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“You need to turn shit over to the police when you find it rather than just looking at it like the world is dropping presents in your lap,” I tell the kid when I take a step back.
“I’m going to end up in a fucking boot camp over a phone,” he growls, his courage making a reappearance now that I’m not holding him.
“From the looks of it, your dad can’t even afford fucking boot camp, kid.”
I walk away from him, using the gate that the other guys must’ve opened on their way through.
I don’t bother to tell the young delinquent that it’s proven time and time again that scared straight programs and boot camps don’t even work. Despite the numerous studies proving such, the prevalence of the facilities still in existence is honestly kind of scary.
Feeling defeated, I pull my headset off, resisting the urge to stomp it into the ground.
“We know where she’s at,” Rocker says when I approach the SUV.
He covers the bottom of the phone as if doing so will mute his voice to whoever is on the other end.
“One of the women from the shelter reached out to the director. Victoria called Cerberus,” Rocker explains.
“Where is she?” I growl, wondering why we’re still standing here in front of a rundown house in Santa Fe when we should be going to wherever Beth is.
“I’ll get everyone else up to speed,” Rocker says before he hangs up the phone.
I climb into the vehicle with Rocker and a few of the other guys, leaving Stormy to have to ride back with Kincaid in my spot in that vehicle.
No one argues, and I love how well-oiled and adaptable Cerberus is.
“With the help from Wren with Blackbridge,” Rocker begins once we’re on the road, “he was able to identify the guy who didn’t get back on the bus. He had to trace him back and found that he had gotten on the bus with her in Farmington. The guy is Xan Adair.”
The name is familiar, but once again, I can’t pull up anything else on him from memory.
Rocker turns his phone around and shows a better picture of the guy.
“That’s the motherfucker who I stopped outside of the postal store last week.”
The second Hemlock mutters the words, I place him. As he said, he was the guy who he prevented from entering the postal store while Kincaid was inside. I remember the way the guy wasn’t even a little terrified at the big man blocking his path.
“Max said he recognizes him as a guy who stopped outside of the shelter one day when he was posted up, waiting for Beth to finish up inside,” Rocker continues.
My blood runs cold. “Someone from Lindell?”
“Nathan and Xan Adair—” Rocker begins.
“Fuck,” I interrupt. “This is about Brielle.”
Brielle Adair has been at the shelter in Farmington for the last year. Despite neither Kincaid nor Em being happy at the request, she’s been there as some sort of relocation request and favor from a friend working on a case against Nathan Adair in Columbus. Beth wasn’t privileged to this information, and if Brielle breathed a word about it to her, she never told me. I have to work under the assumption that she was just helping the woman out of the kindness of her heart and not trying to stay involved in a nationally televised case.
Of course, Nathan Adair has pleaded with the public about his missing stepdaughter, leaving out the fact that she’s the number one eyewitness who has the power to put him in prison for decades.
“Brielle has been instructed to meet Adair. He gave an address to a local park, but we know from Brielle explaining the conversation, that Adair isn’t going to bring Beth,” Rocker explains, his eyes avoiding mine on purpose.
“He’s going to kill her,” I say, knowing it’s what he isn’t saying.
Reports on Nathan Adair portray him to be one of the most ruthless men many of us have ever seen, and that’s saying a lot, considering the men we’ve come across both in the Marine Corps and while working for Cerberus.
“Cooperation makes it quick and painless,” he says, not needing to tell me the other option. “We can’t compromise Brielle.”
My cheek twitches in irritation. We’re told early on in our journey with Cerberus that it’s best not to put value on any one person outside of the club. If you have to choose between an unknown person and a member of the club, Cerberus will win every time.
“She’s my wife,” I tell him. “I don’t give a fuck what Columbus has on the man, Brielle isn’t worth more than Beth.”
“And sending her in will get them both killed. Adair doesn’t want Brielle because he loves her. He plans to eliminate her as a threat to his empire. Just showing up at the park he gave the address to could end with a bullet in her head from a sniper. And for all we know—”
