SIX
LACHLAN AND STRAT’S car was a rental. Her brother texted the agency for pick up and left the keys with the guy at motel reception.
They bundled into Strat’s car, with him driving and her shotgun, and got to the highway without saying a word.
“How long will it take to get back?” she asked, calling number after number in Strat’s phone. Just as he’d said, no McDade phone was on. “How far are we from home?”
“It’s him. That’s all you care about,” her father said. “You have no concept of what the rest of us are going back to.”
“Oh, I have a pretty good idea,” she said, choosing to text the same numbers, just in case. She had to be doing something. “You’re going back to a prison cell.”
“You have no proof of anything.” Good point. “I’ll deny everything and people will listen to me. No one will take you seriously, there will be no investigation. You have no credibility.”
Huh, yeah, if she went back shouting out Ronald’s guilt, who would believe her? The woman in bed with a McDade, enemy to men like her father.
Lachlan wasn’t to be underestimated. “Is the suppressed firearm the murder weapon?”
“That’s proof.”
“Proof of nothing. The gun isn’t registered to me.”
She didn’t want to ask who it was registered to or how he’d come into possession of it.
“I can’t believe this,” Lachlan murmured. “I can’t believe any of this.” Her heart hurt for him. “I told Sersha she was full of shit when she told me about you and Manzani, but it was true, wasn’t it?”
“You shouldn’t believe everything your sister says. Ire has been pouring poison into her for weeks, months.”
Strat glanced at her. “Take it things went the McDade way?”
With the Harvest deal. Had voting been that week? Maybe.
“For all the difference it will make if Conn’s gone,” she said. “I don’t know how the cards will fall without…” Her voice cracked, so she cleared her throat. “Sorry.”
He reached over to squeeze her hand. “That fucking bastard won’t die so easy. He’s out there.”
She hoped so.
“Have you tried hospitals?” Lachlan asked.
“He wouldn’t go to a hospital.”
“Where would he go?”
She twisted to glare. “You better not be pumping me for information with ideas of bringing down my guy when your own father is a murderer. Whether Conn is alive or dead, our father killed our grandpapa, he did. Can you believe that? I couldn’t… Let it sink in. It’s all about Manzani. About power. Greed. Money. Our father killed our grandfather because he promised Silvio Manzani votes. Henry was smarter than him, smarter than both of them, he was asking questions. He knew something was going on, something was happening, and he wanted to stop it.”
“Did he know?” Lachlan asked, though not of her. “Did Henry find out you were working with Manzani?” Ronald said nothing. “I’ll back her. Don’t doubt it, Dad. You can dismiss Sersh as crazy, deluded, whatever, but I’ll be with her. You better be ready to trash both of us.”
He’d stand with her because it was the right thing to do, because it was right for their grandfather’s memory.
“I already told her if she comes for me, I come for the McDades.”
“Then you better hope Ire is alive,” Strat said. “He’s the only one who’ll listen to her, and she’s your only chance of getting out of this with your life.”
“The McDades will come for him.” She exhaled and settled in her seat again. “I guess it’s all moot. Why shout about his crimes to the authorities when the families in the city will run him out on a rail? He took the money and failed to deliver. He put a bullet in one McDade and held another captive for almost a week.”
“Not much of a future.”
“You threaten me while allying yourself with a criminal.”
“Who’s a criminal?” Strat asked.
“Ire! Ire McDade!”
“Oh, really?” her friend played it straight. “I didn’t know that about him.” They shared a smile. “I’d love to see the proof of that.”
If the authorities had enough to bring down Conn, they’d have done it. Just like her father claimed now, that she had no proof, he wouldn’t have sufficient proof to back up his claims either.
“You’re both hypocrites.”
Her friend’s wrist slid to the top of the wheel. “Say that’s true, we’re hypocrites and you’re both murderers, you and Ire, like say, hypothetically, it’s true. There’s still one major difference.”
“What’s that?”
