Rules of Survival(60)

His lips twisted. “I didn’t tell anyone crap. You think I’d take a chance on Shaun’s life? I knew something was up. I wouldn’t put him at risk.”

“Then explain how they knew we’d be there,” I challenged. “You were the only one who knew.”

“When Shaun told me what happened, I didn’t understand at first,” Patrick said, reaching for his jacket. He pulled out his cell. “That first day when I met with one of Jaffe’s men, they made me leave everything at the door. After you told me you were ambushed, I started to think. Then, when I opened up my cell, I found a trace.”

“A trace?”

“A bug,” Patrick amended with a roll of his eyes. “They bugged my phone.”

“I knew there was a reasonable explanation,” Shaun said. There was a look of smug satisfaction on his face that, a few days ago, I would have found irritating. Now it was just endearing. It was Shaun.

“Fair enough,” I said cautiously. It made sense—especially seeing how much he genuinely cared for Shaun. But there was still more. Deep breath. I could do this. This wasn’t Patrick, the bounty hunter who had made Mom’s life miserable, chasing her to the ends of the earth and back. This was Patrick, the man with the answers I needed to make sense of this whole mess.

I hoped.

“Like I said to you on the phone, when you found me at the cabin, I was there to get something. A letter.”

“From Mel,” he said with a nod.

“Yeah. Only those guys busted in and I didn’t get a chance to read it. Not really.”

“She only had time to skim it,” Shaun interjected. He’d rescued his jacket from Patrick and was stuffing it down between us, where I assumed he thought it would be safe from further assault. “That’s how we found Mick’s name.”

Patrick tapped the table impatiently. “We went over all this before.”

“I don’t know what it is she did to you, but you’ve been chasing my mom for years. You know a lot about her. Where she’s been and what she’s done… I saw a part in the letter about a last job. Something went wrong. Someone got hurt. Do you know anything at all about it?”

He didn’t look happy. “A little over a year before you were born, Mel decided to give up the game. She and her partners had one last job planned, and then they were done. But you’re right. The job went badly. An innocent person was killed. A teenager,” Patrick finished after a deep breath.

“They killed a kid?” Shaun’s eyes went wide.

“I’m not clear what happened. Mark Bengali—”

“Bengali,” I exclaimed. “Deeds mentioned that name!”

Patrick nodded. “He was a stockbroker with a huge bankroll who Mel was romancing. She was getting ready to clear out, but something happened and his kid was killed. Mel had been living at the house and her prints were everywhere. She was seen fleeing the scene covered in blood and ended up the main suspect.”

So far, everything fit with what the letter had said, except his concept of timing. “This happened the year I was born, you mean,” I corrected. “The note I found at the cabin said she decided she wanted to quit when she found out she was pregnant.”

Patrick blinked.

Shaun got a kick out of his shock. “Allow me a moment to revel in this, because Pat believes himself infallible. You got your intel wrong, man. It happens.”

“So, then that would make you eighteen. Not seventeen.”

“Yep.”

He watched me for a moment, and I did my best not to squirm. His scrutiny was weird and uncomfortable. Like he was trying to see through a lie—because I’d lie about my age, right? Maybe in twenty years or so, but not right then.

“Anyway,” he said after a long moment. “I think I’ve figured out who’s responsible for your mother’s death.”

Shaun slapped the table. Coffee from Patrick’s cup swished and slopped over the edge. “And you’re just telling us this now?”

Patrick rolled his eyes and ignored him. To me, he said, “I think Jaffe is really Mark Bengali.”

Shaun slumped back in his seat. “Because he thinks she killed his son…”

“I’ve done some research. Bengali has been on the move over the last fifteen years. He’s been in six of the last twelve cities you and your mom were in at the same time.”

“Revenge…” Shaun nodded. “So you think he’s been tracking them?”

“That would be my guess. He certainly has the resources. If he’s been following her all these years, then he knows about Kayla. It’s possible that the reason he’s still pursuing you is because he doesn’t feel justified quite yet. She stole his son. He’ll steal her daughter. An eye for an eye.”

Hearing him talk about Mom like she’d committed the murder pissed me off. He might have been hounding her for almost two decades, but he didn’t know shit about her. Not really. “Thinks she stole his son. Mom didn’t kill that kid. I think one of her partners did.”

Patrick’s expression darkened. His eyes narrowed, and said, “Yeah? Well she was with her partners, so even if she didn’t pull the trigger, she was an accessory. Plus, she took the money.”

“How do you know she took the money?” I countered. Deeds thought she’d taken it, too. I’d shot out a random number in a panic. Nearly one million. If that was even close to the amount stolen, I think I would have known if she had it. There’s no way someone living like Mom could have spent that much in eighteen years—much less in the nine months before I was born.