Page 21 of Twisted Enemy
And now I have to accept that I’m as gullible as any rube Shannon ever bankrupted. Because when Kate was missing, I couldn’t make myself care about anything as mundane as money. I paid my blackmailer just so I could concentrate on bringing Kate home.
Now she’s back, and so is my leech of a blackmailer. Sure, I’m a billionaire, but this asshole is greedy. If I pay the next hundred mill, I might as well send a stack of blank checks. My June 1 deadline will be followed by July. Then August, September, all the way through to the end of the year. To the end of my life.
I’ve hired Best’s mercenaries to guard my home. How much more can it cost to have them take out an enemy like this? All I have to do is lure the fucker into the open…
After I figure out who he is.
The current threat—exposing the indictment that should be sealed within the juvenile justice system—could come from Megan. She’s one of the few people alive who knows that billionaire Cole Wolf pled guilty to fraud in juvenile court more than a dozen years ago. My sister has the same allergy to mercy that I do because she learned the same cons from the same woman. And God knows she could use the money.
But that’s the thing—Megandoesneed cash. She looked rough when she showed up with Tarasov. If she was myblackmailer, she never would have been at the gate. She would have fled with the first hundred million I paid. Megan would be safe and sound in Ibiza by now, or Dubai. Paris at the very least.
Plus, this whole blackmail game began with a threat to release my client list, before the indictment ever came into play. Megan has a lot of skills, but she isn’t a hacker. She could never break into my Lone Wolf files and get my clients’ names.
Kate could.
And when Kate first arrived here, withFuck Youtattooed on her chest, she might have. She might even have taken my money when she was on the run after our fight, lying to herself that it was payment for services rendered.
But she came back. She didn’t flee to Ireland forever. I’ve looked into her eyes, and I’ve been inside her body. I’d know if Kate was fleecing me.
I’m back to glaring at the monitor—What will your clients think when they see this?—when my phone rings. My first instinct is to let the call go to voicemail, but one quick glance at the screen tells me I can’t ignore this call.
“Barry,” I say.
“I have a deal that’s sure to earn me fifteen mill by the Fourth of July.”
Kate’s father never wastes time with greetings. In the month since Kate and I were married, Lynch has come to me with half a dozen “sure things.” He’s the captain of Baltimore’s Irish mob, but he didn’t get his position from his shrewd business dealings. He’s more a machine-gun-in-the-back-room, cement-shoes-in-the-harbor kind of guy.
It doesn’t bother me that my father-in-law is a criminal. A lot of my clients are. But Barry Lynch doesn’t listen to a word of my advice. He has the attention span of a gnat and a lemming’s sense of self-preservation. He refuses to learn.
“What deal?” I ask, fully aware that I’ve taken too long to respond. Lynch likes to boast. His trigger finger starts to itch when he has to throttle back his bragging.
“Illyria,” he says. “You know about it?”
“No.”
Lynch makes a disgusted sound with his lips. “You really don’t keep up with crypto, do you?”
I keep up with it enough to know it’s an excellent way for an idiot to lose a fortune. And to know even the best ones are more volatile than Molotov cocktails. Lynch’s new coin might make him fifteen million by Independence Day, but if he misses his window by an hour or two, he could find himself the same amount in the hole.
Lynch has yet to meet a cryptocurrency he doesn’t love. Maybe it’s because mobsters like him use the stuff to launder money or maybe it’s the slick videos promising wealth the average man can only imagine. But more than half of crypto coins fail before their second year, which Lynch never wants to hear.
“Who’s backing this one?” I ask.
“That’s what I want you to tell me.” Lynch’s tone prickles with indignation, as if my question is absurd.
“I can ask around.”
“Do that.” There’s noise in the background, a commotion I can’t make out. Half the time, he calls from his family compound in the heart of Baltimore’s Canton neighborhood. But the rest of the time, he’s “out in the community.” That can mean he’s at a bar. Or a poker game. Or pumping away between the thighs of one of his mistresses. He’s called me from all three in the past week, which makes me wonder how much Kate actually knows about her father’s failings.
“I’ll let you know what I find,” I say.
“By tomorrow,” he says. “Noon.” He disconnects the call before I can remind him that tomorrow is Saturday.
I can call in some markers, but I can’t guarantee I’ll have an answer by his deadline. It hardly matters. Lynch will buy this coin, the same way he’s bought half a dozen others.
He’s paying a small fortune to keep me on retainer. He insisted I marry Kate, too, to keep his business all in the family. I shouldn’t care that he ignores whatever I tell him.
Hell, I should look for more clients like him. Irish mob captains are a lot less likely than the average businessman to give a fuck about my criminal record. The years I spent in juvie might actually be a selling point for idiots like Lynch.
