Page 82 of Borden 3

“What’s going on?” Tyler asked Hawke as they stepped into the meeting room with Borden. There was a table and two chairs. Borden had already organised the space, but he hadn’t expected Tyler to be present. No matter, Hawke sat down and pulled Tyler down into his lap. Borden locked the door and took a seat across from him.

“Got anything on you?” Borden asked.

Hawke pulled out a blade. Then he pulled off his rings, placing them neatly on the table. His eyes were hard on Borden’s the entire time. Borden withdrew his gun and pulled it apart, setting the pieces on the table next to Hawke’s weapons. He looked back at Hawke.

“What’s going on, Borden?”

Borden may have been suited and cleaned up, but he couldn’t bury the chaos in his body as he retorted, “Years ago, I asked you to look into Emma.”

Hawke’s brows furrowed. “We going that far back?”

“We are.”

“Okay.”

“You remember when I did this?”

Hawke took a moment to think. He drummed his fingers along Tyler’s hips. “I remember. You’d left that diner she was working at. She’d slapped you.”

Tyler’s brows shot up, but she didn’t say anything. Borden nodded. “That’s right.”

“You asked me to look into her.”

Borden grabbed the file resting on the corner of the table and slid it to Hawke. “This is what you presented me with. Flick through it for me.”

Hawke opened the folder and flicked through some papers. Tyler leaned forward, her eyes skimming what was written there. It had copies of Emma’s birth certificate, school records, diploma, medical papers, newspaper clippings of her father’s murder, and even the court files over her mother’s incarceration.

“You seriously dug into her life like this?” Tyler asked Hawke.

Hawke didn’t respond. His face was still screwed up as he went through everything. Then he closed the file and slid it forward. “Flicked through.”

“What is it missing, Hawke?” Borden pressed.

Hawke didn’t look back at him. That was the first fucking red flag.

“Why did you omit it?” Borden asked now, his voice dropping lower.

“I didn’t try to omit anything,” Hawke returned.

“But you know what’s missing, don’t you?”

Hawke rubbed at his light beard, leaning back in his chair. He was no longer drumming his fingers along Tyler’s hip. She stared between the two of them, concerned. Her eyes dropped to the blade on the table and then looked at Borden. He stared back at her, a dark smirk on his face. “Try it,” he said simply.

Hawke gripped her tightly. “Don’t you fucking dare, baby.”

“He’s looking at you like he’s going to murder you,” Tyler retorted, frightened.

“That’s because he feels like he wants to.”

“This is Marcus fucking Borden,” she hissed. “He will murder you.”

Hawke ignored her words, looking across the table now, at Borden. “You’re referring to the kid, aren’t you? The disappearing boy.”

Borden’s blood pumped harder. “Theo.”

Hawke nodded slowly, thinking. “That’s what he went by.”

“Is that not his fucking name?”

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