Bracing for a battle of wits, he pushed through the door.

Wilson watched him approach, though he appeared to be a bit dazed.

That could work to his advantage.

Zeke took a chair at a right angle to him at the table. “I just finished talking to your friend, Razor.”

Wilson blinked—but his face remained expressionless.

“As you might expect, he wasn’t happy to hear you were getting ready to leave the country—and let him go to prison. To paraphrase a line from an old play, hell hath no fury like a minion scorned. He confirmed you were his boss.”

At that news, Wilson’s posture sagged, and resignation dragged down his features. “So much for Belize.”

“Tell me why a man in your position would choose to run a drug ring.”

Wilson traced a hairline crack in the table with his index finger.

Five seconds ticked by.

Ten.

Twenty.

Zeke tamped down his frustration.

They were at a dead end. Wilson wasn’t going to—

“I can sum it up in three words—LaTasha and Xavier.”

Yes!

That was tantamount to a confession—but as long as Wilson was willing to talk, it was best to keep the dialogue going as long as possible. Every piece of information he revealed could prove valuable.

Zeke ran the names through his mind. Came up blank. “You’ll have to explain that.”

“My wife and son.”

“Go on.”

The man rested his hands on the table, one atop the other, and lowered his chin. “Xavier was in the Marines. Twelve years ago, he was killed in the Middle East—not defending his country, but by one of the guys in his unit who got high on heroin and went berserk. He shot Xavier, wounded three others, and turned the gun on himself. Two years later, my wife was murdered in our neighborhood market after a guy who came in to rob it decided to open fire. He was high too.”

Zeke let out a slow breath.

No matter what the man sitting across from him had done, it was hard not to feel empathy for all he’d gone through.

“I’m sorry.”

“Everyone was. But being sorry doesn’t fix the problem. We have to help people get off drugs.”

Zeke frowned at the disconnect. “If you believe that, why were you distributing them?”

The man lifted his head. “I can’t force people to stop using. All I can do is help the ones who want to kick the habit. And I devoted my life to doing that after LaTasha and Xavier died.”

“You also ran a drug ring.” Zeke struggled to connect the dots. “That’s inconsistent.”