Three of the four chuckled, while the fourth, a crotchety old veteran of the muckraking style who’d cut his teeth in the old George W. Bush days, glowered. Then again, I had never seen the man with anything other than some sort of scowl on his face, so I wasn't that surprised. He was also the one I had to watch the most, as he tended to ask the most off the wall questions.
"Before we begin, I'll make an official statement. Last night, there was a report of an assault on two men in the area of the city known as the Playground. Sadly, this isn’t that unusual, as even with the best efforts of our police and social services, the Playground is an area with a crime problem. As for any additional speculation as to the nature of the attacker or attackers, we are not able to verify anything at this time."
Tim Gass, one of the two network anchors, raised his hand. "Excuse me Andrea, but is City Hall saying that this isn't a vigilante attack?"
"The police are treating this just like any other assault case," I said. "As for any alleged vigilante, well, all cases of vigilantism are treated with the utmost seriousness by the police."
Tim smiled and nodded. Next was Robbie Petersen, who was from the local hippie rag. She was big into activist journalism, but her style was more bombast than actual investigative journalism. She’d gone to university as a journalism major, and had actually gotten herself fired from the campus newspaper for being too inflammatory on her writing. Even when she wasn't being assigned an editorial, she wrote with an editorial slant that made the facts secondary to her predetermined position. As such, it actually made her easier to deal with, she wasn't going to listen to what I had to say anyway. "Miss Bylur, isn't this dismissal of the vigilante claims by the victim nothing more than another example of the classism and dismissal of the claims by young minorities in this city by the powers that be?"
"Thank you for a great question, Robbie," I answered with a grin. "As always, you make a great point. Now, I don’t know how you can claim any form of prejudice as by most of the cases that you claim are being done by this vigilante or vigilantes, there seems to be no correlation among the victims. By the count you used last time, adding in this one, the supposed vigilantes have involved themselves with members of every racial group in the city, as well as most of the socio-economic groups as well. In fact, the only consistent factor amongst the so-called victims is that subsequent investigation by the police department shows that they are engaged in criminal activity. Or at least, they were engaged in criminal activity."
"Perhaps by police files they were criminals, but according to my sources..." Robbie began, and I broke a rule and cut her off.
"Yes, your sources, including some of the underlings of the criminals that have been busted. Such as Ramon Esperanza, who was one of the lieutenants in the largest street gang in the city before being busted by the so-called vigilantes. Or perhaps you mean Tyquan Roberts, who was a self-professed pimp king, and had a nasty habit of cutting girls who didn't please him. I believe the term for Tyquan's favorite punishment is the Glasgow smile, isn't it?"
I’d busted Tyquan personally, and I had to admit it was as much a pleasure as it was a service to take him down. I'd seen what he'd done to some of his girls, including one girl who had to have her jaw surgically reattached after his smile treatment went too deep and cleaved the right upper portion of her mandible in half. Even with treatment and surgeries paid for under the MJT charitable banner, the poor girl was never going to be able to speak properly again for the rest of her life. The cause for such a harsh penalty? Tyquan had suspected her of withholding a ten dollar tip a John had given her on top of her normal fee. My only regret in taking him down was that I hadn't broken more bones in doing so.
In any case, the response shut Robbie up. I looked around, and was glad that the other reporters didn't have anything to say. They'd probably crib some notes from the press release itself as well as re-listen to their recordings to get something for any story they were writing about the issue. I was glad that the vigilante story didn't get a lot of traction within the local media except for the fringe areas. I think a lot of it came down to the fact that a lot of the older media, cops and others in the city remembered what the city was like before Dad and Uncle Pat started cleaning up the place. They remembered the Confederation and the Union and all the other stuff. They didn't want a return of those days. Since the stories of a vigilante or vigilantes traced back to beginning of the fall of the Confederation, it had become kind of a superstition around the city. Don't talk about the vigilantes, or else they might go away.
After the meeting was finished, I caught up with Dad for lunch. "How was your press conference?"
"You guys picked the right girl to handle it," I said with a chuckle. I looked at Dad's lunch, a simple lettuce wrap with tuna and sprouts. "Watching what you eat for some reason?"
Dad laughed and took a bite. "Hey, I'm not as active as I used to be, remember? And I want to look good for my only daughter's wedding. Remember, I get to give you away, and I want to look good doing it. Besides, gotta’ keep your mother's attention somehow."
I guffawed. “Please, you know mom has never had eyes for another man. Are you just trying to make sure you're in shape for when Carter and I are on our honeymoon?"
"Keeping up with Riley is going to be tough," Dad said with a chuckle. "Especially in trying to keep him under control. He reminds me a lot of Patrick back then. The same sort of lack of seriousness."
"Let's hope that you don't have to put him through the same level of trauma to get him to calm down."
Dad shook his head. “Your mother would never put up with that."
Chapter Four
Riley
I looked at my suit, which I hadn't worn fully in nearly a year, with a mix of anticipation and trepidation. After the physical ass-kicking Carter had put me through that morning, I wondered if I was ready to go back out on the streets yet.
"Sweetie?"
