Corrupted Queen - Nicole Fox Page 0,30

but considering how poorly they treated her, I suspect I don’t want to know. And I hope when he is older, he doesn’t remember.

I lean back against the wall as my heartbeat slows. Alexis begins to sing softly. I probably take as much comfort in the song as Harry.

I would do anything to keep Harry from meeting another monster, but my nightmares are far from over. That means his are too.

10

Alexis

Harry runs ahead of me, squealing with delight at the freedom the long hallway provides. I stride after him, holding my hands out for when he inevitably falls. When he reaches the end of the hall, he turns and runs into my arms.

“Good job, little guy.” I nuzzle against his head. “Do you want to keep going?”

“Ya!”

I hold him a second longer, straining to hear through the door we just happened to stop beside. If Gabriel is watching the cameras, I’m not doing anything suspicious. I’m certainly not eavesdropping. I’m just helping our son develop his muscles and balance and using the hallway that stretches between the nursery and Gabriel’s office to do so.

“... more work on the docks,” I hear Vito say.

Harry struggles in my arms, keen to start running in the other direction, and his irritated whimper means I miss part of Gabriel’s reply, catching only, “... another shipment next week.”

I release Harry and he bolts in the other direction. I follow close behind, digesting what I just heard. Gabriel took shipments and did work on the docks before purple heroin came along. Maybe that’s still all it is. Maybe he’s not part of the crisis at all.

I know. Wishful thinking. I don’t want to face the repulsive fact that my father’s son, the man who I maybe—possibly—am falling for for the second time, is scum of the earth.

Gabriel is a criminal, sure, but I thought he at least had a code. Pushing purple heroin onto dealers and saturating the streets with it, while also cutting funding to programs that could help save lives, is so utterly beneath him that it doesn’t make sense to me. Even as the evidence lines up in a neat row before me, I don’t want to believe it. My gut tells me something isn’t right. But how much can I trust my gut when it’s compromised by my apparent residual feelings for Gabriel? I don’t want to believe the Italian Mafia are involved in the purple heroin trade because I don’t want to believe that the man who can look at my son with such love and adoration would be capable of an enterprise so vile.

I need to dig more. If I am going to investigate and expose Gabriel, I want to be very sure. Especially after what I learned about my dad.

My chest tightens at the thought. I was so sure that Gabriel was lying, that he’d murdered a good man. An innocent man. But the evidence doesn’t lie, and seeing my father torture Damien Walsh with a smile on his face …

Harry topples over ahead of me and I push those dark thoughts from my mind. I spent nearly a week entertaining nothing but the cold, leaden weight of my morbid discovery, languishing in the pain.

I’ve had enough of that now. It’s not productive. The pain is still there, but I ignore it when I can. The more I focus on Harry, the easier that is.

Gabriel comes to the nursery later that afternoon, while I am reading and watching Harry play with his blocks, and before either of us speaks a word he hands me my cell phone. I wonder what I have done to earn this privilege but decide not to look the proverbial gift horse in the mouth.

“Thank you.”

Gabriel nods and goes to Harry’s side, helping him construct an even higher tower. I check through my notifications and am dismayed to see several missed calls and a half-dozen texts from Clara. She’s sorry, desperately sorry, she writes. She was scared.

I side-eye Gabriel. He has that effect on her.

I remember testing the boundaries of my freedom, having assumed I was relegated to my room and the nursery. Nobody told me that I was allowed to walk around the house, but I was. I wonder how far I can push the borders of my incarceration.

“Gabriel,” I say.

He glances back at me, and in that time Harry swipes a fist through the blocks and sends them tumbling to the ground.

“Yes?” Gabriel asks, as though he hasn’t noticed the architectural disaster.

“I want