1. Lindsay #3
“Wait,” I say, making him pause. “Who fed you the information about the warehouse? Who are you hiding from?”
He stares at me, eyes assessing and for a beat I think he won’t reply. But then he does.
“The same person who fed me the information.”
“What?” I press, confused.
“I’m hiding from the same person who fed me the information that turned out to be a trap.”
“I don’t understand.”
“You’re not supposed to. Try to stay away from trouble, although I don’t think you’re capable of that. I’ll see you around.”
The shadows swallow him up and then I’m left all alone in the alley. I stand still for a couple seconds, turning over the conversation in my head.
At least until I hear the small squeak of a rat and remember where I’m standing. I rush back to my car and I don’t breathe easily until I’m driving past the street. Until the darkness and the shadows fade away.
The farther I drive away from the neighborhood, the more my nerves loosen. Soon enough I’m in familiar territory. The streets become brighter and less menacing. People mill about, going about their businesses of the night.
I eventually pull up in front of my hotel. My hair flips over my neck as I step out of my car, the feeling of belonging settling deep within me once again.
For as long as I can remember, my life has been just like this. Posh hotels, expensive cars, private schools and vacations all over Europe. I grew up with a metaphorical silver spoon in my mouth, with a father who doted on me and everything I could have ever wanted at my fingertips.
And yet it’s never been enough. Trying to live a life of privilege to show you have everything you want is meaningless when you don’t have any of the things that you need.
“Welcome back, Ms. Beaumont,” the valet greets as I hand him the keys to my Lexus.
My stomach growls as I head inside the hotel, so I make a quick pit stop at the restaurant. I haven’t had anything to eat besides the pastry I had with Val earlier, and I’m famished. A quick glance at the menu, and I order some dinner and a nice wine to pair with it.
It arrives soon enough and I settle into my chair for a quiet meal.
Unfortunately, it’s ruined a couple minutes later by a squeal and a woman pushing back to chair in front of me to slide in.
“Oh my, Lindsay,” Mrs. Dupree exclaims.
The diamonds in her necklace catch the light as she moves, matching the twinkle in her blue eyes perfectly.
She’s dressed in the typical tweed outfit that’s popular with Stepford wives.
Her blonde hair is styled perfectly, and the Botox is doing a wonderful job of making her look younger than her sixty-something years.
For a brief second, I wonder if I’m staring at my future. Shit could blow up in my life and I could find myself marrying some rich CEO. Maybe quit my job and become the perfect housewife.
Hell would freeze over before I would ever let that reality take shape, though.
“Hello, Mrs. Dupree,” I say politely.
“I can’t believe I ran into you, dear. It’s been so long since I’ve seen you around.”
Honestly, I blame myself. Usually, I eat outside the hotel to avoid the high-end clientele it usually draws in.
They’re people who have known me all my life and are always interested in pulling me for a conversation.
I’ve tried my hardest to stay away from their crowd.
I don’t attend a lot of social functions, and I don’t have a lot of rich friends either.
“How have you been?” the enthusiastic woman questions.
“Good. Busy,” I reply monotonously.
“That’s nice. Honestly when I heard you were going to law school, I couldn’t believe it. And now look at you, a prosecutor and a successful one at that. Your father must be so proud.”
I smile, feeling my cheeks stretch almost painfully with the movement.
“Yes, he is. So proud,” I mutter.
I still remember the moment I decided to go to law school. I was tired of being dismissed as some spoiled pretty girl living off her family’s money. People looked at me and decided they already knew me before I ever opened my mouth.
So I chose law. Not because it was easy, but because I wanted something no one could take from me. I wanted to prove to the world and to myself that I was capable of building something on my own.
What I hate most is how women are constantly expected to justify their worth. If we’re beautiful, people assume we can’t be intelligent. If we’re ambitious, they say we’re cold. We are always forced to prove we can be more than one thing at a time.
But I am.
Lindsay Beaumont is beauty and brains.
Mrs. Dupree must see that she’s losing me because she quickly speaks up before I do.
“Speaking of your father, my husband, Sid, you remember him, right?” she plows on without waiting for an answer.
“He’s been trying to get in touch with your father’s office.
Apparently, his company’s planning on building a center and he needs to sign off on some permissions from the mayor’s office. But it’s taking forever.”
“Riveting,” I say dryly.
“I was wondering if you could talk to your father. Try to speed things up for him?”
A part of me wants to tell her to fuck off. But I was raised better than that. And I am better than that. So I settle for a little white lie instead.
“I’ll see what I can do, Mrs. Dupree.”
“Fabulous,” she states, clapping her hands together. The smell of Chanel No. 5 wafts over at me with the movement. She gets to her feet with a wide smile. “It was really nice to see you, Lindsay.”
“You too.”
Thankfully, she leaves and I’m left to continue my meal in peace.
What Mrs. Dupree doesn’t know is that I haven’t spoken to my father in weeks.
And I have no plans to do so anytime soon.
And even if I was speaking to him, no way in hell would I pass along such a message.
She can go through the proper channels and take the necessary steps like everyone else.
Interactions like that fortify my decision to take a step back from this world. There are succubi everywhere I turn, hoping to get a taste of my soul.
After my meal I head up to my room, in need of a shower. I strip and then head inside the bathroom, pressing a few dials before standing under the shower head.
Soon enough, icy water streams down my body. I barely even flinch at the sensation. The water streams down, dampening my hair and biting at the tension between my shoulder blades.
For a couple of minutes as I stand there, my thoughts run quiet and I don’t think.
But that never lasts, of course.
I run a towel through my wet hair as I exit the bathroom twenty minutes later. A quick glance at my bedside table reveals a buzzing phone and a thick file right beside it, both of which require my immediate attention.
But after the day I’ve had, I’m really not in the mood for work. I grab my phone, ignoring the call from Rachel, my paralegal, and switch it off entirely. After pulling on a robe, I step outside the bedroom.
The door shuts behind me with a soft click as I step into the living space of the glamorous penthouse I’ve been living in for the past few months. Ever since I left my father’s home in a blur of indignation and betrayal.
Floor-to-ceiling windows stretch across the far wall, the city spilling out beneath them, and while it’s an amazing view, it does nothing to improve my current mood.
My heels sink slightly into the carpet as I cross the living space, the room open and expansive with neutral tones and clean lines. Everything is curated to suggest comfort without ever quite achieving it. At least not for me.
The kitchen gleams to my left, unused mostly.
Stainless steel, polished stone. As beautiful as all of it is, it does nothing for the ache in my chest that hasn’t dwindled since I found out about my father’s involvement in the mafia.
Since then it’s like I’ve been gliding over quicksand, wondering when and if I’m going to sink into the feelings I’ve kept at bay.
While I’ve been keeping a brave face, I know eventually I’ll have to deal with how it all makes me feel. My father, my best friend Valentina and her new family, and everything I’m going to do about it. But until then, I’ll stick around this penthouse, avoiding it all.
I take a seat at a glass desk in the corner and pull another thick case file from the stack. I go through this particular one every single day, almost religiously. It’s the file on the Vitales.
It has everything from financial records and registrations for seemingly legal companies, which I’m sure are simply used as a front for their illegal activities. And then there’s some evidence those illegal activities, paper companies, businesses whose books simply don’t add up.
It’s pretty clear there’s some franchises that are used for money laundering on a big scale. I’m sure what I know is only a tip of the iceberg. And that’s only the financial crimes.
There are also several surveillance pictures and videos of members of the mafia. They’re timestamped and serve as evidence that puts some of them at the scene of several murders.