Vengeful Bonds, page 19
“Think Kroger will talk to us?”
“J.J.? Probably, yeah. The problem might be shutting him up. But if you don’t get there soon, he’s gonna be too shit-faced for you to get any real information out of him. He seems to be gunning for Dutch’s position as town drunk.”
Saint and Binnie exchanged looks once more before Binnie said, “Thanks for your help.”
“Yeah, sure thing.”
Once they were outside, Binnie said, “We’re gonna go talk to this Kroger guy, right?”
“Yeah, of course.”
Luckily, there was only one bar across the street, which was squished between a vape shop and a laundromat. It had a sign with a picture of an overflowing beer and peeling letters on the front window in green that spelled out Fosters Too. Fosters Too? Not Fosters Two? That was weird. The minor detail scratched at Saint’s brain. It was a stupid name for a bar.
It had the usual weekday bar crowd. There were people in business casual at the bar as well as those wearing jerseys or t-shirts who were clearly there to watch the game on one of the ten or so televisions set up around the place. Spotting the construction workers was easy. Some still wore their orange vests, others had them next to them or on the table beside their drinks.
There were only about six men in all: four clustered around a table while two played darts. They paid no attention to Saint or Binnie as they approached, the occasional overly loud laugh piercing the air. When the men finally noticed them standing there, the four instantly grew hostile. Alphas. They wore scent blockers, but Saint didn’t need his nose to recognize four assholes guarding what they considered their territory.
Saint recognized three of the men from the memorial the night before. He really didn’t want to get into a public fight, but he could feel the agitation rolling off them in waves.
“One of you Kroger?” Saint asked, keeping his tone neutral but staring down the man who seemed to be their leader, letting him know he was fully prepared to take this outside if necessary. Binnie closed ranks, standing shoulder to shoulder with him.
A tall, lanky man with a scraggly brown ponytail sneered at Saint. “Who’s asking?”
Saint pointed to himself. “I’m Saint. This is Binnie. We were hoping we could ask you a few questions.”
“What kind of name is Saint?” the guy with auburn hair and a ruddy complexion asked, words already slightly mushy, most likely from the almost empty beer in front of him.
Saint needed to deal with this before they closed ranks and iced him and Binnie out as outsiders. “A nickname. 10th Mountain Division. Two tours.”
The men gave him a look of begrudging respect, sitting up a bit, looking at each other like they were conferring silently.
“What do you wanna talk to J.J. about?” the older black man with a mole on his right cheek and patchy facial hair asked, gaze darting to another man in the corner.
The one who’d still yet to speak. He wore a backwards snapback and a wary expression, watching them closely.
“Dutch Maren.”
Ball cap scoffed. “Dutch is dead.”
Binnie rolled his eyes. “Yeah, we know. His kid hired us to look into his death.”
Ball cap barked out a laugh. “Who? Ritchie Rich and his fancy pants girlfriend?”
Saint eyed him cautiously. “Kroger, I presume?”
The guy in the ball cap shrugged. “Yeah, that’s me.” He pointed to the auburn-haired man. “O’Donnell.” Then the man with the patchy facial hair. “Darnell.” Then the man with the ponytail. “Whitey.” When he met their gaze again, he said, “What do you want?”
“Who’s Ritchie Rich?” Saint asked, though both he and Binnie knew they could only be talking about one couple.
“Junior and his girlfriend with the rich daddy. He’s the only one who could afford to hire his own PIs. You are PIs, right? You’re definitely not cops.”
Saint had no idea what about them made them “definitely not cops” but he just nodded. “We were talking to your boss, Adamski, and he mentioned that you and Mikey had witnessed Dutch getting into it with a couple of guys in suits? Can you tell us about that?”
Kroger snorted, throwing back about two fingers worth of cheap whiskey in one go. Binnie winced beside him. “Why not just ask your client?”
Binnie frowned. “What do you mean?”
Kroger looked to O’Donnell and then nodded towards the bar, shaking his empty glass. The man hopped up, jogging away, presumably to refill his drink. “We weren’t close enough to hear anything. We just saw Dutch going at it with them. He said those suits came from Bas’s company.”
