I don’t know why I ever thought it was a good idea to fuck that up.

Except that my dad and I are sinking. I can’t bear to drag Vic down with us. If we can’t give him the future he deserves, then somebody else has to do it.

So I rip open the envelope and I pull out the results.

It takes me a minute to understand what I’m looking at.

Subject 1: Victor Rivera.

Subject 2: Unknown Female.

21.6% shared, 29 segments.

Possible Relationships: Uncle/Niece, Aunt/Nephew, Grandfather/Granddaughter, Grandmother/Grandson, Half-Siblings.

Right. The test can’t tell the age of the subjects, so it’s just guessing how they might be related. But I know Victor and Bella. Bella’s not his aunt, or his grandmother. Which means . . . she’s definitely his half-sister.

I let out a long sigh. I don’t know whether to be relieved, or deeply unhappy.

I think I’m leaning toward the latter.

You could tear it up right now. Throw it in the trash. Never tell anybody.

I could do that. But I’d be doing it for me. Not for Vic.

I give myself five minutes to feel a sense of loss. Then I stuff the paper back into the envelope and square my shoulders.

I’m going home to take a shower. Then I’m going to track down Raymond Page. I’m going to make him listen to me this time—even if I have to stuff that envelope right down his throat.

I get back to Alliance Bank just in time for Raymond’s lunch break.

This time I’m a little smarter. I cleaned myself up, putting on the one nice dress I own—it’s black, and I wore it to my grandma’s funeral, but it helps me fit in a little better in this neighborhood. I wait outside the bank, then follow Raymond to his restaurant of choice, staying back a good half-block so he won’t catch sight of me.

He leaves the building at almost exactly the same time as before, with a different employee by his side this time—a pudgy guy with glasses, who keeps trying to read information to Raymond out of a folder, while simultaneously trying to match Raymond’s long stride which forces him to jog alongside his boss.

Raymond takes no account of the pedestrians in his path. He plows straight ahead, trusting the self-preservation of everybody else who has to jump out of his way.

He enters a fancy-looking seafood place called La Mer. I watch through the window while the hostesses practically fall all over themselves to greet and seat him.

When I enter, they give me a much less friendly, “Can I help you?”

“I’m here with Uncle Ray,” I say, pointing in the direction that Page disappeared.

“Oh,” the girl says. “I’ll take you to the table.”

“That’s okay,” I say, pushing past her. “I want to surprise him.”

As I sneak up to Raymond’s table, I see the pudgy guy take a quick sip of his water, then hurry over to the bathroom.

Perfect.

I slip into the booth opposite Page. He barely glances up at first, thinking it’s just his buddy back already. Then he sees me sitting across from him, and his expression changes from mild surprise to pure fury.

“You’d better have an extremely good reason for bothering me again,” he hisses.

“You didn’t bother to ask what I wanted the first time,” I tell him.

“I don’t give a damn what you want,” he says, his dark eyes narrowed. They’re the only striking feature in an otherwise craggy face. The lashes that are so pretty on Vic are utterly disturbing on Raymond. They make him look like a creepy doll—the kind that would sit on a shelf in a horror movie, then come alive at night to stab you.

But I can’t let him intimidate me. I’m here for Vic, not for myself.

“Maybe your wife would be interested in what I have to say,” I tell him. “Unless she’s okay with you cheating on her.”

Raymond doesn’t like that at all.

His hand whips across the table, seizing me by the wrist.

“You think you can threaten me?” he hisses. “Do you have any FUCKING clue who I am?”

I refuse to wince, no matter how hard he tries to twist my arm.

“I know exactly who you are,” I tell him. “That’s why I’m here.”

With my free hand, I pull the envelope out of my pocket and slide it across the table toward him. I’ve already scanned the test results, in case he tries to tear it up or something.

“What the fuck is this?” Raymond says.

Without waiting for my answer, he pulls out the paper and reads it in a glance.

I covered over Vic’s name with a black sharpie, but the rest of the information is there.

“Explain,” Raymond says curtly.

“You have a son,” I tell him. “I compared his DNA with Bella’s.”

I see his eyes flick up quickly from the page, then back down again.

It’s hard to read his expression. He’s angry, obviously. But he lets go of my wrist, reading more closely.

I wonder if he’s actually pleased at the idea?

Bella is his only child, as far as I know. He doesn’t seem to give much of a shit about her. Maybe he always wanted a boy?

“Who is this supposed son?” he says.

I hesitate. I was going to tell him. But now I’m realizing that I could be creating a dangerous situation for Vic. I don’t know Page at all. Except that he’s connected to a whole bunch of criminals, and he himself isn’t afraid to break the law.

“I’m not going to tell you that right now,” I say.

“Why not?”

“Because I want to know your intentions, first.”

Raymond lets out a barking laugh. “My intentions?”

“That’s right.”

Raymond’s colleague has returned to the table. He’s a short, tubby guy with a carefully-trimmed beard and an expensive suit that still doesn’t fit him very well. His tinted glasses look like the kind Tony Stark wears, but a lot less cool.

He stops short when he sees me occupying his seat.

“Oh, hello . . .” he says, awkwardly.

Without looking at him, Raymond says, “Go wash your hands again, Porter.”

“Right,” Porter says, turning around on his heel and marching back to the bathrooms without a second glance.

“You’ve got your employees well-trained,” I say.

“You can’t even imagine what I could tell him to do,” Raymond says, in an icy tone. “If I asked him to drag you out of this restaurant and throw you directly into oncoming traffic, I wouldn’t even have to say ‘please.’ ”

My skin is clammy. I desperately want to blink, but I won’t let myself drop his stare for a second. Men like this feed off of fear.

“Look,” I say. “It’s pretty clear that you don’t like being inconvenienced. I won’t waste your time. You got an escort pregnant, and now you’ve got a son. He has no interest in creating some big public scandal. Neither do I. I don’t know what you’d owe in child support—probably some insane number. We’re not greedy—I’m just asking for a one-time payment to make this disappear, permanently. Fifty thousand for your son’s education. And you never have to hear from either of us ever again.”