Chapter 32
Hudson nursed a bourbon at the bar as he watched Tessa’s tracker on his phone. Had he just told her he loved her while they were fighting?
Fuck, he had. He wouldn’t take it back, but shit, did it complicate things. He wanted the position with VIPER so badly it made him jitter.
But he wanted Tessa more.
He knew the dismal statistics for military couples.
Add in special forces, and the divorce rate skyrocketed.
Chris and his wife were proof enough. Tessa had spent her entire life surviving chaos.
Now that she’d found stability, he couldn’t be the man who took it away.
Even if he gave her everything he had while with VIPER, there were no guarantees he’d come home.
Her heart had already been broken too many times.
He couldn’t set her up for heartbreak again.
That left only one option, and it would surely land him on the General’s, an admiral’s, and the director’s shitlist.
He looked toward the entrance to the ballroom searching for Tessa and squinted. Was that Nathaniel hurrying toward him?
Shoving his phone in his pocket, he threw the rest of his drink down his throat. Half the bourbon splashed down his chin as he stalked toward the unexpected visitor, rage and anticipation bubbling in his chest and questions on his tongue.
Wiping his face with the back of his hand, he grabbed the prick’s arm. With enough force to leave no doubt he meant business, he tugged him to a corner screened by two lush potted trees and pushed him onto a loveseat behind the foliage. “What are you doing here?”
Nathaniel scrubbed sweat from his brow. Straightening, he held up his hands in surrender. “I need your help.”
Hudson swung a chair around and straddled it. Draping his forearms over the backrest, he stared at Nathaniel. “And I need answers. Start talking.”
Nathaniel’s lips quivered. “They’re gonna kill my son, his wife, and my grandbaby if I don’t get them ten million dollars.”
Hudson didn’t move a muscle, but everything inside him jerked in surprise. Why hadn’t a ten-million-dollar debt come up in any searches? “Who do you owe?”
“My bookie. Please, Hudson. He’s been threatening to hurt my family for a while if I don’t pay my debts in full, but I didn’t think he was serious.
I tried to get the money myself, but it all went wrong.
” He darted his gaze around the room. “I know you don’t like me, and I’m sorry Sam had to die to make things right, but after the way—”
Hudson shoved off the chair’s backrest. The legs screeched against the floor as he kicked the chair to the side. Clamping his fingers around Nathaniel’s throat, he yanked him up and pinned him against the back of the couch as the confession blared in his ears.
Sam had to die.
“You killed Pop?” The question ripped out in a snarl as deadly as shrapnel. Blood thundered in his ears. The shockwaves shattered the disco ball’s reflection into streaks across Hudson’s vision as each pulse tightened his grip on Nathaniel’s jugular.
“No…no. The men from P-Passage International did.” Nathaniel gripped Hudson’s wrist. His eyes watered with the effort to speak. “They set up Tessa’s father to…to take the fall.” Spit gathered at the corners of his mouth. “I just made a deal with them to do it.”
Hudson tightened his hand on the murderer’s windpipe. “Why?”
Red blotches mottled Nathaniel’s face. “Because I need…needed Vivian’s inheritance to cover my…my debts.”
“How did Tessa’s father become involved?” Hudson eased the pressure on Nathaniel’s throat just enough so he could talk over the deejay calling everyone to the dance floor.
Nathaniel sucked in a gulp of air. Tears from lack of oxygen, not remorse for anyone but himself, clung to his lashes.
“I…” Nathaniel shoved against Hudson’s elbow.
“I heard Sam talking to Ralphie a few weeks ago about what a stupid loser Tessa’s father was and realized he’d be the perfect guy to pin an accident on.
Those Passage International guys discovered I was looking into him and paid me a visit at my office in D.C.
After they questioned me with their fists, they offered me a deal.
They wanted to get rid of Frank and make it look like they had nothing to do with it. I wanted to get rid of…”
Nathaniel swallowed. Hudson felt the twitch under his fingers. Every muscle in his hand screamed to drain the life out of the evil he hadn’t seen coming. “Say it, you coward.”
“I…”
Hudson pressed on a pulse point. A glance around assured nobody watched them. “Fucking talk.”
“I wanted to get rid of Sam. They agreed to engineer the accident. All I had to do was let them know about his whereabouts on a certain day and make sure the crash did its job.”
Hudson growled, each animalistic sound louder with each event that led to Pop’s death.
The call from Nathaniel.
Him by the car when Hudson arrived.
His suggestion to the police that Pop was drunk or had a heart attack.
It all lined up to a sickening outcome. “And if the crash didn’t do its job?”
