Fighting With Light (The Coldwell Brothers #2)

9. Liam

9

Liam

“You’re going to have to give me more than that,” I command and grab my laptop, ready to start taking notes and cross-referencing everything she tells me. It’s giving me an idea: go for her father first, which will create an opening for mine. If we can get enough on the Costa organization, then we would have enough cause for a RICO case, effectively dismantling both of them. The Racketeering Influence and Corrupt Organizations Act would go after Costa and link to my father, which is the point of the law. It’s what brought down the head of La Cosa Nostra in New York back in the seventies. It would end Dad’s campaign, get him removed from office, and if we’re lucky, Costa would kill him first, so he couldn’t weasel out of jail time. It might take a while, but this is the best option we’ve had in years. I have to tell my brothers.

“Hold on a second. I’m not just going to tell you everything and walk away. The moment I start telling you anything, I put my name on a bullet aimed for my head. He will kill me if he knows I talked.”

“I know the feeling,” I grumble.

“So then you’ll understand when I say if I’m going to do this, I need to make that bullet mean something.”

My body tenses, and my blood runs cold. I wouldn’t let them hurt her if she wanted to help us and the many people our fathers have affected. I would protect her because of her sacrifice.

“What do you propose?”

She reaches over to the nightstand, where I left a bottle of water, and takes a large drink.

“I want in,” she says like it’s a done deal.

I smile and throw my head back, laughing.

“You cannot be serious,” I say and open my eyes.

She’s looking at me with a straight face and determination in her eyes.

“You are serious.”

“It’s like you said. He’s my father. I have this information and I haven’t done what I should,” she says.

“But he has your mom. I get—“

She holds up her hand, silencing me. “I have a chance to do something now, Liam. I have done what I could over the years, but it’s never been enough. It won’t be enough until it all burns down, with him inside it.”

“Let me get this straight, after I seduced you—” She smiles, then immediately tries to hide it. “—drugged you, and tied you up, you are asking to work with me, therefore my family, to go after your father and, by default, mine. Is that correct? Did I get that right?”

She rolls her eyes, pushing her hand through her hair

“First of all, I allowed you to seduce me, as you so finely put it. And honestly, I haven’t slept that well in a while, so thanks.”

“You can see how that is a little concerning, right?”

“But you weren’t going to hurt me. Right ?” she says, emphasizing the word.

I dip my head. Women and children are a line I don’t cross. I’ll cross many others, but that’s one I’d put a bullet in my head before that happened.

“Exactly, so we can call it even.”

I chuckle. “How in the world does that make us even?”

“Because you’re going to let me help you bring my father and, by default, yours down. I can’t sit here anymore. You’re right.”

My chest twists with her words. I love my brothers, but Emerson calls the shots, and Kai does the talking. I’m just the crazy one who’s put in a corner until he’s needed. I know they don’t mean that, and I try not to take it personally, but sometimes that’s hard to do.

“What about your brothers?” I ask her.

She purses her lips again. “They are insane, but they were raised in this life like I was. It’s affected all of us in different ways. They don’t like the trafficking, either. But they like the money. That being said, I don’t think they would stand in our way.”

“So let’s just say we theoretically get rid of your father. Your brothers would just step in, right?” I don’t know how that helps anyone. I don’t know how that solves any problems.

“Right, but isn’t your goal to ruin your father, not take down the mob?”

I lean back in my chair and shut my laptop. It feels wrong suggesting that the mob connected to my father be allowed to continue, but she’s right. My goal, my family’s goal, is to go after Dad, not the mob. We simply don’t have that amount of manpower to carry out a strike on a large criminal organization. I’m not even sure we have the manpower or the guns to do this as it is.

“But I can’t just let the drugs, guns, and human trafficking continue if I can do anything to stop it,” I tell her.

“I don’t believe they would continue the trafficking. They enjoy the thrill of the drugs and guns more. As bad as it sounds, it’s the truth.”

“But all of those things are still killing people.” I’m torn. There is a right thing to do here, but I can only do so many right things because there are too many to do. I have to pick, and I pick my father. The mob itself will have to wait another day.

“They are. It’s all bad. There’s no question about it, but there is no way you could take on the mob. You would be killed before you could get to your father. They simply have more guns and men.”

“Your brothers hate your dad that much?” I ask her because it’s hard for me to believe when you are born into something like that it grows loyalty, I would know.

“Just because they are loyal to my father doesn’t mean they want to be. There is a difference and it includes me, too. Liam, I am offering to help you. I want to help you. I can talk to Romeo. He’s more level-headed than the other two and I’m sure he will help us.”

“But what if he doesn’t, Aelia? I’m not agreeing to anything, but what if he doesn’t? What if he gives us away and then we’re all dead? I can’t take that risk. I…” I trail off because I don’t want to tell her about Cordi and Theo. They must be protected at all costs.

