Black Sheep

by Zara Cox

  I put the car in gear, take a second to appreciate the sweet engine, and drive out of the parking lot. We arrive at the lake twenty minutes later. The weeping willows provide good cover as I circle to the far side of the large lake. Rarely used because of the steep banks surrounding it, it was nevertheless a good make-out spot during the summer but deserted at other times of the year. Behind me, the SUV rolls to a stop. I follow suit a little further on the bank, my nape tingling with fuck knows what as I get out. Troy’s camera is still trained on me.

  When my phone vibrates in my pocket, I jump. “Yes?”

  Troy. “The big man says we’re not going to torch it. You’re going to drive it into the lake.”

  “For fuck’s sake!”

  “Hop to it, brother. Time and tide and all that.” His tone sounds forced, the usual resident assholery lacking.

  I take a moment to admire the car’s classic lines, and silently mourn its impending demise. Then, after putting it in neutral, I give it one giant push and watch it roll toward the brackish water.

  A second camera that I hadn’t been aware was filming from the SUV tracks Troy and Ronan as they walk up on either side of me. Troy’s camera is trained on the sinking car. His face is devoid of emotion, his jaw rock hard. I start to frown. A second later, grim resolution tightens his face, and he turns the camera on me.

  I step away. “I’ve done my part. Can we fucking go now?” I snap.

  Ronan watches the bubbles swallow the car until it’s almost submerged. Then he turns to look at me. “Yes, brother. We can go.”

  When we get to the SUV, Bolton is nowhere in sight. Apparently the lure of a restroom on the other side of the lake was too strong to resist.

  I slam the door and don’t give the sinking car another thought.

  All I want is to get home to Cleo.

  I lied when I told Troy she and I weren’t fucking. My soul was damned to hell the day I laid eyes on her because it was the day I vowed to make her mine at the very first opportunity. Waiting until the law gave us permission to turn our relationship physical was never going to happen. I’ve owned Cleo McCarthy’s tight pussy for months now.

  I ignore the shared looks between Ronan and Troy as we leave Bearwood Lake.

  As I leave the site where I became a double murderer.

  Half an hour later, I’m in her arms.

  Things take on a weird vibe after that day. Bolton embraces his addiction and resides in a near-constant state of drug-fueled euphoria. Ronan redoubles his efforts to become Finnan’s Mini-Me. Troy remains Troy, only worse.

  Three weeks later, Finnan announces that he’s taking Cleo to her birthplace of Boston to finish processing her transition to be his ward. My request to accompany her is flatly refused. Something about the whole thing fucking stinks, but I hang on to the thought that, once she’s back in my arms, I’ll never let her leave.

  Besides, I intend to use the time she’s away to double the two hundred thousand sitting pretty in my gambling account. The minute she turns eighteen, I’m marrying her and leaving this shit hole behind.

  She’s gone for six agonizing weeks. She returns two weeks before my twentieth birthday.

  And the girl I’ve loved since I was twelve is gone.

  In her place is a cold, heartless stranger.

  Chapter Nineteen

  FADE TO BLACK

  Axel

  The screen fades to black, and my vision darkens along with it.

  I can’t move. I can’t think of anything else besides the faceless strangers whose blood drips from my hands.

  Of families who will never know the truth. The fact that I will never know is a punishment I bear along with my innumerable sins.

  But whereas I can never contemplate closure, I crave it for my victims. Have craved it for almost a decade.

  I open my eyes, stare into the shadows that live within me and without. I reach down for the remote. One more time for the fathers, mothers, sisters, brothers, sons, and daughters who are missing two people unfortunate enough to be caught in the Rutherfords’ web.

  Before I can hit replay, my phone buzzes.

  The dead organ in my chest attempts to leap. There’s only one phone call I’m expecting at this time of the day. Everything else was diverted through executive assistants, attorneys, and minions.

  “Any news?”

  Detective Mac Malone pauses for a beat before he answers. “Nothing new worth breaking out the single malt for.”

