Page 66 of Devil's Dilemma

Demon uses his own phone. “Cad. Get in here now.” That’s all he says.

The computer guy’s there in a moment. Well, his office is only next door. He views the photos much the same as anyone else, using finger and thumb to enlarge the clearest.

“There’s no fuckin’ doubt,” he announces at last.

There’s not. There’s the giveaway scar running through his left eyebrow that’s clear when you zoom in.

“Where did you get these, Mel?” Cad unsurprisingly wants all the information he can get.

Knowing it’s hard for me to speak, Pyro replies for me. “Friend from her work was in Vegas this weekend. She took them there.”

“How would she know it was Skull?” Again, it’s Cad who queries me.

“She, er, she met him a few times,” I manage to get out.

“Can you give me her number, Mel?”

I’m sure Beth wouldn’t mind under the circumstances. “Yeees,” I stammer out. “But I d-d-d-don’t think there’s anything more she can tell you. She wasn’t c-c-c-certain of course, so didn’t approach him.”

The computer man’s eyes flick to Pyro then to Demon. “I’d like to know her impression. Did he look like a resident or a visitor? See this bag he’s holding? It’s got a grocery store logo on it. Might mean nothing at all, but if it’s grocery shit, he could be a local.”

“Or self-catering at an Airbnb,” Demon suggests.

“I’d still like to talk to her. There’s a way people tend to look when they’re tourists. Interested, looking around all the time. Locals tend to be more focused. Any clue we might prompt her to remember would help.”

“If he’s a local, he’d be easier to find?”

The conversation has been going on over my head. Suddenly those words hammer home and I interrupt, “I don’t know if I want you to find him.” All three men look astonished, so I try to offer an explanation. “I loved him; thought I still did. Mourned him as though he was dead. Spent months trying to cope living with his memory rather than the man himself.” That’s not news to them. “This,” I point to my phone lying forlorn on the desk. “This proves he left me without a second thought. He knew I’d believe the worst, yet still he left. He could have called, told me he wasn’t coming back, but he didn’t. He left me to think…”

I sob, and this time it’s Pyro who hands the tissue to me.

“He left the club too,” Demon reminds me through gritted teeth. “Another couple of months we’d have held a wake. Didn’t hold it sooner because of you, but that was in my mind. He let us think he was dead too, Mel.”

“I want to find him. Make him wish he was fuckin’ dead,” Pyro snarls.

“I want to kill him myself.”

I’m not sure whether Demon is joking.

“I’m pregnant,” I say, hurriedly. “That man, in those pictures. That man is this baby’s father.” My voice drops and becomes a whisper. “What if he wants custody when he finds out? Or at least, to exercise his parental rights?”

Pyro’s eyes have gone wide. “Motherfucker walked off and left you, Mel. He didn’t know you were pregnant, but there was a chance. Parental fuckin’ rights?” He snorts. “Man like that who doesn’t want or deserve a baby, shouldn’t fuckin’ be entitled to anything.”

Demon’s eyes flare. “I hear what you’re saying, Ro, but I hear Mel too. Wasn’t too far back Vi was faced with a custody battle with Theo’s sperm donor. There’s going to be a risk Skull will decide he wants to be a dad in a few years’ time, even if he doesn’t right now. There’s no saying the courts might not find in his favour.”

“What are you suggesting we do, Prez?”

“Kill him?” Cad offers almost hopefully.

“Make him realise at the very least that it’s not in his best interests to have anything to do with the kid. Before we do anything… drastic, we get him to sign away his parental rights.”

Which means I’ll have to do the one thing I don’t think I’ll ever be ready for. “I’ll have to face him.”

Chapter Twenty-One

Pyro

Mel’s realisation that she’ll have to come face-to-face with the man who’d walked out on her without a backward glance at her most vulnerable time hits her hard.

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