Page 93 of Reckless Seduction
“Fuck, I wonder if she actually ever knew the bitch’s name,” Kiernan spits. “It always seems to me like she just blocked it out.”
“Or forgot,” Ava chimes in. “If the woman wasn’t Bailey’s real mother, she would have no distinct memories of her. There wouldn’t have been a bond strong enough for her to remember.”
“What does the birth certificate say?” I ask. “The one that Crowe submitted to the adoption agency.” Kiernan shuffles through a small stack of papers we’ve kept on Bailey.
“Riley Jameson,” Kiernan reads out. My fingers fly across the keyboard. Bingo. “Riley Jameson, twenty-one, died of an overdose in her apartment in First Hill on May 2, 2000. Police were seen carrying a crying toddler from the scene.”
“Sounds like who we are looking for.”
“Jesus, her LiveJournal is still active.” I click on the link. “Fuck, this is old.” Riley Jameson’s page pops up on my screen, and I scroll through the old posts and photos. It is a mess. LiveJournal has been around since 1999 and predates sites such as MySpace and Friendster.
“There.” My father points to one of the photos. “That looks like Lina hanging off Eriksen’s arm, and that,” he says as his finger shifts to another woman I don’t recognize, “must be Riley Jameson.”
“They were club girls.”
“Look at how he holds them at a distance,” Ava interjects. “See how his arm isn’t actually touching them, but they are curled toward him? He is trying to keep his distance.”
“That would make sense,” Father agrees. “He married Elizabeth not long before this photo was taken.” It has been dated in the corner as having been taken in 1997. The year Bailey was born.
“I’m assuming Eriksen doesn’t know his new wife is the one who undoubtedly killed his late wife.”
My father shakes his head.
“But why were they all murdered?” Ava questions, her brow furrowed as she scrolls through the news release on the Vixen massacre. “If it was a personal vendetta, why kill the rest of them? That takes time and planning.”
“No one had a clue about why they were suddenly massacred,” Father admits. “But they didn’t have all the information we have. Bridgett managed to gather some information from one of the disgruntled bikers from Eriksen’s crew. Apparently, he’d been branded and removed for raping one of the biker bunnies who said no.”
Kiernan grunts in disgust. “That term gives me hives.”
I chuckle. “Kind of gives me furry vibes.”
Ava groans at the image. “Gross.”
Ignoring our antics, our father continues. “At nineteen, Eriksen was engaged to marry a Marilina Brandt, the daughter of another biker president. Then he met Elizabeth and fell in love. According to the biker, the marriage was called off. It shouldn’t have been that big of a deal. Eriksen hadn’t met the girl, and he managed to salvage the relationship with the other club and make an even better deal. Eriksen married Elizabeth in a private courthouse ceremony. Only for her to end up dead three years later. Bridgett managed to dig up a new marriage certificate. Lina Davenport married Toph Eriksen two years after Elizabeth’s death.”
“I’m betting Toph doesn’t know Lina Davenport is actually Marilina Brandt?”
Father sighs. “From what I was able to get out of the new president of Brandt’s chapter, she was thrown out after she killed one of their club girls in a jealous rage. Word is she was also selling flesh with some of the local traffickers for extra cash and drugs.”
“Why did she end up fixating on Elizabeth and Toph?” Ava wonders.
“Greed,” I presume. “And jealousy. Every picture I bring up that has Lina in it has her staring right at Toph as if he is her sun. It is never reciprocated.”
“I believe it started long before then.” My father drags out a photo from one of the folders he brought in. “When I was digging up information on Senator Crowe, I came across something I didn’t think held any value. Not until that photo of a younger Lina popped up. These two ladies look familiar?”
It is a college sorority photo taken in front of the University of Washington. Underneath it, the wordsbad bitches rule the worldare scrawled in sloppy loops. The same loops as Bailey’s resignation letter.
“You probably recognize two of them.” My father points to the two strawberry-blonde girls who are posed on either side of their raven-haired friend. “The one on the left is Sarah Bradshaw, Crowe’s wife. Marilina Brandt is the one on the right. The dark-haired one in the middle is Bailey’s mother, Elizabeth. They met their freshman year of college in an economics class. All three of them were studying finance and business.
“Later that year, they joined Alpha Delta Pi, where they met Elias Ward and Richard Crowe, members of Sigma Nu. From what Bridgett has been able to piece together, the three girls had a falling out after a disastrous frat party one night, where the police were called. Elizabeth alleged that Richard Crowe, Sarah’s boyfriend, drugged and raped her that night with his fraternity brothers while her friends stood and watched.”
“Jesus.” I am going to be sick.
“The case is buried, of course.” My father waves a hand dismissively. “The Crowe family was untouchable, even back then, and so was Ward. Everyone knew that Ward was connected to the Romano Don, and Dante’s father wasn’t to be messed with.”
“What happened after that?” Ava asks curiously, sipping on the coffee she brought down with her.
“She unenrolled from college and started the Vixens. She met Eriksen somewhere along the way, seemingly mended bridges with Lina, and the rest is history.” He shrugs. “But what is really important was what the Vixens MC fought against, because I believe that was part of the reason they all ended up dead.”
