by H. P. Bayne
“Maybe,” Lachlan said. “If we can provide a strong enough incentive. The chief of police sniffing around might give us that incentive. We need to call Ed back to arrange a meeting, if we’re going to have one. I need to know first: What happened with you? The fact you’re here and relatively uninjured suggests someone else isn’t.”
Sully scanned his boots. He hadn’t wanted to go there, had hoped to avoid it. But Lachlan was right. If they were hoping to sit Sully down with the chief of police, better his secrets were shared first with the people he trusted.
“The men who tried to kill me at Ravenwood took me to an abandoned farm about an hour from the city. The Dules—Lorinda, Rhona and Greta—were waiting, and they had a bomb.”
“Jesus,” Dez hissed.
“The hangman—his name’s Thadeus, apparently—jumped in and took over, but I was present and aware. He used Ned to get out of the house before it blew. The Dules were killed in their own explosion. Then Thadeus killed the men.”
“How?” Eva asked. “Anything that will trace to you?”
Sully shook his head. “I don’t think so. He used Ned to toss one into the fire. Then he forced one to shoot another and then shoot himself.” He had yet to look up from the ground, and he felt hands—definitely Dez’s—settle on his shoulders.
“I don’t care what happened or how,” he said. “It’s not your fault. The hangman and Ned kept you alive, and that’s all that matters. What I want to know is how comfortable you are turning the hangman against Lowell.”
“Not a good idea,” came Raiya’s voice from behind them. Sully turned his head to see she and Marc had stepped from their vehicle.
“Why not?” Dez asked. “He’s got my daughter, and he’s already killed my father and brother. I don’t give a damn if he gets hurt or killed.”
“That’s not the point,” she said. “The more often Thadeus is given free rein—and the longer he’s allowed to stay there when he’s in control—the stronger he gets. He completely took over this time. It was all Marc and I could do to press him back to allow Sully back.”
“I don’t care,” Sully said. “If it means saving Kayleigh, I’ll let Thadeus take the reins forever.”
“That could be a problem,” Marc said. “From what you’ve said, he isn’t capable of caring about anyone. You and I have been friends for a few years, and he thought nothing of trying to hurt me. Like Raiya said, he had murder in his eyes before you came forward. He doesn’t share your concerns, Sullivan. He cares about nothing but self-preservation. You need to stay in control if you want your family kept safe.”
“I can’t do the things he can. He’s stronger.”
Marc stepped forward, laid a hand on Sully’s arm. “As I told you, he’s a part of you, not something separate. If he’s strong, so are you. You don’t see yourself as I do. Your aura is unlike anything I’ve ever witnessed. You’re a very powerful being, Sullivan, and you’re selling yourself short. The only difference between you and Thadeus should be where you draw your power. He takes his from darkness. Find yours in good.”
Sully didn’t respond beyond a smile. He wasn’t convinced, not by any stretch. He’d spent much of his childhood helpless and afraid, and he’d found himself back there during his time at Lockwood and while trapped by the Dules at their old house in The Forks. If he had any sort of power beyond what Thadeus was capable of, he had yet to find it. It was through Thadeus, after all, he’d learned how to harness and use the energy of the ghosts around him.
Instead of heading farther down that path, he settled on an earlier point of discussion.
“What should we do about meeting the chief?” Sully asked.
“We haven’t arranged anything,” Lachlan said. “But I’ve made it clear we won’t be comfortable coming to headquarters. Not right now. Paul gave us the names of six police officers who are members of the Circle. One of them’s an inspector. Too many things can go wrong if we’re inside those walls. Anyway, it’s safest for Ed, too, to keep any meetings between us quiet for now.”
“What about Kayleigh?” Sully asked. “Do we tell him about her?”
Dez jumped in quickly. “No. Lowell said no police. I’m not taking a chance.” He turned to Lachlan. “I know you want to get Leuvan on board to start circling the wagons around Lowell, but I want to wait until we’ve got Kayleigh back. Any sooner and we risk something worse happening to her. Right now, she’s his ace in the hole with us, a way to keep us in line. The second he sees we’ve fallen out of line, he’ll have no reason to keep her alive.”