  Bleakness I have no hope of stemming claws through me. “Then why call?” I snap.

  “Not so you can have the satisfaction of shooting the messenger, that’s for sure. I said I’d check in. That’s what I’m doing.”

  “I’m paying you to do more than check in, detective.” The cold blade of my disappointment is poised to strike. And considering just how much I was expending on the bent cop, the treatment was deserved.

  “Yeah. I’m aware of that.” His tone is less willful.

  I take a moment to remind myself why I picked him.

  Growing up in a family such as mine exposed me to the reality of greed and corruption from a very early age. By the time I was ten years old, I could spot a bent cop from twenty paces; I could negotiate, bribe or threaten my way out of just about every situation by the time I hit puberty. It was only when I grasped the true extent of Finnan’s ruthlessness that my family name became an anchor around my neck.

  But those early years of training came in handy when needed. The end result was Mac Malone. Weighed down with two alimony payments and crippling gambling debts, he was ripe for the plucking when I needed serious work done after four private investigators hit a dead end.

  “So?” I press.

  “My contact at the Bureau is still drawing a blank on those accounts. Without a name of a bank or an account holder’s details—”

  “If I had those details, do you think I would’ve sought out your services?”

  “Look, I’m just saying we started this thing with one needle buried with a million needles in a haystack whose location we don’t know.”

  “And five years later, despite countless promises, you haven’t found the haystack. If I didn’t think you knew better, I’d think you were using me as an ATM.”

  The middle-aged man sighs wearily. “The money’s great, sure, but beating my head against this particular brick wall is beginning to give me a concussion.”

  “Say the word, and I’ll sever ties,” I reply coldly.

  “No! There’s no need for that. If you would let me talk to the other individuals who were present—”

  “No. Finnan is the one who issued those orders. I’m the one who drove the car into that lake. This is on the two of us. No one else. The man and woman were picked up in New Jersey in a sky-blue Camaro. Surely that should’ve yielded some results by now? You have the date and a starting point.”

  “You assume he was picked up in New Jersey. I’m digging through traffic camera footage for where you say the Camaro was picked up. But you have to allow for the fact that it’s been almost ten years,” he says, the way he’s been saying for far too long.

  My black temper frays as I stare at the blank screen that epitomizes the conversation I’m having.

  “What about Bearwood Lake? It’s a public park. Surely someone would’ve seen a two-ton Camaro being dredged from the lake bed and taken away?”

  I receive a dark, cynical chuckle. “With respect, sir, you were a soldier once. You’re also a Rutherford. So you know any desired result can be achieved with the right amount of incentive.”

  “And yet you don’t seem to be incentivized to achieve mine. You have one week to find me something, Detective.”

  I hang up and slide the phone back into my pocket. My fingers brush against metal. Cleo’s phone.

  I take it out and press the home button. The picture on her home page surprises me. Camilla McCarthy’s beauty was flawless as well as timeless but she never possessed her daughter’s vivacity or traffi
c-stopping body. Plus she never smiled. Not like she’s doing in this picture.

  Also, Cleo never got on with her mother, Camilla’s controlling nature constantly pushing her daughter out of the house. And more often than not, towards me. Which made Camilla hate me more than she already did for my blatant interest in her daughter.

  In the months before Camilla and Michael McCarthy went to Boston never to return, Cleo and her mother fought constantly. Mostly about me. I made the mistake of trying to talk to her once to smooth things over. She told me she intended to leave Connecticut for good. Take Cleo with her. The conversation didn’t end well. I may have threatened her a little. Or a lot.

  In later years, I discovered that the McCarthys had gotten onto Finnan’s radar because Michael McCarthy had been encroaching on Rutherford territory, doing deals with the Armenians, much like I am doing now. Only he hadn’t been destroying the drugs. He’d been cutting them with other cheap and dangerous substances and selling them in his own clubs. Michael and Camilla fought about those clubs because Michael wouldn’t let them go and because the girls in the clubs were being made compliant with drugs. General Courtland’s transgressions arrived at a critical moment, a way for Michael to stave off retribution from Finnan by offering to share the private military contract deal.

