CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
Balor
H earing Ella is crazy about me thrills me, but that thrill quickly circles the drain hearing that prick’s name brought up.
Wes...
Her ex.
The man who abused her. This bastard has her skittish about committing to me.
Shaking my head, I say into the microphone on my wrist to the Exfiltration Specialty Team Marcus assembled. “Stand by.”
I resisted doing this sooner, but I had no choice. Now something’s at stake.
I find the email I was copied on to Eoghan’s office with Ella’s work papers to see her driver’s license.
Estella Reyes.
I found out a while back, she doesn’t have the same surname as her father. The one smart thing he did to protect her.
The address on her ID is not the same as the building I’m about to rappel down. And I have an uneasy suspicion the old address is where that asshole who abused her lives.
She agreed to live with this prick. Yet she ran away from me .
As I run the address to get homeowner details, my fingers tense seeing the name materialize.
Michael Wesley Brennan
Ella wouldn’t tell me his last name. Now I have that— and his address.
But the name hammers into my brain and it hits me like a bullet to the chest.
Sgt. Michael W. Brennan is Riordan’s informant .
I.e. A dirty cop on the take from us.
Something I don’t get involved in other than background checks. Which didn’t include looking for an arrest record, because, as Ella pointed out, cops protect their own.
And my family doesn’t exactly look for Boy Scouts to work for us.
Assuming this is the same guy, I hack into Brennan’s employment records.
Yep.
Michael Wesley Brennan
And the address on Ella’s driver’s license matches his.
It’s the same guy.
“Fuck,” I roar and bang on the armrest to the bird. “Marcus, collect those damn ropes and get us the hell off this roof.”