Page 25 of Pretty Lethal
“I think so,” West answers. “Although, I can’t be sure. There are no photos or anything, but what are the chances this woman had more than one stalker?”
“And both with the name Mel?” Hawk tacks on dryly.
“Unlikely,” Kai agrees.
“It doesn’t sound as though this ‘reporter’ has any actual proof,” Hawk notes, frowning at the screen. “In fact, it sounds like he or she has been stalking the family and spotted Mel following the girl on multiple occasions.”
“Yeah, the reporter did a number of pieces on the girl’s family—political family, a big name on the Boston social scene. I think they were trying to find a story that they could use to break into the field of journalism. Possibly get a job at one of the newspapers. As I said, it’s amateur stuff. But the fact that someone made the effort to get the article taken down strikes me as strange. I doubt anyone would pay much attention to what one unknown reporter on a random internet blog has to say, so if there’s no truth to the story, why bother?”
“Okay, so who is therealMel?” I ask.
“So, this is where things get… interesting,” West says. “I originally thought the girl’s family had the article taken down. Yet when I started looking into the O’Sheas, I found a whole heap of shady shit.”
He pulls up a photo of an older man standing outside a corporate building withO’Shea Corp.written above the doors. His arm is slung over two younger men who bear enough resemblance for me to presume they must be his children. Both are striking men—I’d guess in their mid-to-late twenties. All three are wearing suits, although one of the sons has tattoos spilling out from beneath the cuffs and neckline, hinting that he’s more than the corporate businessman he’s masquerading as.
“That’s Domhnall O’Shea and his two eldest sons. They have their fingers in every pot in Boston, and from what little I looked at, a good chunk of what they’re doing is illegal.”
Kai scoffs, and I turn to look at him as he shakes his head. “They’re a fucking crime family.”
“Yeah,” West agrees. “That would be my assumption, too.”
“And Mel—Melissa—is one of them?” I question.
West shrugs. “It’s hard to know for sure. She has the same last name, although it doesn’t look like he openly accepted her as his child. His name was on her birth certificate, which I was able to find. However, interestingly, his wife’s name was not.”
“Huh,” Kai says, sounding intrigued. “So, she was the child of an affair?” he guesses.
“It looks that way,” West agrees. “Again, there’s nothing I could find to confirm it. Could literally have been a one-night stand that resulted in a pregnancy. Her mother didn’t appear to have much money, and if Domnhall refused to acknowledge the child as his, then maybe she gave Mel his surname in the hopes he’d take care of her financially.”
It’s all speculation, of course, though his reasoning makes sense.
“I also found police reports filed by Rebecca concerning her stalker. They’d been buried, with Mel’s name redacted, so I hadn’t been able to connect the dots back to her that way. It definitely takes a certain type of power to be able to do that.”
“You think the O’Sheas had someone on the police force bury the reports,” Kai deduces.
West nods. “There are various articles that imply police corruption, and several charges have been dropped against O’Shea Corp. due to evidence going missing or being mishandled.”
“Do we know if anyone on the O’Shea’s payroll will come looking for her—or us?” Wilder asks.
West shakes his head. “From what I can tell, other than her sharing their last name, there was little-to-no contact between them. So, I’d guess no, but I can’t say for certain.”
“If she was a liability—which it looks like she was if she was stalking a politician’s daughter—then they probably wanted nothing to do with her,” Kai offers. “Buried any reports of what she was doing so as not to bring more eyes on the family, but other than that, ignored her. They maybe even gave her an ultimatum if she was being a nuisance and causing problems for them—get out of town, or we’ll kill you.”
I gasp, struggling to believe anyone could be so callous toward their own daughter.
“They’re a crime family, Em,” Kai tries to explain. “Ruthless. Violent. If you’re not an asset to the family, you’re not worth keeping around. Even more so if you’re a liability.”
“He’s right,” Wilder agrees. “It might seem harsh, but to some families, prestige and social standing come before their children.”
The derision in his tone has me looking up at where he’s glaring into space, and I get the impression he’s referring to his own family as much as he’s talking about Mel’s.
“In the world of money, power, and influence, blood means fuck all,” Wilder continues. “One screw-up is all it can take for people you’ve known your entire life to turn on you. Hell, the fuck up doesn’t even have to be yours. Look at my family. I got ex-communicated along with my dad purely because his genes make up fifty percent of me.Thatwas enough for them to label me a problem and kick me aside before I even had the chance to fuck up on my own terms. And yeah, I know he’s a sick fuck and most absolutely deserved what happened to him—honestly, they shoulda just shot him in the head and been done with it—but the point is, shit like this”—he gestures toward the computer screen, indicating the O’Shea’s—“happens more frequently than you’d realize.”
His rant is met with a tense silence, and I push out of Kai’s lap to nuzzle my face against Wilder's chest, hoping he realizes that it’s his family’s loss. They have no idea about the amazing man they lost. However, their loss is our gain, and we sure as hell aren’t ever letting Wilder go, no matter how badly or how frequently he might cross lines or screw shit up. I know it’s always done with the best intentions in mind, and that matters a hell of a lot more to me than power, prestige, or money ever will.
“So, we think we’re in the clear?” I ask for clarification and to get the focus off Wilder.
“I think so,” West says. “I took another look through Mel’s phone and nothing linked back to the O’Sheas. There’s been zero contact. We also know that she left Boston at least four years ago. If she’s kept a low profile since then—which she more than likely has—then any eyes the O’Sheas may have kept on her are probably long gone.”
