Crush(27)

“I went to an AA meeting down the street and then was going to head home early, but I saw your car when I was walking back so I came in to check on you. What do you say to letting your old man buy you dinner?”

I stood and rounded my desk. “Sorry, Pop, I’ll have to take a rain check. Elle said everything should be wrapped up by five, and I think I’ll try to catch up with her and take her out to dinner. Do you need a ride? though?”

He shook his head. “No, I’m good.”

“You sure?”

He nodded.

“Then can I ask you a quick question?”

“Yeah, sure.”

“Have you ever heard of anyone on the street referred to as the Priest?”

His brow creased. “No, I haven’t. Why do you ask?”

I shook my question off casually. “No reason really, I just heard someone refer to the Priest and had no idea what they were talking about.”

“Church maybe,” my father laughed, rising from the desk and patting my shoulder. “A place you might want to visit once in a while.”

It was then that the thought struck. The call and message Elle received spoke of God. Was the Priest the one contacting Elle?

Holy shit.

No, it couldn’t be, or could the connection be that easy?

“Logan?”

I snapped out of it and gave my old man a shake of my head. “What can I say? I follow the lead of my old man.”

“I probably should have done a better job on that one.”

I laughed. “You know what they say about hindsight.”

“You got me there.” He looked at his watch. “I think I’ll catch dinner with Killian. Give Elle my condolences.”

“I will,” I said, and couldn’t help but notice that his shoulders were slumped. “Hey, is everything cool with you?”

Like a bat out of hell, he averted his gaze. “Yeah, I’m good.”

“No you’re not. Talk to me.”

With a sigh, he turned to look out the window. “It’s nothing I want you involved with and I mean it, Logan, but Patrick has me pulling financials for all his businesses. He’s looking for something and I’m fairly certain it’s what we already found.”

“How? He’s still in jail. I thought his bail was denied?”

“It was. His trial attorney contacted me.”

I should have known. “What’s he looking for?”

“My best guess—to verify his son’s involvement.”

“The Tommy connection to the drugs. The reason they’re in jail,” I commented.

My father nodded. “And the money clearly leads back to Tommy and I knew about it. If I act like I didn’t know Tommy was stealing money, I’m f*cked, and if I tell him I knew, I’m even more f*cked.”

“Then don’t tell him anything. It’s not your f*cking job to look out for his tweaker son.”

He turned back around. “No, but it is my job to make sure the money-laundering process runs efficiently.”

“Patrick is behind bars, and hopefully will stay that way. Can’t you stall? Ride it out and stay clear of him.”

The smile on his face was anything but genuine. “He owns me, Logan, you know that. I do what he says, when he says, regardless of where he is.”

“Maybe it’s time you talk to Gramps. See if he knows anyone that can help get you out of this. With Patrick behind bars, there has to be a way. Someone out there willing to cut a deal.”

Wide steps brought him close to me. “Yeah, I’ll do that.”

I wasn’t sure he would. “Call me if you need anything.”

He patted me on the shoulder before he left. “I will.”

Following the impromptu discussion with my father, I felt both better and worse. Better about O’Shea and Elle having to spend the day together, and worse because my old man’s situation should have been getting better with Patrick behind bars, not worse.

When the brief for a client that had to be filed in federal court on Monday was complete, I glanced at my watch. I had a shit-ton of other work to do but decided to spend some time researching scripture to see if what the caller had recited and texted to Elle had any context. After finding nothing that made sense, I concurred with Elle: it was this man’s, whom I’d concurred could possibly be the Priest, own words.

Before closing out, a local advertisement online caught my eye. Taking the bull by the horns, I decided to quit waiting around for Elle to be finished and text her.

Me: Everything go okay today?

I knew Elle felt torn. She hadn’t seen her sister in fifteen years, and all she knew about her was that she had abandoned her family and somehow put them in danger. On the other hand, she was her sister. I didn’t push her to talk about it. I knew if she wanted to she would.

When she didn’t answer, I quickly sent another text.

Me: Can you meet me somewhere?

Then, like a chick, I sat back in my chair and waited. Unable to concentrate on anything, I paced my office, cleared some papers off my desk, then stared at my phone screen. It was just as I was about to head out and go meet up with my old man at the nursing home when my phone buzzed.

Elle: Yes. We just finished eating. Where?

Dinner was out of the question since she’d already eaten, but that was okay because I had something better in mind. I wanted to take her on a real date, but it would be dark if I went to go pick her up first, so I settled on a pseudo date.