Page 148 of Blood Money

“We’re taking off in a few minutes,” I grumble into the handset. “Make it quick.”

He scoffs on the other end of the phone, but the retort doesn’t come. Instead, he says, “Congratulations on winning the election, by the way.” For a full second, I think he’s being genuine. “Mum would have been proud of you.”

Ah, there it is.

“Get on with it,” I say. “I know you’re calling about her, so just say it.”

The bottle of water and the pills fall out of the machine. I stoop to pick it up while Graham flounders on the other end. For a moment, I’m brought back to when we were kids. Well, when I was a kid—Graham’s so much older than me that it feels like he’s always been an adult. When I was a kid, I wanted to be just like him. I dreamed of us having a close relationship.

Those dreams died the day our mum did.

It changed us both, in different ways. I don’t hold it against him, actually. I still like him. He will always be my brother. But we aren’t exactly friends, and that will always be a problem.

“I’ve found something,” he begins. “From the security tapes.”

I click my tongue. “There were no tapes,” I say. “The cameras were down that day.”

“Yes, but every fucking person in our community has CCTV. Even the Trust Grounds that backs on to our house.”

“There was nothing on any of them,” I grit out. All of this is burned into my memory. My father spent months combing through all of this and came up empty handed.

“I did a lot of digging, called in a few favors and—”

“Aren’t you supposed to be laying low?” I cut in.

How thefuckis he doing all this sleuthing without attracting attention to himself? Is he trying to get himself killed? A headache blooms at the base of my skull. Fuck, I can’t believe I have to worry about this too.

“Just fuckinglisten, Alex,” he hisses. “One of my mates was able to find footage from one of the community cameras that captured the car I think the motherfucker drove. It shows up in the neighborhood a few times in the weeks leading up, always turning on to our street. And it was there the day of Mum’s murder, but never came back.” He pauses briefly. There’s a curse on the tip of my tongue, but I’m actually interested to see where the fuck he’s going with this. “That was enough. My mate scoured the traffic cameras for footage of that specific car. It’s ten years ago, it was really fucking hard, but he finally found something yesterday.”

My heart’s beating so fast it’s a hum to my ears. There’s too little air in the room. I push away from the vending machine and walk over to a secluded corner of the lounge, by the floor-to-ceiling windows. The plastic bottle groans in my grip.

“Well?” I ask, my voice low. “Did you find him?”

Mum’s killer.

For years after she died, I dreamed of finding the motherfucker myself. I thought of killing his mother, or his wife, his kid—whatever it took to make him feel the same kind of pain. I wanted him to watch me do it, to feel the same fear I felt, cowering in the greenhouse. Then I would shoot him in his kneecaps, remove his fingernails, cut out his tongue.

I would make it last for days.

The final shot would be right between his eyes.

If Graham’s found him, then my little fantasy could become a reality sooner than I think. My mood darkens. This is exactly why I didn’t want to answer my phone. The bloodlust comes over me suddenly. The edges of my vision fade out, and the world feels sharper.

“Yes and no,” Graham says.

“What the fuck does that mean?”

“The motherfucker doesn’t exist.” Finally, the irritation breaks through his calm and measured tone. He sounds the way I feel. It’s refreshing in a way, to know that I’m not alone. “We have a fucking clear shot of his face. Yes, it’s been ten years so he must have aged, but there are no hits, nothing.”

I’m not surprised. He killed the wife of England’s most influential crime lord. Of fucking course he’s a ghost. Only a ghost could get away with what he did.

“I’ll send you the picture,” Graham says. “Obviously I can’t go digging to try and find out who this guy is. Now that you’re a step closer to becoming a member of the Kingmaker Society, maybe you’ll be able to find something I can’t.”

I straighten my spine.

Alarm bells are going off in my head. I don’t want to be a part of this. At least, not right now. I already have to deal with bringing Alize home to meet our asshole of a father. Adding this to my plate right now is a surefire way to push me over the edge.

But I owe it to mum, don’t I?

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