Chapter 8 #2
“Because he’s had evidence against Draven before but hadn’t been able to make it stick.”
“Exactly.” Shaw nodded. “Then it flashes back again. There’s three more times when he goes up against Draven and comes out the loser.”
Draven would be the smug, untouchable criminal. And in a way, that’s exactly who he had been. People had gravitated toward Draven because of his confidence. His power. He’d been a natural leader with a sharp mind and a no-bullshit attitude.
You loved him fiercely.
Or you hated him with equal passion.
Dash was like that to a degree, though Bryce and the boys had mellowed him over the years.
We’d all mellowed after the Kings had closed their clubhouse doors.
“There’s a scene with a young cop Marcus is mentoring,” Shaw said. “Another where he butts heads with Luke.”
“Luke’s in this?”
“Yeah. He’s the hero.”
“No.” I shook my head. “Genevieve is the hero.”
“True.” He sipped his water. “Luke and Marcus don’t agree on a burglary case.
This kid breaks into a store, and Marcus wants to let the kid off with a warning because he plays golf with the kid’s dad.
Luke argues that since the kid is twenty-one and was drunk off his ass at the time, he doesn’t deserve a break.
It’s the first time you question Marcus as a cop. ”
“Good.” Maybe that story was true. Maybe it wasn’t. But it was time to start infusing some doubt about Marcus himself.
“The scenes after that jumps into the present timeline. Draven was arrested but is out on bond. Genevieve has moved to town. She came because she wants to investigate her mother’s murder, but then she learns that she’s Draven’s daughter.
Though her story is shown from Marcus’s perspective.
He’s out to dinner with his wife and overhears a rumor.
He’s upset. He liked Genevieve and he feels like she’s on the other team. ”
“Because she was.” Genevieve’s determination to find her mother’s killer was the reason Marcus was in prison.
Though Shaw had it wrong as to why she’d moved to Clifton Forge, but since that truth was known by only a handful of people, that was no surprise.
Genevieve hadn’t moved here to watch the investigation.
She’d come here to see her mother’s grave and had been kidnapped along with Bryce.
It had taken them a year to learn that Marcus had been their kidnapper.
Still, it had never been made public knowledge.
That was one of the few Tin King secrets I’d been privy to.
The day of the kidnapping, I’d come to work and the entire place had been abandoned.
I’d tried to call Dash and Draven with no luck, and I’d known instantly that something bad had happened.
So I’d done what I’d always done: I’d taken care of the business.
I’d claimed a family emergency and rescheduled appointments.
Then I’d waited, hoping everyone would be all right.
God, what a year that had been.
The year of death. It had started with Amina’s murder, then the kidnapping and then Draven’s suicide.
We’d all been scared and on edge. There had been a murderer at large. The Warriors had been threatening retaliation for the death of one of their members—they’d suspected their man had been killed by a former Tin King.
Everyone had been stressed. Bryce had been pregnant with Xander, and Dash hadn’t let her out of his sight. Bryce used to come in and work here every day because Dash wouldn’t leave her at the newspaper.
It had been such a miserable year, yet we’d all become closer for surviving it together.
“We get more flashbacks,” Shaw spoke, his smooth voice pulling me into the present. “Marcus runs into Amina in Bozeman. He asks her out and they start dating.”
“Do you show that she knows he’s married?”
Shaw shook his head. “He never tells her. In one scene, he’s taking off his wedding ring before he meets her.”
Thank God.
None of us knew if Amina had known Marcus was married when they started dating.
According to Genevieve, her mom hadn’t talked much about the man she’d called Lee—a nickname from when Marcus and Amina had been kids.
Maybe Amina had known that Marcus was married.
Maybe he’d promised her that he was leaving his wife.
Or maybe he’d hidden it, along with so many other things.
For Genevieve’s sake, to protect the memory of her mother, I pretended Marcus had lied.
