Backstreet Hero by Justine Davis

Author:Justine Davis
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Silhouette
Published: 2008-10-13T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter 14

“It’s about ten times removed from firsthand hearsay,” Tony said.

John Draven looked at him and nodded. “I got that.”

“I’m just saying,” Tony said, a bit uncomfortable under his boss’s steady scrutiny.

“I know.”

“It made more sense that it was her ex,” he said, wondering if it sounded as lame as he felt it did. “Why would Chilton go after her? It’s not like she had anything to do with him going to prison. She just came in to clean up the mess he left behind.”

“If Chilton was man enough to come after the ones who really put him where he was, which would be Sam and Ian and me, he probably wouldn’t have done what he did in the first place.”

Tony couldn’t argue with that cogent and concise argument, so didn’t even try. “My contact’s going to set up a meet with the guy who was in the slam with Chilton. Later today, I hope. I’ll see if I can get any more.”

Draven nodded. And then, in a way that even Tony knew never would have happened before his marriage to Grace, he went on, almost conversationally. “Come in handy sometimes, those contacts.”

It struck Tony, not for the first time, that it was rather amazing that Draven hadn’t had using those contacts in mind from the moment he’d found out about him. In need of the distraction, he asked his boss something he’d always wondered.

“When you dug into my background sixteen years ago, how hard did you push Josh to toss me back where I belonged?”

Draven’s legendary cool didn’t waver. “Josh never asked me to do a background check on you.”

“But you did,” Tony said; he knew his boss well enough by now to know that unless directly ordered not to, Draven checked out everyone that might have access to his boss.

Draven’s mouth twitched. “Of course.”

“So?”

“I didn’t. It’s who Josh is, and it’s not my place or desire to change that.” He gave Tony a sideways look before adding, “I did push him to just give you that hand up, then let you sink or swim on your own.”

“But when I finished school he took me into Redstone instead.”

“I knew he would. I also knew you wouldn’t be happy at a desk job, no matter how much business or accounting they crammed into your head.”

“But you didn’t figure I’d end up working for you someday, did you, jefe?”

Draven gave a one-shouldered shrug. “Josh is the real boss. I do what he wants.”

Then, after a silent moment reminiscent of the old Draven, the onetime man of fewer words than anybody at Redstone except St. John, he again elaborated. “I didn’t want you here just because of where you came from.”

Tony’s brow furrowed at the ambiguity of the statement. “You didn’t want me because of that, or not only because of that?”

Draven’s mouth twitched again. “Yes,” he said. “The first because I thought that if I ever needed to send you back to the streets on a case, you might lose everything you’d gained.

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