I turned and saw Mom coming up the stairs to the Bell Tower. Even though Sophie Bylur was in her late forties now, the practical side of me said that Mom was still a beautiful woman. "Hey Mom."
"What're you doing?" she said, then saw me with my outfit. Different from Andi or Carter's, who favored color motifs that barely broke up the dark blacks and grays of their suits, mine was mostly color, although as a nod to Dad's insistence on stealth above all else, the majority of it was midnight blue. The speckles of white throughout the side panels and back were just part of what earned me my nickname of Blizzard. "Oh, I see. How are you feeling for tonight?"
"Worried," I said. It's funny, but Mom is the one person in our household that I've never tried to bullshit or not tell the total truth to. With everyone else, there was always this sort of unspoken need to not show any concern or fear. But with Mom, I never even considered it. "Carter kicked my ass this morning."
"I know, I saw," she said. When I blinked in surprise she laughed. "I can still move around silently when I want to, Riley. I figured you and Carter would have some honest conversation, and I didn't want to interrupt it. When I saw you struggling with the bar, I knew to stay back."
Mom grew serious, not allowing me to respond. "I know you're worried. I was too the first time I ever went out on a mission. It scared the hell out of me."
I'd never heard about this before, and set my suit down to listen more carefully. She had an intense look on her face that I’d never seen before, and I knew whatever she said next would be important. "After rescuing me, Mark and I were trying to just run from the Confederation when we got a call from Tabby. She'd been taken hostage, and was being held at a night club, the same club that Mark and I met at, in fact. We ended up saving her from six or seven men. I hadn't had any training yet, I wasn't in shape, none of it. But I still went."
"That's because it was Tabby," I said. She and Mom had always been closer than sisters, and you could tell that the reason the Bylurs and the McCafferys still lived in the same house was because of them. "You would take on the devil hims
elf for her."
"And my family would be right beside me,” Mom reassured me. "What I'm trying to say Riley, is that despite Carter's misgivings, I know you. You're my son, and I know more about how you feel than perhaps anyone. You're a lot like me, and I know that your heart is in the right place. You'll do fine tonight."
Mom gave me a hug, and I felt comforted. "Thanks, Mom. I'll do my best."
"You better," she said. "I don't want you getting hurt before you bring your girlfriend by for dinner. I only talked to her for a little bit that night of the party, but she seems like a nice girl."
"She is, Mom. And I know you'll like her too."
* * *
I was nervous a week later as I waited outside Janet's house in my old Mercedes. It was a refitted job, so the self-drive wasn’t part of the original setup. As such, the steering wheel and controls were still the classic size, although there was a computer shunt in the system that disabled them unless there was an emergency. I could’ve afforded a more modern car, hell I could have bought a brand new Bentley. But, as I was officially a Bylur, that meant I had to live like my family didn't have a billion plus dollars in our bank accounts.
Not that it mattered. Sure, it took the occasional jump through an extra hoop to make it look legitimate, but I had never worried about it. Tabby and Patrick were great about it, and inside the house we lived as one large extended family. Carter and Barbara were as much my siblings as Andrea was. Only outside the house did there have to be any sort of separation between us, and that was damn small.
It didn't matter to Janet, who I was waiting on. I was unexpectedly apprehensive as I sat at the curb, looking at her house. It was on the north side of town, not in the worst neighborhood, but not the best either. Janet shared the house with three other girls, and while I'd been invited in before, I was too nervous that night for dealing with the other three.
Seeing Janet come out of the house in her cute little black dress, I didn't care. Turning on a heel, her skirt flared just a little bit, and I got a nice look of her thigh, a little surge going down to my pants. Janet didn't understand how she affected me, and I hadn't worked up the guts to tell her in plain language yet. I was kind of hoping things would just develop organically, or at least as organically as anything ever did in my family. There are certain things that don't get talked about with people without serious consideration.
I got out of my car and came up the short concrete walk, taking her hand. "You look gorgeous."
She blushed, accepting my compliment. "Thanks. I had to borrow it from Penny, but she was happy about it when she found out why."
I pulled Janet in for a hug, relishing the feeling of her curves under my hands. She never acknowledged it, but Janet was one of the cutest girls I'd ever seen. Not only did she have curves in all the right places, but a smile that could light up a room. The only shame of it all was that she hid it so often underneath a thick layer of shyness.
On the other hand, it may have been that shyness that attracted me to her. I'd cultivated a well-deserved reputation as a playboy, having wined and dined my way through most of the A-list girls in the city, and then again at Harvard. I wasn't a bad-boy per se, but more of a serial dater.
It wasn't that I intended to be a player, I just never was able to find a woman who interested me past the first date, or at worst, the first time we went to bed together. So many of them were self-absorbed, thinking they were goddesses when the only difference between them and every other girl in the world was usually a few surface changes and the size of their bank accounts. If any of the girls that I dated wanted to meet a goddess, I'd happily introduce them to my mother or my sister.
But Janet was different. If anything, she underestimated her looks and ability, refreshingly so. She didn't kiss my ass either, and I appreciated that. Instead, she just said thank you meaningfully when she thought I did something nice for her, and listened when I spoke. She really listened too, and didn't just wait for her turn to talk. I tried my hardest to reciprocate. My mother hadn't raised a disrespectful fool, after all.
