his body releases some of the tension he’s been holding.
Dom takes a deep breath in. “But I fucked up. Colossal fuck up. Three times, not once, not twice, but three. The first time was when I overheard you all in the toilets. When I first found out Della was the one who killed Jae. I felt left out, insane as it sounds, but I did. Part of that has a lot to do with Della and me, but I thought I had all the information. My ego took over and that was the first time I went to Lucini with the initial piece of real information. I told him to look into Della.”
Slater’s mouth thins. Kelso and Pacer curse and Mack takes a seat on the long sofa and rests his head in his hands. It’s shocking to hear, but from the moment Dom said he worked for Lucini we’ve been waiting to hear those words from his mouth.
“The second time I fucked up has been a long time coming.” Dom’s expression darkens and his jaw clenches. “I never knew Jae raped, abused or harmed Della. I never figured out the big secret to why you supposedly killed him. It’s the one piece of information I always knew was missing, and you warned me early on it’s something I’d never find out, so it’s something I never pushed, but I didn’t stop trying to find out.” Dom’s eyes swing to me. “I knew you and Rex had an idea, but neither of you ever talked about it, with anyone.”
Suddenly, all eyes turn to me and I have a strong urge to confirm Dom’s words. “That’s true. Rex refused to believe our father would ever hurt Della. No one in the crew knew except me, Corey, Kodi, and Reed. Rex forbid us to ever speak about Slater’s allegations. Rex told everyone else the Kings wanted Parkland Territory and that’s why Slater killed my father. That was until months ago when you took me, and the rest of the Poison Boys heard why you did it. And Brett, sorry Dom, wasn’t there then.”
“He was at the hospital, guarding Della,” Kelso adds.
“I never told Lucini Della killed Jae. Although, after Della told me what Jae did to her I raced back to Lucini’s side. I needed to fix my mistake at any cost. My third fuck-up was thinking Lucini cared that a woman was raped. When I tried to play it off as it could have been anyone who cared for Della to get revenge, all I did was personally hand deliver Della as a suspect to Lucini and give him a motive. So I decided to stay close to him, listen and watch for any signs of Lucini making any plans for Louisville. What I found was so much more than I could have ever thought possible.”
Slater drops the bat to the floor and with a pained expression he asks, “Is that why you’re here? Lucini’s coming for our sister?”
Dom sits forward in his chair and hastily replies, “No. At the moment, Lucini is in Mexico and he has bigger problems than one of his drug mules being murdered. However, those problems are why I’m here today.”
“Mexico?” Mack’s voice first comes out bewildered and then resumes to his normal confident tone. “We got no connections that way. Nothing out there could have anything to do with us.”
Dom throws his hands up and growls, “Secrets and games.”
I jump, realizing I’m more on edge than I thought I was. I seem to be the only one, the guys just stiffen slightly, but no one appears threatened by Dom anymore, more curious to hear him continue.
“I’m taking credit for all my mistakes and for acting before I had all the information, but if you’d been honest with me from the start, I would’ve made different choices.”
Dom turns his stare to Slater and opens up old wounds, brings the past into the future and causes all of them to jump to their feet and for the first time in my life I see The Portland Street Kings truly frightened for one of their own.
“Della’s real family is what’s in Mexico. Michael O’Connor, her father, who freely handed her over to the recently deceased escapee and child pedophile, Phillip Wiltse, when she was only two-years-old. Michael O’Connor is one of the most dangerous and cold-blooded men in the world. He owns the Guerrero coastal route that brings the drugs in from South America.”