She snorted, looking up at him. “I thought you were going to be honest with me.”
Nothing got past this girl. If her father and Sledge and the rest of the senator’s security team weren’t climbing out of cars right in front of them at that very minute, he would’ve wrapped her up in his arms then and there.
She even managed to seem casual, waving to her father as he approached the porch. “I heard you were feeling kind of tired today.” William took her face in his hands, looking down at her with concern. “How are you feeling now?”
“Fine,” she smiled. “I just needed to sleep.”
When he observed the affection with which William treated his daughter, Jace softened. Just a little. Enough that the urge to rip the man’s head from his shoulders passed.
Just barely.
“I think I’ll freshen up a bit before dinner,” he announced, smiling. Anyone who didn’t know him would think he was on top of the world, that he had nothing to worry about. The image of the competent, confident, hard-working senator who cared for nothing quite as much as he did his constituents.
“Sir, if you wouldn’t mind, there’s something I’d like to discuss with you. Privately, if possible.” Kara stiffened next to him, but he didn’t give any indication of noticing.
“If you wouldn’t mind, Jace, I’ve had a long day. I would like to go wash up and enjoy dinner with my family.” William’s gaze was unflinching, his tone unapologetic. “In case you have forgotten, this is still my home. Unless there’s an emergency, I would appreciate being allowed to go about my business.”
He knew something was up. He wouldn’t be taking this defensive stance if he didn’t. He could pretend all he wanted that nothing was wrong, that he didn’t suspect anything, but there was a deeper truth underneath. The light had left his eyes. He was wary, suspicious.
There was nothing for Jace to do but nod, taking a step back. “Of course. Whatever you say.”
William walked past him, going into the house without a backward glance. Kara touched Jace’s arm, but he didn’t trust himself to look at her. She might see something in his eyes that gave him away—his wolf was so close to the surface, furious, demanding to be heard. It would only scare her away to see how William’s dismissal had affected him.
He only shook his head, stepping into the house. William hadn’t gone upstairs right away — instead, he’d gone to his office, where the door stood slightly ajar. “Hello?” he asked, and Jace assumed he’d answered a call to his cell.
There was a moment of silence—then, “I told you never to call me. Not ever.”
Just like that, Jace’s posture changed. He was now on a mission, tracking his target without making a sound. He held up a hand to stop Kara from following him, then moved on silent feet further down the hall until he stood outside that partly open office door.
“I don’t care. Stop this. Whatever you want from me, you can have it, but leave my family out of it. This is between you and me. Nobody else.”
Sledge joined him, the two of them having a silent conversation. He sensed Sledge’s wolf on the alert, just as his own wolf was. Something was about to happen. How would the senator react to this call? How would he react to what Jace was about to present to him?
One thing was for certain: he couldn’t pretend nothing was wrong anymore. He probably knew that the minute Jace approached him outside. The jig was up. His lies were catching up to him.
There was no such thing as a completely clean politician.
By the time Jace and Sledge entered the office, William was slamming his cell to the desk. “I told you! I have things to do. We can talk about this later, whatever it is.” Now he was harsh, sharp, no longer pretending to be the gentle, mild-mannered guy he presented to the world.
“No, I think we’re going to talk right now.” Sledge positioned himself in front of the door so William couldn’t get out of the room, while Jace faced him head-on. “Why don’t you start talking about the Foundation?”
Panic swept across William’s face, but he managed to push it down and feign ignorance. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. What foundation? I’m affiliated with so many of them.”
“The Foundation of America. Wasn’t that their name back when they first donated to your campaign? I don’t know what they call themselves now, of course.”
Finally, William was at a loss for words. He sank into his desk chair, his head in his hands.
Jace didn’t move a muscle, staring at the man, not daring to let his guard down for fear of his wolf attacking. “Why don’t you start by telling me what you were doing affiliating yourself with a terrorist organization?”
Chapter Twenty-Five
Kara had to lean against the door to support herself or else she would’ve ended up on the floor.
Terrorists? No, not him. Not her father. There weren’t many things she was unwilling to believe when it came to him—any illusions she’d ever entertained when it came to the purity of politicians had died a long time ago. Anything was possible, especially when a person thought they were doing what was right, when they believed they were a hero.
Her father certainly fit the bill when it came to that.
“They aren’t terrorists. Just goes to show how little you know.” There wasn’t a lot of conviction in his voice, though. He didn’t believe what he was saying. It was obvious.
“They have been classified by the FBI as a domestic terrorist organization. Come on, Senator Collins. This isn’t my first day on the job. You must have known we would find out about this eventually.”
Just like that, her father changed his tune. “It was so long ago. So long. I had no idea who I was dealing with. You have to believe me. I was naïve. I needed the money for my campaign! If I was ever going to get elected, I needed them.”