“He’s logical, Liam. He’s a businessman. If he sees that this move of power will calm things down, make him more money, and get rid of our father, then yes, he will agree to it. I’m not the only one who hates what my father has done to our mother. I think one of them would have killed him by now if they could. Let me help you,” she begs. Her hands are clasped together tightly, her eyes are wide and pleading. I know this isn’t smart, but I don’t see any other way. We can’t send people to spy, we won’t be able to turn someone who works for him, and we don’t have that kind of time when my father’s campaign has already begun. I have to take the help where I can find it and pray to God that it works.

“I have watched my mother descend into a shell of herself for most of my life. I can’t take it anymore, I can’t take living with the guilt anymore. I will get on my knees right now and beg you if I have to. I think you are the answer I didn’t know I was praying for.”

I scoff. “I’d love to see you on your knees, Aelia, but not for that.”

She keeps her composure, but her eyes spark and the apples of her cheeks turn light pink.

“Fine, but we’re going to do this my way and you will tell me every single thing you know, down to the most unimportant detail you can think of,” I say.

Her shoulders drop and she relaxes into the bed. “Everything. But um, there is a small problem.”

I groan, tossing my head back. “What is it?” I sigh, wondering if she is going to be more work than she’s worth. But damn, she’s beautiful work.

“My father is expecting me back in a week partly because I told him I would be, but I only go for my mom. When I don’t show up, it will be a problem.”

“Can’t you just call him and tell him you’re going to…I don’t know, Italy?”

She smiles sadly. “I could do that. But I always come back around this time. It’s their wedding anniversary. I go to support Mom because she loathes him. My brothers and I are there for her, not him. I’ve never missed one, and if I did, he would know something is up. ”

“Of course,” I grumble. “So what is your plan, then? Go home, act like everything is normal, then what, come back to Bali? I won’t be here much longer. I’m a professional surfer, and I have competitions and climbing trips coming up.” This is becoming more and more chaotic the more we talk. I’m not a logistics guy, I never have been. It’s a bad idea, but it’s the best lead we’ve had for a very long time and I need to remember that.

“No, but he won’t blink an eye if he thinks I’m with a friend.”

“What does that mean?” I ask, wondering if maybe she’s the crazy one and I’m the sane one, which is saying something.

“My father hates that I basically do what I want when I want, but he’s taking it from the approach of ‘don’t do anything about it, and maybe she will stop doing it’. Well, I don’t because I know it pisses him off. So if he happens to find out that I’m sort of dating someone, that would be icing on the cake.”

“Don’t you think working together is bad enough? Do you want him to believe you’re dating a Coldwell? There is no way he would be okay with that because it’s insane, Aelia.” Unable to sit anymore, I put my computer on the desk and start pacing the room.

“Well, here’s the thing, he doesn’t need to know it’s you. We should probably keep that quiet. It’s the fact I’m seeing a man and willing to travel to see him that will piss him off. He doesn’t know that I know who you are. But I know about his business. He believes I am entirely oblivious, other than I know what my family does. He doesn’t know that I’ve been watching and taking notes for a long time.”

“You’re not oblivious, though,” I mutter, gripping my hair. She doesn’t respond and I lift my gaze from my feet to her wide eyes. “What?”

She blinks a few times. “The only reason he pays attention to me periodically is because it suits his interests,” she says.

I can sense there is more behind her statement. But I don’t push it. “Why would we do this?” I ask her.

She groans and throws herself back onto the bed.

I am way too tired for this.

“Because it’s worth the risk of helping our families,” she says into the ceiling .

My feet keep moving as my brain struggles to organize all the details and the stories. The problem with lying is it’s hard to keep track of the lies, so we have to put the truth and the lie together in order to sell it. Small details, like meeting in Bali, could be what sells that she’s seeing someone seriously. It’s a good excuse.

“You’re going back home to the party, and then meet me in Portugal, and we’ll start digging . Plus, dating someone will be the perfect excuse for you to go and leave again because you’re in love. “ She sits up and her hair is a mess, but she looks… no, Liam, stop.

“I can sell that,” she says confidently.

“You better, princess because I don’t know how else we can explain you and me together if he finds out.”

She puts her hand on her chest in mock offense. “Excuse me, I know how you kissed me, Tarzan, and that wasn’t a ‘I just want sex kiss,’ that was an ‘I like this girl kind of kiss.’ You’re not fooling anyone but yourself.”

My mouth splits into a smile before I have a chance to smother it and she grins back.

“Yeah, you’re not wrong.”

“I knew I wasn’t,” she says confidently.

“So you want to pretend you are going to see a man in order to take your father off his throne, and then what?”

She looks at her nails and picks at them. “I haven’t thought that far and I’m not going to bother trying because the likelihood of us being killed is much higher than surviving, so let’s focus on the task at hand.”

“Are you sure, Aelia? Once we start this, there’s no going back, there’s no more avoiding Daddy. We have to assume he’ll eventually put two and two together.”

She gives me a dirty look and her jaw ticks. “I don’t want to go back. Like I said, this is my opportunity and I’m taking it .”