The round table discussion wasn’t going well for the town leaders, they were definitely scared of Vincent, though they could easily have killed him. However, that would bring rather swift and decisive retaliation from The City Club, and I think they realize that too. Vincent will be taking over the Shining Moon, though I’m not sure what that means exactly. Things likely wouldn’t change much and could get even worse. However, I already know the police are keeping track of The City Club and don’t want me to interfere with them directly.

I can do what I want with the people here, however, so that is good. Vincent has said I can take all the girls that are working here though, unless they would prefer to stay, but hopefully we can reunite them with their families, like with Chelsea. I asked TJ if she would like to be free or stay here and it didn’t look like she really believed me, so I had Katresa explain things to her. Apparently her parents had died from heart attacks in the same night, which sounds rather suspicious.

She is an only child, so were each of her parents. Hmm, Scott really does his homework and picks out girls from families and then kills the parents. I wonder how many underage girls he has here at the Shining Moon. Anyway, after Katresa talked with TJ, she then wanted to come with us rather than stay here. So I told Katresa to take TJ out to the limousine where she will be safe with Kitty and Sherry. Chelsea is still there too and doesn’t yet know about her family and the house fire.

We didn’t at this time either. Meanwhile, Aari and the Black Wolves came down the street where Chelsea’s home was located and noticed it burning with the firefighters sitting around drinking coffee and watching the fire, but doing nothing to fight it. An older woman was out there yelling at them so Aari stopped to see what was going on. The woman then told him what had happened and Aari had Carine communicate this information with me. “Now I know why you were a little late to this meeting chief Winters,” I said, “you went over and killed Chelsea’s family and then had the fire department set the house on fire to conceal the evidence.”

The look on his face was quite amazing. “That is all a lie!” he exclaimed. “No, it’s all the truth,” I said, “I guess that’s what you do with the families of all the girls that work for you Scott, that way they have nowhere to go if they run away from you. Of course you would normally have the Curator do the killing, but chief Winters sent him on a nice vacation to Las Vegas with lots of money to spend after he killed Miss Peterson’s family.

Notice that I was able to find the Curator quite easily chief Winters, how come you couldn’t do it? I did tell you before that have great resources at my disposal. Now, perhaps we can finish things by paying Miss Peterson the money you owe her, some $800,000. Let’s go get it from your safe, Scott.” “I already checked his safe,” said Vincent, “it had very little in it.” “Did you check both safes?” I asked. “Scott only told me about one safe,” said Vincent, as he looked over at Scott.

We then went to a back room, but only one safe was visible, and it wasn’t very big. “Behind that bookcase,” I said to Scott. Vincent looked at him too and soon a much larger safe was revealed and Scott opened it. There was quite a lot of cash in this one, plus drugs. Vincent had his men take all the cash out of the safe, about $2,000,000 worth. Vincent counted out the money for me, which the girls put in boxes and carried out to our car. The fight was over outside now so it was safe to take the money out.

I then gave an address to Vincent and told him this is the house where they kept the rest of The City Club’s property. “However, I had some of my people watching that house,” I said, “and a large truck came up and they took a number of large boxes out of the house, put them into the truck and drove away with it, escorted by some guys on motorcycles.” That got a lively argument going between the town leaders and finally Vincent stopped it. I then handed a piece of paper to chief Winters with a phone number on it.

“That’s the Curator’s phone number chief,” I said, “I’m surprised you didn’t know that, or maybe you did. Call him and find out where he put the bodies of Miss Peterson’s family. Then maybe I will let you live.” I then asked Scott where the other girls are kept and he told one of his men to show me. There were only three other women who chose to leave, so we took them back to the hotel with us. I quietly suggested to Vincent it might be a good idea for him to return to the hotel with us, to ensure his safety.

I think these people just might be foolish enough to try and kill Vincent. The night passed quickly, but without incident which was nice. After all, it was quite late by the time we returned to the hotel. We all went down for breakfast and everything was functioning normally with the assistant manager in charge. Apparently it is Mrs. Winslow, or whatever name she wants to use this week, is the true owner of this hotel, something that doesn’t surprise me.

Vincent and his two men came into the restaurant shortly after us and he asked to join us. “You are quite different than I would expect from the head of such a large organization,” he said to me, “perhaps you are someone else?” “My boyfriend built this organization himself,” said Ivy, “and he has always been a ‘hands on’ type of person, not someone who sits behind a desk. He likes to stay involved.”

“Yes, I can see that,” said Vincent, “The City Club has great resources too, just like you mentioned having, and we have discovered another large organization called The Investigators, who are also from France. They have a man as there leader and are an organization of women. Could you be one and the same?” Ivy looked at me, as did some of the girls close to us.

“Yes, we could be the same,” I said, “but we are not after you or The City Club. We want the murderers of Miss Peterson’s family and a few other families as well now. I would like to put these other people in prison if possible, but, if it comes to bringing in the state police, I will make sure they leave you alone.” “Do you have that much influence with the state police?” he asked.

“I can keep them away from you,” I said, “they don’t know you and you have been helpful to us.” “They might know me,” said Vincent, “I’m sure most police in this area have photos of the top people of The City Club.” “Perhaps,” I said, “but there are ways to keep you safe, including making sure you leave this town before I call in the police.” It was at that point chief Winters came in with some of that street gang, all of them carrying shotguns. “Good bye Vincent,” said Winters…

To Be Continued. ©2025 Steve McLeod.