Chapter 26
The bar was half empty on a Wednesday night.
Noah was on his second bourbon. Callie was beside him with a glass of red wine she hadn't touched in ten minutes. McKenzie was across from them in the booth, working through a whiskey like it owed him money.
None of them were in uniform. None of them were on duty. Two of them weren't coming back anytime soon.
"Well," Noah said, looking at the folded copy of the New York Times on the table between them.
"I guess the Sutherland name truly is famous now.
" He took a drink. "You know, reputation means everything to my father.
The things that man will do to avoid someone marring his reputation. " He shook his head. "Well."
He didn't finish the thought. He didn't need to.
"It will all blow over," McKenzie said. "They'll come to their senses."
"I don't think so," Callie muttered. She picked up her wine and took a sip.
Set it back down. "You should have heard Rivera.
I thought it would be thirty days with pay.
But she's looking at longer. And when I come back, she's talking about reassigning me to desk duty.
" She looked at the glass. "Can you believe that?
Desk duty. Like I'm a rookie who forgot to file a report. "
"What a shit show," McKenzie said. He raised his whiskey and drained half of it.
"Meanwhile, I'm still on, which is great, except now it's all on me and every reporter, bureaucrat, and armchair detective in the state is watching every move I make.
" He signaled the bartender for another.
"Had a guy from Channel 5 yesterday ask me on camera whether I had sufficient experience to lead a multi-agency task force.
Sufficient experience. I've been doing this longer than that kid's been alive. "
"What did you say?" Callie asked.
"I said no comment and walked into the bathroom. Hid there for four minutes. Very dignified." He paused, casting a sideways glance at Noah. "And you know the best part? You know who they've got to replace you, Noah?”
He cast a sideways glance. “Terry?"
"Nope. Porter. And you know I fucking hate Porter."
Noah laughed into his glass. The sound surprised him. It felt foreign, like a word in a language he hadn't spoken in weeks. Callie chuckled too, swirling the wine.
"Porter couldn't investigate a parking ticket," McKenzie said. "Yesterday he spent forty-five minutes reorganizing the evidence board by color. Color, Noah. The man arranged crime scene photographs by the dominant hue in the background."
"That's efficient," Callie said.
"That's insanity."
The laughter faded. It always did. The humor was a raft and the water was dark underneath it and they all knew they couldn't float on it forever.
McKenzie leaned back in the booth and looked at Noah. "I just can't believe they fired you."
"Oh, I can."
"You didn't do anything wrong at that campground. You followed procedure. You had backup. Danny escalated."
"That's not the story they're telling."
"The story they're telling is bullshit."
"Doesn't matter. The story they're telling is the one that went national." Noah turned his glass slowly on the table. The ice shifted. "And whoever fed that story knew exactly what they were doing."
The booth went quiet. The bartender set McKenzie's fresh whiskey down without a word.
Noah looked at both of them. Callie. McKenzie. The only two people he still trusted inside this case. One suspended. One barely hanging on. The three of them were in a booth in a half-empty bar while somewhere out there a man with a rifle was still working through a list.
"There's something I need to tell you both," Noah said. "And it stays between us until I know what to do with it.”
McKenzie's glass stopped halfway to his mouth. Callie's eyes found Noah's and held them.
"Savannah is compromised."
The silence that followed was different. Sharper.
"What do you mean, compromised?" McKenzie said.
"Luther Ashford is funding Cora's cancer treatment. The private facility. The experimental protocols. All of it runs through a chain of shell companies that traces back to Ashford."
McKenzie set his glass down. "You're sure."
"I traced it. Halcyon Medical Group to NorthBridge Health Partners to Arclight Ventures. Arclight's only real money comes from Luther."
"Jesus Christ," McKenzie said.
Callie hadn't moved. She was processing, the way she processed everything, silently, completely, letting the information settle into place before she reacted.
"When?" she asked.
