Page 31 of Finding Elodie
Which was what he needed.
Without cops on his payroll, it was damn difficult to kill his enemies. His grandfather had had it easy compared to him. Paul had no idea how many men his grandfather had gotten rid of in his lifetime, but he hadn’t spent a single day behind bars for his actions, thanks to an army of law enforcement at his back.
Paul, conversely, had surrounded himself with loyal employees. People who did anything and everything he requested, including lying their asses off to the authorities when necessary. In return, they received generous salaries, nice places to live in the city, and became a part of his influential family.
But his private chef…
Paul had a lot of enemies. Shooting them was messy and noisy. And with all the cameras in the damn city, hit-and-runs would inevitably be captured on film.
But killing someone in the privacy of his home? Without them fighting back? Without the mark even knowing what was happening until it was too late? That was ideal. He could dump the bodies in the river and make it look like a drowning. Stick a syringe in their arm and leave the stiff in a back alley somewhere.
There were countless creative ways he could get rid of bodies once they were poisoned.
And Paul thought he’d found the perfect person to assist in his plan.
He’d been wrong.
Dead wrong.
When he’d approached his chef, explained what he wanted her to do…she’d had the gall to say no! To him.
She was in his house, and under his protection. She should’ve said “yes, sir,” and done what he’d asked. That was the only acceptable response.
All she had to do was put some of the arsenic he’d secured into one of the bowls of soup she’d been planning on serving for dinner. That was it. His mark had already been arrested a few times for selling drugs, so when his body was found, the cops would just assume he’d overdosed. It was the perfect plan—except for the bitch shaking her head and gaping at him in shock when he’d told her what to do.
Paul hadn’t been able to make her pay for such disloyalty right then and there; he’d had dinner guests waiting. But he’d definitely gotten his point across that she was in deep shit.
After his guests left, he’d planned on making doubly sure his chef understood she wasn’t allowed to say no to him. Ever. That she’d do anything he told her to do from now on.
But she’d bolted. Hadn’t even taken most of her belongings with her. No, the only thing she’d taken was a small bag…and she’d dumped the damn bottle of arsenic he’d left in the kitchen, in the hopes she’d come to her senses.
Stupid bitch. She was too stupid to even take the bottle with her…the only evidence.
But she still had something on him. Still knew his plan. And there was no way Paul Columbus was going to chance being taken down by a thirty-something mousy fucking cook. A dumb one at that.
Paul stood and paced his office, mumbling under his breath. Occasionally he gripped his hair tightly, his gait twitching as he walked back and forth. Small tells his son would have noticed in a heartbeat.
Paul knew his eldest son, Jerry, thought his old man was crazy—but he wasn’t. He’d do anything to safeguard his family and his name. And the fact that there was a woman out there who knew what he’d planned for his dinner guest, and who could go to the cops with her suspicions, was eating at him.
No, Paul didn’t think he was crazy, but he was paranoid. If his employees weren’t with him, they were against him.
Twitching nervously, Paul growled in frustration. He’d been searching for the damn chef for months. He’d thought he’d located her a couple times, only to be disappointed.
He hadn’t said anything to his son, or his head capo…his uncle, who was in charge of some of their soldiers. No, this was his fuckup, and he needed to make it right.
And as long as Elodie Winters was out there breathing, there was a chance she’d talk. Blab her mouth about what he’d asked her to do. She had information that could potentially bring him down. And for that—and for having the nerve to tell him no—she had to fucking die.
But first, he had to find her.
They’d located her in Pennsylvania and Los Angeles, but hadn’t been able to kill her before she’d disappeared both times. She had no family he could threaten her with. No real friends whose fingers he could chop off and mail to Elodie…not that he’d know where to mail them anyway.
The woman was a ghost. A ghost with no friends and no connections. He’d thought that would made her the perfect employee, but he’d been wrong. And Paul Columbus hated being wrong.
A knock on his door brought Paul out of his head. “Enter!” he called out.
Andrew stepped inside the office and closed the door behind him. Andrew was one of his capos, but he wasn’t related by blood. He was lower in rank than Paul’s uncle, loyal as hell, and Paul trusted him implicitly. He was the only one he’d trusted with his current problem, and Andrew had been working for months to find Elodie.
Andrew had a shit-eating grin on his face and looked way too fucking cheerful for Paul’s current mood.
