Page 5 of Wrapped in Silver (Dark Ties #5)

Quinn

Okay, I think I spent enough time to make the rookie believe it was me who discovered the Russian mob symbol scraped onto the side of the house.

Listen to me… I sound like a crazy person. As if anyone’s going to question it.

I’m standing outside in the freezing cold—flurries flying in all directions—staring at the phone in my hand. A part of me feels like I’m interrupting Uncle F’s detective work in these critical hours before my father is gone for good, but deep in my gut I know Silver’s right.

The mark is undeniable.

I swipe for Ferraro and click call .

“ Hey, hun, how we holding up? ” his belly-deep voice is warm and comforting.

“Been better.”

“ Jacob tells me you’ve been circling the block and running up and down the stairs for the last six hours. ”

“Tell Jacob he went to college and suffered six months at the academy just to be a rat.”

“ Quinn Dall! ” he scolds me. “ We’re here to protect you. ”

What about my father? I think to myself. He needed protection too.

“How’s the search? Did you find him?” I ask.

He clears his throat. “ Not yet. One of our trails went cold, unfortunately. Onto the next. ”

My heart sinks into my belly, leaving me lightheaded. Gravity keeps coming and going like some twisted merry-go-round.

“ Quinn? ” he makes sure I’m still there.

“I—think I have a lead.”

“ What? Quinn… I’m very busy right now. These hours are dire— ”

“Uncle F, I need you to trust me.”

He huffs. I can feel him rolling his eyes on the other end of the line.

“ Alright, hun. Let’s hear it. ”

His voice has that placating tone… like I’m the same little kid playing on the swings in his backyard. For the sake of my father, I really hope he has the sense to listen.

“On the side of the house, there’s this mark that wasn’t there before. I’ve been searching online all day, and it looks like an unfinished sketch of the Russian mafia star. It signifies rank, I think, and it’s undeniable. Let me send you a picture.”

He grumbles quietly to himself on the other end.

“ Hun, I shouldn’t be saying this over the phone since it’s an ongoing investigation, but all the leads are cartel. We even have one camera shot of the shorter man. He’s not Russian complexion. ”

My brow furrows. “But—”

“ Quinn. You need to get some rest. You’ve been running on fumes all day. ”

I shake my head—thinking back to the awful memory of my father being shoved around. In the flashlight shading, I’m almost sure both men were white.

“Uncle F, I think the men were white. I know this mark is new… please .”

“ Quinn, enough. We’re going to find your father, but you have to let us do our job. Pat’s my brother as much as he’s your father. I’ll give my life to have him back. ”

“Just promise you’ll have a look—”

“ Sure, Quinn. I’ll have Jacob hear you. Now get some rest. And don’t give him a hard time. ”

I hang up on him, squeezing the phone tight in my grip.

It’s infuriating to have him baby me. Dad spent all that time teaching me about forensics and the like, for what? So my Uncle could never see past the safe little accountant Dad guilted me to be? Screw that.

I’m not giving up.

My eyes linger over my shoulder, to the mansion across the way. Is Aros watching me right now? A part of me wishes he was. The man has such raw confidence, such sureness. I bet he’d be able to find my father if I could convince him.

He’s probably mafia, Quinn. Don’t even think about it.

Just as the thought enters my mind, heat tingles from my frozen toes all the way up my thighs, like his fingers are caressing them. I shut my eyes to ignore the sensation.

Maybe I am delirious…

Alright. Time to play nice with the rookie, even if it is a longshot.

My boots scrunch over the snow as I make way to the front door, and when I stomp them clean, Jacob reluctantly looks up from his phone.

“You can pretend to look busy,” I say.

His face turns a shade of pink. He could say anything to me: “I don’t work for you.” “Go to your room.” Anything to fight back a bit. But I’m on a first name basis with his boss, and that scares the shit out of these first years on probation.

“Can I help you, Ms. Dall?” he says with a frown.

“Actually, you can. I need you to show me something.” I hold out my hand. “Your phone.”

“ What? ” He takes his elbows off the kitchen island and stands defensively.

“Yeah. I want to see what Lieutenant Ferraro texted you.” I smirk knowingly.

“I’m not allowed to do that.”

“Consider it an order from his boss, Captain Dall,” I say, stepping forward.

“I’ll get in serious trouble.”

“He’ll never know.”

Jacob shakes his head. He’s hedging his bet that my father is already dead, which hits me like a bag of bricks to the face.

“Fine, c’mon then.” I grab him by the wrist and drag him outside. As punishment, I don’t give him time to put on his coat. Judging by his lack of protest, Uncle F already told him to placate me, which infuriates me to no end.

