Page 44 of The Dirty Saint

“Do not talk to me like that.”

“I’ll talk to you however I want,” Ezra recoils. “You aren’t the boss of me.”

I roll my eyes, my cheeks flushing with anger. What a stubborn, stubborn girl she is. Always trying to reclaim control as if she ever had it in the fucking first place.

“Let me tell you, Ezra, you are playing a dangerous game.”

“I can handle it. Now get the hell out of my cell.”

“Excuse you,” I growl.

“You heard me.”

“You’re damn right I did,” I snap. “Who do you think you’re talking to?”

Ezra inches her face closer to mine. “I am going to say this one more time, and then you’re gonna have to pry my jaw open to get me to speak. Leave my fucking cell now.”

I don’t even register what I am doing until I discover myself with my hand wrapped around her throat.

“Do it,” she urges. “Choke me. Cut my oxygen off. End my miserable existence in this miserable place.”

“What about your son,” I whisper against her skin.

Ezra’s lips form into an expression of disgust. “How the fuck do you know about my son?”

“The same way I know everything about you,” I release my grip only slightly. “You have four siblings: Nathaniel, Aurelia, Beatrice, and Jude. Your best friends are Nathan Bard and Brianne Maya, who is your cousin. Your parents, Giselle and Rob Maya, have been together for over thirty years, and you’ve always staked out your own long-lasting love, but you come up short in every relationship.

“The last serious relationship you were in was with a man named Christian Asher, who you met after you were kicked out of your home at seventeen when your mother found out you were pregnant. In fact, Giselle Maya was so angry about the whole situation that she almost killed youandthe baby.

“Should I keep going?”

Ezra bares her teeth, seething.

“Okay. What else…Oh, yeah, so you married Christian, and the two of you raised your son, Noah Asher Maya. However, you both knew that one day, Noah would start to ask questions, and you couldn’t lie to your child about the fact that Christian was not the real father. Because that would be Caleb Santo, the man who you allegedly killed.

“But none of that really mattered then because Noah was young, and Christian wasn’t going anywhere. That was until he started growing more anxious and depressed and then one day, he swallowed a full bottle of pills and fell asleep in the bathtub, thus drowning himself. Leaving you to raise Noah all on your own.

“You see, Ezra, I know more about you than you realize. Your favorite color, your favorite movie, your favorite drink, none of that really tells you anything about a person. They’re the surface-level things, but they aren’t the defining factors. No, those are the events that force you to evolve and adapt, changing you.”

“Are you done,” she whispers.

“As of now.”

Ezra bobs her head up and down in acknowledgment.

“It’s funny, you say you know everything about me, but let’s be honest with each other, you aren’t 100% positive about what happened to Caleb. That’s why I’m here, to hopefully give you answers. And yes, you may know about Noah, Christian, and my mother, and that doesn’t exactly sit well with me, but what does is the fact that you still have no clue where Caleb Santo is. Because you see, Joey, I have zero interest in recounting the past. I’ve moved on. Maybe whoever hired you should, too.”

I sneer. The idea of Michael Santo moving on is absolutely laughable. He is probably the most ruthless man I have ever met, and I have met a lot of ruthless men in my career.

“What are you laughing at,” Ezra asks.

Oh, pretty girl, you have no idea.

During

EZRA

I stare out at the wall with my knees hugged to my chest.

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