  But drugs started it all. It was the reason I kept my nasty little habit from Cleo. And the reason I kicked it to the curb the night after the Camaro incident. No way was I turning out like Bolton.

  Luckily, I wasn’t hooked enough for it to be a problem. Or maybe my addiction to her was stronger.

  * * *

  The phone goes dark, and I slide it back into my pocket. I return the remote to its slot, cast another glance at the blank screen, and grit my teeth.

  What the fuck did any of it matter when my victims remain faceless? When my penance rings hollow?

  Weariness drags through me as I stand. I’m halfway to the door when my phone rings. The caller is unknown. My hackles rise as I answer. “Axel.”

  “Mr. Rutherford, your request for a meeting is granted. Shall we say your club in one hour?”

  The voice is different than the Bratva lieutenant’s I met with the last time. This one holds more authority. Clearly, I’ve been elevated another rank.

  “One hour. I’ll be there.”

  “Very good,” he replies solemnly, and then he hangs up.

  I take one last look at the blank screen. The closure of knowing who my victims were might be blocked from me for now, but if I play my cards right, another opportunity might just open up before the day is over.

  I return downstairs and slip quietly into the room. Cleo is still asleep, her dried hair a sexy, tangled mass on the pillow. The sheet has half slipped off her, and one breast is bared. The remembered taste of her fills me with fresh hunger. I clench my jaw and turn away. My hunger will need to be satisfied later.

  I slip back out and head to my office. Because I’ve stayed in the club overnight on many occasions, I keep a stack of laundered clothes in a closet. I dress in a black shirt and black pinstriped suit and head for the parking lot.

  It’s still early enough for traffic to be bearable. I arrive at a deserted XYNYC ten minutes early and nod at the security guard at the door.

  I’m not surprised when I walk into the empty club to find Sergey Yurinov, the head of the New York Bratva, seated in the booth at my private lounge, with half a dozen of his lieutenants fanned in a semi-circle around him.

  I hold out my arms for the obligatory search before Sergey nods a dismissal at his men. Five of them stroll off, leaving the man I imagine is his number two.

  I open my mouth to offer drinks but spot the five-thousand-dollar Stolichnaya Elite bottle and shot glass on the table next to him.

  Sergey catches my gaze and shrugs. “You don’t mind, I hope? It’s still the middle of the night in Saint Petersburg.”

  I stroll up the steps and take a seat at the end of the booth. I don’t hold out my hand for a handshake, and they don’t hold out theirs. “Not at all. Feel free to keep the bottle.”

  He leans back, the half smile playing at his lips not diluting the look in the flint-hard eyes studying me. “Such generosity will aid us well in our negotiations, I think, Oleg, da?”

  “Da,” Oleg agrees, his shrewd eyes behind rimless glasses examining me as keenly as his boss’s.

  I stanch my premature anticipation of victory by cutting to the heart of the matter. For one thing, I don’t intend to be away from Cleo longer than necessary. “Shall we discuss terms?”

  Sergey picks up the bottle, pours the chilled vodka, and lifts the shot glass, unhurried, to his lips. “First, explain to me, as you did to my emissary, why you need guns to run your nightclub.”

  I take a breath, play the game, and give the answer he’s already aware of. “I don’t need guns to run my nightclubs. I don’t need guns at all. I just don’t want Finnan to have them.”

  The boss and his assistant exchange glances.

  “And before you mention it, yes, it’s personal. Will that be a problem?”

  Sergey stands and strolls to the edge of the empty dance floor. “No, I don’t foresee a problem.”

  I breathe easier. “Good. I propose a one-off payment of—”

  “I’m not interested in your money, Mr. Rutherford.”

  Tension grips my nape but I force myself to remain calm. “What are you interested in?” I inquire.

