Chapter 17 #2
“Didn’t Lucian say they tried to have the initiation every other year for men who had come of age?”
“That’s what he recorded as the frequency, according to Sergey,” I responded.
“Then why were there so many different aged men? They should’ve all been within a year or two of each other, three maximum, but Nico and Titus were a decade apart,” Devlin remarked. “Why?”
“Was this the first gathering since the Syndicate was broken apart?” I heard Skid ask in the background.
“Yes, as far as we can tell,” Devlin replied, and I realized what they were thinking.
“You believe someone came of age and that’s why they made the move so suddenly.
And they dragged distant members of the various families who weren’t part of the business, like Claire and her father.
” Devlin’s blue eyes looked directly into mine through the screen, and he nodded.
“So, who finally grew hair on his nuts and turned eighteen?”
“That’s what we need to figure out. But think about what Hannah said.
The lady she remembered from the house, Martina, she said she was five and Martina was pregnant.
What if Sergey fathered another child with Martina?
It’s not a stretch to believe, and that child would be about eighteen this year, if Hannah’s memories are accurate. ”
“She knows what she saw,” I replied, raising my voice slightly.
I wasn’t going to have anyone accuse Hannah of lying or being mistaken about something. She pushed herself every day to remember her time with her mother, and any little detail she remembered, she’d tell me so I could put the piece into the puzzle.
“I’m not saying she doesn’t, but what we need to do is connect Martina to Hannah’s mother, to see if there was a record of a birth around that time and try to determine where the baby went,” Devlin reasoned like it was an easy task, “and if that baby was Douche, who was mysteriously absent from the ceremony.”
“That’s all?” James asked, shaking his head. “That’s a lot of possibilities and maybes for us to go off on a tangent.”
“I agree with Devlin that we should at least look into the possibility,” I returned, and James looked at me with wide eyes as if I was crazy.
I never agreed with Devlin, even if I thought he was right. It was a matter of principle and my desire to be a thorn in his side. But the time for pettiness was over. Somewhere out there, someone thought it was okay to take innocent women and hurt them in their climb for power.
“I’ll get one of my men to start digging while we keep working on our tasks,” Devlin remarked with a shit-eating grin on his face.
“Let’s plan on not speaking tomorrow and we’ll meet again on Wednesday.
With Lucian and Rylee having the babies and Connor still feeling under the weather, I think we all need a day to recoup. ”
“Agreed. I’m around if anyone finds anything,” Skid offered before James disconnected his call.
“Tell Hannah I’ll be returning the money to her this week.
We’re enhancing the envelopes to see the faded postmarks, and all the bills have been fingerprinted and the serial numbers recorded, so I want to get it back to her,” James said, then he used two fingers in a salute before his screen went dark.
Devlin glanced to his side as James made some noise, and a moment later, the sound of a door closing came through my speakers. Devlin turned back to the screen and smiled at me.
“How’s Hannah been doing? Is she ready to become part of Callahan Cyber Security.”
Exhaling deeply, I answered, “She’s tired from finishing up the projects at work, and they gave her a trainee starting today. I think she’s excited to start something new, but she’s running herself thin.”
“I’ll make sure she gets a few days off before she starts with us.” He paused and asked, “Are you still coming up in a few weeks? Stella will only be satisfied with video calls for so long.”
“We’re planning on coming up with Regan the week after next,” I replied. He glanced down before looking back at me. “What’s going on?”
“I . . . I want to make sure you’ll bring her around us.
I know her relation to us wasn’t what any of us expected, but since we’ve gotten a chance to know her, we want to be part of her life.
” His pause went on longer than I was expecting before he requested, “Will you make sure to keep her part of ours?’
“I have no control over Hannah, Devlin, but I would never do anything to keep the family apart. I know I’m an asshole, but we’re all related backward, foreword, and sideways, it seems. And the last thing I want to do is shrink Hannah’s world by excluding people from it.”
“I know we’ve bumped heads a few times over the years, but I wanted to tell you that I know you to be a good man, and I believe Hannah and you were meant to be. Just like my lamb and me.”
That was the greatest compliment I could ever hope to receive from Devlin. Elise is his world, and DJ and Connor are wonderful additions. Comparing Hannah and me to him and Elise showed I truly had his blessing with his sister.
Not that I needed it. No one—not Devlin, Lucian, or the devil himself—would be able to keep me away from Hannah. And anyone who tried would be added to my hunting list.