Starlet: A Dark Retelling - Cora Kenborn Page 0,120
He shrugs. “Sorry for the shitty last name, but she didn’t give me much to work with.”
“But my aunt—”
“Was paid a hundred thousand dollars to keep her whore mouth shut.” A smirk creeps along his mouth. “And given a nice scar to remember her oath in case Jim Beam decided to talk for her.”
I know the scar he’s talking about. It’s a jagged, silver line down her cheek. “She never said shit to me. Even when I went to Phoenix when mom died.”
Luciano frowns, the corners of his eyes turning down. “Carlo told me about your mother. I’m sorry.”
I don’t want his sympathy. I want to know how the fuck Angel got from Phoenix to Chula Vista. “But she left that home when she was sixteen.”
“Lost track of her for a while. Finally caught up with her again, thanks to you and your shit show on Paulo Bellini. Once I saw a picture of Jade Saxton, I knew I’d found her. Tracked her ass right to Chula Vista.”
“To save your own ass in case her memory came back?” I shout.
His palm slams against his desk. “No! To save yours!”
I don’t want his protection. “When she turned eighteen, why not just kill both of us and save yourself years of trouble?”
Luciano’s face flushes bright red, and he backhands the ashtray, sending it crashing to the floor. Rising out of his chair, he looms across his desk, fire in his eyes. “Because you’re family, Dominic. You saved that girl. She meant something to you. I could see it in your eyes.”
“But Rosten—”
“I told you not to go after him,” he roars, pounding his fists against the wood. “I warned you, and you wouldn’t listen!”
“You could’ve told me how dangerous he really was.”
He lets out a dry laugh. “You were out for blood already, Dominic. If I told you he ordered the hit on that girl and her family, you wouldn’t have just tried to ruin him. You would’ve tried to kill him.”
He’s right.
“What about afterward? The lawsuit. I came to you.” Resentment wells inside me. “I begged you for help, and you turned your back on me. You told me I was dead to you.”
“What’s more important to you, boy? That business or your life? I could’ve helped you build another business, but once there’s a bullet in your brain, that’s it. If I’d bailed you out, you don’t think that asshole would’ve put two and two together eventually? He didn’t know you were there that night, but if I started throwing my weight behind you and against him, you better be damn sure he’d have figured it out. Use your brain,” he shouts, jabbing his finger against his temple. “If Marco didn’t kill us, someone else would’ve.”
“You knew she was the real Alexandra Romanov. You lied to me.”
“I told you to send her back to Chula Vista, and you wouldn’t listen. I told you she’d get inside your head and bring you to your knees, and you still didn’t listen. I even told you once the real Alexandra Romanov came forward, we were both fucked, and you still didn’t fucking listen. So, did I lie, Dominic? Or did you just not want to see the truth?”
I don’t know why I didn’t see it before. Why it didn’t cross my mind. Luciano buys everyone. Unions. Politicians. Law Enforcement.
Pharmaceutical companies.
“Son of a bitch, it was you. You were the one who had the test switched to BioLink.”
“I knew what the results would be.”
“But why?”
“Eventually you’d both need proof. Why not already have it?”
“Did you have my contact fired, too? Did you set the reveal in motion on purpose?” Because I swear, if he did, I might empty my gun right now.
“No. That was dumb luck. As your girl would say, ‘fate always finds a way’.”
I’ve said before that tension smells like a strained rubber band being stretched to its breaking point. After fifteen years of strain, it finally snaps with one final unanswered question hanging in the air.
“When you gave Joey and me the job, you told me it was over a debt. It wasn’t, was it?”
Luciano’s eyes cloud as he lowers himself back into his chair and pulls out a third cigar. “Why don’t you go pay your friend Rubio a visit? Ask him to dig up files on one of his dad’s old buddies. Name’s Larry Kramer.” Clipping off the end of the cigar, he glances up at me. “Sometimes the dirtiest layers are hidden by the most honorable shields.”