“We’ve been over this,” Lachlan said. “Leuvan wants a meet. If we don’t figure out a way to turn him the way we want him to walk, he’ll run completely the wrong direction. They’ve got an officer down because of another cop, one involved with a creepy underground organization. We’ve had to give them names to protect Forbes. If we don’t get on this and strategize with them immediately, they might just take a scattergun approach and start hauling in the first Circle members they can lay hands on. Word will get out fast we’re onto them, and it’s only a matter of time before Lowell hears about it. We need to do some damage control before we can move forward.”
“Maybe we can split this up,” Sully said. “You guys talk to Leuvan, get him moving on this in a way we can all live with. I’ll start working on finding Kayleigh.”
“Dez and I aren’t sitting out a search for our own daughter,” Eva said.
Sully gave her a humourless smile. “The kind of search I’m thinking about doing, I can do right from the same house. I won’t go anywhere without you.”
“Is there anything Raiya and I can do?” Marc asked. “I’d like to help, if I can.”
“Come back with us for now,” Sully said. “I’m going to have to draw on all this psychic stuff, and it might be I could use a little guidance. The way I’m feeling, the wall between Thadeus’s hate and my own is pretty damn thin. One wrong step and he’s looking at a wide-open door, and there might not be any pulling him back again once he’s out.”
15
With Marc and Raiya set to follow, Dez settled into the slightly more spacious front passenger seat. Sully took Dez’s previous spot in the backseat, prodding Pax—giddy from the reunion with his human—back into the hatch to make room for both himself and Eva. Dez wished he’d insisted on driving as Lachlan pulled out his cellphone.
“We should get going,” he said to Lachlan. “The snow’s really coming down, and I want to get back to looking—”
Lachlan shushed him as he dialled. Dez watched the man’s fingers fumbling over the keypad. Why he hadn’t programmed any of the numbers into his phone’s address book was beyond Dez, but as soon as everyone he loved was safe and Lowell either dead or behind bars, Dez planned on swiping Lachlan’s phone to deal with this annoying problem.
Dez figured out pretty quickly who Lachlan was calling.
“Ed? It’s Lachlan. Listen, we’d like to meet with you, but it’s got to be somewhere safe. Come to my place. You remember where it is?… Yeah, that’s the one. We’re a short distance out of town and the roads are crap. Give us forty-five minutes and meet us there, all right?… Okay, sure. But no one else. Given recent events, I don’t think I can over-accentuate the need to play this carefully.”
Lachlan hung up a moment later and returned the phone to his pocket. “He’s bringing the head of Major Crimes.”
“He’s not on Paul’s list, right?” Sully asked.
“Nope, he’s in the clear as far as all that goes,” Lachlan said. “Staff Sergeant Duncan McPhee. Bit of a dick but a decent guy, honest as the day is long. Night, too, for that matter. Now does anyone know the best spot to turn the car around so I don’t get us stuck in the snow?”
“Let me drive, and I’ll solve the problem for you,” Dez said.
Lachlan fired him a hot look. “Not on your life. I may still have a concussion, but I’ve been cleared to drive. And you, my young associate, are a damn mess. I’d rather get there la
te than not at all. So shut up and buckle your seatbelt.”
The drive back into town was treacherous, snow having packed to form a slick surface on the streets and an icy sheet at intersections.
Dez gritted his teeth and kept his right foot pressed to an invisible brake pedal whenever Lachlan sped up. He flipped down the visor and caught Eva’s eye in the mirror. She had her head against Sully’s shoulder, and he second-guessed not staying back there with her. She was toughing this out miraculously well, but strong as she was, she had her limits. Both of them had hit those limits the moment they’d learned their daughter had been taken. If they didn’t sort this out within the next few hours, Dez was pretty certain he’d run mad.
What was more, he still wasn’t thrilled with the plan to meet with police. He’d heard and understood Lachlan’s point, but Dez had a few points of his own. He wanted nothing more than to dive fully into the search for Kayleigh; anything else felt like a delay they couldn’t afford.