“From Veritas?” Binnie asked, struggling to keep his voice neutral.
Kroger nodded. “Yeah, I guess.”
“What would they want with Dutch?” Saint asked, almost to himself.
Kroger shook his head. “No clue. At first, I thought maybe they were doing some kind of background check on the kid now that he has his fancy pants job title to match his fancy pants doctor girlfriend, but Dutch told us to mind our business. Which was weird ‘cause normally you couldn’t shut the asshole up.”
“Maybe he was a volunteer?” Whitey said. “Lots of people in the neighborhood make extra money volunteering for their research projects.”
Binnie and Saint exchanged looks once more. “What kind of research?”
Whitey shrugged. “Fuck if I know. I just know Dutch always had needle marks on his arms. At first, I thought he was a junkie, then I thought maybe he was sick. He just said he donated blood. But lots of people get money from Veritas and they have those same track marks from the injections.”
“Did he donate that blood to Bas’s company?” Binnie asked, trying to connect the dots in real time.
“I don’t think so. Those suit guys seemed real pissed when Dutch told them to fuck off. He was ranting about how Bas couldn’t even be bothered to come himself. How he’d sent some Men in Black types instead,” Kroger said.
O’Donnell returned, dropping another glass of whiskey in front of Kroger before doling out the beers in his other hand.
Saint looked at Whitey. “Do you know anyone who was a test subject at Veritas? Someone who might be willing to talk to us?”
“What does Veritas have to do with Dutch’s death? I don’t think refusing to participate in some kind of clinical trial or Bas’s background check would warrant a bullet to the face,” Kroger said, taking another heavy swallow.
“Dutch thought that girl was bad news,” O’Donnell volunteered. “I wouldn’t put anything past rich folk. He said Bas was a dumbass and a sell-out, said he was whipped for that broad he was marrying. That he wasn’t his kid anymore or some shit. But he was always disowning one of them or another. God knows he had plenty to spare.”
Saint let that marinate. Maybe it was a background check? He couldn’t imagine that, even if Win’s father accepted Bas, he was willing to risk his fortune somehow falling into the hands of someone like Dutch Maren. Maybe this was all nothing.
But it didn’t feel like nothing.
“Did he say anything else that might give us an idea of what they wanted?” Binnie asked, clearly also trying to follow the breadcrumbs.
“Don’t you work for the brat?” Kroger asked. “Just ask him.”
Saint shook his head. “No, we don’t. We work for one of his other sons.”
Kroger frowned. “One of his other sons? Which one? None of them would dare spend Dutch’s life insurance on some private dicks so they could investigate a random road rage attack. He’d roll over in his urn. He would have thought it was a waste of money.”
Saint wasn’t going to say who it was at first, but then he played a hunch. “It was his youngest. He’s paying out of pocket.”
That shocked the four men. Whitey seemed the most surprised. “Dekey? No shit. Last I heard, the kid was missing? Or had runaway. Dutch said he’d disappeared and blocked them all. Was real upset about it.”
“He was?” Binnie choked out, incredulous.
They all gave him weird looks.
“Mm,” Kroger said, looking at the others, who all bobbed their heads in agreement. “We were surprised, too. He had a weird relationship with the kid. He used to brag about him, just like he did Bas. But as he got older and went unpresented, he started calling him a pansy, saying he was useless. Made fun of him wearing makeup.”
“All that changed when Dekey took off, though,” Whitey said. “The longer he stayed away, the more worried Dutch got. He even sent the older boys looking for him, but he’d just…disappeared without a trace.”
Binnie frowned. “Dutch was worried…about Deke?”
O’Donnell nodded. “He was…agitated when he didn’t come back. Got more and more pissed the longer he was gone. He wasn’t so much worried about his safety as he was his retirement fund.”
Binnie scowled. “His retirement fund?”
They all nodded.
“That’s what he called him. Not to his face, but, you know, to us,” Kroger confided.
“How would a twenty-two-year-old kid have his retirement fund?” Binnie asked.
