Page 72 of Flame
The answer is elusive, and I’m tempted to call his bluff—he’s trying to confuse me on purpose. But then something in my brain clicks.
“Rafe’s uncle?” I rasp, unable to disguise my shock. “That doesn’t make any sense.”
“Doesn’t it?” With a smug grin, Gino sits back, folding his hands before him. “Rafe plays it as though he’s a tough, hard-ass, but deep down, baby? He’s a fucking pussy. With him in charge, Shen has a loyal soldier, but one who plays by the rules. Since he’s had the reins, the triad has retreated from the game in every sense of the word. What do they do now? Shake down business owners for chump change. There’s no real money in that. But Shen knows that no matter how hard he tugs on his little puppy’s leash, Rafe won’t hesitate to bring him down if he goes too far. The only problem? All the money he funnels into his life, including that nice political run, doesn’t come from nowhere.”
And maybe he’s right. Despite his bravado and tough persona, Rafe had allowed Mr. Zhang to rack up a sizeable debt—only to pay it off himself. That act reveals more than what he made it seem. He’d deliberately avoided extorting the money another way.
Then he took the loss, opening himself up to his uncle’s retribution.
“I thought Mr. Shen wanted to keep his hands clean,” I blurt, parroting Rafe’s own insistence on that fact.
Gino chuckles. “Bullshit. When his precious nephew bailed, Shen just found another fucking patsy.”
I don’t think he’s lying. He’s too tense, hunched forward, frustration coiled in his posture.
“You?” I ask, stating the obvious.
He sits forward again, but this time I don’t react, even as his breath hits me full in the face. “You have no fucking idea. And if you think me telling you this shit changes anything, then you’re wrong. It’s already too late, baby. For you, your precious Rafael, and—” He breaks off suddenly, his gaze cutting over my shoulder. “What the hell?”
The back of my neck prickles in warning before I even turn to see why. A tall figure is barreling toward us like a storm, shoving his way through anyone who tries to slow him. In his wake, two bouncers stagger, one clutching his stomach. Only now do I remember the phone in my purse, still relaying everything we’ve been saying.
And Rafe looks like he’s heard every last word. His eyes blaze like fire, his hands curling into fists.
I’m stepping into his path before I realize it, bracing my hand against his chest. “Rafe, don’t!”
He easily shrugs me off, heading for the booth where Gino eyes him warily, still seated.
“You think this is funny?” Rafe asks. He forms a fist and punches the table so hard it jolts against the floor, its joints squealing. “Playing fucking games. Spreading this bullshit?”
Gino blinks, his gaze unwavering. “Do I look like I’m laughing, mutt? Maybe it’s about time you got your head out of the fucking sand. Look around—” he gestures to the rest of the club with an outstretched hand. “If Shen really gave a shit about some dead girl, do you think he’d let me open up shop so soon? Not unless he needed somewhere to stash his precious pussy—”
“Enough!” Rafe nearly lunges across the table, snatching a fistful of his suit collar. “You work for Shen? Let’s call and ask him?”
Gino’s eyes practically glow in the dim lighting. “Fuck, yes. Call him, mutt. Ask him why he’s cut you out. Made you do his dirty work. The way I hear it, the old man’s all but left you for dead.”
“Rafe, don’t!” I grab the fist he starts to form before he can lift it. Tension ripples off his body like a wall of heat. I grit my teeth in the face of it, and it takes everything I have not to give in to the raw, instinctive need to back away. “Don’t do this.”
He snatches his arm from me, but in the same moment, grips my wrist as he turns on his heel. I have no choice but to follow him. When I look back, Gino is watching us, his arms crossed, lips still quirked.
And his warning seems more ominous than ever.
“Run little mutt,” he calls. “But you know the truth, don’t you? You never meant shit to him, and still don’t.”
Rafe tightens his grip on me rather than answer. As we pass the bouncers, they let us go without a word, and his car is already parked directly out front.
“I thought we had a deal, huh?” he snarls once we’re inside it. “Ten minutes, and if I say you bail, you bail.”
“I don’t think Gino killed Faith,” I blurt in a rush. “But he knows who did. I think he’s afraid of them.”
I hesitate to admit anything more, gauging his reaction. He’s staring straight ahead, still furious. Would he even believe that his uncle was capable of such crimes? Though perhaps he’d deluded himself like I had.
But the truth is inescapable. Branden’s reasons were well beyond trying to intimidate me.
The silence between us extends as Rafe says nothing, but he doesn’t have to. He heard Gino’s tirade himself through my phone. Even knowing that I can’t bring myself to name the prime suspect out loud.
But I don’t have to.
“No,” Rafe says, starting the car. “No. He wouldn’t… He wouldn’t. Not him.”
