Miah-1(Lane Brothers, Book 2)(36)
“Fuck you, Dad! You had your hired goons beat up the father of my unborn child?!”
Oookay. I’ll ask later.
“Now, Melly, you got to understand. Daddy thought he was a spying traitor like that cousin of his. The only reason I haven’t killed that bastard yet is because his daddy would rain down hell on the operation.”
That gets her to turn around and I watch her stalk right on back and drill a finger into her father’s chest.
“You won’t do any such thing, Dad! Roman is my family now, and that makes Miah my family, too. You’re going to keep your shit together and run your business properly while keeping my new family safe, or I swear to God I’m calling Uncle Jim down here to see just what a nasty piece of work you really are.”
Roman looks fit to bust a gut when the little brunette turns on her heel and stalks back to the car with a frustrated shriek that sets the nightlife abuzz.
“Honey bear—”
“Not another word! You either trust my man or you don’t, and that’s final. Now shut up and leave us be for the rest of the night. I have to get Roman to the emergency room before he bleeds to fucking death. I swear to fuck, all men are Goddamned brainless!”
Roman salutes the chief and gets into the car, its headlights disappearing after a minute or two.
“That’s it? Old Dobson is afraid of his brother, the senator, and Melissa gets Roman into the inner sanctum by blackmailing her father?”
“Something like that. He made a deal with the girl, and she’ll collect after this is all done.” Jace shrugs, turning away to start the long trek back the way we came and to the car we hid down the road.
The walk is silent while I think it all through, and I’m not too sure I like this one bit by the time I get to the car. Too much can go wrong. Roman has involved an innocent woman in this mess, and knowing him, if he’s not banging her yet, he will be soon enough.
I can’t have him ruining shit by falling for Dobson’s princess.
“Can we trust her, Jace?” I ask, getting into his car and leaning back with a sigh.
“Beats me, bro, but Roman seems to think we can, so I gotta trust him, ya know? Long and short of it is that we don’t have any other choice right now. We have the cops on the corruption but nothing on that militia yet, and that’s the main mission here. He needs to get in with those guys before we move on Dobson.”
“Yeah, but what if Melissa Dobson turns out to be one of them?”
“All we can do is keep an eye out for the guy and hope this goes down good, man, you know that. This op is no different from any of the others we’ve pulled over the years. We go in and do what we can and hope an informant isn’t a plant.”
Yeah, but working an op with guys who aren’t my blood makes things so much easier. Having one of my own in the line of fire makes things complicated, and I find that I don’t like it one bit.
“Stop overthinking things and trust the guy, Miah. He’s good for this. We, on the other hand, have to turn our focus to Ronny and her little band of not-so-merry idiots.”
“What’s she up to now?”
Jace scratches his chin and smiles at me in the darkened interior of the car.
“She just booked a flight to good old Paris, bro. You thinking what I’m thinking?”
“Impossible.”
“Nope. Jared got Paulie to hack her computer and download her travel itinerary, and take a guess where she’s headed.”
“Not…”
“Yes.”
That changes things. Big time. The question is what to do about it. If Veronica somehow knows about Bolton…
“We’ll have to move him.”
“No, man, me and Case were thinking that he could shadow her down there and make sure she doesn’t leave France. Just think, Miah, we’d be doing her a favor, reuniting her with her long-lost bestie.”
That sound great but for a few pertinent facts.
“If she disappears, there’ll be no reason for Paulie to be there anymore, and we won’t have someone on the inside. Cleo’s great but she’s limited to what intel she can provide. So far Paulie has been vital.”
Jace considers this and scratches at his beard growth with a frown.
“Dammit, that’s true. So what do you want us to do?”
“Get Case down there and have him move Bolton to the other location, and let’s leave Veronica to chase her own tail.”
“Damn. You’re way too smart for my liking, bro. I was looking forward to seeing Ronny foaming at the mouth.”
“That’s why I’m still in charge. I’m the brain. Now get me home, if you please. Clari promised to save me a plate of Ma’s pork roast, and she recorded Gold Diggers for me.”