Kroger took another sip, slumping back in the booth. “No idea. Just figured it was because the kid wanted to be an actor. Thought maybe he was banking on him being a success. But to be honest, that wasn’t really Dutch’s style.”
Saint and Binnie stood there as the men continued to drink. Finally, Binnie just said, “Can you think of any reason someone might want Dutch dead?”
They all shook their heads in unison. “The guy was a mean drunk but he was harmless, relatively speaking. No worse than half the other assholes hanging around here.”
“You talking about Dutch?”
They turned to see a heavy-set guy in a stained neon green t-shirt that clashed with his orange vest. He was bald and broad, built like a tank despite his rounded belly. Saint recognized him vaguely as the man who was tossing heavy concrete blocks onto a flatbed truck across the street.
“Yeah,” Saint said. “Did you know him?”
The man scoffed. “He was my boss off and on for, like, ten years. We weren’t braiding each other’s hair like these fuck wads,” he said, waving his hands at the four around the table, “but we talked.”
“Can you tell us anything?” Binnie asked.
The man snorted, giving a boisterous laugh. “Yeah, the guy was a kook.”
“Fuck off, Bristol,” Kroger sneered.
Saint ignored the other man, giving his full attention to Bristol. “A kook? Dutch?”
Dutch Maren didn’t seem like the kind of person one would call a kook. Crazy, sure. Psycho, even, maybe. But a kook implied a whole different type of mental illness.
Bristol looked at the other four men. “You didn’t tell them?” When they just glowered at him, he gave another laugh, then looked at Saint and Binnie. “Yeah, get a few drinks in him and he’d start rambling on about the supernatural. Myths and legends and all that shit.”
The hairs on the back of Saint’s neck stood on end. “What kind of legends?”
Bristol crossed his arms over his massive chest. “He used to ramble on about royal bloodlines and how his family was descended from an ancient line of shapeshifters or some shit.”
“Shapeshifters?” Binnie echoed dully.
Bristol nodded, his amusement obvious. “Yeah, he called it his genetic legacy.”
Genetic legacy? “What the fuck does that even mean?” Saint asked, not sure if he should be relieved or concerned when the others seemed just as lost.
“Not a clue, man. He was a drunk with a vivid imagination. He wasn’t the first dominant alpha who tried to claim some bizarre lineage that made them seem more important,” Bristol reasoned.
Saint gave a begrudging nod. He wasn’t wrong. Their murky origins had caused some to create elaborate tales of the first alphas and omegas to fill in the blanks. It was widely believed that, once upon a time, they could shift from animal form to human. Science backed them up, but there was still a lot they didn’t know as a society. That didn’t stop people from taking those stories and running with them. Werewolves. Skinwalkers. Hell, even things like sasquatch. All came from the idea that, long ago, their secondary gender allowed for them to be more than what they were now.
“We done here?” Kroger asked, waving to a group of girls who’d just entered the bar.
“Yeah,” Saint said. “Yeah, we’re done.”
He caught Binnie’s gaze and nodded towards the door.
“Hey,” Whitey called after they’d taken two steps. “You should talk to Bas. They were close before the kid started working for that fancy place. Dutch once said he’d warned the kid they were just using him, but Bas called him crazy and jealous.”
“When was this?” Binnie asked.
“Years ago. Before he hooked up with the doctor girl,” he said.
“Okay, thanks.”
Saint’s head was spinning as they left, replaying the conversation in his head. What the fuck did any of this mean?
They were waiting at the light when footsteps ran up on them from behind. They both whipped around, ready for a confrontation, but it was Darnell, who raised his hands in mock surrender, taking a couple of steps back.
“Sorry. Sorry. I just wanted to catch you before you took off.”
He stuffed something into Saint’s hand. A crumpled napkin. “What’s this?”
Saint opened it to find a number. “That’s my number. If you really want to talk to someone who’s been a research subject at Veritas, let me know. My sister…she, um, she participated in a few trials for them. I’m sure she’d be willing to talk…if you can promise to keep her name out of it.”
“Out of it?” Saint echoed.
He nodded. “Listen, they have a lot of money and they’re owned by some really powerful people. She’s signed papers. But she might be willing to talk. Especially if you could help her.”
