Chapter 27 Zane
Zane
Istand there and watch the taillights of Alessa’s black Ferrari disappear before I get back in the car with a fuming Jay.
I knew dismissing him would piss him off, but I can’t let him stand there and talk to Les like that.
He’s been my partner ever since I became a detective two years ago, and he’s the closest thing I have to a friend, as sad as that is.
I fire the car up without saying a word. “You still bend over backward for that bitch, and she doesn’t even give you a second glance.”
Now is when I thoroughly regret getting drunk and spilling the whole tale of Les and me.
The truth is, I had no damn business pursuing her at eighteen when I was twenty-eight fucking years old, but damn, I couldn’t help myself.
She was drop-dead gorgeous at eighteen and just kept getting better with age.
“Call her a bitch again, and I’ll put a fucking bullet through your brain,” I warn, jerking the car into drive and tearing out of the parking lot.
He scoffs. “Why are you still hung up on her? She’s a criminal; you’re a detective investigating her.”
I grimace at that. It’s true my department is investigating Les and her merry band of men, among others.We have been for as long as I can remember but they’ve never gotten enough to bring them down.
What Jay doesn’t know is all I do is feed them little information to keep suspicions off me and the heat off her.
I also couldn’t tell Les any of that because she would shoot me on principle.
“I’m not hung up on her,” I argue.
He pulls the folder from my lap, waving it in the air. “What’s this then?”
“That’s a damn good tip, no matter who it came from.”
I know Les has a soft spot for kids, mostly because she can’t have any, so it didn’t surprise me when she handed me the folder.
I found out the hard way about her being unable to have kids.
I spilled my heart to her one night and told her I wanted her to tell her dad so we could quit hiding, maybe get married, and have kids.
She shut down immediately, and it took her weeks to tell me Frankie Perez’s men fucked her up so bad she had to have all her reproductive organs removed, rendering her infertile.
That was also the downfall of our relationship.
We would break up and get back together repeatedly until the fateful night when she found out I was in the police academy.
I didn’t care that she couldn’t have kids; I just cared that it hurt her so bad.
She wouldn’t listen to me when I told her I was doing it for us, so I could get her away from all the danger she was always in.
She never talked to me again after that night.
The first time I spoke to her in the years after was when she took over for her dad.
She had an altercation at one of the clubs, and I was the beat cop that showed up to investigate.
I waited late in life to pursue law enforcement because I didn’t want to disappoint my dad, but he died thinking I hated him for still following Luca Poletti.
Jay sighs, and I know he looked over the information in that folder. “How do we play this?”
I do work for Les most of the time when she can’t put herself in the middle, but she never hands me anything illegal.
I think it’s her way of making sure I don’t become a dirty cop, or I’m just telling myself that.
I’m already a dirty cop for not turning over what I know, stuff that could put her and her crew in prison for life.
“We?” I ask. He seemed less inclined to help in front of her.
“You going to sideline me?” he smirks.
“No,” I sigh, “I have an informant down there. I can convince him to sign that he gave the tip.”
I take the exit to head downtown toward the address of the foster home.
I park two buildings down, shoving the car in park, just watching the building.
Who the hell would put kids in danger like that?
I’ll never understand why people become foster parents if they don’t give a shit about the kids besides the check they bring in.
My dad may have raised me while working for one of the most lethal crime bosses in the world, but he loved me unconditionally and protected me the same way.
“So, what’s the deal with you and her?”
“You already know the story,” I reply without looking at him.
“I mean now. Why does she still have you by the balls?”
Because I’m still in love with her. Because I never got over her. Because I hate myself for fucking it up. Because she was the only girl ever to captivate my heart and soul. “She doesn’t have me by the balls. You know it’s better to keep them in your pocket than your enemy.”
“You have that wrong. She has you in her pocket. You know damn well you don’t keep people like her in check.”
I finally look at him. “People like her?”
He looks at me like he’s talking to someone that’s slow. “Violent. Murderers. Criminals. Do I need to keep going?”
