Twenty
Kitty
“This makes no sense,” I whispered mainly to myself, as Phantom and Gadget who typed away on their computers. When I looked at the file, I expected to see an actual name, like Bill, Dave, or James…not Sandman. And to top everything else off, there wasn’t even a picture. Nope, just a single name typed with a birth date of April 9th, 1998.
Without an actual name, I was screwed. But then again, so was Caroline, so that was a plus. God only knew where she was and what she was planning. I had to find my brother before she did. That was a fact, but I didn't know where to start with only the name Sandman to go off of.
“Call her, Kitty,” Lena said as she continued to do what she did with that damn computer of hers. “I’ve gone through all the damn files on that SD Card. There are no references to Sandman in any of them, but the one file you saw. I can do an actual deep web search, but the results will be in the thousands with a vague name. You need to call your mother. That little shit Sypher fixed our phone problem. So, we can communicate with each other freely now.”
“I know,” I said, smirking, remembering the call I just had with Dylan. I was so happy to hear his voice but not so delighted to find out he was up moving about. It had only been three weeks since he was hurt. He still needed to rest and heal.
I wanted so much to call my mom and hear Hailey’s gibberish. I needed to know she was okay. Mentally, I knew she was, but I just couldn’t risk it. Until this mess was over, I would have to trust that my mother and daughter were safe.
“I can’t call her Phantom. I just can’t.”
“Okay, then what do you suggest, because I am out of options.”
“What about my father? My biological one? Do we have anything on him?”
“Well, until I have a name, I can’t search anything. Look, Kitty, I searched the name, Xavier Goldman. Yes, he served with William Doherty in Vietnam, but that’s all I’ve found. I know where he was born and when he enlisted. But after his service, the man evaporated. There is nothing on him, not even a marriage certificate. For all intense and purposes, the man never existed.”
“How can that be. The land, the money?”
“All in William Doherty’s name.”
“Shit.”
“Whatever game Caroline and Diablo are playing, they are good. They erased everything. You need to call your mother and have her give you a name. Anything I can use to find your brother.”
“Well, you could call Toxic,” Gadget muttered, typing away.
Both Phantom and I looked at the kid.
When Gadget looked up, he sputtered, “Um, I just meant, well, Toxic was friends with Shane Keller, your step-dad. He is the President of the Flordia Chapter, right? He might know something.”
“How do you know that?” I asked, walking over to him as he typed something into his computer and pulled up a picture. “It’s in your dad’s file. See,” There on the screen was a picture of my dad, Shane Keller, Nitro and Toxic. The three of them were in New York and were smiling while they straddled their bikes.
“When was this taken?”
“I would say sometime shortly after September 2001. Look, you can still see the rubble from the Trade Towers in the background.”
“I would have been born then.”
“Yep.”
Reaching for my phone, I looked at Phantom. “What do I ask? If he is working with Caroline, I don’t want to tip him off.”
“I don’t know, Kitty. You’re going to have to take a leap of faith on this one. In your whole life, have you ever known Toxic to do anything against the club?”
“No, but he wasn’t part of the main chapter. I didn’t even know my dad knew him.”
“The call is yours. Trust him or not, but without information were stuck.”
And that was the rub. For so long, I had been methodical with who I trusted and put my faith in. My list was small, like I could count them on the one hand, small. Trusting someone out of the blue was never easy for me, and generally, I avoided it like the plague. Trusting people never got me anywhere in life, and the few I did trust, I kept at arm’s length.
My own husband and mother still didn’t know everything. They knew enough to keep them safe, but not the whole story. Too many secrets, lies, and deaths surrounded me, and to just throw caution to the wind, was not something I was eager to do.
No, I needed a plan. I needed to talk to Toxic and see him for myself when I asked him questions. One thing my dad told me growing up was that the eyes were the gateway to the soul. A person could be the nicest person on the planet and could still stab you in the back.