Page 2 of Avenging Kelly

“How do you know that? You’re not supposed to know anything about me,” I snapped at the woman.

I’d read in the paperwork when I’d signed up for the program that my personal information wouldn’t be available to anyone involved in Operation Jackpot. My past was supposed to be off limits. It was right there in the fucking fine print.

The Gambler laughed at my outrage as she dropped the syringe into the medical waste bin. She then went to her desk and picked up her tablet, carrying it over to where I perched as I rolled down my sleeve.

“I like you, Hearts. You’re not like the rest of these assholes who look forward to killing for no reason. You’ve got a conscience—for now. So, why’d you change your name from Brown to Boone and then back to Brown?” she asked me.

That brought my mind back to the perverted pedophile Bob Boone, Mia’s father.

“My stepfather adopted me when he married my mother, and he insisted Mom change my name to Boone. She didn’t argue with him. I changed it back when I was older,” I told the woman. Anything more wasn’t her fucking business.

While I was in Mosul, my mom had called to tell me that Bob Boone was dead. A fucking bus fell on him while he was working on it. The circumstances were suspicious, Mom had said, because Mia had told her that one of her friends said Bob had messed with the girl. I hoped to fuck the girl’s father had killed the bastard.

NYPD had ruled it an accident and closed the case. Funny thing was the hanging controller for the hydraulic hoist was about two feet away from where Bob’s body was crushed under the bus. They had also found the hoist to be in good working order, so they chalked it up as an accident and moved on. If they had no problem accepting that the bus just fell, I didn’t, either.

When I got arrested for being AWOL, I asked my attorney about changing my name back to my mother’s maiden name, having never met my father, and he said he’d handle it for me. Why would I want to be known by that fucking pervert’s name?

“Hmm. Okay. So, here’s what I could find about your family,” she stated as she turned the device toward me and showed me a picture of a beautiful little girl with dark hair. She was newborn in the picture, and she had my sister’s smile.

“Where’d you get that?”

“Hospital records for Baltimore County.”

“What’s her name?” I asked, unable to stop myself.

“Daisy.”

I looked at the picture again and exhaled. “Is there any way for me to get out of this program?”

“Stay in touch with me, and I’ll make sure you get your shots, Hearts. I’ll try to remove your file from the server in hopes you’ll fade into the woodwork, but I can’t guarantee anything. I’m working on an antidote for the serum, but you can’t tell anyone, Kelly,” the woman told me. She then leaned forward and kissed me on the mouth, which led me to believe there would be a price tag attached to any future interactions with her.

After seeing the face of my niece, I was certain I’d do whatever the woman asked. Daisy Boone deserved the best life I could secure for her.

1

LONDON ST. MICHAEL

Christmas 2022

“Lon, you have a phone call,” Mom yelled to me on Christmas morning. I was outside with my older brother Dallas looking over his new Harley—which had woken the whole fucking family at three in the morning when he pulled into my mother’s driveway in Silver City, New Mexico.

“Cool bike, man,” I told my brother as I jogged from the enormous garage to the house.

Our father had died while on deployment to Iraq during Operation Desert Storm under classified circumstances. We all missed him.

I slid off my boots and went inside where my mother offered my cell phone that had been charging on the counter.

“St. Michael,” I said once I had it near my ear.

“Hey, Narc. It’s Dom.” The heaviness of his voice let me know it wasn’t a social call.

“Hey, Beaver, what’s up?” When Dominic Mazzola Torrente didn’t squawk about the nickname he hated, I knew something was definitely wrong.

Dom handled all the admin responsibilities at Golden Elite Associates-America, where I worked as a bodyguard-investigator-janitor—whatever was needed. I was lucky enough to work with a group of extraordinary people who were mostly former military, though there were a few who’d never worn the uniform.

I’d enlisted in the Army when I’d been eighteen and had gone to boot camp with Shepard Colson, putting in my time before I got out and went to work for the DEA. That was what had earned me the nickname of “Narc” from my colleagues.

“It’s about Mathis. He died last night in a hit-and-run on his way to Christmas Eve dinner at Solé. Gabby found out about it after the cops identified him, and he talked to the Sinclairs this morning. They’re going to have a private service for him on the twenty-eighth, and they invited the team.”

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