Chapter 9 #3
“The amount of information you’re fishing for is disturbing,” Danny said.
He laughed as he set the cookie jar down and circled the bench.
He wrapped an arm around Peyton’s collarbone and pulled Peyton into his chest. Since Danny was basically a tank in human form, he towered over Peyton like a bear.
“You do you, man. The more the merrier, right?”
Peyton wasn’t answering that.
“You don’t see me shacking up with three people!” Lucas said loudly. Too loudly. Peyton really hoped their dad wasn’t home. He didn’t normally come home for lunch, but today would be the day because Peyton’s luck was terrible. “I obviously have to live vicariously through my little bro.”
“You and Tyler looking for a third?” Danny asked. “A fourth? Maybe you’re looking for that sixth.”
“Fuck off,” Lucas said, scowling. “Anyone tries to touch Tyler, and I’ll set them on fire. I know how to make it look like an accident.”
“Leave your brother alone,” Theresa said, waving her wooden spoon. “Get over here and help me dish up the soup.”
“I just think,” Lucas said as he reached up to get the bowls out, “that Peyton should have to cough up deets.”
“I’m okay with not knowing how kinky he is between the sheets,” Danny said. He gave Peyton one last squeeze and then settled onto the stool beside him.
“I’m not kinky!” Peyton protested. “Please, I am begging you, any of you , change the subject.”
“Do we know them?” Lucas asked curiously.
Peyton opened his mouth, unsure of how to respond to that. Other than Sebastian, they definitely knew them. He wasn’t sure he wanted to admit that just yet.
“We do!” Lucas declared. He put the spoons beside the bowls and leaned his elbow on the counter. “Who is it? One of them is Will, right? I thought you two were already dating.”
“You wouldn't be the first,” Peyton said dryly. He still wasn't sure how he hadn't noticed that Quinn, and apparently numerous other people, had thought he and Will were an item.
“Okay, so Will. Who are the other two?” His eyes widened. “Don't tell me, is it—”
“Lucas, do not ask me to tell you again to leave your brother alone,” Theresa warned. “You are not too old for me to put in the naughty corner.”
“Still has your name on it,” Danny said. “I think you spent most of your childhood there.”
“So many memories,” Lucas said with an exaggerated sigh, looking at the ceiling like an idiot.
It was a little quieter after that since Lucas was more focused on shovelling food in his face than talking. It was the only time he was quiet, really.
Peyton paused with his spoon in his soup as he looked at the three of them.
Sometimes it was easy to forget just how lucky a childhood he’d had.
There had been squabbles with his siblings—there were six of them, there was no way that it could have ever been all rainbows and sunshine—but nothing earth-shattering.
They had been close their whole lives, with each other and with their parents.
Peyton hadn’t been able to confide in any of them about the struggles he’d had, both during and after his time in the military.
But that had more to do with him than with them.
He needed to prove he was worthy of the Sinclair name.
That he was as strong and competent as they all were.
They were all so accomplished—even Lucas—and had paved their own way through life to find their places.
Peyton still hadn’t found his place, but he would show them that he could.
“So,” Grady said as he propped himself on the corner of Quinn’s desk.
Quinn glanced absently at him before he continued reading his report.
The beige manila folder that Grady held in one hand was not a good sign, and Quinn was already getting a headache, so he really didn’t want anything to do with it.
Gloria hadn't been home when they'd gone there, and something inside Quinn had broken a little.
They'd needed a break in the case, and it finally felt like maybe they'd gotten one, and they'd been thwarted because an old lady had been out running errands—or whatever she was doing.
They'd waited an hour, but no one had arrived.
And they were still trying to dig up a phone number, which shouldn't have been that hard.
So Grady could stick a new case where the sun didn't shine.
“If that folder doesn’t contain all the answers to every question that I have for the way-too-many cases that we currently have, I don’t want to hear about it,” Quinn said.
“A few fun facts today for you.”
“Extra points for the alliteration,” Quinn murmured.
“When do I get my gold star?”
“In your next lifetime.”
“Cute. Well, I worked out who the second victim that was found in the park—Richard Burrows—is and the connection,” Grady said.
“Oh?”
“Yeah. Do you know anything about a raid that TOU conducted about a week ago?”
Quinn knew because of Will, but he wasn't about to offer up that information.
Grady was already in a foul mood from the failed interrogation, the post office visit, and having to sit still for an hour.
They hadn't been having a great day, and Grady was about a hairsbreadth away from blowing a gasket. “Yeah, I'd heard of it.”
“Their intel said five guys, but they only found four.”
“Burrows is the fifth guy?”
Grady pointed at him with a pen. “Bingo. But I have even more interesting news.”
Quinn checked his phone. One missed call from an unknown number. He furrowed his brow and went to his voicemail before putting it to his ear. “Yeah? What interesting news?”
“Out of the four guys that were arrested, three of them were represented by one guy, and the fourth—”
“Was represented by someone else?” Quinn guessed. At Grady's nod, he said, “That's not unusual. Maybe he has more money than the others or personally knows someone? There are a lot of reasons why they'd have different reps.”
“And what about when that rep is Sebastian Devlin?”
The voice in his ear was drowned out as Quinn took in the implications. “What?”
“He's right in the middle of this shit,” Grady said. “And I want to know why.”
So did Quinn, for a vastly different reason.
“When does it go to court?” he asked. Whatever the date was, he would make sure there was some kind of security because it had to be connected to this somehow.
“Didn't.”
“What do you mean, it didn't?”
“I mean, it was settled out of court. I wonder why he didn't mention it?”
“He likely doesn't know it's connected. He works a lot of cases.”
“Are you trying to make excuses for him?”
“Don't be an asshole.”
