Wilson 25.
I sit casually on the couch, Keller and Pierce on either side of me. Buchanan paces the stained concrete floor as his father conducts a civil interrogation of our guest, Eric Rawson, aka Dale Rawson.
It’s an act. Madison is furious for so many reasons, but he is a master at setting a scene. Lulling his victim into a false sense of safety, leaving them unrestrained, like two people having a friendly chat. Until Prez believes he’s reached the point of no return, where the guest is unwilling to give up any useful information, thinking themselves untouchable. At that moment, which we are quickly approaching, McKinley and Barkley will take over and it will be anything but civil or friendly, and our guest will be disavowed of any such notions as untouchable or safe.
“Rawson, you gotta give me something. All we need is for you to tell us where the auction items are being stored and where you’ve stashed the money.”
“I wish I could.” Rawson’s eyes track Buck as he turns around and paces the other direction. “It’s terrible what happened to such a worthy cause. But I didn’t take them, I would never.” He places his hand over his cold dead heart and feigns sympathy. A sociopath like Eric Rawson is unable to feel anything, especially sympathy.
With a dramatic sigh the Oscar committee would find award worthy, Madison nods his head and stands from the leather chair seated across the table from Rawson. “I understand. I appreciate your time.”
“No problem. I understand you have to turn over every stone in a matter like this. If I can be of additional help—”
“Oh, don’t worry. I give it less than an hour, and you’ll be more helpful than you could ever know, Eric.” Madison says with a sinister grin. Rawson sucks in a surprised breath, his eyes widening in shock for a second, before the mask falls back into place.
“I’m sorry. I don’t understand. My name is Dale.”
“McKinley. Barkley. He’s all yours. Have fun brothers.”
“What? Wait! What do you—No! Get your hands off me!” Rawson struggles fruitlessly against our Sergeant-At-Arms and Enforcer. In moments, he’s on the table, arms and legs secured, a garotte wire across his neck that limits his movements.
I’m not sure if I should be impressed with my brothers’ skills, or disappointed at the efficiency of their methods. But it isn’t more than 10 minutes of Barkley running a feather across the bottom of Rawson’s bare foot before he’s spilling everything he knows and more than we asked for. Tickling is weird, I know, but people do not enjoy it, and when they squirm and jerk, that wire becomes mighty unpleasant as it digs into the thin skin of their throats.
“I don’t know where it is! Seriously! You’ve got to believe me!” Rawson wails. “I got hit from behind! Check my head, I swear.” Barkley rubs his hand over the back of Rawson’s head.
With a shrug, he says, “He’s got a good size bump.”
McKinley leans down until he’s inches from Rawson’s face. “You were knocked out?”
Rawson starts to nod but stops because of the wire. He gulps, and explains, “I-I-I was securing the room where the auction items were held. Everybody had left the venue. I just had to get the U-Haul from where I was staying.”
“Was it always your plan to cut Patrice out? Or was that a greedy last-minute decision? Better yet, did you always plan to murder your cousin? Or was he disagreeable with your scheme?”
Rawson slumps against the table, his chest seemingly collapses as he exhales in defeat. He’s aware of how much we know.
“She was a means to an end. And Dale…he was always perfect, always the golden boy…Anyway, I remember a sharp pain in the back of my head, my vision blurred and then I woke up sometime later alone in the building and everything was gone. I had an automatic transfer set up on the account with all the donations and when I woke up, I checked that right away. It was empty. All the money…gone.” He swallows hard, closes his eyes. “I got out of there, returned the U-Haul and—”
“Hid like a little bitch?” Buck spits out in disgust, stopping at the end of the table.
“Buchanan.” Madison warns.
“No! This fucker may have hid, but he and his ‘means to an end’ still tried to ruin Wilson and Tilly’s lives!”
I stand and place my hand on Buck’s shoulder. “Thanks, brother. But we’re good. You know Lincoln had our backs. We weren’t in any real danger of being imprisoned.”
Buck sniffs and shakes my hand off. I bite my lip to stop me from smiling at his display of emotion. He doesn’t like them. Says their icky. “It’s the principle of the matter.”
“Rawson. You’re gonna tell Pierce here all about the accounts you set up for the money transfers.”
“And you’ll let me go?” Rawson asks hopefully. It’s a sad display, doesn’t stop several of us from laughing.
“Yes.” Madison says. “Let you go right into FBI custody.”
“No! Come on, I’ll tell you what you want to know, but you don’t have to involve the FBI.”
“Fairs, fair. You called them first!” Madison says with a finger wave, and strides from the interrogation room in the basement of the clubhouse. To the casual observer it would look like a man cave, if you didn’t pay attention to the removable carpeting, drain in the middle of the floor, or soundproofing.
About an hour later, Corn lets us know that the FBI have arrived. Several of us escort Rawson out to the gate, where Lomax, Fish and several more men in black wait.
“They tortured me! Arrest them!”
Lomax looks Rawson up and down, unimpressed. “How?”
“Uh…” Rawson glances around before admitting softly, “They tickled me with feathers!”
Fish doesn’t bother to hide his laughter, “Tickled you, you say? My God, what animals!”
“They held me captive!” Rawson tries again, holding up his wrists which are bare. He rears back as he takes in his own clear skin.
“Did they use feathers for that too?” Fish chuckles.
Two agents forcefully guide Rawson to an unmarked cruiser. Lomax and Fish stand together, staring down Madison. When that doesn’t intimidate our prez, they lose some of their rigidity. Lomax asks, “How did you find him? Our guys weren’t able—”
“Your guys couldn’t find their way out of a wet paper bag.” Buck snorts derisively.
Fish nods, “That’s accurate.”
Fields steps next to Prez when Madison motions for him. “I tracked him using the GPS from the U-Haul he rented in Wilson’s name.”
“Yeah, we did too, but he’d already returned it.”
“One of the stops on the GPS was a block from a shitty rent by the hour motel.”
“A wet paper bag.” Lomax laments, patting Fish on the shoulder. They lift their fingers in goodbye, get in their vehicle and drive off.
Back in the clubhouse, Tilly comes downstairs from my suite…our suite. Dammit, it’s our suite. I loop my arm around her waist at the bottom of the steps. “You live here now.” I mumble into the crook of her shoulder, dragging my tongue up her neck.
“Ok.” She says breathily, both hands on my cheeks, she redirects my mouth to hers and inhales my tongue.
“I expected an argument.”
“Oh, there’ll be arguments. Don’t worry.” Patting my cheek with a condescending smile, her hips sway as she saunters over to the bar for a drink, before joining Betty, Stacy, Audrey, Quinn, and Chastity. I give the ladies a smile, then get a drink for myself.
“I know it’s not Tuesday, but I’m in the mood for Tandoori.” I hear Tilly say loudly and I nearly choke on my beer. She glances over her shoulder with a wicked grin, and winks at me.
“Uh…” Audrey stares at the other women and blinks owlishly. “I don’t think that’s a good idea. Your brother—”
“My brother isn’t here and since I’m moving in with Wilson, it isn’t Tybalt’s concern anymore what I eat.”
“No, but it is mine!” Madison charges over to their table. “I ain’t about to have the plumber on speed dial—”
“White chocolate toffee crunch cookie, Prez?” Tilly smiles up at Prez innocently, producing a container of cookies from under the table. Was she hiding them in her pants? Where did they come from?
Prez’s face lights up like a kid, “Ooh, my favorite.”