Page 47 of His Prize

I stood from my seat. “I’ll make sure to keep your prison tab full, Mr. Moretti.”

He shot up from his chair. “What did you just call me, girl?”

I hung up the phone and turned my back as guards stepped out from all corners of the room. I heard my uncle cursing my existence and spitting at the plexiglass before they tackled him to the ground. I lifted my head high as I slid my purse up my shoulder, walking away from whatever life I thought I had. Because in that moment, I disowned my uncle. I disowned part of my family.

And I silently vowed to myself to cultivate a new one.

I wanted a life where I was loved and cherished. I wanted a life where people loved me instead of tried to kill me. I wanted a life where I was respected for my opinions, loved for my advantages, and helped with my downfalls. I wanted a life where there was more love than hate. More tears of happiness than tears of sorrow. I wanted a life filled with light and brightness, not darkness and bloodshed.

But, if this were my plot in life, that didn’t mean I had to do things like Pava. That didn’t mean I had to be ruthless like people thought whenever anyone mentioned the Moretti name. That didn’t mean I had to fall into the same dark footsteps that had preceded me. Because if there were one memory I’d never forget of my father, it was how kind he was—how giving he had always been with his community.

That was the Moretti family I knew.

And if it took disowning my uncle and his family to make that happen, then so be it.

20

Bonnie

“A body has washedup along the shoreline of Lake Michigan. Authorities have identified the man as thirty-four-year-old Branson Baker, the General Manager of PetShop Galore.”

I turned up the radio as loud as I could stand it while the announcer kept talking.

“Officials have found that the cause of death was a gunshot wound to the back of the head. No word on ballistics yet, though the police are working around the clock to try to find the person responsible for the murder. Branson Baker, a decorated war hero with two purple hearts, will be greatly missed. Our hearts go out to his grieving family in their time of need.”

Aerosmith started blaring through the speakers of my car, and I turned them off. As I pulled into the parking lot of the hotel where Israel and I were still staying, my head swirled with so many things. The man had been executed. Was it really a coincidence that he just happened to work for the same shop whose truck slammed into me?

You really don’t know, do you?

I quickly gathered my things and tore out of my car. I rushed into the hotel and didn’t stop moving until I found myself inside the comfort and safety of the hotel’s penthouse suite. My hands trembled as I hung up my purse. I slipped out of my heels and jogged into bedroom Israel and I shared. I pulled out the box of files I kept underneath the bed and rifled through them until I found the files on PetShop Galore.

And when I found a picture of the General Manager, Branson Baker, images flashed through my mind.

“Get down, Miss Bonnie!”

My breathing came in short spurts as the crunching of metal filled my eardrums. I sat down on my ass by the bed as tires squealing filled my mind. I squeezed my eyes shut while the smell of burnt rubber filled my nostrils. And as my mind replayed for me the absent memories I’d been trying to conjure for days now, I saw it.

Him.

The truck driver.

Through the window of the Town Car.

“Branson,” I whispered.

Israel killed that man for me.

I scrambled to put everything back into the box, and I shoved it underneath the bed. But all too soon, I heard the elevator whirring. My eyes bulged as I pulled myself up from the floor, hoping and praying I didn’t look as disheveled as I thought I did.

“Miss Moretti?” A knock came at the door of the penthouse as I ran my fingers through my hair. “Miss Moretti? We need you to open up.”

I walked over to the door and slipped back into my heels. “Who is it?” I asked.

“Police, ma’am.”

My heart stopped in my chest as I fluffed my hair out one last time before opening the door. “Come in, gentlemen. Can I get you anything to drink?”

The two detectives pushed past me and walked straight into the living room.

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