Page 106 of Collateral Claim

“Are my sons not coming?” Massio asks Endo.

“They’re working. I need them on standby when Cass’s location is revealed. Which I need in the next ten minutes if I’m going to sit here and eat with you all.”

“Where is your head of security?” Wilfred asks.

“He’s on vacation. What’s with the questions?”

Wilfred sips his wine, not knowing that Endo might shove a gun down his throat at any moment. I kind of wish he would.

Honestly, what’s Wilfred even doing here? This is a family matter. I don’t like that he’s here. It implies he’s more involved in the family business than I originally thought he was. But then again, I wouldn’t have expected my dad to come alone.

Endo rolls his shoulders. He’s really crawling with anxious ants. I can almost feel his patience evaporating. He has very little patience to begin with, and everyone seems to be testing it.

Wilfred runs a hand over his cropped hair. “My sources tell me your head of security was shot and died on the spot.”

“Oh yeah?” Endo asks.

“When you took Scarlett,” Wilfred says, a strange tone to his voice, “I had to get a pound of flesh.”

“I’m sorry, what?” I ask.

My dad rolls his eyes. “It’s embarrassing how well educated you are and just how stupid you can be. Your mother was right. You can’t see what’s right in front of you. She said that disqualifies you from running a household. I’m glad to see youchose to listen to her when she spun the story about her and her medical school.”

WHAT?“Are you kidding me?”

“Don’t talk to her that way,” Wilfred says to my dad.

“I don’t need you to defend me.”

Under the table, Endo taps my hand twice. What’s that mean? Gangsters have too many signs. I need a manual.

“Let’s talk business,” Massio says, trying to interrupt what’s sure to turn into a family dispute.

Oh, okay. Let’s talk business and forget how we insulted the little woman at the table. I don’t think so. “Look around you, Dad. Look at who you’re sitting with. A human trafficker and an arms dealer. What are you? Their supplier? Why did you make Cass disappear when you knew he had a broker who would make you money? Did he make you money, and you double-crossed him?” Now that Dad’s veil has been peeled off, I can tell from his expression when I close in on the truth. “You did. You double-crossed him.”

“Cass is not missing.”

The weight of his crimes settles like lead in my belly. Speculating is one thing. Hearing my dad speak about Cass is another.

“He’s in Hontus,” Wilfred says.

“Pardon?” Endo goes still, and so do the men.

“Where is Hontus?” I look at Endo, whose eyelids lower slightly over dead eyes. It seems he’s disengaging. This can’t be good. Hontus might be a famous criminal burial site, for all I know.

My dad breaks the eerie silence. “He got himself busted. It took forever to find out where they took him. Men in Hontus only get numbers. No names.”

Oh no. “What is Hontus?”

“Cass was supposed to deliver cargo to afamilyin Europe,” Endo says. “But you had him meet someone else. Who?”

My dad smiles.

Endo returns the smile. “Massio. It was Massio.”

Massio pulls out a weapon, at the same time as Endo grips the back of my neck and pushes me under the table. I fall to my knees while gunfire erupts around me. I press my hands over my ears and scream. Someone grabs my shirt and yanks. The material rips, and I scramble to hold on to the blouse while more hands grab me.

My dad ducks under the table and offers me his hand.