The Monster (Boston Belles #3) - L.J. Shen Page 0,101
pricks aren’t very good at listening.”
“You will do as I say, goddammit!” He wiggled under my foot desperately. I grabbed him by the shirt, dragging him toward my car as he kicked and grunted in annoyance, pocketing his gun after checking if it was cocked (shocker: it was not).
I hurled Gerald inside and slammed the door, getting into the driver’s seat next to him and starting the car.
“Where to?” I grumbled.
“The penthouse. The one Hunter and Sailor lived in before moving into their own house.”
I nodded, noticing that he shook beside me. Unbelievable. I put his daughter through so much shit, and she always gave me one hell of a fight. But this guy, he couldn’t even sit still without wanting to piss his pants. I didn’t know where Aisling got her strength, but it sure wasn’t from her fucking parents.
When we got to the penthouse and Gerald pushed the door open and started his verbal diarrhea, I pressed my finger to my mouth then started looking around the living room to see if it was bugged. As far as I could tell, it wasn’t. I sat at the dining table, smiling sardonically at him.
“You may continue with your meltdown now, Gerry.”
Gerald erected himself to his full height, jutting his chin out, trying to appear braver than he was. The weight loss made him slightly less deplorable physically, but I still knew that behind the exterior was a man who deserved a slow and painful death.
“You’ve been caught, Sam Brennan. I set a trap for you, and you fell for it,” Gerald boasted, still standing up, for some reason beyond my grasp.
“You already said,” I yawned. “Care to elaborate?”
Gerald leaned forward, pressing his fingers to the oak dining table as he spoke.
“When you asked me to give you a list of all the women I’d had an affair with, I got suspicious. It seemed farfetched, and as time went by and you dragged your feet about my little problem, I got even more suspicious. You’d never failed a mission I’d given you before, and suddenly, you didn’t have as much as a lead. I couldn’t understand why you left me to drown. Then the poisoning happened. And the cufflinks …”
“Christ, Gerry, I was there when all of this happened. Get to the juicy part. My time is precious.” I looked around, wondering if he had any good coffee.
He straightened his spine.
“Aisling made me do it. She told her mother and me what to do, that way we could know for sure.”
“Made you do what?” I spat out, losing patience.
The mention of her name made me nauseous. This was outrageous. I couldn’t be nauseous. I wasn’t a fucking damsel in distress.
“Plant a bug. A mole. A trap. See, Aisling said that the only way to outsmart you is to beat you at your own game. Together, we found a woman from my past—Barbara McAllister, in this case—and had her assist us. We knew if you contacted her, that would mean that you were after my throat and not those who harmed me.”
I stared at him, speechless.
Aisling played me.
And she fucking won, too.
She loved me, yes, but not so much that she was blinded by my actions.
Even more than her affections for me, she was loyal to her family, and hell if it didn’t make me miss her even more.
“The newspaper—” I started.
Gerald shook his head, walking over to the coffee table, picking up what looked to be today’s newspaper, tossing it into my hands. I picked it up and glanced at the headline.
Keaton Hints at Firing Clayborn After Elections: What’s Next for the White House?
Motherfucker.
“The headline was fake.” I let the words churn in my mouth, deciding I fucking hated how they tasted.
Gerald plopped down next to me, rubbing at his face tiredly as he reached for a whiskey with two tumblers at the center of the table, pouring us drinks. I took out a pack of cigarettes and lit one up, making myself comfortable. This bullshit wasn’t going to be over anytime soon.
“Quite.” He nudged my drink in my direction, his fingers still trembling. “I didn’t believe Aisling when she said you were probably a double agent, so I came to see you a few times at Badlands. Each time, I turned around, losing my nerve. But I noticed the same newspaper was rolled and left at the entrance each time, so I figured that was your media outlet of choice. From there, faking a headline wasn’t too hard.”