Grady scowled. “It's not the only thing he didn't mention.”
“Great,” Quinn muttered.
“I had the rookie digging up any information he could find on Mason Delgrade,” Grady said, ignoring him. “He’s a clever kid.”
“Doesn’t that rookie have his own work? And his own partner for that matter?” Quinn said, frowning. He’d been seeing Henry following after Grady—and Ange, when Grady was busy with Quinn—a lot lately.
“You mean the waste of space that Greer is?” Grady said dismissively. “Have you seen him today? Because I sure as fuck haven’t.”
Quinn sighed and leaned back in his chair.
Greer wasn’t the mentor he would have chosen for a newbie like Henry—who, while he’d been on the force a number of years, had come from a country town so small it would have fit in one plaza downtown and who was still in a lot of ways very green—but the choices had been limited since Greer’s old partner, Callum, had abruptly quit six months ago, and they’d scrambled to find a good-enough replacement.
“What did he find?” Quinn said.
Grady dropped the file on Quinn’s desk. “He was a bit of a loner. No family, no friends. Most of his financial transactions involved his dog, porn subscriptions, takeout, and what I strongly suspect is the residence of a woman he pays to give him personal lap dances.”
His dog. Quinn had no idea what to do with Persephone.
If Grady was right, and Delgrade had no friends or family, there was a chance no one was going to come forward and claim her.
Quinn hadn't been in the market for a dog, but giving her up to the RSPCA seemed wrong as well. Another headache for him to deal with.
“You can get lap dances in a club,” Quinn said.
In the right kinds of clubs anyway. The only time Quinn had ever been in one had been for an unfortunate case in his rookie days.
The ladies were pleasant to talk to, but they hadn’t been packing anything he’d been interested in even if they’d looked at him like they were willing to offer something for free.
“Guess he liked the delivery option.”
“How do you know it was only lap dances?” Quinn asked. Did they put that on a receipt or something? He flipped open the file and started sifting through the impressive amount of information their rookie had managed to dig up.
“They probably fucked too. I’m trying not to think too in-depth about it. Lap dancing is more PG and about all I want to stomach.”
“What kind of lap dances have you been getting?” Ange said from her desk, laughing.
“I’d ask for your money back,” Gideon said solemnly, nodding along with his partner.
“Don’t you two have work to do?” Grady said, giving them the finger. Ange just laughed harder while Gideon returned the gesture. “Stop interrupting me, Quinn. I’m trying to get to the point.”
“Any day now,” Quinn said dryly.
“His phone calls were pretty substandard.”
“Did he pay for sex hotlines?” Quinn asked. He found the phone records and pulled them to the top, skimming over them.
“How did you know?”
“Lucky guess.” The guy had money, likely from the drug trafficking, and it seemed his activities were easy to decipher—sex, booze, food that had enough cholesterol to clog the arteries, and enough dog supplies to sink a ship.
There weren’t many numbers on the list. A one-eight-hundred number was there, almost like clockwork, every Tuesday at nine, so Quinn suspected that was the hotline. The others were random enough, and not frequent enough, to be of any interest.
“I pulled his phone records going back two years, just in case.”
“In case of what?”
“He only became an informant a year ago, so I was interested to know who he might have been talking to before then.”
Okay, that was clever. “And?” Quinn shuffled through until he found them. There was one number that was quite frequent. “Who is this for?”
“You’ll never guess.”
“I won’t need to because my partner isn’t about to waste my time making me run in circles, is he?” Quinn said, raising an eyebrow at Grady.
“You make everything boring.”
“Riley has your transfer papers already ready to go on his desk,” Quinn said. “Just say the word.”
“It’s Sebastian Devlin’s work number.”
Quinn straightened in his chair, frowning. “What?”
“Triple-checked it, just to make sure. But it is definitely my lucky day and definitely his number.”
Quinn stared at the number, trying to sift through his thoughts. “That’s not his number.” Not the one he used to have, not the one he had now. Unless he had another in between those two, he supposed.
“Funny you mention that. This particular number was hard to track down. Not a burner phone but close? I’m still doing some digging.”
“He could have a separate work and personal number,” Quinn said absently.
Sebastian knew the man who was murdered.
He knew , and he hadn’t said a word to Quinn.
He’d made his way back under Quinn’s skin, into his bed.
They’d shared Peyton and Will between them.
And all that time he’d known. Why hadn’t he said anything?
Quinn closed his eyes in horror. No. This wasn’t happening again.
He’d made a mistake last time when he’d believed everyone except Sebastian.
Every fantasy, every missed opportunity, every regret he’d felt when Sebastian had gone cold and never looked back came roaring back all at once.
It had been Quinn’s fault. He'd let his insecurities guide his thoughts, and he'd destroyed the relationship he and Sebastian had been building.
There was no way history could be repeating itself, surely. It had to be a mistake this time, just like it had been last time.
”You’re positive?”
Grady scowled at him. “Trying to rationalise this or ignore the facts isn’t doing you any favours.”
“Do we know why they were having frequent contact?”
“Yeah.” Grady pulled out a clipped set of papers. “Delgrade was a client of his.”
“Not a random encounter, then.”
“Got him off intent to distribute. That's not easy. I say we need to ask him some questions.”
Quinn wanted to say no. His first instinct was to keep denying, to say that nothing was what it seemed. But he couldn’t argue with facts.
“Yeah, okay,” he said, his heart sinking. “Bring him in.” This was going to be a clusterfuck of epic proportions.
“No, we go to him,” Grady said. “I don’t want him prepared for anything.”
Quinn let out a slow breath. “He's working from home today,” he said, feeling like he'd just hammered a nail into his own coffin. He ran a hand down his face, feeling queasy and sick.
What a goddamn mess.