"The other day." Miller glances at June across the diner and turns toward me. "I took her shopping. She told me she lost her purse, so I took her to dinner and bought her a new one. I slipped a tracker in both of them."
"You bought her two purses?"
"Yeah, I mean, one's super small. You know the shit girls take to clubs and stuff, and the other one's a normal size." He shakes his head. "That's beside the point. I've been keeping an eye on her. She hasn't gone anywhere but home and work this week."
"Hold up, you said she lost her purse. She had it when she left me on Sunday. She must have lost it somewhere between when she left and when you saw her. And she was upset when you talked to her? It could have happened around then."
"Yeah, maybe," Miller says. "Either way, I have it covered. I see everywhere she goes." He scratches his chin. "We saw London on Monday night."
"Who's London?" I ask.
"Ricardo's daughter."
"Okay..."
"They knew each other." Miller reaches for his mug of coffee and takes a drink. "I thought it sounded suspicious but didn't have a reason to question it. What else did she say when she was drunk?"
"Something about a baby." I rack my brain and try to remember exactly what she said. "And that she killed her boss." I chuckle but the humor is gone when Miller doesn't seem to react the same way. I stare at him and when he doesn't respond, I smack his shoulder. "Dude. Talk to me."
Miller sighs.
"Is it true?" My heart pounds out of my chest because if even a fraction of what she confessed was actually true, there's a possibility that the rest is, too. And if that means what I think it does, she's in trouble with Ricardo, I just don't know how badly.
According to what I've learned of him, he's not the type of guy to fuck around with. He's ruthless, but not in the same way the guys I work for are. Ricardo has no moral compass. There isn't anything he wouldn't do, including selling his daughter to the highest bidder. If he'd do that to her, there's no telling what he would do to Cora.
"It's notnottrue." Miller glances around the diner again and focuses on me. "Listen, I don't want to tell you anything that you can't deny if the situation ever arose, but I can tell you that there is truth to what she said."
Cora killed her boss? How is that even possible? She's sweet, and innocent, and isn't capable of such a thing, right?
But when I think back to her telling me that if I saw what she kept hidden away, I wouldn't like her anymore. I wonder if this is what she meant—that she murdered a man.
Surely, she must have had a damn good reason.
He was bothering her, giving her a hard time. Maybe things escalated and she was forced to. Cora is a good person; she wouldn't just kill someone for the sake of killing them.
It had to of been justified, and if that's the case, I don't fault her for taking things into her own hands and doing what she had to do.
I only wish that she didn't have to carry the weight of that secret alone and felt like she could confide in me. At least she has Miller, and I guess that has to be good enough, for now.
"I know what plausible deniability is," I tell Miller. "I wouldn't say anything to anyone, even if I did know." Hell, I work for criminals every single day, there are plenty of secrets tucked away that I'd never confess.
Mainly because they aren't mine to tell, and partly because I don't want to end up dead in a ditch for betraying them.
22
CORA
Ionly agree to meet June after work today because I can't stomach the idea of being around my dad anymore. I've gone home every night this week and he's been there, lurking and trying to talk to me, providing me with zero answers to where my mom is and if she's okay.
I can't continue to listen to his evasive answers and exist in the same space as him. When he's in his room, doing whatever he does in there, it's easier, but every single night this week he's waited out in the living room for me to come home and basically corners me the second I walk in the door.
At least if I go out with June, I can arrive later than usual and potentially avoid him in the process.
My Uber drops me off at the outskirts of the Haven District, and I walk the rest of the way to one of the bars that Simon owns. I wouldn't be surprised if he has the entire Haven in his back pocket. Just when I think I have a grip on his investments, they surprise me by saying he's bought something else.
I'm not sure there's anything in this town that at least one of them doesn't have some kind of say in.
I still haven't figured out who bought The Wellerton, and honestly, I wouldn't put it past Simon to have purchased that, too. Some kind of weird power play or maybe an overprotective brother vibe to give me job security. Once the initial concern ofam I going to get firedwore off, it dawned on me that it very well could have been him who bought the building.
