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“It’s hard to get all of the facts straight when there’s blood dripping down my neck.”
Before I can respond, Lars places a hand on the arm that’s holding the gun and steps forward. Parker’s hands are zip-tied behind his back so Lars takes a small handkerchief out of his back pocket and dabs the side of Parker’s face.
“Thank you, Lars.”
“Parker, this is not a joke.” Suddenly the Eastern European accent that Lars always works so hard to mask peeks through. “You’ve worked here long enough to know how badly this can end for you.”
“I’m trying.”
“No, you are not. Something is holding you back. What is it? Tell us everything, no matter what it is, and I am sure that Boss will be lenient.”
I clear my throat, letting Lars know that he’s making promises that he can’t keep, but Vaughn taps the back of my heel with his foot, wanting me to allow Lars to continue working his magic on the kid.
“Something happened before Megan ever came outside."
"Go ahead."
"After Naomi got into the car, Fabre’s man spotted me.” Parker sighs heavily with reluctance, clearly not wanting to tell this part of the story. “They must have asked Naomi who I was, or maybe they just knew by the look of the car, and Fabre approached me.”
“This was your first time talking to Fabre?” Lars asks.
“Yes.”
“You never met him before? Talked to him before?”
“No.”
“And what did he want?”
“He identified who he was. He told me he was Naomi’s father and that he was here visiting. He asked me if Boss was home so he could thank him for looking out for her.”
“And?”
“I knew immediately when he said that something was off about the guy. I knew a thank you wasn’t exactly what he wanted to give. I told him that Boss wasn’t home.”
“Wait–” Vaughn interrupts. “Why would he think that you knew who Naomi or Hunter were at all? How could he know that if you’ve never met?”
“Exactly,” I mutter, taking a seat across the room and letting my guys pick Parker’s lies apart, statement by statement.
“I might have forgotten to mention that he knew who I was. When he came over, he called me by name. He called me Parker. I thought that maybe Naomi told him who I was but that wasn’t the case because it didn’t take him long to bring up my mother.”
“Your mother?” Lars questions.
I didn’t even know Parker had a mother. Well, I mean, I guess we all have one, but he’s never mentioned her. What the hell does she have to do with any of this?
“She’s sick. Really sick.”
I stand up. “I’ve never even heard about this mother of yours, and you’re trying to tell me that Fabre knows who she is?” I say.
“Yes, I don’t know how. I guess the dude does his homework. It isn’t hard to find if you care to look. We have the same last name, live in the same city, and her address is one of the old places I’ve lived that you can pull up on any credit report.”
I turn to look at Vaughn, and he gives a slight shrug of his shoulders. It’s his job to vet all my employees, but it’s not his job to remember every single detail about their lives. If he ran across the address or the name of Parker’s mother in his search, it’s probably sitting in a file somewhere on his computer. And even if he did, the fact that someone has a mother is not cause for a red flag.
“Okay, so she’s sick,” Lars says. “And Fabre knew this?”
“Yes, he knew she was sick, and she knew she was broke. She doesn't have enough money to even continue care in the same hospital she worked for her whole life. So he offered me a king’s ransom to leave the area for an hour.”
I am fucking livid.