Chapter 15

"You see, Jo, I'm not from Ganghaven." Ash admitted, "I'm from Gulden."

Jo's eyes flashed with an "I told you so'' look but she refrained from saying anything when she saw the sad smile that was fixed on his face.

"I grew up super comfortable, I didn't lack anything I wanted," Ash continued, "Had the best teachers, best designers, best cars. I was the envy of the private schools I attended."

Jo scowled, "The best of the girls, too?"

After she said that, she winced at how insecure it sounded.

Ash looked at her, "Well, yeah," he shrugged, "But even then, I wasn't interested in meaningless encounters."

That he hadn't been promiscuous or anything soothed Jo.

"I went to an Ivy League University and got a bachelor's degree in Business Administration; I was hoping to take over my father's business." Ash said bitterly.

"What about your mother?" Jo asked.

"I never knew my mother. My father showed me her headstone and I sometimes visited her grave. Not because I missed her, but because it seemed like the right thing to do." Ash said.

"One day, my father told me to go to a business dinner with a prospective business partner in his stead. That day, I was so happy that my father had trusted me enough to give me such an important task. It meant I'd pleased him.

I wore my best suit, memorized facts and figures that would make me look smart, and even got a haircut I thought looked professional."

Jo smiled at his élan.

Ash continued "During the meeting, in the middle of my great pitch, a waitress interrupted us, asking me if I were Katie's son. I was so embarrassed. I asked her who Katie was, an instead if replying, she kept shouting, "OMG! It's Katie's son." My dinner guest got angry and asked the woman to move or he'd get her fired.

At the mention of her job on the line, she cleared the spot. My guest asked me if I knew who she was, and I said I did not.

The meeting continued, but the woman's words had become indelibly etched on my mind at that moment.

At first, I dismissed her as a loony drugie. I mean the name on my mother's headstone was Margaret, not Katie.

But after a while, my curiosity got the better of me and I went back to the restaurant, asking to see her. I hoped she'd say something like she'd mistaken me for someone else.

When I got to the restaurant, the manager told me she'd quit. I didn't let that stop me. I hired a private eye who traced her to a ramshackle condo here in Ganghaven.

At the time, she was living with her disabled husband. When I knocked on her door, she was so scared that I'd come to visit her. For some reason only known to her, she thought I'd brought danger to her doorstep.

But I reminded her she was the one who'd approached me in the restaurant. She told me it was a mistake she regretted, and begged me to leave.

I told her I was going nowhere until she told me all she knew, and that if she wanted me gone, she should start talking already."

Ash stopped talking as he tried to swallow a lump in his throat. Jo took his hand that was on the table in hers and squeezed it reassuringly, a non-verbal statement that she was there for him.

"I got my wish and she began to talk. She talked and talked and brought out an old stack of pictures to corroborate her story." Ash said.

"She told me a tale of my father. She said my father among other unscrupulous things, was a sex trafficker. His catchment ground was Ganghaven.

She told me how my father had recruited two naïve girls eager to get away from the poverty the grew up in.

She was sent to a high-class brothel in Gulden while my mother, who my father deemed beautiful became his own personal whore.

When my mother got pregnant with me, he supported her all the way but when I arrived, things changed.

He took me away from my mother saying that his child wouldn't be raised by a whore.

Apparently, my mother refused, and blackmailed him, telling my father that if he didn't hand me over, she'd show the world the real him.

Some days after that, my mother met with a horrible accident, a hit and run. The driver was never found. Nobody went to the morgue to claim her body, the waitress said.

When I asked her why she didn't, she said at the time, she wasn't aware that my mother was dead, she was being held against her will at the brothel until there was a police raid.

At that time, my mother's body had disappeared from the morgue."

Jo stared at Ash in shock. She knew it was hard to get over the fact that everything you've been told since you were born was a lie.

"So what did you do?" She asked soothingly.

Ash looked away, "I confronted my father with the news expecting him to deny it, but he didn't. Instead he told me he'd been meaning to tell me about the nature of some of his businesses for some time.

When I asked him how his conscience could allow him treat people the way he did, he laughed. The bastard fucking laughed.

You know what he told me? He told me not to act so sanctimonious, that all the trappings of life I enjoyed as his son, were paid for with the aid of his not-so-nice businesses.

I threatened to expose him, and he told me to go right ahead, it was his word against mine and that nobody would believe me.

I knew he was right, so I decided to stop him through another means. I decided to come to Ganghaven and shut down his business no matter how long it took.

When I arrived here, I saw that his prostitution ring was only a tip of the iceberg. My father was involved in almost every sordid business. Drug dealing, blackmail, extortion, kidnapping, you name it.

I decided to go under the radar and form a gang of my own whose work would be to hinder my father's businesses from operating."

Jo looked at him with awe and squeezed his hand again, "It's so brave and altruistic of you to actually do what you do."

Ash brought her fingers to his lips, "I figure it's the least I could do to atone for the crimes my father committed."

Jo respected the hell out of him at that moment, she thought. Sure, on a normal day, she respected him, but now, her respect had increased exponentially. It took a lot of guts to leave the lap of luxury. She knew many people would have joined Ash's father in a heart beat, but not him.

"Do I know your father?" Jo asked.

