Total pages in book: 109
Estimated words: 103620 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 518(@200wpm)___ 414(@250wpm)___ 345(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 103620 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 518(@200wpm)___ 414(@250wpm)___ 345(@300wpm)
“Yes,” Zander says. “Yes, yes, yes. She stood in this very castle and told me that she would be willing. Told me that she would do whatever she had to to make things right. That she was sorry about all the pain and suffering her pilfering of this diamond had caused and she would resolve it.
“She and Lars would go on to live a happy life together, my diamond would be returned to me and, with Danny no longer in the picture, this silly ‘triangle’ of yours would be broken. Alec would see the folly of his ways and return back home to me, and he and I would maintain the van den Berg legacy.
“Now, I’ll be the first to acknowledge that it was not the most lekker of plans. It had its myriad holes, pitfalls, and blind spots, but things this complex are rarely rounded off perfectly and tied with a bow. I had no idea, for example, that Christine not only had no intention of doing as she promised, but also thought to launch an assault on Brasil Lynch’s operation all by herself.”
“He was trafficking fucking women,” Christine bites out.
“Indeed,” Zander says, “Indeed he was. Not a nice man at all. In retrospect, I should have just let him die at your hands. Then, perhaps, my other son would still be alive.”
For the briefest of seconds, a sadness passes over him. It’s not like the other, performative displays of emotion he’s attempted to showcase. It feels sincere. And there may be an equally brief moment inside of me where I feel sorry for him, but it passes quickly, if it was really there at all.
“Who threw Christine from the roof?” Alec asks. His voice startles me. He sounds exactly like his father. It’s unnerving.
“Anton,” Christine says. “Anton and Cillian.”
“What?” I ask with more than enough astonishment for everyone.
“Anton was the point person. And Cillian was the one inside Brasil’s operation who was assigned to make sure I did what I said I was going to do. They were both there.”
That’s why Cillian grabbed Christine in Belfast. That’s why this Anton asshole was calling his phone after we caused him to crash the van. Anton was probably the one who fired the shot on the bridge too.
So, Cillian was never working for Brasil. He was working for Zander. And he and Anton were responsible for what happened to Christine.
Which means, ultimately, Zander was.
Fuck. Me.
“I didn’t know anyone was following me the night I went up there on the roof,” Christine continues. “I thought the only people with me were Reggie and Lex. Alec’s guys. And all they knew was that they were supposed to be watching out for me. They didn’t know what I was doing.
“Cillian and Anton showed up just as I took the shot. When they saw I hadn’t shot Danny, but at Brasil’s guy—that David—Cillian grabbed the gun and Anton and I struggled, and the next thing I knew, I was waking up in a basement apartment with the windows covered and guns under the floorboards.”
“As I say, messier than anyone would have liked,” says Zander. “But it’s so good to see that you finally have your memory back, young Christine.”
“What the fuck does any of this have to do with my daughter?” Eliza practically barks, having listened to this tale of woe for far longer than I’m sure she intended.
“Unfortunately, my dear,” Zander says, “it needn’t have had anything to do with her. Or your brother. Or you. That part was made inevitable by the wild, daring rescue you all executed to retrieve Alec.
“It had ever been my intention that when Alec and Lars had healed sufficiently from their collapse from the falls, I would carefully reveal all this to Alec myself. But, of course, we all know what happened instead.”
“So why didn’t you just kill Danny and Christine and whoever the fuck else you wanted to kill and leave me and my child out of it?”
“Because when one is making a deal, a trade, one must possess something of great value to trade for. And, beyond that, dear Eliza Watson, she is not only your child. She is my grandchild. And, as I started reflecting on the importance of family, it occurred to me that it would be a great tragedy for the girl not to know her oupa.”
Eliza flushes with anger, but she holds herself back. I might say admirably. And I might say that because I have had more than I can take and I do not.
“Fucking ENOUGH. E-NOUGH,” I shout. “This is all spectacularly supervillain-y of you, Zander, but why the fuck are we having to listen to it? You drag us here, by fucking train, to… what? You said there was a trade you wanted to make? Some kind of fucking trade so that Eliza can get her kid back? It’s obviously not the diamond. You have that. Assume you had your paramilitary goon squad grab it up from the glass house in the woods?”