Yet, he understood how getting the police involved in the Circle investigation might help their cause. While not all Circle members were bad people—Paul was a solid example of that—plenty within its ranks were the type who’d achieved success by turning their fellow humans into rungs on a ladder, happily stepping on as many as possible to get to the top. Faced with the likelihood of a downward plummet, they’d do what they had to do to stay where they were, including using one of their own for leverage. Destabilizing the Circle meant pulling Lowell’s supports away one by one. If he was alone, it would make a final battle, if it came to one, a whole lot easier.
Then there was the other benefit: They would get a little breathing room if they could give police enough to keep them busy. Sully could focus one hundred percent on using his gifts to find Kayleigh, Lowell and Kindra. Dez hadn’t yet asked him whether he’d seen their dad or Aiden recently; part of Dez hoped Sully hadn’t, that the two ghosts were with Kayleigh, watching over her. Protecting her. God knew, with Lowell there, she could use every bit of help she could get.
Dez realized his error in thinking, struggled to force the pain back before it ended in another round of tears. He was tired of crying, sick of the feeling of being on the edge of panic. He wanted nothing more than to be Liam Neeson in Taken, kicking ass until he found his little girl; he felt more like the Cowardly Lion flailing his arms through a band of flying monkeys.
A hand settled on his shoulder, and he turned just enough to meet Sully’s eye.
“How you doing?” came the inevitable question.
Dez offered a tight nod, the best he could manage under the circumstances. Sully’s lips turned up a little at the corners, his attempt at an encouraging smile. It didn’t pass the test. Sully was scared too; Dez could see it as well as he recognized it in himself.
They arrived at Lachlan’s within the hour, giving the private detective just enough time to put together a quick meal for himself, Dez and Eva. Sully had already eaten with Marc and Raiya, he said. Dez and Eva did little but pick at their sandwiches, appetites lost and unlikely to be easily found.
As the time for the police visit approached, Lachlan launched into business mode.
“Are you sure you’re up to speaking with them?” he asked Dez. “If you’re not bringing up what happened to Kayleigh, you need to try to keep your emotions steady. Can you do that?”
“I’m going to have to.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
Dez sighed. “Yeah, I can do that.”
“I can’t,” Eva said. “I’ll have to go upstairs with the others. I’m sorry, Snowman.”
Dez tugged her into an embrace. “Don’t be.”
Eva, Sully—with Pax on his heels—Marc and Raiya took their leave, heading upstairs, Sully offering a solid pat to Dez’s back as he passed. Just in time, too, as less than a minute later, a set of headlights pulled to a stop on the street outside Lachlan’s, suggesting their company had arrived.
Dez dragged in one last calming breath, one that missed its purpose. He wasn’t calm. Nowhere near it.
He’d have to do his best impression.
Lachlan led the two men into the sitting room where Dez was waiting.
“Have a seat,” Lachlan said, careful to make a beeline for his usual chair before anyone else gravitated that way.
The chief stopped in front of Dez, peering up at him, sympathy in his gaze. Dez struggled to pin it together, lost as he was in thoughts of Kayleigh. Ed couldn’t know about her. No way he could know.
“How are you holding up, son?”
Dez forgot to breathe, caught himself and worked around the question. “About what?”
“Everything,” Ed said. “You’ve had a rough couple of years. I take it since you’re working with Lachlan, you’ve sorted through some things?”
Dez heaved an internal sigh of relief. His mind flashed back to the last time he had seen Chief Leuvan, seated behind his desk with a sorrowful expression causing his face to droop. It was the moment Dez knew he was about to be canned. Having already been through the losses of his dad and Sully, the sting of job loss had piled on extra hurt.
“Yeah, I’m doing better,” Dez said. “Thanks.”
“I don’t remember a whole lot about our conversation that last day,” Ed said. “I want to make sure you know how sorry I am about everything you’ve been through.”
