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Bishop

“That was rude.”

Knight didn’t respond. He closed the door and bolted it, then crossed the room to the desk which spanned one wall.

“Knight.”

“I know, but I wanted you to hear about what I have found before she does. Then you can decide what you’re going to do with the information. Trust me, you’ll thank me for it.” He tapped a couple of keys on the keyboard, and the screens on the wall came to life. “Let’s start with Sandro Trebuni.”

He pulled out a chair and sat down, fingers moving rapidly over the keyboard. “It took me a while to track him down.”

An image of the man from the warehouse where I’d found Eden flashed up onto one of the screens.

“He works out of New York as an associate with the Ricci family. Sandro Trebuni is not his real name, so the ID you found was fake. He uses quite a few other names, but once I had a clear photograph and some identifying tattoos, it made things easier.”

A new photograph replaced the first. The same man, slightly younger. “Meet Ricardo Rossi, low-life drug dealer and regular informant for the NYPD.”

A third photograph joined the two on the screen. Of Trebuni and another man.

“Rossi is Detective Dulvaney’s CI.”

“So, Dulvaney hired Rossi to track down Eden.” That had been my hunch, so I wasn’t particularly surprised by it.

Knight leaned back on his seat. “This is where it gets interesting. The screen name you gave me, FreedomIsPainful. Once I got through all the redirects, it finally pinged on a contract phone out of Baltimore.” He spun the chair around to face me. “You’ll never guess who owns it.”

“Tell me.”

“Guess.”

“I’m not playing games, Knight. Just tell me.”

“Susannah Fletcher.”

People rarely shocked me. I could count on the one hand the number of times anyone’s actions had rendered me speechless. For the most part, humans were creatures of habit, and once you knew them well, they became predictable.

This was not predictable.

“Susannah? Are you sure?”

“There’s no doubt at all. I won’t bore you with the technical details on how I tracked it down. All you need to know is the end result. And that is the fact that Susannah Fletcher is FreedomIsPainful .”

It made sense, in a way. She knew my line of work—enough to give Eden details that would make me wonder who she had spoken to. If she’d been watching me, then she would have known my whereabouts.

The only question to be asked was why? Why had she sent Eden in my direction in the first place?

“Your relationship with Susannah was the worst kept secret ever,” Knight said when I didn’t speak. “I’m pretty sure her husband has been aware of it from the start. Because, when I said this is where things get interesting, I wasn’t talking about Eden’s contact being Susannah.”

I frowned. “Then what did you mean?”

“You told me, Eden was sent to meet you. From what I’ve pieced together, Trebuni was sent by Dulvaney to take Eden back to New York. Somewhere along the way, he acquired a second job which paid better than the first.”

“A second job?”

“You said there were three people at the warehouse. Trebuni and two others. You left one alive to take a message back to his employer.”

“That’s right.”

“Those other two men weren’t originally with Trebuni. They were sent along by his new employer to help ensure his instructions were followed. Instead of being charged with taking Eden back to Dulvaney in New York, he was paid to have Eden lead them to you. Eden was just a means to an end at that point. They probably would have killed her once they had you secured. Only that went horribly wrong for them. The guy you left alive scurried back to his boss and passed on your message.”

“And I assume you know who that is?”

Knight’s lips stretched into a smile. “Come on, Bish. You know the answer to that . Just think about it for a second.”

A recent conversation flashed through my mind.

… I don’t care who she fucks, but the rule has always been no more than a couple of times with the same person. If it hadn’t already ended, I’d have searched him out to make that clear …

I scrubbed a hand down my face.

Trebuni must have seen an opportunity to work both angles.

On behalf of Dulvaney, he questioned me about Eden. Once he’d gotten all the answers he needed about my part in her planned disappearance, I had no doubt he would have then moved onto Fletcher’s part of the job and the message he wanted to send, which I’m certain would have resulted in my death.

Would Eden have survived that night if I hadn’t killed Trebuni? At this point, it didn’t matter. I did kill him, and she survived.

“The good news is you’re not dead, so I guess Fletcher was satisfied with what he saw at Crosby’s over the weekend.” Knight’s voice broke my internal thought process.

“And the bad news?” Because there was always bad news.

“Dulvaney has issued a missing persons alert on Eden.” He tapped the keyboard and brought up a news report. “If I was a betting man, I’d say he’s on his way to Glenville to get back his property.”

“Eden isn’t his property.”

Knight’s lips tipped up. “I’m aware of that. Apparently, she’s yours. But the point is, he’ll be on his way, so you need to get ready to deal with him.”