Page 68

There was a knock on the door and Caite entered.
“Sir, there is a Victor Montgomery here to see you,” she looked at me.
Everyone froze.
“Sir, should I send him in?” she looked around the room then looked at me once more.
“Yes, Caite, thank you,” I said.
She nodded and left, returning shortly with Victor who she ushered into the office and closed the door behind him.
Victor looked way older than the forty-one years he was supposed to be. He had a lot more grays in his hair and his suit looked a size too large, which meant he lost weight. His eyes looked dull and there were prominent wrinkles by his eyes.
“Dominic,” he stated firmly.
“Victor,” Dominic responded in kind.
Victor didn’t move. He stood where he was and spoke. “Emily reached out to me this morning. We met at my house. When she arrived, she had Lillian.” His voice cracked a bit. “I hadn’t spoken to my daughter in over a year because of what happened between us.” He scanned the room before he continued, “After seeing the videos of Delilah, I had already decided to come here, because it could’ve easily been Emily, and as a father, what kind of man would I be if I withheld information that could put that bastard behind bars?” His voice hardened at the end.
Dominic nodded. “Thank you for coming. We appreciate it. Please tell us what you know.”
“A little over a year ago, Obsidian met with a few older heads of the Syndicate. Dominic, he was pissed when you and Sebastien had confronted him and threatened to take down the Syndicate.”
Dominic and I shared a glance, but we didn’t say anything. Victor looked at Dominic when he spoke. “He stated that you broke the code by telling Sebastien about Syndicate and the fact that you guys were able to gather all that information about them meant that you all were threats. He wanted the Syndicate to destroy you.”
Victor’s jaw clenched, “But, when everything came out in the open after Emily and Lucy were rescued from Amber, the other members understood why you would’ve thought the Syndicate was behind it and that you did what any upstanding man would do for his family.”
“But Obsidian wasn’t having any of that, was he?” Dominic asked.
Victor shook his head. “Obsidian wanted blood, your blood. The other members thought that going after you would be reckless and unnecessary. Obsidian knew that if he went directly after Dominic, the Syndicate would catch on…”
“So, he came after me.” I finished his sentence.
Victor nodded in agreement. “In every way possible. Since he couldn’t get everyone on board he recruited Hawthorne.”
“So Hawthorne is a part of the Syndicate,” Leo stated, and Victor nodded again.
“He also tried to recruit me, saying that any man who could sell out his own daughter and best friend would be the type of ruthless man he needed for the job.” Victor’s gaze softened.“I regretted everything I did to Emily, and I was still trying to get her to forgive me, so there was no way in hell I’d go after her brother-in-law. But even though I didn’t join him, Obsidian couldn’t help but brag. He was the one who threatened your staff so they’d quit and offered your vendors better deals so they’d break your contracts.”
“Fuck. I thought all those things were coincidental,” I said.
“They weren’t. He was trying to get you frustrated so that when the big plan was rolled out he’d get you right where he wanted.”
“What was the big plan?” Axel asked.
Victor focused on me as he spoke. “While Obsidian worked on you, including the protection fee threats and the fire, Hawthorne worked on Dean. He befriended him, even got him new clients. So when he told him about wanting to get the rare luxury cars, he already had Dean, hook, line and sinker. That’s when Obsidian made his move as a car dealership owner.”
Shit! That was the piece we had been missing all along. The connection.
I told Vega to check all the clients of Dean’s business right before he went bankrupt. Had I told him to check back a few more months I’m sure we would've been able to figure out that Hawthorne and Obsidian were working together earlier.
“Obsidian shipped in the cars, knew they were stolen and had forged papers, but him getting them into the country past security was child’s play because of his connections. They thought that after bankrupting Dean, and after he began to use drugs, he’d come running to you, because you were his best friend. But he didn’t.”
My blood ran cold.
“So everything that happened to Dean was because Obsidian was trying to get back at me?” I asked, my chest tightening.
Victor nodded.