Empire of Lies - Whitney G. Page 0,35

news.

He shrugs, puffing another “O” of smoke. “Pretty sure.”

“Pretty sure or one-hundred-fucking-percent sure?”

“Both.” He rolls his eyes. “When’s the last time I did something half-assed?”

“You don’t want me to answer that.”

“I can show you the video, if you’d like,” he says, reaching over and rummaging through the burner phones in his glove compartment. “Is that what you need to see to believe me?”

“No.” I shake my head. He’s made stupid mistakes before, but he’s never been wrong or misfired. “I’ll take your word for it.”

“Good.” He sits up and lights a new cigar. “Don’t hurt her too badly when the time comes, okay? I mean, make sure she doesn’t suffer more than necessary. His words, not mine.”

I give him a blank stare.

“Oh, and uh—” He paused. “I know you don’t typically do this, but he wants to make sure that the police don’t find her body for at least five years.”

“I don’t take requests for how the fuck I do my job.”

“Hence the words, I know you don’t do this typically…” he says. “You don’t typically go on five-hour dates with the targets either, so it looks like this is opening an entirely new era for you, isn’t it?”

Fuck off, Trevor.

Him wanting Meredith dead doesn’t add up in the slightest, but I can’t spend too much time questioning it right now. There are far more important things on my mind, and I can get to the bottom of this Thatchwood mess later. Maybe.

Sure, I can’t seem to think about anything except getting another taste of her lips or diving deep into her pussy again, but she doesn’t mean anything to me. She’s just the first memorable woman I’ve ever met, the first person who’s ever intrigued me this much in over a decade.

She’s just a job. Just a job.

“What other business do you need to talk to me about, Trevor?” I ask. “I need to go home and get some sleep.”

“Please don’t insult my intelligence.” He hands me a folder.

I open his folder, and inside are two lists. The first one consists of the businessmen and companies who are late making their deposits into our account—an offense that will prove very costly if they don’t rectify it by the end of the week.

The second list is a personal one, the names we hardly ever say aloud. These are the people who ruined us long ago, the people who’d turned us into the half-hearted monsters we’ve become. The people who still, to this day, steal our sleep by haunting us in our nightmares.

We don’t make any money “handling” them, but I’m willing to fit them into my schedule for free.

The list started with twenty-eight, but now it’s down to ten. A far cry from the zero we’ve been wanting to reach for years.

All or nothing.

I stare at the name Dr. Holden McAllister and feel my blood beginning to boil. “I’ll pay our old therapist a visit in a few months. I need to do some research on his new life.” I glance at the other list and blink a few times to make sure what I’m looking at is real.

“Why is Rio Warren on the debt list?” I ask. “I just saw him a few hours ago at Fahrenheit 900. He didn’t seem off or anything.”

“I’m sure that’s because he dropped tons of money into your club and wanted you to see that,” he says. “Unfortunately, he’s months late paying us, so hopefully, he didn’t spend it all on liquor and bottle service.”

“We don’t fuck with the mafia, Trevor. Ever.”

“We do when they owe us over a quarter-million-dollars.”

I raise my eyebrow, stunned that anyone would ever be more than a second late after owing that much. Still, a man like Rio isn’t a suit. There has to be an explanation.

“Someone is probably late paying him,” I said. “Give him a few more weeks. He’s never been late before, and he’s always good for it.”

“Fine.” He motions for me to get out of the car. “I need to get back to New Jersey to finish off an IKEA manager, and you need to turn back into the Michael I know by the time I get back. I expect to hear fucking research and planned times of executions. Literally.”

I roll my eyes and step out of his car.

He speeds off the moment I shut the door, and I return to the Four Seasons. I know better than to revisit Meredith in the penthouse suite again—even though I’m tempted, so I request a different