Page 157 of Monster

I would have all of my family soon, and all this shit would be over.

I would make sure of it.

“All right, son?”

He nodded and stepped back, leading me inside to the living room.

I saw his open laptop right away and looked over at him questioningly.

“You asked me to find the man responsible for hurting Emmy,” he said by way of explanation.

“I didn’t mean for you to do it right away. You should have gone to sleep first.”

“Can’t,” he answered absentmindedly. When I didn’t answer him, he glanced up from where he was studying on the laptop. “I’m fine, Dad. You don’t have to worry.”

“Always worry about you. You and Braxton. You’re both my fucking world. How could I not worry?” I asked gruffly, taking a seat on the couch next to him.

He didn’t say anything to that. I doubted he would really understand until he was a dad himself.

Fuck me, but the thought of being a grandpa at my age…

Yeah, thirty-eight was too fucking young to be someone’s grandpa, even if Kai was a hell a lot older than me now than I was when I had him.

“Why did you call me here?” I asked him.

“I found the bastard. John Moore.”

“John Moore,” I said slowly. The name of my next victim. Perfect.

Kai shook his head. “That’s not why I called you here, though. I did some background research into the man and his family. Did you know Emmy isn’t the only person he attacked? He went to a party months after the attack on Emmy and sexually assaulted the governor’s daughter. He was trialed and sentenced but only spent two weeks of his four-year sentence in prison.”

“What the fuck?”

Kai nodded. “Yeah. And the judge who sentenced him was found in a ditch a week after he got out.”

So Johnny boy knew some powerful fucking people. Not fucking surprising, considering Nevada was crawling with corrupted pieces of shit. But who? The Irish mob? Or…

I looked up at Kai and the look in his eyes told me the answer before he did.

“The accounting firm the Moore family owns took on a new client a few years back. Sonny McCain.”

“The piece of shit running Sons of War?”

Kai nodded. “Dad, there’s a connection between them. I’m not sure where Moore is in Las Vegas now. He doesn’t have an address on file for some reason, but I’m sure it’s probably with the Sons of War. There are too many coincidences here. Are you… are you sure about Emmy?”

I narrowed my eyes at him. “What are you saying, son?”

“You know what I’m saying.”

I stood up and turned from him. “No.”

“You have to admit it’s a possibility.”

“You questioning my ability to read people?” I asked, turning to him.

“Of course not. But I know you’ve never been like this with another woman.” He looked off to the side. “Not even with Mom. And I’m not blaming you for that. I know why you couldn’t love her. She’s a fucking bitch.”

“Don’t call your mother that, boy,” I said, even if what he said was true.

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