“I have no idea what that means, either. You’re talking in code. I’m a direct person, Detective. If you have something to say to me, please just say it.”
“All right, then. Kayden wasn’t in that alleyway going to the damn supermarket, as he claimed. He was after something, and he ended up with you. So either he’s helping you hide something—”
“Hide something?” I demand indignantly.
“. . . or he’s after something he thinks you can give him,” he continues. “If the latter is true, what do you think will happen when he finally gets it?”
I want to lean away, to withdraw, so I flatten my hands on the table and lean forward. “I know why you hate him.”
“What happens when he gets what he wants?”
“How do you know I’m not what he wants?” I challenge.
“I have no doubt he wants you, but my question is why?”
“Insulting me isn’t going to win you points here.”
“I don’t want points,” he bites out. “I want justice.”
“You want revenge,” I say. “And you want it to the point that it’s illogical and scary. Do you even care if you hurt other people to hurt him?”
“I care if he hurts other people.”
“And yet you’re hurting Giada by using her.”
“You’re very hung up on Giada. She clearly worries you.”
There’s an implication of more than sisterly worry that I decide is going no place good, so I sidestep it. “Why am I here, Detective?”
He reaches down to his seat and sets a file on the table. “It’s time you understand who, and what, he is.” He opens the file and sets a picture in front of me, of a man in his mid-forties. “Do you know who this is?”
“I do not.”
“He’s my boss.” He slides the picture down the table but still facing me, setting another one in front of me. This one is of a younger man, mid-thirties maybe, with dark, curly hair. “What about this man? Do you know him?”
“No,” I answer honestly.
“His name is Raul Martinez, and he’s the leader of a Mexican cartel that’s in bed with the Italian mafia.”
I don’t react to this information, but he’s too close for comfort. “Why are you telling me this?”
His answer is to flip over another photo that turns my stomach—and it’s all I can do not to react. “What about him? Do you know him?”
“No. I don’t know any of these people.”
“Niccolo Bulgari,” he supplies. “The leader of the Italian mafia. And do you know what all of these men have in common?” His reply is to start turning over photos of Kayden with each of the men. “Kayden is what they have in common.”
I glance at the photos and then at Gallo. “Do you know all of these men?”
“It’s my job to know them.”
“So those men all have you in common as well, right?”
His jaw clenches and he turns over another photo. “This man,” he says, indicating a tall, thin man in an impressive suit, “is a politician believed to have killed his wife.” He shoves a photo of Kayden talking to the man in front of me. “That was taken right after she died,” he continues. “For all we know, Kayden killed her.”
“Kayden didn’t kill her,” I snap, not sure what the explanation is for this and wishing I knew.
“And you know this how?”