Dez nodded in response, mostly because any attempt at a verbal one would prove futile around the lump in his throat. He’d known Ed pretty well, used to see him most times he visited his father in admin offices. Ed and Flynn Braddock had worked well together, had been friends even. Dez couldn’t imagine how hard it must have been for Ed to have to sack his dead friend’s son.
Lachlan, in true Lachlan style, drew the conversation forward with a one-word question. “Gentlemen?”
Ed patted Dez on the arm before turning and making his way to the couch. Dez suddenly recalled the file containing Aiden’s autopsy results and snapped his gaze to the coffee table. It was gone. No doubt Lachlan had moved it somewhere it wouldn’t be seen. Its discovery here and now would raise questions they couldn’t answer. Not yet.
Lachlan waited until Ed and Staff Sergeant Duncan McPhee—the latter a rotund man with a face that was the counterbalance to Ed’s typically open and affable expression—took up spots on the sofa before asking a question.
“Lisoway. What happened with her? You pick her up yet?”
Duncan looked to Ed, as if for confirmation this was a detail he could share. Ed nodded, allowing Duncan to provide the answer.
“Based on the strength of Sergeant Raynor’s statement, we’ve arrested Sergeant Lisoway and charged her with attempted murder. She’s denying everything, but she’s having a hard time accounting for her movements—particularly since she was driving one of our unmarked units at the time.”
“We’ve had the marked units outfitted with GPS tracking for some time, but only recently did the same with our unmarked vehicles,” Ed explained. “It’s been only a few days and we hadn’t yet put out a memo to members to notify them. She didn’t know we had ways of tracking the vehicle.”
“Have you asked her about the Circle?” Lachlan asked.
“The investigator I tasked with handling the interview asked about it,” Duncan said. “She initially denied knowing anything about it but, once confronted with a handful of names from the list, said nothing was wrong in the way the Circle conducts itself. She compared it to the Freemasons.”
“Freemasons aren’t involved in criminal enterprise, at least not on the organizational level,” Lachlan said.
Ed sat forward, raised eyebrows suggesting his upcoming question was to be asked more from curiosity than doubt. “What makes you so sure the Circle is?”
Lachlan stewed over that one a minute before providing a vague response. “I have my suspicions.”
“We didn’t come here to talk suspicions,” Duncan said. “We want facts. I know damn well you pride yourself on those, Fields
. Let’s start easy: How’d the two of you know where to find Thackeray Schuster’s body?”
“You mean Desmond and I?”
“The young woman renting the place gave us two names: Lachlan Fields and Oliver Chadwell. Funny thing, though. She didn’t describe either as an older guy, but she had Dez here described to a tee. You don’t find too many six-and-a-half-foot tall gingers running around Kimotan Rapids. I’m curious: Who’s the other guy? The one with the long hair and beard the renter described as—I’m quoting here—‘super cute’?”
Dez didn’t respond. He’d thought Forbes was to take that interview, and so avoid requesting physical descriptions. It seemed there had been a change of plans.
“He’s our source on this,” Lachlan said. “I can’t reveal more than that. Not yet, anyway.”
“I need him to come forward. I saw the basement.” Duncan turned his stare on Dez. “You didn’t dig anyplace else. Just that one spot. You knew exactly where the body would be. Now, that makes me wonder whether your source was involved in either killing or burying Thackeray Schuster. I need him to come in so we can question him.”
“That could be a problem,” Lachlan said. “He’s not easy to find. He’s homeless, and the phone we got him doesn’t always work. I’ll try to track him down for you, though, okay?”
“Give me his number and I’ll track him down myself.”
Lachlan’s grin was a cool one. “Not gonna happen, Dunc.”
“Don’t call me Dunc.”
Ed held up a hand. “Boys, that’s enough.”
Despite the situation, Dez had to restrain a grin. Ed was, if anything, the same age or younger than Lachlan. Dez couldn’t imagine a time in Lachlan’s life when he would have answered to “boy.”
Thankfully, Ed picked up the conversation before Lachlan could come back with something about the use of the word. “We actually had something else we wanted to ask about, something we haven’t been able to make hide nor hair out of yet. We can’t talk to Forbes yet as he’s pretty doped up—”