Chapter 15 #2
In that instant something tripped in his mind. He lowered the gun. A sudden calm swept over him. He looked down at Frank, his look incredulous when Callum planted his foot in his face and shoved him backwards.
Frank tumbled into the corner, knocking over a stack of boxes.
Callum stood there.
It was a moment before Frank dug himself out of the spilled boxes and re-emerged, rubbing his jaw with his hands still tied. His lips were bleeding. “You’re a good man, Harrison. I knew you’d come to your senses.”
Callum strode out the door, his head beginning to throb.
“She’s changed you, Harrison!” Frank called after him.” Before you met her, you would have killed me first and asked questions later.”
“Lucky for you,” Callum said, as he headed back out into the night.
Callum shoes left little red puddles of blood as he trudged up rain-soaked stairs. He felt like he was sure he looked. Tired. Beaten. Torn. When his hand grasped the doorknob, he noticed his gnarled bloodied knuckles. Like his hand belonged to an animal rather than himself.
The cassette tape he scored from Vitalie’s office was still in his pocket, and felt heavier than before.
But listening to it would have to wait. Hell, he wasn’t even sure he had anything to listen to it with.
Who had a tape deck anymore? All that mattered now was getting Brielle safely through the night and on the court tomorrow. The rest would have to wait.
The smell of burning birch watered his eyes when he stepped through the door. Leslie sat on the couch in the great room with a blanket pulled around her and a coffee cup in her hand.
“I heard you pull in.” Her forehead wrinkled when she looked at him. “I put some coffee on. But maybe you want to get in the shower or something. You look awful.”
“You built a big fire in the fireplace,” he thought out loud. “You must want to talk.”
“I was hoping you would want to.”
He smiled, his eyes following her as she went over to the kitchen counter. “Actually I do need to talk to you about a few things. I need some advice.”
She pulled the coffee pot from the machine and poured him a cup. “You went to see Big Frank tonight.”
“How did you know?”
“You have that look. Plus, the way you bolted from the crime scene tonight, I figured you had plans.”
Callum came up to the counter and sat on the stool across from her. “I guess you know me pretty well by now.”
“You didn’t kill him, did you?”
“No, but I wanted to.” Callum didn’t miss the relief in her eyes.
“He has something to do with it, doesn’t he?”
“He is it, Leslie. Classic Frank Riley. He planned it with Vitalie. They’re all in on it. Vitalie, Geoffrey?”
“Brielle?”
He closed his eyes. “I don’t know. That’s my problem.” Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out the tape and tossed it on the counter.
“What’s that?”
“A smoking gun.” He drank his coffee while he considered where to start. “Tonight, at the party, I saw the guy from the bar. The one with the tattoo. His name is Malcolm Rodriguez. He was one of the waiters.
Leslie leaned across the counter. “Did you talk to him?”
“Hell, yeah I talked to him. That’s where I was when Vitalie had Brielle.”
“I can’t believe you let her go out there alone in the first place.”
“I didn’t have much of a choice.” He ran an unsteady hand through his hair. “Malcolm told me he was the one Vitalie paid to send Brielle threatening mail and that whole mirror stunt at the Pelican. He wanted to throw off the investigation.”
“And?”
“And he told me about this tape.” He took it out of her hand, flipping it back on the counter. “Vitalie taped all his conversations with Frank for insurance.”
“So, what about Brielle’s saliva on the envelopes?” Leslie reminded him. “You’re saying she was set up?”
“It wouldn’t be hard. Vitalie owns her house for Christ sake. Break in, grab her toothbrush smear it over the seal.”
“Well you’ve certainly thought of all the possibilities, haven’t you?” Leslie picked up the tape and held it up to the light. “Callum, this is great. You might have Frank right where you want him. So, what’s the problem?”
“Brielle. If her agreeing to the attack was recorded, no one is ever going to believe she changed her mind.”
Leslie leaned against the counter. “Does Frank know you have it?”
“He doesn’t know it exists.”
“Okay, but what about this Malcolm guy? How do you know he won’t warn Frank?”
“I don’t,” Callum admitted. “But he seemed pretty much into protecting himself. I doubt he would volunteer anything to anyone. There’s no way for Frank to tie him to the tape. It was Vitalie’s. This Malcolm guy is in pretty deep and I doubt he wants to go back to prison.”
Leslie lifted her chin as if she suddenly understood the crux of the problem. “Oh I see, your issue isn’t how to get Frank, it’s how to protect Brielle.” Her face darkened with disapproval. “You’re taking a lot of chances here, Callum.”
“I’m trying to do right by everyone,” he said. “Look, I’ll turn it in when the time is right, but as long as Frank doesn’t know it exists, he won’t come looking for it, which means Brielle is safe.”
“For now” Leslie said.
“Yeah, for now.” He looked back toward the open bedroom door. “Where is she anyway?”
“Sleeping out in the gazebo. I helped her turn on the fire pit about an hour ago, but don’t worry I keep checking on her.”
He turned toward the window, spying the orange glow of the fire in the gazebo. “Did she talk to you at all?”
“Some,” she replied. “She definitely had a lot to say about Geoffrey. I guess she thinks he has something going with Nila. She says after the match, she’s breaking off the engagement.”
His heart kicked him in his chest. “Well, it’s probably for the best. The guy’s a liar.”
“I got the impression he was trouble.”
“But she sure is something isn’t she?”
“You would know better than I would.” She sighed, then walked around the counter, taking a seat beside him. When she placed her hand on his shoulder, he recognized the gesture as her attempt at sincerity. “Before I leave you here with her, I feel like I need to say something.”
Her serious tone made him aware of his impending headache, so he went for his pill bottle on the counter. Dropping two in his hand, he popped them in his mouth and swallowed. “Okay, lay it on me.”
“I know you hate lectures but I can’t help it when you insist on being your own worst enemy.”
“What the hell does that mean?”
“It means I know better than anyone how you don’t tolerate personal feelings interfering with work. You need to listen to that tape. And if there are things you don’t want to hear, you need to deal with it as a professional.”
The part of his brain that still housed a shred of objectivity told him she was absolutely right.
At the very least, Brielle was a witness to potentially a slew of crimes.
But if he stretched the rules like he loved to do, he could say he had her in protective custody.
“I’m not doing anything until tomorrow. She’s waited for so long for this opportunity and I don’t want to ruin it. ”
Leslie’s patted him on the hand. “Okay, I won’t say another word about it until after the match. But you are too good at what you do to ruin it over a fling. Just keep that in mind.”
The word “fling” hit him wrong. It was obvious now what he felt for Brielle was more than a simple attraction.
He had never in his whole life loved a woman, and sometimes he wondered if he would even recognize it if it ever happened to him.
Maybe that’s what made him smile when he saw her and his insides sizzle when he touched her.
But right now he wasn’t interested in defining his feelings. Not tonight.
“Don’t worry Leslie, I’ll do what I have to.” That was the truth he decided as he trudged off to the shower.