  “You are very successful in the nightclub business.” He looks around, slowly spinning on his heel. “This one, for instance—”

  “Is off the table,” I interject before he can finish. “I’m not interested in letting it go. I also have a silent partner who might object to our arrangement.”

  Another exchange of glances. Oleg nods confirmation.

  “The Punishment Club is also a noncontender,” I add, sensing the direction of the conversation.

  Sergey returns to his seat and pours another shot. “This conversation is not going how I intended, my friend.”

  I flash a mirthless smile. “You weren’t expecting me to be a pushover. I’m trying not to disappoint you.”

  He laughs, but the humor doesn’t reach his eyes. He downs the drink and straightens his pristinely knotted tie. “Okay, let’s move further south. Viper Red.”

  “Viper Black,” I counter. “You’ve done your homework. You know it’s in a good location, and you know how much it’s worth. It’s yours, free and clear, along with a year’s free consultation. In exchange for your agreement never to deal guns to my father.”

  I’m aware I’m throwing a very lucrative business away, but the recollection of Cleo’s ugly bruises, and Finnan’s glibness over his atrocities, has sparked renewed rage. The chance for payback sooner rather than later is too good to dismiss.

  Sergey Yurinov takes his time to weigh my offer. He helps himself to two more shots of premium vodka before his eyes flick to Oleg. The second in command reaches for a leather binder I hadn’t spotted on the bar and extracts a document, which he holds out to me. I take it from him and open it to find a transfer of ownership document. I suppress a smile.

  “I’ll have my attorney take a look at this and get back to you by noon.”

  Sergey dips his head and holds out his hand. When I shake it, he holds it firm, black eyes pinned on mine. “In return, you have my word that the business interests of your father and Bratva will never join forces.”

  I nod, dark elation expanding through me.

  When they leave, I cross to the bar, pour a finger of Balvenie whisky, and toss it back.

  The bracing liquor warms the dark spaces in me. I feel lighter than I have in years.

  By day’s end, Finnan’s last bastion will be gone, and I can hammer the final nails into his coffin.

  PART THREE

  US

  Chapter Twenty

  IT HAPPENED ON A RAINY NIGHT

  Cleo

  I lost my virginity in his bed.

&nbs
p; I fell in love with him in his bed.

  I charted the glorious life we would have together in his bed.

  I named our children and imagined the grandchildren who would enrich our lives and bear testament to our love in his bed.

  I found out the man I loved more than my own life was capable of murder…while I was in his bed.

  It happened on a rainy night.

  To my knowledge, Finnan Rutherford had not stepped foot in the pool house since his son moved in. Not until that day.

  Axel is out picking up a pizza, our staple food after hours of marathon sex. I’m lying in his bed worrying about the college letters that are piling up on his nightstand. He put off college when his mother passed last year. I helped him mourn the mother who was never really there for him, while I was secretly overjoyed at having him to myself for a whole year. Despite our obsessive need to be with each other, he reapplied the moment his father started talking to him about joining the family business. I know he regretted his hasty decision the moment he posted the applications. Same as I know that this time around, I’m the reason he’s putting off answering the offer letters that are pouring in from Ivy League schools.

  I should be selfless. Think about the foundation we’re laying for our future. Axel wholeheartedly supports my passion for interior design. I feel like the dirtiest bitch for not wanting him to leave me. He thinks it’s because I haven’t seen or heard from my parents since they flew out to a wedding in Boston four months ago. And that was partly true. My heart aches for the vicious argument my mother and I had the morning she left, when she once again mentioned moving back to Boston. The very idea of leaving Connecticut, leaving Axel fills me with dread, so secretly I’m glad they’re not back.

  But Axel’s father reassures me that he’ll leave no stone unturned until he finds my parents, and my almost seventeen-year-old self is consumed with Axel, so it’s been easy to give my heart permission not to worry. To enjoy whatever time I have with Axel. My parents will always be around—once they rear up their heads from wherever they’d disappeared to. It’s not the first time they’ve done this since we moved to Connecticut.