It was true. I was perhaps the only person in Scott Pressman's life he could actually trust, the one person he knew the consequences of telling something to. Strange. "She... Melinda's behind it all," he admitted, sagging into his chair. "She and Berkowitz go way back, back to when Melinda was more active in the game. They've stayed FWB since then, nothing I minded before, but after what you did.... Berkowitz told Melinda she knew how to cure me, to undo what you did. I know it's bullshit, I think Melinda does too, but Berkowitz, she knows she needs an in somehow. She goes through a normal union shop to get to MJT, all of that shop's shit comes out into the light. Pressman though, we've been hiding more skeletons than a graveyard for two generations now."
"Then why keep going with it?" I asked quietly. "You know you can't be quick fixed. I'm better at what I do than that. Besides, you also know what I'd do if you actually came within sight of Tabby Williams."
Scott lurched, and I realized I'd seen it before, when I had said her name the first time. "The conditioning is stronger than I planned. I thought they'd have come and gotten you in four or five hours, not eight."
"Yeah well, its only in the past two months that I've been able to even hear her name without wanting to puke. If this case goes to trial, I'm probably going to piss myself and go blind as soon as she walks into the courtroom."
"So why do it? Fuck, I gave you an out. That doesn't happen often with me."
"Because of my son," Pressman replied, anguish in his voice. "She knows the deal. Divorce laws in this state give custody to the mother over eighty six percent of the time. And she's got dirt on me, man. Video, not only of me before, but me since. She’s taunted me for weeks, breaking me down mentally. I mean, all of us in the seduction game, or at least most of us, have gone the other way for a mark at times. I didn't need to often, but I'd done it before, always topping. This time, I bottomed for some cuckold fantasy mark she was honing in on. Or at least, that is what she told me."
"What happened?" I said, a hollow ball in the pit of my stomach. "She set you up?"
"You think? It was all a trick by her. She got me in the worst position, and only afterwards showed me the video. Christ, I was acting, man! But she's got it on video, me being someone's bottom bitch while she isn't in the filmed part at all. She's held that goddamn file over my head ever since."
"Why is she coming after Tabby so damn hard?" I asked, curious. "It wasn't her who put you out of action."
"No, but she can't get to you. You don't get it, Snowman. She doesn't just hate you, she hates everything about you. She hates that you pulled me out of the game, took me out of it. I had over three million dollars in seductions going, even without Marcus Smiley's money, you know that? I had Gina Franklin riding me twice a week and this close to giving me the account numbers I needed to clean Bill Franklin out. You know how much we're talking there, even if it was only a few of the accounts?"
"A lot," I replied, trying to not puke. Even with his injury, even with his own trauma, he was still a self centered asshole who thought of sex as merely a weapon to use, like I use my Glocks.
"Understatement of the fucking year. And Melinda, she wanted it all. We were going to get away from it, away from the air conditioning contracts and the games, just get away and find a new life. We were going to pull a ghost job, just like you were probably going to do at first before Sal fucked you over. So, she's going after MJT. Notice I still can't say her name without feeling nauseous. I put up with it because, despite the fact that yes, I'm still an asshole. Despite the fact that I'm a total scum of a man who hates most of the fucking world, and most of all hates you, there is one thing that I do all this shit for."
"What's that?" I asked.
"The same thing that has kept me from climbing the Financial Tower and jumping off, or going over to Central Station and stepping in front of the Silver Bullet Express to Washington. My child. He's still innocent. I'm trash, I'm a motherfucker, but he's still innocent. And I swear, as God as my witness, I’ll keep him innocent. I may have my own little plot in the seventh circle of Hell all ready to go for me. It might be right near yours, all things considered. But my son? No. It ends with me, and it ends with Melinda. She's at least agreed with me to that much."
I could tell even listening to him then, he was lying, to himself as much as to me. He knew his wife was going to screw him over, and most likely bring his son into the game as soon as he was able. I'd never seen the boy, but if he was at all as good looking as his mother and father, he was going to be a heartbreaker if he wanted to be. I could see it in the way Pressman held his shoulders, the tone of his voice, he knew it. If I could have seen his eyes, I would have seen it there too.
I considered for a moment what to do. I looked at Pressman, and then thought about his wife. There was an option I could choose. I could kill Scott Pressman, wait for Melinda Pressman to come home, then kill her too. It was tempting. It would solve the problem with the lawsuit as well.
My fingers itched with the idea. But my hands didn't move. Maybe I was getting soft, but I didn't think so. Killing Scott and Melinda Pressman wasn't going to solve all of their son's problems. He'd be sent to live with his grandparents, the King and Queen of Hearts, grand thieves in their own right.