Page 67 of A Murderous Crow
His eyes met mine, and I downed the rest of what was in the glass and held it out to him. He took it, tapping his fingertips against the glass as he considered me.
“So, you’re not mad or disgusted?”
He shook his head slowly.
“No, definitely I’m neither of those things. A little shocked, maybe – definitely in some awe that you’ve pulled this off this long. Nobody else knows but me?”
“Fabian… a little… but not really,” I shrugged.
“How much were you paying for that place?” he asked.
“Six-fifty a month, all included.”
He snorted and said, “Hell of a deal, but that place still wasn’t worth that much.”
I shook my head.
“No, I know. My dad and I did our best, but it was definitely just lipstick on a pig.” I sighed and leaned back in the chair.
“Go to bed,” he said, lacing his fingers between mine and giving me a gentle tug to get me on my feet.
“What about you?” I asked.
“I got a few more phone calls to make, and a couple of emails to send. I’ll be right up.”
“I’ll figure something out as soon as I can,” I promised and he shook his head.
“Tomorrow, worry about that shit tomorrow.” I looked at my watch.
“You mean later today.”
He nodded.
“Yeah. That.”
“Thank you,” I whispered, and he stood up and hooked fingers behind my neck, caressing my cheek with his thumb. He pulled my forehead to his lips and kissed me there before letting me go.
“Bed. Now.”
I smiled a little wanly and said, “Yes, sir,” and took myself to the bottom of his steps leading up to the second floor.
I could hear him pour himself a drink when I was but a third of the way up.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Corvus…
Tonight, I learned…I don’t know why, but the phrase kept turning in my head.
Tonight, I learned… tonight, I learned, tonight, I learned…that Savannah Kittridge had one hell of a secret, and that she was damn good at keeping them.
A lot of pieces had suddenly fallen into place for me. For one, how something about her had always screamed disingenuous and fake – but to be honest, while I’d clocked that, I never in a million years would clock that she wasn’t frommoney. Oh, sure, her family farm was multi-generational, but there wasn’t a whole lot of money to be had in farming. Most every farmer out there was one or two failed crops away from total fucking disaster and her grandfather’s handling of things was something I understood all too well.
How many foreclosures had I myself snapped up, paid to have flipped, and sold for a pretty profit over the years?
Shit, I bet there were foreign investors lined up around the block practically salivating over her family’s holdings, waitingwith bated breath for them to fail and for the IRS to seize their shit and put it up for auction.
Likewise, I bet my last dollar that Savannah was killing herself when if she’d only hired a tax attorney, she likely would be paying peanuts on the dollar to clear the tax debt. The IRS had a good way of scaring the shit out of people to get their money, and that was what a good tax attorney was for.