“They gave me something undetectable to inject him with that would make sure he died. I took care of it before you arrived.”
Hudson tightened his fingers around the throat of the bastard who’d ended Pop’s life.
“P-please.” Nathaniel’s reddened face disintegrated into bluish gray. He tried to push away Hudson’s hand, but lack of oxygen sapped his strength. “S…stop.”
Hudson wrapped his other hand around Nathaniel’s neck. With a controlled calm that raced chills down his spine, he pressed forward until their foreheads almost touched. “Why should I let you live? You’re a murderer.”
Tessa’s voice penetrated the blinding rage roaring in his ears.
Frank isn’t a murderer
His hand shook around Nathaniel’s throat as he heard Tessa again, louder this time.
Frank isn’t a murderer
Hudson jerked back, like the murdering bastard he’d been damn near close to strangling the life out of had burst into flames. Nathaniel’s hands flew to his throat as he doubled over and wheezed.
“Fuck.” Hudson pinched the bridge of his nose.
The only shred of respect Tessa had for her father was his lack of violence.
Even though Hudson knew every kill-spot on a person’s body, he couldn’t stomach the thought of seeing that respect disappear when she looked at him.
“Do you have any idea what kind of shit Passage International is into?”
“What does it matter? I just care about keeping my family alive.”
“But not about keeping my family alive?”
Nathaniel spat into the potted plant. “Sam didn’t care about mine. Why should I care about his?”
Confusion tempered Hudson’s barely controlled rage. “Explain.”
Nathaniel’s upper lip curled in a sneer. “Sam and my father grew up gambling together. Sam always had luck. My father didn’t. When he got himself into trouble with a loan shark, he asked Sam for help. Sam thought he was too good to get even his money a little dirty.”
“Because he had morals, you shitbag. Keep talking.”
“My father killed himself a week later.” He pointed a finger at Hudson’s chest. “Sam had plenty of money to spare thanks to his stupid luck, but he wouldn’t help a friend.”
Hudson slapped Nathaniel’s hand away. “Luck? You think Pop’s fortune came from luck?
” He shoved his fist in his pocket. The sinker, hot and unforgiving against his fingers, fueled his rage.
So did Pop’s voice in his head calling Nathaniel a pompous prick, just like his father.
“Success comes from hard work, you lazy shit. And definitely not marrying someone to get an inheritance. Does Vivian know that’s why you married her? ”
“She’s figuring it out. Why else would I tie myself to that bitch?”
Hudson bent forward, the urge to close his hand around the marks he’d already made on Nathaniel’s throat held back by the oath he’d sworn and the woman he loved.
“Only family gets to call Vivian a bitch. If you say one more nasty word about her, or anyone else I love, I’ll murder you right here and make it look like I was saving you from choking. Understand?”
Nathaniel’s comb-over slipped as he shook his head. “I’m sorry. Vivian is just …please. I need your help.”
Hudson leaned back an inch. His head spun with how fast Nathaniel flipped between self-serving righteousness and desperate self-preservation. “Did you put the listening device in my ring and the bug in the house?”
Splotches of color flared on Nathaniel’s face. “So, you found those. You’re not the only one with contacts.”
Hudson growled at his smug tone. “But I’m the only one in this conversation who knows how to kill a man a dozen ways with his bare hands.” Hudson cracked his knuckles. “Why did you spy on me?”
Nathaniel eyed Hudson’s clenched fists. “I couldn’t be sure Vivian’s inheritance would be enough to cover my debt. I need the Project V contract to keep my company afloat. I heard you’d been tapped to join the program and utilized the resource.”
The implication of Nathaniel’s actions blasted into Hudson like a bullet.
Tessa thought she, by way of Frank, had been the cause of Pop’s death.
She had it all wrong.
Project VIPER was the reason.
I was the reason.
Hudson sprang forward and grabbed Nathaniel by the shirt. His control stretched to the breaking point. “What you meant to say was you killed my grandfather because you’re a selfish bastard who tried to use me to cheat like a spineless coward.”
“It wasn’t cheating. It was a strategic business move.” Nathaniel huffed. “The listening device was a waste, though, because it didn’t work at your meeting today.”
“I found it, you moron.” Hudson shoved Nathaniel back onto the couch. “Do you know why the enforcer from Passage tried to abduct Tessa?”
Nathaniel rubbed the back of his head. “No. I swear.”
“What about the explosion at her house?”
“Nothing about that either. Just…please help me.”
Hudson’s pilot buddy called his name again. He ignored the greeting as he pulled his phone from his pocket. He needed to call the General. As he looked at the screen, his heart stopped.
Tessa’s red dot wasn’t in the ladies’ room.