Page 15 of Twisted Empire

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When I opened my eyes again, I barely remembered having fallen asleep. I definitely hadn’t meant to. I blinked, staring at the four guys sprawled around me in the early morning sunlight drifting through the window.

Now that my exhaustion and shock had faded, the thought of how much they still didn’t know hit me like a smack of cold water. I needed to tell them everything, lay it all out, as painful as some of it might be. We couldn’t deal with the huge problem still facing us until we all understood what we were dealing with.

I stretched my legs. Slade jerked upright as my cool feet pressed into his side.

“Jesus,” he muttered. “Keep those icicles to yourself.”

His dark brown eyes met mine, glazed with sleep, but despite the complaint, his expression showed nothing but contentment.

“Could you shut the fuck up?” Logan groaned, rolling over and then rubbing his face.

Beckett chuckled, though his eyes hadn’t yet opened. “Good morning to all of you too.”

With a sigh in anticipation of the conversation ahead, I sat up.

Dexter peered up at me and pushed up on his elbows. “What’s the matter?”

“There’s a lot we still need to talk about,” I said, measuring out my words. “A lot that I found out yesterday, about Doom’s Seed and about Logan’s mom.” I paused, studying Logan’s reaction, but his mouth only tightened a little.

I forced myself to continue. “I think I know how they got involved, and what Doom’s Seed is trying to cover up—as well as why he had my dad murdered.”

CHAPTERSIX

Madelyn

“…and then I shoved the dresser in front of the closet door and ran for it,” I said, wrapping up my account of my kidnapping.

All four of my men were staring at me from their positions around the living room. Beckett and Logan had staked out the spots on either side of me on one of the sofas, and Slade and Dexter had each taken an armchair nearby.

For the first several seconds after I finished speaking, silence hung over the room. Logan’s mouth had flattened into a tight line. Beckett’s expression was stormy. Slade set his hands on his knees, balled into fists, and Dexter rubbed his hand across his frowning mouth.

“An illegal transplant service,” he said, breaking the silence. “It does fit all the pieces. That must be what they were transporting in the poisonous fish coolers: the organs they got by some illegal means.”

Beckett nodded grimly. “And the building we investigated yesterday will be where they performed at least some of the transplant operations in this area.”

Slade shook his head in bemusement. “I guess people must be willing to pay a hell of a lot for a procedure that could make the difference between life and death.”

The instant after he’d spoken, his gaze flicked to Logan. I hadn’t spelled out the assumptions I’d made after hearing Yvonne’s conversation with the man who must be Doom’s Seed, but the implications were obvious.

Logan looked up at us. His voice came out strained and without his usual force. “And that has to be how my mom met Doom’s Seed. She must have paid him to handle my liver transplant—there mustn’t have been a match soon enough, and she got desperate.”

“That would fit too,” I said carefully, watching his expression. I had no idea how hard this must be for him. Not only had his mother totally abandoned him without him knowing, but it’d been to join a major criminal whose crimes she’d involved her nine-year-old son in too.

Logan bowed his head, and I reached over to grasp his hand. He squeezed it back, taking a moment to gather himself again.

“It even makes sense why things were so tense between her and my dad after the operation,” he said. “I don’t think Dad has any idea how she pushed the operation forward, but she had to get that money from somewhere. At least one time I heard him saying something about their savings, and he mentioned more than once that he wasn’t sure he could trust her anymore. She must have taken a bunch out and refused to tell him what for.”

I stroked my thumb up and down the back of his hand, remembering the doubts he’d expressed in the past about whether he’d even deserved his second chance at life. How much more would this revelation have shaken his sense of self-worth?

“It was her choice, not yours,” I reminded him. “You didn’t get any say in it. And maybe she was wrong, and there would have been a liver by legitimate channels in time, and you getting the liver you did only meant that someone else’s life got saved too.”

Logan grimaced. “Still. The people he’s getting those organs from must also be desperate—desperate or murdered. And now I…” He couldn’t seem to finish, resting his hand on his abdomen over his scar instead.

Slade spoke up, equally tentative. “From what you said, it sounds like Yvonne’s connection with Doom’s Seed has gone beyond, er, professional? They’re romantically involved?”

I tipped my head in reluctant acknowledgment, still focused on Logan. “She was definitely talking to him as if they had a personal relationship, like they’d built a life together. He wasn’t exactly affectionate, but he didn’t dispute that idea either.”

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