At least Aros had the decency to care.

“You see that?” I point and put my phone with the image of the fully sketched bratva star next to it. “Tell me that’s not an uncanny match?”

Jacob stands on his tiptoes and scratches it with his pinkly-cold finger. I gasp at the lack of care. If he really thought it was evidence, he would never. With mounting frustration, I swipe his phone from his pocket and revel in the stupidity of it being unlocked.

“ Quinn’s going through a tough time. I’m going to need you to entertain her suspicions, and after she’s satisfied, try to convince her to get some rest. ”

My blood boils upon seeing the text, and so does Jacob’s, apparently, when he angrily grabs his phone back.

“Ms. Dall. I’m just trying to do my job!”

“And I’m trying to help find my father!” I yell right back, stepping into his face. “What would you do if it was your dad, huh ?” I grab onto his shoulder, then nod toward the shingles. “You think that’s just coincidence?”

“I—I don’t know.” He shrugs.

“Aren’t you an officer?”

“A new one, yes. The department has good leads, Ms. Dall. The lieutenant is very worried about you, and he’s doing everything he can to find the captain.”

“And what are you, my babysitter?”

“For the next four months until probation is up, I’m whatever the bosses say I am, no questions asked.” He puts his hands up, and my frustration triples.

It feels like being on the phone with customer support for hours, handed to five different reps and going in circles. I have the answer. I trust that silver fox despite having only met with him twice in my life.

Fuck!

I kick snow and stomp back to the front door.

“Where are you going?” Jacob asks.

“To do what Uncle says and get some goddamn rest,” I lie.

When I’m back in the house, I pull off my boots and toss them angrily on the floor, then rush upstairs to my father’s room.

Ignoring the tape, I look for his work laptop I used to scour when I was obsessed with going into forensics.

It had built-in databases that he downloaded periodically.

As long as I don’t search online, the department won’t know that I’m snooping around.

Pulling open his drawers frantically before babysitter Jacob comes back inside, I stumble upon it and slip back into my room.

Aros would never talk to me again if I led Jacob near his house, so I have to let the nerves settle, and in the meantime? I’m doing my research.

Using my phone to Google all the known current bratva bosses, I narrow down to those who’ve been linked to crimes in Jersey, then start scrolling through Dad’s database.

Yuri Patrovski seems to be the main player in New York, with brotherhood associates called brigadiers running Jersey.

There are two of them. Aleksandr Sokolov and Nikolaj Vikyav.

The farther I dig, the more horrified I become.

Human trafficking, murder, drugs, torture.

These are the darkest of the dark. Their files are limited and a few months outdated, but Aleks was last seen funneling in women to a local strip club in south Jersey.

And Nikolaj runs a ring of underground casinos all over the state.

What the hell am I going to do with that? I’d stick out like a sore thumb anywhere near those places.

Pulling at my hair, I scoff and slam the laptop shut.

Dad…

I squeeze my eyes tightly closed, feeling the scratchiness of dried, cried-out eyes.

If he’s right and the cops are on the wrong trail, Aros is my only chance.

Hours go by. Over and over again, I open the laptop, research the locations of the two brigadiers and their past crimes, and count down the minutes I can make a run for it.

He’d be suspicious and more likely to follow me if I broke away after dark, so I have to lay staring at the ceiling the entire night until the next morning.

I don’t even remember if I got any sleep—that’s how delirious I am. But I’m determined. Even if my joints ache, I’m going to get my ass up and get to Aros again.

While bundling up, I smirk at the sight of another pair of fuzzy dog socks in my drawer.

Butterflies shoot around my stomach when I think of him commenting on them.

It’s brief, and overwhelmed by angst, but the way his angry eyes soften once in a while helps me cope.

There’s something in there worth chasing—a goodness. He’ll help me.

When I find the time to sneak over to his house, I notice there are no footsteps where the fresh patches of snow fell. Ringing the bell and clamping on his doorknocker confirms it. He’s not there.

I check the shed… then the guest house… and nothing.

At a loss, I run out of the walkway and take the long way around the street. I’m a prisoner in my own body. Frustration makes me want to sprint a marathon until I collapse. My uncle won’t listen to me, Silver is nowhere to be found, and my father slips farther and farther away.

When I return to my house, another rookie is on shift. This one prefers to sit in his car right out front. He’s not as frightened as Jacob, but he’s plenty standoffish. Probably because he wants nothing to do with dealing with the captain’s daughter.

Works both ways, buddy. I want nothing to do with you either.

Come dinner time, exhausted from anxiety and lack of sleep, I pass out in my bed.