“Yeah,” he said. “The first job and I’m the babysitter.”
I chose to ignore what he'd just said and instead focus on more important things. Like the fact that this guy was connected to my father, but not in the way I’d thought he was. No, he was now connected to him in a way that might be really dangerous for him and his club. Fear gripped my chest. “Did my father ask you to kill Billy?”
“What if he did?”
“I’m not kidding around. I’m asking because it’s important. Are you going to kill him?”
“Not personally, but yeah, it’s a job.”
“So the club is going to kill him.”
Blaze shrugged. “It’s a job, sweetheart.”
Anger boiled up inside me. “Stop calling me sweetheart. It’s patronizing.”
“Well, I'm just a stupid biker who doesn't have the extensive vocabulary you have, so I guess I just wouldn't know what the word patronizing means. Sweetheart.”
Obviously he knew what patronizing meant. I wanted to smack him. Smack him for bringing me here. Smack him for being a member of his stupid club. Smack him for getting involved with my father. And above all, smack him for not being smart enough to understand when he was being set up.
“Let me spell it out for you in small words,” I said, my words punctuated with all the rage I’d been building up inside. “Billy is not just some guy. He’s not a college freshman from Iowa with a couple of farmers for parents. Do you know what his last name is?”
Blaze just stared at me, the muscles in his face flexing as he clenched and unclenched his jaw.
“His last name? It’s Randolph.” I could hear my voice getting louder now, and I struggled to keep it under control. Keep calm, I told myself.
Blaze’s face paled.
“Does that ring any bells, sweetheart?” I asked.
“Randolph. Are you sure?” He was suddenly much less cocky now.
“Yes, I’m fucking sure. Do you understand what I’m talking about? The Randolphs. Your club was tagged with killing Billy Randolph. How do you not know who he is?”
“Mad Dog agreed to it. We didn’t have the details yet.”
“Is your club in the habit of agreeing to shit without having all the facts?”
Blaze sighed. “It’s probably already done.”
“How would the club do it without knowing who he is?”
“Mad Dog is not exactly up on politics, you know. Even if they told him Billy’s name, I’m not sure he’d put two and two together.”
“No one in the club watches the news?”
Blaze shrugged. “They’re not brain surgeons. I wouldn’t trust them to figure it out. It was just supposed to be a hit on some college kid.”
“Just a hit, right? So this is the kind of shit you do all the time? This is who you are?” I was angry with him for being exactly who I feared he was.
“What do you mean, this is who I am? Your father is the head of an international smuggling operation.”
“Yeah, and?”
“You think he doesn’t kill people? And besides that, what the fuck do you think he smuggles? You think he’s smuggling clothes?”
“I don’t want to hear it.”
“No, you don’t, do you? You think your dad is some innocent guy.”
“Of course not. I know who he is.” He had no idea. Blaze was accusing me of being blind to who my father was, but I knew my father was a monster. He was a monster, but he couldn’t do the things Blaze was insinuating.
“No you don’t, little girl,” he said. “You don’t know who he is at all. You think I’m not a nice guy? You think us doing a hit on Billy is a not nice thing to do? Your dad is a million times worse. He’s in a class of his own.”
“I thought this was your first time doing business with him. You have no idea what he does.”
“No? Your dad smuggles people, sweetheart. All that shit you have-that shit you’re wearing? The hot car you drive? It’s paid for by women, maybe even kids. You know what those they're doing? They’re sure as shit not coming here to be adopted into some rich family. They’re bought. By people who are into that kind of thing. That’s where your dad’s money comes from.”
“You don’t know that.” He didn’t have any way of knowing that. My father might be a criminal, but that - no, that was beyond him. It had to be. The problem was that when Blaze made the accusation, I knew in my gut it was something that my father certainly had the capacity to do.
Blaze smirked, and I wanted to smack the stupid smile right off his face. I didn’t have to take his shit. I might have to stay here, but I didn’t have to make nice with him.