“Ire loved her, loves her.” More support from her friend. If she wasn’t ready to accept Conn’s death, Strat wouldn’t either. “She is loyal to him and his people because they all love her. She’s one of them. One of us. She isn’t on the outside, she isn’t judged. Sersha cares about people. You have no fucking idea how far she’s gone to protect the people she cares about. People I care about. Hell, to protect practical strangers. And that’s without breaking the law.” Though could be classed as the gray zone. “Your daughter is an amazing woman, strong and virtuous…” maybe, sometimes. “You should be proud of her, support her. Maybe if you had…”
She wouldn’t have ended up in Conn’s bed? They wouldn’t be in this mess?
“If she comes for me, if any of you come for me, I guarantee I’ll be the last one standing.”
“Because you’ll abuse your position. Just like you abuse the city’s faith. Like you abused your father’s trust.”
“I won’t take this. You class yourself as a McDade,” her father said. “Judge one by one measure and use another for others? I won’t take it. It’s a double standard.” The truth, unfortunately. “You have no proof of your claims, and I control anyone who might investigate them, which means, like I said, no investigation.”
“Resign.” A single word from Lachlan, who’d been quiet for a while. “Resign your position.” In silence, they reflected on the suggestion. Well, she did, her father was probably dumbfounded. “Today. Right now. Email in your resignation.”
“I will not! Why would I—”
“Because you’re not the right man for the job, you don’t understand it. Proposing to use your position in order to free yourself from a criminal charge proves you don’t understand it. Henry would’ve insisted on this. You know that. You know he would. That’s why you shot him, why you killed him, right? He found out you were in Manzani’s pocket and influencing others to accept his bribes? There are repercussions for that, for what you did. You can’t just get away with doing what you want and lining your own pockets.”
And that was before addressing him being a murderer. Ronald seemed to be taking the fifth.
“I agree,” she said, backing up her brother. “Resign. You expect us to cover up your crimes? To stay silent? You can’t walk back into your life like nothing’s changed.”
“No one would believe it. Why would I suddenly give up a role I value? I excel in it, it’s my life, my purpose—”
“Your family,” Lachlan said. “You’re giving it up to spend more time with your family.”
“People would believe that,” Strat offered. “You did just lose someone. Puts things in perspective.”
For some people, not the one holding the gun and pulling the trigger, apparently.
“And you don’t excel in it,” she said. “Your job is literally to uphold the law. Didn’t Conn remind you that you’re supposed to obey it too?”
“How could you do it?” Lachlan asked. “Henry was—he didn’t deserve—I can’t believe you’d walk in there and shoot your own father. He wouldn’t have seen you coming, wouldn’t have thought anything about letting you in to talk. You took advantage of his trust.”
Exactly what she’d said.
“Ron’s not the man we thought he was,” she said.
“You’ve been telling me that for years. I should’ve listened. I’m sorry I—”
“It’s not your fault that you wanted to see the best in him, Lach. You idolized him. We see what we want to see.”
“I’m not a monster,” her father hissed. “Neither of you understand. It wasn’t meant to—I didn’t mean to… I didn’t go there intending to hurt anyone.”
“Except you took a gun, one not registered to you,” Strat said. “Kinda kills that argument. Why go armed if you didn’t intend to hurt anyone? And if it was for protection, in case laws were broken, don’t you have a service weapon?”
“This has nothing to do with you!”
Oh, her father was getting catty in all the wrong ways. She twisted, grabbing the headrest to get a better look at Ronald.
“I would walk into fire for Strat,” she said, narrowing her eyes. “I haven’t even decided if I’ll let you live yet.”
“Sersh,” Lachlan warned.
“Accidents befall people all the time, Lach. Especially out on the open road.”
Strat’s warm laugh appreciated her.
Lachlan’s scowl did not. “Sersh.”
“Okay,” she said, holding up her hands as she bounced back in her seat. “I’ll behave.”
“Never do for anyone else,” Strat said from the corner of his mouth and winked her way.