“It’s not a unique story, what you’re telling me,” Jace pointed out. “Nowadays, just about every politician is in somebody’s pocket. Some millionaire or billionaire, some organization. They take the money for their campaign so they can get elected, and they think it ends there because they’re too stupid to realize what the person or group making the donation knew all along.”
“I wasn’t stupid.”
“You were naïve. You just said so, Senator Collins. I was right here when you said it. Personally, I would more easily believe that you deliberately turned a blind eye. You wanted to pretend like you didn’t know the money came with strings attached, or you thought you could shake them off once the election had been won.”
“You don’t understand anything. You only think you do. Do you honestly believe I would take money from any sort of terrorist organization had I known who they were? What, do you think they walked around, bragging about the things they did? They presented themselves to me as an organization devoted to creating equality, bringing America back to its roots, steering away from the big corporations, big monoliths that even twenty years ago were beginning to encroach upon our country. Teddy Roosevelt fought monopolies back in the day, but they’re creeping up on us again. I want to end that. They told me they wanted the same thing. They fought for justice, for the working man.”
Kara closed her eyes, touching her forehead to the door. That was just like him. She could only imagine how quickly he’d jumped at the chance to work with these people when they made themselves look like the good guys, like they shared a common goal. They had his number from the start.
Though she still couldn’t understand what this had to do with anything.
“Let me get this straight. You took that money without doing your homework. Didn’t you have aides in place? Assistants? A secretary, for God’s sake? Somebody to look into this group, to figure out who they were and what they were really all about? No. All you saw was the campaign and all the good you could do once you were elected. Isn’t that right?”
“You make it sound like a crime, wanting to do right by people. I knew I could do well, and I have! Look at everything I’ve done: the bills
I’ve passed, the truth I’ve brought to light, the awareness I’ve raised. Tell me the end didn’t justify the means.”
“You fool.” Kara winced when he said it, though she knew her father deserved to hear it. Because he was a fool. If he had taken that money without doing the work necessary to learn who it was coming from, he deserved that and much more.
When Jace continued, there was less spite in his voice. “You see yourself as a hero. That doesn’t surprise me. I’m sure you couldn’t have known at the time what you were opening yourself up to. When did they first come to you and ask you to return the favor?”
“They didn’t have to,” her father admitted. “I got word of a bombing they were behind. Some big-box store, one of those giant places that have wiped out small businesses in so many towns. One of the men who first reached out to me during the campaign was killed during that bombing. That was when I first knew what had left myself open to.”
“And what did you do?”
“I went to them, of course. I told them they could have the money back, that I wanted nothing to do with them.”
“But you can’t put the toothpaste back in the tube, can you?” Jace snickered. “It was already done. They weren’t about to let you off the hook.”
“I’m telling you. I did the best I could.”
It was chilling, really. Hearing him talk that way. He sounded so weak, and all her life she’d believed he was strong. She’d believe he was powerful, that he could make people even more powerful than he was shake in their boots because he was the good guy. He was the one with goodness on his side. She could go to sleep at night proud of him, proud to know he was her father.
And look at him now. He was weak, sniveling. Practically begging the stranger to understand him, to not blame him the way he deserved to be blamed.
“It wasn’t enough,” Jace reminded him. “What did they want from you?”
“What didn’t they want?” her father countered, miserable. “They wanted me to hire members of the group for my staff so they would be better aware of the issues up before the Senate. They wanted me to defend them whenever they came under fire for their tactics. They wanted me to cover up the things they did. I wouldn’t do it, I swear. I never did. I told them time and again they would get nothing from me.”
“Senator Collins. I’m going to ask you a question, and I want you to tell me the truth. I’m only going to ask once. Did they cause the crash that killed your daughter?”
The entire world went red.
The same color red as Krista’s parka.
Before she knew what she was doing, Kara burst into the office. She swung the door so hard, it bounced off the wall. Her father was sitting behind his desk, at least he had been until she came into the room. He stood, his mouth falling open in horror as he stared at her.
No matter how horrified he was, it wasn’t worse than how she felt.
“Kara, honey—” he began.
She shook her head. “No. Answer the question, Dad. It wasn’t a deer, was it? It was another car. Who did it? Was it this group?”
His head tipped to the side, his face practically crumbling. His eyes darted around the room like he was looking for a friend, somebody to back him up. He wouldn’t find it.
His shoulders barely lifted. “I don’t know. And that is the truth. I don’t know whether it was them or not. Yes, it was another car. I was run off the road.”
She had never really known true, hot, boiling rage up until that moment. She’d only thought she had. She’d imagined she knew what it felt like to really and truly want to kill somebody, what it meant to look at someone and know with certainty in her heart that she never wanted to look at them again.
“All this time, you knew they might have been the reason for the accident, and you lied. You lied and you lied, over and over. My whole life! How could you do that?” She lunged for the desk, but Jace caught her. What she thought she would do, she had no idea. Her body had taken over for her.
Tears rolled down her father’s cheeks. “Honey, I’m so sorry. I wanted to protect you!”
