these on his fucking computer?
Choosing one of the slips, I ran a search for the name listed under the field labeled ‘product.’ My stomach bottomed out when a missing person ad immediately popped up for a little girl named Cherry Dawson.
I flipped through several more slips before coming across one for…Amanda Grey.My blood went cold. Amanda Grey? As in his…wife?
He owned his wife?
I glanced up from the screen to look at Kyle, who was slumped over in a kitchen chair that probably cost more than most people’s cars.
Had I just stumbled on someone involved in a human trafficking ring?
Was Caleb a child born from this man raping his‘wife’? Or had he purchased him, too?
Judges were elected officials. I knew enough about the process from what Cassandra had told me to understand that you didn’t necessarily need to be a good person to be elected. You just needed to be popular.
It was common for judges to marry to assume the image of a ‘family man.’People trusted a man more if he had a family. Don’t ask me why, but it’s true.
Why not just marry any gold digger off the street? Well, I would assume it would be a pain in the ass to hide the fact that you’re helping some underground crime ring literallysell fucking peoplefrom someone who lived in your house.
Why not just buy a wife from the ring you’re running and call it a day? He probably knocked her up with Caleb and paid someone to deliver him privately to keep her out of the hospital. Hospitals typically needed identification and health records… That would explain the lack of a birth certificate.
