After a few tense minutes, Shadow looks up, his intense gaze trained on me. “Are you telling me that we were hired by sex traffickers and almost took out a guy trying to stop them?”
“Yes.”
His expression goes from anger to devastation in seconds. “Fuck.”
I nod, saying nothing while I find the courage to fess up. “I confess I made a call and I let the target get away. I couldn’t gothrough with it after learning what I had, and…” I gesture to Pax. “And there’s this situation.”
“And what exactly is this situation?” Shadow asks. “Are you together?”
Pax inhales sharply but doesn’t speak.
“Probably not after this is settled, but we spent time together for a few weeks. I wouldn’t be here right now, wouldn’t have brought him into our home, if I didn’t believe everything I learned. We have to do something, Shadow.”
He rises, turning his back to us and going to stand in front of the empty fireplace. I watch him, trying to read his body language so I can at least be prepared if he explodes with anger. When he finally turns around, my breath catches. He looks wrecked.
“This is upsetting, obviously,” he starts softly. “It makes me wonder how many people have died who maybe shouldn’t have.”
I nod. “Yes. Same here.”
“I need to think about things.”
“Right, I know, but, Shadow, I need your blessing to handle this differently.”
“What’s your plan?”
“Don’t have much of one yet until I get your buy in. Step one is to find Paxon’s brother and get him to a safe place. Step two is to find the client and handle business.”
“You’re proposing we step in and take down this ring?”
“I’m not sure we can. We don’t know how big it is, but we can sure as fuck handle what’s happening in our city.”
“You want me to condone the client becoming the target?”
“And give me the resources to handle it.”
Shadow sits down again, scrubbing his hand over his face. “This sets a precedent. If it’s found out, we stand to lose a lot of credibility.”
“Fuck credibility. We potentially have innocent blood on our hands, and I don’t know about you, but that’s not okay with me.That’s not what any of us signed up for. I have zero problems taking out a thousand bad people, but not even one good person. Patrick fucked up, he did, and he made a bad decision, but he did it for a good reason. We have to help, Shadow.”
He’s quiet for a moment, studying Paxon, who, to his credit, doesn’t flinch or back down at all.
“You understand what we do?”
Paxon nods. “Wraith was forced to tell me when it all came to light.”
“And how do you feel about it?”
“Conflicted as fuck, to be honest. I can see that Wraith is a good person, but I’m not gonna lie, it fucks with me that he has no problem killing people.”
I flinch at his words. I didn’t expect him to feel any differently, but it still sucks to hear it.
“But if you’re worried about me saying something, I’m not a fucking idiot,” Pax continues. “I recognize what a bad idea that would be, and I’m not here to hurt Wraith or any of you. I just want my brother to be safe. I’m also a high-profile public figure with plenty to lose if all this got out.” He looks at me. “I came here to support Wraith and prove to you that he went out on a limb for me and my brother because he knows it’s the right thing to do.”
Shadow nods. “Would you excuse us for a few minutes, Paxon?”
I nod and Paxon gets to his feet.
“There’s a bench right outside this room by the window. Wait for me there.”
