Total pages in book: 57
Estimated words: 52592 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 263(@200wpm)___ 210(@250wpm)___ 175(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 52592 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 263(@200wpm)___ 210(@250wpm)___ 175(@300wpm)
“I followed the killer that night because I wanted to know what he was doing. It wasn’t a job at the time,” I answer honestly. “I could tell that something wasn’t right, and so I stalked him for a while. He cased that alley several times before he eventually took a position there. And after watching him long enough to see that he was going to do something, I hid behind the dumpster to see what it was.”
“You didn’t know that he was going to shoot my mother?” She asks as if it surprises her. “Were we just in the wrong place at the wrong time? Could it have been anyone else walking down that street that night who was shot instead of my mom?”
I can practically see the wheels spinning in her head. I did the same thing to myself after my brother died. Hell, I still do. You try to rationalize how to blame yourself for something that had too many moving parts to be only one person’s responsibility.
“No, I didn’t know,” I say before deciding to give her a piece of additional information that is bound to send Elle down a rabbit hole. We’re too far into this conversation for me to pull the plug without it causing even more questions and problems. “But I don’t think that it was random. I think that someone was intentionally waiting in the dark with the sole purpose of killing your mother.”
“Like a hired assassin? Why in the world would anyone want to have my mother killed?” Elle’s eyes shine with a glossy wetness that hints at her holding back tears. “All she ever did was take care of me and support both my dad’s career and his ego. She never did anything bad to anyone that I know of. What makes you think it wasn’t a random incident?”
“The way it was covered up afterward. You were probably too young to notice, but—”
“No, actually, I noticed,” she interrupts. “It always bothered me how no one ever talked about it again after that night. It wasn’t a robbery. The killer never asked us for anything. There was no further information, no deep investigation into what happened; it was like her murder, and her whole life had suddenly just disappeared. I felt so alone. Even my father didn’t want to talk to me about what happened. One might think that having a detective for a father would mean getting an intense and relentless investigation until the killer and motive were found. But instead, he avoided talking about it with me entirely and could never give a good reason why no one found or even looked for answers. I was left to deal with it alone and to hunt down my own answers.”
“And you thought that by hunting me down, you would find them?”
“Of course,” she nods. “You were the only other person there that night. So, if you weren’t the monster sent to kill her, and you don’t know who the monster who shot her was, with all of the ways that you’re able to find out information inside the mafia, then that means there’s more to what happened that night than meets the eye. The real monster behind it all might still be out there.”
I brought Elle here to understand both me and the situation that she’s been meddling in. I wanted to use it as a deterrent to keep her safe. But now, this has only shown me she needs my protection even more, and I now fear that she understands too much about the danger surrounding that night and about me.
CHAPTER 11
ELLE
“Elle, did you consider someone closer to you might be hiding the villain you seek?”
Nico’s question doesn’t register in my head at first. But then, as he goes on to call out the cops, I see where this is leading.
“The police department, and many of the detectives who work within it, are corrupt,” he says assuredly. “I’m not saying that all cops are dirty and that all the higher-level detectives are compromised, but I’d wager to say that the majority are. And that night, there was a case to be made surrounding an investigation into your mother’s murder. But there was nothing. Don’t you find it strange that the wife of a city detective was shot at point-blank range in the middle of an alleyway on the Vegas Strip and no investigation was launched?”
“Of course, I find it strange,” I say, sounding annoyed. “But what exactly is it that you’re getting at?”
“Come on, Elle. You’re smart. Smarter than most. Use your head.”
The truth is that I don’t want to use my head, not with this. I’ve questioned why my father didn’t push harder for answers for years. He had the authority. He had resources at his disposal. But yet, he let it all simply slip away. I told myself that it was because he was protecting me, that he knew I was already traumatized by what I’d seen and gone through, and that he was just trying to make it all go away so that I could try to rebuild my life. It was a rather weak plot that I built for myself, which would have been more convincing if he'd actually been supportive of me after the incident. But all my father did was stick me in therapy and shove me off to a private academy. He never once talked to me about that night or what I saw. It was as if he just wanted to erase it from my memory completely.