"Regardless of whose it is, you make it look beautiful," I said, kissing her on the cheek. I wanted to take her to bed so much, but at the same time I didn't want to rush things. I was looking for the time when she was ready, and not try to push things like I always had before. "Seriously, my sister is going to be jealous."
"I doubt that. I've seen her, remember? But thank you for the compliment anyway. Come on, lets get going before I lose my nerve."
I chuckled and held the door open for Janet, who took the passenger seat and buckled in while I went around to the driver's seat. I punched in my destination and the car pulled away, gliding with traffic. I waited to make sure things were going well before pushing back from the steering wheel. "You know, you don't have to be nervous. You've already met Mom, after all."
"For all of about thirty seconds the night I met you," Janet said with a little smile. "Although I do owe her a thank you for introducing us. But there's a difference between talking for thirty seconds with the lady of the house and sitting down for dinner with the most powerful family in the city. I mean, Tabby McCaffery is like the woman I wanted to be when I was in junior high school."
I laughed despite myself. “Tabby’s just like any other person in the world. She has her share of quirks and weird stuff about her just like you do. And my Mom is no different.”
I dug into my suit pocket and pulled out my phone, quickly flipping through the files. I'd downloaded one specifically for Janet, after getting Mom's permission, of course. "Take a look."
Janet took my phone and looked. "Who . . . wait, this is your mother?"
"Yep," I said with a laugh. It was one of the only photos of Mom before she became Joanna Smith then Joanna Bylur that I could use, since it didn't have any identifying marks. Since according to her official biography, she hadn't met Tabby until after her and Dad were married, pics of the two of them enjoying the single life in the city as undergrads were verboten. "That was taken exactly two months before she met Dad. Look like anyone you know?"
The resemblances were striking. Janet's hair was nearly exactly the same as Mom's natural color. Sure, some wise-ass could make a few Oedipus complex comments, but I really didn't give a shit. I liked Janet for who she was, not her resemblance to my mother.
"Okay, point taken," Janet said, handing me back my phone. “Riley, do me a favor. Pinch me if I say or act stupid tonight, at least?"
"Just be yourself, and there won't be any problems about that," I said with a laugh. Taking Janet's hand, I kissed the back of it, looking her in her beautiful brown eyes. “I know we've taken things slow, probably against my reputation, but don't doubt that I'm not interested in more.”
Janet blushed again. "Uhm, Riley, I guess I should say something about that now. When we have a private moment before we get to your house."
"What?" I asked.
"I . . . I’ve never been with anyone before," Janet said quietly.
I blinked, surprised. I mean, I'd lost my virginity in high school. I figured everyone did. I knew for sure I wasn't the first in my class either, considering one of my classmates in freshman Spanish had to take four weeks off to have a baby. "Okay then. I guess what I just said comes off as a bit pervy."
Janet shook her head, then smiled that smile that I had come to look forward to. It was her smile that told me she was genuinely pleased, but at the same time she was pushing past her shyness. "No. To be honest, I've been thinking a lot about it too. Can I tell you something that might come off a bit crazy?"
"Considering the household I grew up in, I doubt there's anything you could say that I'd really think of as crazy," I said. "So go ahead."
"I've kind of had a few fantasies since you started asking me out," she said, her blush deepening. "The kind I wouldn't feel comfortable telling my parents about."
I smiled and kissed her hand again. "We can talk about them later if you like." My car made the turn into the Mount Zion d
riveway, dominated by the view of the Bell Tower. "Just remember, you might think of them as celebrities or something, but they're really just normal people."
My car parked, and I went around to the passenger side to help her out. I saw the front door to Zion open as I did, and Andrea was there, holding the door open for the two of us. "Hey Riley, glad you made it. Dad's got the chops on, he was worried he'd have to pull them off before you two got back."
"Chops?" Janet asked, looking at me questioningly. "Pork chops?"
I shook my head. "Knowing my father, lamb or veal. He likes to show off the culinary skills he's picked up over the years. He's no great chef, but he can put together a pretty mean meat and three veg plate. He knew you weren't vegetarian or vegan, but he didn't know if you were Jewish or Muslim or anything that doesn't allow pork. By the way, are you?"
Janet laughed and shook her head. "Nope, maybe a healthy dose of lapsed Methodist I think, but that’s it."
I noticed out of the corner of my vision that Andrea was covering her smile with her hand, a knowing look on her face. I led Janet up the steps to Mount Zion, stopping in front of my sister. "Janet Wayne, this is my sister, tormentor of my days and the keeper of my life on the somewhat straight and narrow, Andrea."
"Andi," my sister said. "The only people who call me Andrea are my father and Tabby, and Tabby only when she's angry at me or thinks I'm acting too much like a tomboy. Come on, Mom and Dad are waiting inside along with everyone else."
Andi led us inside, Janet holding onto my arm, her eyes big. "Wow," she whispered. "I mean, I was here the night Mayor McCaffery had his party, but it's still a bit strange."
Justice: A Billionaire Romance Page 3