I shake my head. I refuse to keep having this same argument with him.
I know what they are because I used to be one of them.
I’m not going to lie and say I haven’t thought about turning over what I have on Ryder fucking Venchelli to put him under the prison and away from Alessa for the things Jay just described, but it wouldn’t do any good.
I hate Ryder with every fiber of my being, and every cross word that comes out of his mouth toward me pushes me that much closer to getting rid of him for good.
I tolerate the rest of her guys, Gage, more than others because I witnessed what his dad did to him more than once when he couldn’t deal with Gage’s ADHD and mood swings.
He isn’t my friend, but he isn’t my enemy either.
“Ignore me all you want, Zane, but one day, these little jobs you do for her will bite you right in the fucking ass, and the only one who will go down for anything is you.”
Deep down, I knw that she’ll throw me right under that bus if I ever get busted for running her jobs. “I won’t get caught.”
“Come on,” he says harshly, “Get your head out of her ass. You need to move on. Find you another girl. A good girl.”
I shrug. “I don’t want a good girl. I don’t want a girl, period.” I just want her.
“Man,” he throws his head back against the seat in exasperation, “wasn’t she just seen getting close to the new Perez brother?”
I used to be able to follow her all over social media and watch her every move like a fucking stalker, but she’s been missing from any paparazzi pictures for over a week.
The last picture I saw of her was the night she was seen leaving her favorite restaurant, Catch 35, with a guy no one knew.
I found out who he was in minutes, except he came back as Leonardo Janelle, not Leonardo Perez.
That shock came later when he was pictured with Evander and Mateo Perez, except no one had put the connection together until now.
What she was doing with them after what their father did is beyond me.
They are also on the list for investigation, and I have no ties to them, so it’s easier to give over information.
One wrong move and the Perez brothers are going down.
“It was just dinner,” I point out. “And she can do what she wants.” I look closer out the window.
Tall, slim, pants hanging off his skinny ass, pale white face, greased back blonde hair.
“There he is,” I say, nodding toward my informant.
He walks to the driver's side window, leaning in like he’s doing a drug deal.
“What’s up, Jeffrey?” I greet him with his real name with a grin.
His eyebrows turn down over his watery blue eyes. “It’s Playboy.”
“I need information,” I tell him, ignoring that stupid ass name.
“On what?” he asks, casting a nervous glance around.
“6567 Mikee. In that white building.”
“The apartment with all the kids?”
I nod. “What do you know?”
“They sell for Xander out of there.” Xander is the leader of the Vipers, the gang who runs this part of town, and a thorn in my fucking side. “They had twins that slang out here, but they disappeared, man.”
I frown. “Disappeared?”
“Disappeared, bro. Like they ain’t here no more.”
“When?”
“Yesterday. They were at their corner, and this dime in a black Explorer talked to them, and they got into a car with a big bald dude.”
Jay raises an eyebrow thinking the same thing as me. “What did this dime look like?”
“Yo, man, she had black hair and a fat ass.” He bites his lip and groans. “Fuckin’ dime.”
“Did she have anyone with her?” Les isn’t the only girl with black hair running around, but Ryder drives a blacked-out Ford Explorer. Coincidence?
“Four dudes. One of them was the crazy one who busted up Xander’s garage a month ago for not following the rules.” That would be Gage Lawson, so it was Alessa. But where are the missing twins?
Playboy here was so high that he didn’t even put the connection together that the “dime” he saw was Alessa. She rules all the criminals, so everyone usually knows who she is.
“Will you sign that you gave me the tip on the foster house?”
“Yeah, man. I get paid, right?” His eyes light up, knowing I’m going to pay him for his next hit.
“Yeah,” I sigh, “I thought you were done with the shit?”
“What shit? I’m clean, man,” he says defensively.
“Your eyes say otherwise,” Jay throws in, not even looking over at him.
“This tip pays off; I’ll find you.”
He signs the informant statement, grins, and jogs off. I can fill in everything later to turn in to my boss.
“Looks like we are going on a raid tonight,” I say with a grin.