“Marcus hides Amina and the affair from his wife. He sneaks in phone calls and weekends to visit her. He starts drinking more. He isn’t as focused at work. My makeup in the movie gets more and more haggard.”
“He’s becoming the villain.”
“That’s right.” Shaw nodded. “I told you we’d get there.”
I gave him a small smile. “As long as the audience hates him as much as I do when they walk out, we’re good.”
“I’ll do my best.”
“How does it end?” We needed to skip forward.
At some point, I was sure there’d be a scene for Draven’s death.
It was yet another reason seeing this film probably wasn’t good for my mental state.
If I couldn’t listen to Shaw give me the CliffsNotes version, I doubted I’d be able to watch the fictional retelling.
Shaw humored me. “Genevieve finds a picture in Amina’s things of Marcus. Again, it’s from his perspective, but she takes it to his house one night. She asks him about it. And it all clicks. It crumbles around him as she puts it together that he killed her mom.”
How hard had it been for Genevieve to go to his house? There hadn’t been a picture, but she had been the one to piece it together—Shaw had that right. Genevieve had been the one person able to give Draven and Amina justice.
She’d done that for them. For herself. For us all.
“Are you using their real names?”
“Marcus’s,” Shaw said gently. “Most of the others have been changed. I just thought it would be easier to refer to them as the names you know.”
“Thank you. For the names. For talking this through.”
“You’re welcome.”
The explanation, though helpful, didn’t make this project easier to accept. Shaw was trying to help me find peace with the movie but . . . it wasn’t there.
I didn’t want this movie to happen. It would, regardless of Shaw’s time spent answering my questions.
And that was a fact, a disappointment, I’d learn to live with.
Still, I appreciated his time. Shaw didn’t have to answer my questions. He didn’t have to spend his Friday afternoon in an uncomfortable chair.
Why me? Was it because I sat in the front? Because I’d been the first to ask? Would he have told Dash if Dash had been the one to press for answers?
Or was it because something simmered in the air when Shaw and I were in these seats? There was attraction here, more than I wanted to admit. But there was something else too. I didn’t hold back words with Shaw, afraid of how they could be turned against me or used to punish me.
My words flew, ripping, raw and honest.
At the first hint of my attitude, he could have left the garage and never come back. That’s what I’d wanted, right? But he’d returned.
He’d listened.
To me.
I was fucked. If he kept listening, if he kept being his charming self, I was fucked.
Shaw straightened in his chair. “You told me you were worried about the truth. How close are we?”
“Close enough,” I said, watching as the tension in his shoulders eased. “You have the main parts right. The rest . . .” I looked up at Draven’s picture. “The rest died years ago.”
“I’m sorry you lost him.”
I gave him a sad smile. “So am I.”
The room went quiet except for the noise from the shop. Sawyer and Tyler were likely finishing up for the day, anxious to clock out.
“I’d better go.” Shaw picked up his empty cup. “Trash can?”
“I’ll take care of it.” I stood and rounded my desk as he set the cup aside. Then for the first time, I followed Shaw to the door. He opened it and stepped outside, the sun glinting in his eyes, making the gold striations jump. “Did this earn me dinner?”
I laughed. “No.”
“Worth a try.” He stepped away but stopped and looked back. “You still don’t approve of this movie.”
“No. I doubt I ever will.”
Did he need my approval? Not really, but it seemed important to him. I’d been focused on the description and visualizing it in my head as he’d talked. But there’d been something about his voice. Reverence. Like with every scene, he was begging me to like it as much as he did.
“Why is this movie so important to you?” I asked.
“Reasons.”
“Are they the same reasons you’re no longer a cop?”
He studied my face, then slid on his sunglasses. “That’s a different movie. Goodbye, Presley.”
“Goodbye, Shaw.” I stood in the doorway as he strode to his Escalade, waving as he left.
That’s a different movie.
That was a Shaw Valance movie I wanted to see.