Page 165 of Riordan's Revenge

The mayor scowled at his ex-stepson. “When I’m elected again, I’m cleaning up the gangs, starting with yours. Piers will bring investors to the city. You don’t know what you’re dealing with.”

“So it’s money, then,” I cut in.

His gaze shot back to me.

“And I dare because I’ve spent my life thinking about this moment. You asked a lot of questions but never waited for ananswer. Abigail didn’t want me to know you, and now I know why.”

My father’s mouth opened. “Abigail?”

Down the street, police cars arrived, the sirens silencing but the blue lights swirling over the narrow houses. From several, residents spilled, flagging them down and getting in the way.

I pushed on with my half-rehearsed speech. “I’m glad to know I’m nothing like you. It’s been good having this talk because it’s filled in some gaps on the type of person you are.”

“You’re Abigail’s son?”

At last, the recognition I’d craved resolved in his eyes.

A kind of peace settled inside me. I’d missed out on having a father figure, but I’d found it in the men of the skeleton crew and in Cassie’s brothers. More, I was the son of a good woman. A woman who’d raised me to be just like her—kind, caring, willing to give everything for what she believed in. My mother had gifted me all the things Cassie loved and everything I intended to keep giving back.

It turned out, I hadn’t missed out on anything at all.

The mayor’s aim faltered. His hand came slowly down so the gun pointed at the cracked tarmac road. “I’ve thought about your mother every day for years.”

From my back pocket, I extracted her note and brandished it like it was a far more dangerous weapon than the one he held. “She hated you. She never thought about you, and I know that because it took a threat to her life for her to even tell me you existed. She wanted nothing to do with you after getting pregnant, and it says that right there in her own hand.”

In the letter he’d kept for all these years. I hoped my words hurt.

“My mother rejected being your mistress. She called you out on your shit and left you, and I am so fucking glad. What I need to know is why did you keep this?”

His gaze stuck to the paper. “I missed her. I couldn’t throw a piece of her away.”

“You wanted her back?”

“She would’ve stayed if not for falling pregnant. I already had one child. I couldn’t have another outside of my marriage. Her mistake ruined us.”

Her mistake? She’d been a teenager. As if he hadn’t done that to her. It all made sense. The money he’d offered her had been to get rid of me.

I’d heard enough. “Want to know what wasn’t a mistake? What I did to your painting. The family tree you left me off of burned beautifully in a fire that lit up the night. I wish you could have seen it.”

The moment of poignancy left the mayor’s face, and he snapped the gun back up. “You little bastard.”

The word rippled off me. I smiled. “Better a bastard than a man raised by you.”

He swore again, cursing me to the night, his weapon never leaving my direction.

I tilted my head. “My sister, Everly, told me a thing or two about you that made sense. You started deducting rent from her salary a few months ago. She didn’t mind, but why would a man in such a high-profile job need the cash? Then there was the missing watches in your collection, the lack of a decent security crew, and the cheapo cameras you installed. I overheard Piers talk shit about you needing his cash. You’re broke, aren’t you?”

From his slump on the ground, Piers lifted his head. “I’ll do whatever you ask if you let me go.”

His abrupt splutter pulled all of our attention his way.

Piers rasped out desperate words. “He wants my connections, and we had a sweet deal planned, with my people only interested in the clean-up of the gangs because we run a coke line to executives and the gangs undercut us at every turn.I’ll back out. You’ll never see me again.” He swung his bleary-eyed gaze to Shade. “I’ll apologise to Everly.”

He dealt cocaine as well as misery? This guy was a peach.

Footsteps drummed on the road. I tore my gaze to the cop Cassie called Detective Dickhead pushing through the crowd, the rest of his officers held back by a mob of residents.

“Shut the fuck up, Roache,” the mayor snapped. “You were privileged to get to work with someone like me.”

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