Chapter Two : The Enemy’s Daughter
Someone put a jacket over my shoulders. I never found out who it was.
Then they led me down a hallway and a flight of stairs before taking me through a door.
The room had no windows. One bulb hung loose on its wire and swung until it stopped.
Sit, the bearded man said.
I sat down.
Twenty minutes passed or maybe more. I counted the cracks on the floor. There was nine of them. I thought about calling my mother. I did not call her. There was nothing to tell her yet.
The door opened. It was not him.
An older man came in. He was gray at the temples. His cut had more patches on it than bare leather. He pulled a chair across the floor and sat down in front of me.
“Mara Voss.” He said it slow. “Took a long time to see what Daniel’s daughter looks like.”
“You knew him.”
“Better than most men left in this club.” He took a cigarette out of his cut. He did not light it. “So explain something to me. Three years he was gone. Now his daughter is standing in my parking lot asking questions.”
“I’m owed answers. Nobody would give me any.”
“Answers about what.”
“About what happened to him. Whether he’s alive.” My voice came out too loud. I brought it back down. “That is not too much to ask.”
He did not answer right away.
“Your father sat where you are sitting now.” He said it eventually. “More times than I can count.”
“Then tell me.”
“He sold us out.” Sharp. No hesitation. “He took information that should have died in this club and handed it to people who used it to kill three of my men. One of them I had known since I was nineteen. Voss disappeared the same week. He never came back.”
Something scraped against the floor upstairs. Furniture, maybe. A voice gave an order I could not make out.
“That is not the man I remember.”
“You were a child.”
“I remember him loving this club.”
“Family does not sell out family.”
“Then maybe he did not.”
His jaw moved once. He stayed standing. Silent.
The door opened again. It was him.
He did not sit down. He crossed the room and put his shoulder against the wall.
“You’re wasting time on her.” He said it to the older man, not to me.
“Watch your mouth,” the president said.
“I’ll watch it once somebody tells me why she is still breathing in this building.”
“Because somebody tried to kill her tonight. Until we know who, she stays with you.” His voice left no room in it. “Starting now.”
“I do not run a daycare.”
“You run whatever I tell you to run.”
He stood up and buttoned his cut.
“She is under your protection until we find who fired those shots. That is not a discussion.”
His jaw twitched twice. I thought for a second he might argue. He stayed in the chair. Quiet now. He looked at me and said nothing.
“I do not need a babysitter,” I said.
“You almost took a bullet twenty minutes ago.” His eyes found mine. There was nothing warm in them. “So no. That is not up for debate.”
“I have an opinion regardless.”
“Keep it. It changes nothing.”
The president was already at the door.
“Find out who came after her.” He did not look back. “Fast.”
The door shut. The boots kept moving upstairs, back and forth, the same as before.
“Let us be clear about something.” His voice dropped lower. “I am doing this because he ordered it. Not because I believe you.”
“I never asked you to.”
“Good. Your father’s name buried three men in this club. I will not forget that because his daughter wants answers.”
“I am not asking you to forget it.”
“Everyone who walks in here wanting the truth is asking for something.”
I stood up. I did not plan it.
“You do not know anything about me.”
“I know your last name.”
“That is not the same thing.”
The room went quiet. Longer than it needed to.
“You will take the room down the hall.” His voice went flat again. “Locked from the outside. You do not go anywhere without me.”
“That is not protection. That is a cell.”
“Call it what you want.”
He was already at the door. His hand was on the handle. He stopped.
“Do not mistake this for trust. Like I said earlier, I am protecting you because he told me to. That is the whole reason. Nothing else.”
The door shut. The lock turned twice from the outside.
I sat down on the cot. I starred at the door for a long time.
My father sat in that chair once. He told that man things I would probably never hear. The man who just left hated my name enough to say it like it tasted like poison in his mouth.
None of it added up yet. Three years had taught me to wait for pieces to fit. I was not going to stop now because the man guarding me hated me on principle.
I closed my eyes. The footsteps kept going upstairs.
The bulb finally went still.
Someone had known exactly when to fire those shots. Right after I said my father’s name in front of half the club. That was not a coincidence, and I did not believe in those anyway. Somebody in that clubhouse did not want questions about Daniel Voss getting answered. Maybe the same person who had spent three years making sure his name disappeared from every record that mattered.
I thought about the man standing guard outside my door. Arms crossed, probably. Hating every minute of it. He did not trust me. Fine. Trust was not what I needed from him. I needed him to keep me alive long enough to finish what I came here to do, and whatever he felt about my last name could stay exactly where it was.
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