Total pages in book: 206
Estimated words: 192184 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 961(@200wpm)___ 769(@250wpm)___ 641(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 192184 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 961(@200wpm)___ 769(@250wpm)___ 641(@300wpm)
Sadness swept through me at his facial expression. I was no stranger to coming to terms with having a fucked-up father who put his own needs before his kids. The two situations weren’t the same, but I still got it. I was still coming to terms, myself, with what I’d heard on that recording, admission that my dad’s relationship with me was broken because of my mother’s death, and his selfish requests. Things were already screwed with the father- daughter thing so he’d might as well get his lifelong dream of being a wise guy out of it.
When I’d seen Tom Sr. yesterday a part of me wanted to spit in his face, to demand answers. But another part of me just felt numb. I had been forced to face and feel so much in the past several weeks. I didn’t know how to categorize my feelings. I just knew I had to put one foot in front of the other and move forward somehow. At least I had Tommy with me. He’d help me, he’d protect me. And I’d help him and I’d give him what he needed at the end of every hard day ahead of him.
“I’m calling Greg today. I have more questions for him,” he said without looking at me, aware I was awake and watching him.
I snuggled into his side and put my lips to his shoulder and started to trace the outlines of his tattoo with my fingertip.
“I’ll have him here this afternoon. You can decide if you want to talk to him or leave him to me.”
“Kay,” I said, not sure which option I’d choose.
Tommy kissed me on the mouth and then kissed between my breasts, then my navel, then gave me a devilish grin on the way down farther. Sex was a good distractor from our problems. A very good distractor.
I had evidence corroborating Earl’s story. Regardless of why he did what he did, he took her from me and that was unforgivable. His son Michael had stumbled upon the meth situation because Michael was using and selling and spotted Pop leaving the house of his dealer’s dealer.
Earl was dead and gone; I’d shot him after I’d tracked him down, after he told me why. He knew he was a goner when he saw me. He told me that he had a feeling when she was given back to me that I’d be coming for him. He told me he didn’t think, at first, I’d get involved. Never thought I was the type to be a girl’s hero. My father didn’t get involved in these sorts of things since Tia was just a pawn and Earl had known about her father and my Pop’s quest to ruin the man’s life. While he didn’t think I’d come for her, he hoped my Pop might get lured down here due to his connection to Tia’s mother and he’d get his chance for revenge. He told me it wasn’t personal with him and I. Obvious to me or I’d have been dead when he shot near me instead of at me. Didn’t matter. It was him who took her and he had to pay.
I never figured Pop would get heavily into the drug game. Yeah, he’d said he profited from cocaine here and there back in the 70s and 80s, but didn’t bother nowadays beyond weed, which we made good money from, and which I didn’t classify as any worse than alcohol. It was now obvious he’d been keeping it from me.
My PI showed proof that he was moving about two million every few weeks through a few guys locally and with that, who knew what else he was into? He’d financed the start-up of a lab and was making a good chunk of change off it. But my PI also talked to Michael’s girlfriend, who admitted she had told Earl after Michael died about the meth and that Michael had been worried about seeing Tom Ferrano leave his dealer’s dealer’s house. Earl had done some investigating of his own and put the pieces together. The girlfriend died of an overdose a few days after my PI talked to her though my PI Zack said she didn’t seem like a drug user.
My father was set up for retirement. He was set up to leaving all his kids enough money to live comfortably, (although Dare and I had already set ourselves up and didn’t need Pop’s dough) as well as leaving money to set his young wife up for life. He had thriving businesses that were run by his people and that continually brought profit. So why was he in the meth game? It was ego, power, it was all so important to Pop. If there was a business where money could be made, he wanted in, wanted to be seen as a master of all trades.