“Help her?” Binnie asked, like he was having trouble following the conversation just as Saint was.
“Look, if you want to talk to her, just be prepared to pay and make sure nobody knows you talked to her. Ever. Got it?”
Binnie gave a stilted nod. “Yeah. Yeah, we got it.”
He gave a nod, then turned and jogged back into the bar, leaving Saint and Binnie reeling under the weight of this new offer.
“What the fuck is going on?” Binnie whispered.
“Wish I could tell you,” Saint said. “Let’s go home and tell the others.”
“Tell them what?” Binnie asked. “I feel more confused now than when we started.”
“So, what else is new?”
“I knew we couldn’t trust them,” San seethed, ears so hot he was certain he’d see smoke billowing from them soon.
His blood rushed in his ears, heart racing, as he caught Binnie and Saint exchanging concerned looks from the corner of his eye. They acted as if they weren’t the ones who’d just dropped this in their laps. San paced around the living room, shaking his head, fuming. How dare Bas try to get close to Deke just to use him? To maybe use Ollie…and the baby.
San would’ve expected that from Deke’s shithead father. But Bas had seemed…nice. San had wanted Deke to have this. He’d wanted him to have some family he could trust. But he guessed it was too much to ask. Family could never be trusted. San’s mouth felt pasty. Maybe it was his rapid breathing. Maybe it was the way his heart raced. Fen and Seth didn’t look surprised by his rage, but the others eyed him warily.
San spun on his heel, now pacing in the opposite direction, his thoughts a chaotic flurry. And that girl? Win? She was obviously trash, no matter how much money she had. No matter what that article said about her altruistic nature. No matter how normal and friendly she appeared. She was just as bad as all the others, beta or no.
If she even was a beta. What beta could sense an omega pregnancy? There was something…off about her. Who smiled with that many teeth? Who wore white to a funeral? What rich corporate mogul would let his daughter marry a nobody and give them a fancy corporate job? None San had ever heard of.
“We don’t know anything yet, love,” Binnie said carefully. “Please, relax.”
San cut his eyes to his mate, glowering at him even as his stomach swooped at the pet name. Binnie continued to give him that patient look, the one that said “you’re crazy and unreasonable but you’re mine and I love you.” San hated that look. Well, he loved that look but hated how often Binnie had to use it on him.
San wasn’t being unreasonable. He wasn’t. The others were being far too calm about this. They clearly weren’t seeing the bigger picture. They’d all seen this movie before—big evil corporation performs horrible experiments on unsuspecting victims. Veritas Biotech. Even the name was bullshit. Truth? Right. They absolutely couldn’t trust them or anyone involved with them. Why was everyone so fucking calm about this? How was he the only sane one in the room?
He huffed out an angry breath through his nose, looking at Saint, Fen, and Loch where they sat on the couch, all watching him warily, like he was the crazy one. Meanwhile, Seth was laid out across all three of them—on his stomach, no less—like a fucking weirdo. And they all acted like it was perfectly normal. Seth’s head rested on Saint’s thigh, his ass in Fen’s lap, his feet tucked between Loch’s thighs.
When Fen noted him staring, he began slapping out a nervous rhythm on Seth’s ass, which made the other omega wiggle happily like a puppy. San would have laughed if he didn’t feel like his head was two seconds away from exploding. Seth was the closest thing he’d ever seen to a human lap dog. Even Wolf seemed to think the boy’s need for affection was over the top. Luckily, there was no shortage of people within the pack willing to coddle or cuddle Seth, much to the omega’s delight.
San flicked his gaze to Ollie, who sat on the other end of the sofa from Binnie, Deke on the floor between his knees, scratching Wolf’s twitching ears where he’d flopped down beside him. “Tell them I’m not being unreasonable.”
Ollie’s brows shot up, like he hadn’t expected San to single him out as an ally. He didn’t know what he was so shocked about. Ollie was usually the grown up in the room, even more so now that he had so many people to look out for. San crossed his arms and tightened his jaw, nostrils flaring with each heavy breath.
