“She’s looking over colleges. Says she wants to be a vet.” Rhonda beams—a proud mother.
I nod. “A noble profession.” Anybody who helps animals is good.
We step inside the elevator. She pushes the button for the garage, and I hit the one for the lobby.
“You aren’t heading home?” Rhonda says.
“I’m meeting someone.”
“Angelika, maybe? The new intern?”
So she remembers that we came in together. “Yes.”
“She seems like a nice girl.”
“Yes.” Far too nice and innocent. And not wary enough. If she were, she wouldn’t have so readily put herself in my power, especially after having seen me go into Rick Owen’s house.
On the other hand, our interests are aligned at the moment. She hasn’t said it explicitly, but she wants her stepbrother permanently eliminated. It’s understandable. Death is the only real solution to somebody like Roy Wilks.
I walk across the expanse of the lobby and nod at one of the security guards, who returns the nod with a slightly nervous smile. But that man is always on edge. If I hadn’t checked his background, I might think he was an addict.
I go out to the street and head toward the café. About halfway there, the phone in my left pocket buzzes. I glance at the screen, and satisfaction suffuses me like fine vodka.
Courtney Young. I knew you’d come through.
I contemplate a proper reward—or would it be a punishment?—for her part of the deal. Betrayal deserves something painful in return…
But there will be time enough for that later. I drop the phone back into my pocket and step into the café.
“You got an internship at the Pryce Family Foundation?” Eric is screeching, his face so red he looks like he’s about to have a stroke.
I stop to watch the scene. Apparently he heard. Surprising. I thought she’d share the good news the second she came to the café.
“Yeah,” Angelika says, apparently too focused on Eric to notice me.
“You bitch! That’s mine! You stole it from me!”
Stole? Lizochka wouldn’t have hired him after speaking to him for a single minute. And even if she had a catastrophic lapse in judgment and hired him anyway, he wouldn’t last a day with that holier-than-thou attitude.
“I didn’t—”
He steps forward, breathing hard and shoving his face in hers. “You heard me talking about it, and you decided to steal it from me!” He jabs her in the chest with his finger.
I let him do it, mainly to have the security cameras in the café capture his aggression. Not that the cameras are necessary, because the other barista and customers in the café are pulling out their phones.
I turn my face away from the seating area as I move in. Anger flashes in Angelika’s whiskey eyes. “What’s your problem? I didn’t steal anything from you.”
“The fuck you didn’t!” Now there is spit flying from Eric’s mouth.
He starts to jab Angelika in the chest again. I step forward, intercept the finger and twist—hard enough to hurt, but not quite hard enough to break it.
“Ow!” he yelps. “What the fuck, man?”
“No hitting a woman.”
“I didn’t hit her! I was just making a point. Like this!” He uses his other hand and jabs me in the bicep. “That’s not hitting!”
I look down at him. Nobody has taught this man-child a lesson.