“You liar! You just didn’t want anybody to know! If you wanted to protect me, you would’ve gone to the police and told them about these people, about what they were trying to do to you! You could’ve taken it to the FBI. Somebody! No, you kept it to yourself. And now they want me! Did you really think they would stop, that it would be enough? How many times have they reached out to you over the years, Dad? How long has it been that my life has been in danger?”
Then, she burst out laughing. It was either that or cry until she dried up and blew away like a dead leaf. There was an edge of madness in her laughter, and she knew it. But that didn’t stop her. “Is that why I had to stop dancing? Were they following me? All this time. All the things you never told me—why I needed security detail everywhere I went, why I’ve never been able to live my life the way other people do, kids of other politicians. All this time, you left me vulnerable to them because you were too stupid to see who they were from the beginning!”
“Kara…” Jace murmured, but she ignored him. He could hold her still, but he couldn’t shut her up.
“Then it was your career, wasn’t it? Telling yourself all you cared about was the little man. No, you cared about yourself! Why would any of your constituents be more important than me? Than mom? They could’ve killed us, but oh well, right? Tell me!” she demanded.
All he could do was sit there and shake his head, hands covering his face. His shoulders shook like he was weeping. Too little, too late.
“Kara, that is enough.”
She gasped, looking over Jace’s shoulder to find her mother standing in the doorway. “Mom, he—"
Her mother wouldn’t look at her. Instead, she walked into the office and went straight to the desk. She stood in front of her husband, staring down at him. Her face was unreadable, blank, immobile. There was no telling what she was thinking.
It was only clear when father lowered his hands and looked up, with hope in his eyes like he expected to be forgiven, what was going through her head.
The slap she delivered across his face rang out like a gunshot in the otherwise silent room. Kara couldn’t breathe. She had never seen her mother hit anybody before, least of all her father.
But he deserved it. Nobody had ever deserved it more.
“Get out of my sight,” her mother whispered, trembling. “I don’t care where you go so long as you get there quickly.”
Kara turned, pressing her face to Jace’s chest. He led her from the room, and they walked together to the living room where they sat on the sofa, their arms around each other. Neither of them said a word.
What was there to say? Sorry your father almost got you killed? Sorry his career and reputation meant more than you and your family? Sorry he’s pitiful?
It was enough that he held her without saying anything.
Chapter Twenty-Six
It was so much easier to think when he was a wolf.
Jace walked the beach, knowing the only people who would see the footage from the security cameras were from his own team. In the aftermath of Laura throwing her husband out of the house, the senator’s security team was a total mess. Nobody knew what to do, where they should be. With him? With the family?
He had to take this opportunity to be himself, truly. Sledge had his back in the control center. Kara was in her room, probably questioning much of her life.
Even now, in his wolf form, he couldn’t stop thinking about her. Not just physically, not just because he wanted her—needed her—but emotionally. He felt sorry for her. He wanted more than anything to take her pain away, to take her away from all of this.
A breeze blew, ruffling his fur, and he raised his head toward the nearly full moon. It was so bright, turning night practically into day. Just another reason why he was vulnerable out here, but part of being on the team meant trusting one’s teammates.
The world was so much clearer when he looked at it throu
gh these eyes. He could see every sparkle on the water, every ripple. Somewhere down the beach, people were having a party. He smelled the food they cooked over an open flame, and it brought saliva to his mouth. He hadn’t hunted in too long.
He heard their laughter too. Lighthearted. They didn’t have a care in the world, any of them. They were happy to be together, living their comfortable lives. Fools. They didn’t know what the world was really like, how people struggled at that very moment.
Or maybe they did. If the people living in that beautiful house with its pool and its tennis court and its private beach were struggling, maybe all of these people struggled in their own way.
His wolf wasn’t much for that sort of thinking. His wolf wanted to move, so he ran the length of the beach from one rocky ledge to the other, content knowing he was safe, free from notice. He ventured closer to the water, relishing the coolness against his overheated body as it lapped against his legs.
If only he could’ve had the chance to do this right after Sal was killed. He might have been able to find something his human eyes couldn’t see, his human nose couldn’t smell. No matter how much stronger his human senses were than they’d been before, it was nothing compared to the way things sharpened for the wolf.
Even now, he searched, hoping something would reveal itself. Something the shifting sand covered while the police were there. A tool, a weapon, a discarded tissue. Something they could use to get answers.
How could anyone appear on the beach, then disappear without a trace? If there’d been a boat involved, it would’ve needed to pull up to the shore, but there hadn’t even been evidence of that.
It was no use. There was nothing, and it was too late to hope for anything more.
He ventured into the water up to his shoulders, wishing the rest of the team could be out here to enjoy this. They all needed a little fun after the work they’d put in. They needed to run, to hunt, to play. Maybe they could do that when this was over.
Wolf Shield Investigations: Boxset Page 19