"I don't know exactly. But Cora's treatment started about two years ago. Right around the time we started catching resistance on investigations. Redirects. Delays. Then this one with the anti-authority theory that ate up weeks."
“Have you confronted her?"
"Last night."
"And?"
"She didn't deny it."
McKenzie exhaled through his teeth. "Luther."
"Luther," Noah said. "He's got his fingers in everything in this town. He doesn't threaten people. He doesn't need to. He finds what they need and he gives it to them. And then they belong to him."
Callie picked up her wine. She took a slow drink and set the glass down in a way that told Noah she was holding herself very carefully together.
"That's the same thing he did with Emerson," she said quietly. "Anita's mother was sick. Luther paid for her care. And in return she spent a decade making evidence disappear."
"Same playbook," Noah said. "Different target."
"So the whole time," McKenzie said, staring at his whiskey, "every redirect, every dead end, this entire case.” He shook his head. "How much of that was real and how much was Savannah keeping us away from something? And if so, what?”
“Listen, I can't prove all of that. But the money is there. And Savannah didn't deny it."
McKenzie shook his head. He looked angry in the way that quiet men look angry, not with heat but with a cold clarity that was more dangerous.
"So where does that leave us?" he said.
"It leaves you and Porter running the task force with a compromised foundation. It leaves Callie on the sideline. And it leaves me in this booth with a bourbon and no badge."
"That's not what I mean and you know it."
Noah looked at him. "I know."
The hockey game played on above the bar. Someone scored. Nobody in the bar reacted. A couple near the window was having a quiet argument. The bartender wiped glasses.
“You said he finds what they need," Callie said, almost to herself. "And gives it to them."
"Emerson's mother," Noah said. "Savannah's partner. My father's reputation."
"Your father?"
Noah caught himself. He had let it slip, one name too many, carried forward by the rhythm of the list.
"Hugh was sheriff during the Hale investigation," he said carefully. "His legacy is wrapped up in how that case was handled. Luther knows that. He knows what that name means to my father."
Callie studied him. She didn't push. But she filed it. He could see her filing it.
McKenzie drained his glass. "So Luther controls the investigation through Savannah. He controls the narrative through Natalie. He controls the politics through his campaign. What doesn't he control?"
"The shooter," Noah said.
The word landed in the booth and stayed there.
Noah's mind went quiet. The bar noise fell away. The hockey game, the couple arguing, the clink of glasses. All of it receded as the second letter came to mind.
The porch light.
It came back to him without warning.
Rebecca Hale used to leave the porch light on after midnight when Liam was away at school. She said it made the house feel less empty.
Noah stared at the table.
That wasn't something you pulled from a report. That wasn't something you guessed. That was something you knew. Something you saw. Someone who had been close enough to the house to notice it. And to understand what it meant.
Danny Walsh's voice cut through it.
Leave him out of this.
Connor.
The name settled in. Not as a conclusion. As a direction.
McKenzie's voice came back. "Noah?"
He was staring at the table. The newspaper. The bourbon. The condensation ring on the wood.
Noah set his glass down and got up.
“Where you going?” McKenzie asked.
"I need to check something," he said.
Callie looked at him. "Now?"
“No. Tomorrow." He pulled his jacket from the back of the booth. “I’ve got to be up early."
McKenzie watched him. The look on his face was the look he always gave Noah when the gears started turning and the conversation was about to end without explanation.
"You know something," McKenzie said. “Don’t you?”
"Maybe."
“Are you going to tell us what it is?"
Noah put his jacket on. "Not yet," he said. "Let me make sure I'm right first."
He dropped cash on the table and walked out into the night. The weather was cold, the rain from yesterday was gone. The sky had cleared to black with stars sharp enough to cut. His breath hung in the air. The street was quiet. Just a few cars parked. A couple walking arm in arm toward the lake.
He got in the Bronco and sat for a moment.
Connor Walsh. Au Sable Forks.
He didn't have the answer yet. But he knew where to find it.