"Yep. Everyone knows him," Ash replied.

"Who is he?"

Ash sighed, "Josiah Greenwood."

"No!" Jo said, wide-eyed.

"Yes," Ash said quietly.

"First of all, you look nothing like him," Jo stressed.

"Yes." Ash nodded, "Thankfully, I took after my mother."

"Secondly, Josiah Greenwood is the most philanthropic soul I've ever known. I mean, Greenwood Charity was one of the few charity organizations that agreed to come down to Ganghaven when I pled with them." Jo said in disbelief.

"Make no mistake," Ash said, gritting his teeth, "Josiah Greenwood is a wolf in sheep's clothing. He goes around, parading himself as a messiah when in all actuality, he's a vile entity who puts money over people's lives and dignity."

"I believe you." Jo said.

"Thank you. That means a lot to me." Ash said as he took their plates to the tiny sink, before returning to gently pull Jo up and lead her towards the bedroom.

"I thought we were going to do the dishes." Jo said as she willingly walked with him.

The look he gave her made her wet, "Oh, they can wait."

* * *

Andrea moved out of Lieutenant Baines' way. The man was shouting and shoving at anyone who stood in his way.

Andrea thought frustration was not a good look on him, but was it ever a good look on anyone? She could understand Baines' frustration though; J-Cane had been hauled in and interrogated, and he'd denied shooting Detective Salvador.

In the process, J-Cane had also absolved Jo and Ash of any part in the murder; according to him, they weren't even around at the time.

He'd pinned the murder on the Hatter, the disguised man who was also J-Cane's seller.

To Baines, that meant three of his suspects were gone, and the remaining one was a phantom.

Andrea hurried after him, "Sir!"

"What is it, rookie?" Baines replied without stopping, the vein on his forehead popping.

"Sir, about our first two suspects; Asher Mason and Jocelyn Turner." Andrea said.

"What about them?" Baines asked angrily.

"What J-Cane said in the interrogation room proves them innocent. We're pulling the APB and the bounty right?" Andrea asked hopefully.

Baines stopped and scowled at her, "Okay, rookie. Listen up. The day I take the word of a street gangster with anything more than a pinch of salt is the day I die.

How do we even know he's telling the truth, huh? He could be covering for his buddies. They're all gangsters, aren't they?"

Andrea frowned, "But, sir. Looking at the evi-"

"No buts, rookie. Until I get a confession from one or more of them, the bounty stays." Baines said.

"Also, I want an APB on this Hatter. Put a bounty on him too. He thinks he's smart walking around in that disguise of his." Baines muttered as he walked away.

Andrea shook her head. For how long would Jo and Ash be on the run? Although she didn't know how, she knew the second camera the precinct had laid hands on came from them, as a way to clear their names.

If anyone deserved a win, it was those two. She hated to be the one to tell Jo that their plan hadn't worked out.

She decided to get it over with and pulled out her phone.

* * *

Jo and Ash were lying entwined on the bed, too lethargic to move when their cell phones rang simultaneously.

Each scrambled to their respective devices and answered their calls.

Jo grinned when she discovered it was Andrea calling, "Hi girl, what's up?"

"Jo, it was you and Ash who gave us the second camera, right?" Andrea asked.

Jo's grin vanished and she became worried, "Yes. Is anything wrong?"

"Well, we took a look at it and we were able to ID J-Cane. We hauled him in for questioning, and he said it was the Hatter that killed Salvador." Andrea said.

"Yes, he told us too." Jo said impatiently, wondering where the conversation was leading to. She had a premonition it wasn't anywhere nice.

"So our lieutenant doesn't want to call off the bounty. He said he doesn't believe J-Cane. Wherever you two are, remain there and remain safe." Andrea advised.

Jo couldn't believe her ears, "You mean to tell me that everything we went through to get that camera to the precinct was for nothing?"

"Um, not really. At least, the other cops know it wasn't you." Andrea said, trying to placate Jo.

Jo was having none of it, "Tell that to your boss!" She raged, before she took a deep breath and said, "I'm sorry for shouting at you, Andrea. It's not your fault that I'm in this mess. I know you're trying to help."

"I understand. I know how frustrated you must be, but take solace in the fact that at least you're not sexually frustrated." Andrea said, trying to infuse humor into the conversation.

"Yeah," Jo said. That much was true, she thought. With that, she hung up.

At the same time, Ash returned with his phone in a tight grip. His face showed barely concealed anger.

"Who was that?" Jo asked him.

"It was Pascal. Yours?" Ash asked, trying to suppress his anger.

"It was Andrea."

"So we probably received the same news." Ash said as he sat down dejectedly on the bed.

"If by that you mean that they aren't going to call off the APB and the bounty despite the evidence we got for them, then yeah, we received the same news," Jo said, joining him.

"I can't believe this. We're innocent. Why is it so hard for them to fathom? That we're from Ganghaven does not automatically make us murderers." Ash ranted.

Jo put a hand on his shoulder to comfort him.

He placed his hand on hers, "We can't go on like this, I don't want to go on like this, always looking over our shoulders. In fact, I'm tired of it."

"Then we have to clear our names ourselves. We have to present the police with evidence so unshakable, they'll have no other option but to call off the bounties and the APBs." Jo said firmly.