Chapter 18
Eighteen
L owey sat down in one of the few remaining chairs. Half of them were broken, the other half were turned over on the floor, the cushions slashed by overzealous deputies on a witch hunt.
“He’s going to arrest me, isn’t he?” She wanted Quentin to lie to her, but she knew he wouldn’t.
“He’s going to try,” he said. “But I’ll do whatever it takes to keep that from happening.
We both know you didn’t do anything wrong.
They took your gun…and they knew where to find it.
Everyone in this town knows where you keep those under the counter.
So why was that the very last place they looked? ”
“So that they would have ample opportunity to destroy every piece of furniture and upholstery that Joey hadn’t?
” she replied. She didn’t know why the hell Silas did what he did, but she was pretty damn sure that everything the deputies had done since they’d walked into the bar had been on his orders.
“I have a bad feeling here, Lowey…if Silas wanted that gun, it’s because he knows it will match whatever slug they dig out of Joey. This would be so much easier if you had cameras in here! ”
“I do,” she replied. “I had them installed with the security system when I moved into the apartment upstairs. They loop every forty-eight hours.” It hadn’t even crossed her mind.
The security cameras focused on the areas behind the bar, in front of the storeroom, and the entrance to her apartment.
With Joey’s shooting spree, they’d have been pointless.
But if Silas or one of his minions had let himself into the bar to help themselves to her gun, they might have the proof they needed.
“What time does the loop reset?” he asked.
“At midnight,” she replied.
“We’ve got fifteen minutes,” he said. “Let’s get upstairs.”
Lowey followed him up the stairs to her apartment. The security feed went directly to her desktop computer. She sat down at the desk and opened up the program. Rather than try to play beat the clock, she just downloaded the file and saved it for them to review.
“Does anyone know about these cameras?” he asked.
“No. I didn’t exactly advertise that I put them in. The whole point of security cameras is to not tell people where they are so then they can’t avoid them.”
Lowey pulled up the footage and started forwarding through the sections that she knew were clear. When they passed the point in the video where Joey had shot up the place she settled into her chair.
It took forever. Speeding up the footage, slowing it down, checking every strange blip on the screen and realizing that half of them were moths. Finally, they reached the spot where Silas entered the bar.
“Son of a bitch,” Quentin said. “There he is, bold as brass.”
Lowey felt sick watching it, seeing him rifling through the items behind the bar looking for the gun. When he had it in hand, he left the bar. They fast forwarded through the footage until he appeared on the screen again, placing the gun back in its normal spot.
“He killed Joey,” she said slowly, stunned by what she’d just seen. “He really did, and he’s going to try and burn me for it.”
“Yes, he did. Email that to me and email it to my lawyer.” He gave her the email addresses and then called Clayton, giving him the rundown of everything they’d found. After that, he texted the info to Ciaran.
“This stays between us and my brothers,” he said. “We can’t afford to let Silas know we have this until we’re ready to use it. Silas is dangerous, Lowey. If he knew you had this—I don’t know what he might do.”
“I do,” she said. “If he’d shoot Joey, he’d do that to me or worse, all without batting an eye. I don’t want to go to jail, but I kinda don’t want to die either.”
Quentin stepped forward and pulled her into his arms. It was bad enough when he just thought Silas wanted to make her life hell, but the idea of her being in real danger, and from someone who wasn’t just a fuck-up like Joey, terrified him.
“I’m not letting anything happen to you,” he promised. “I’m not letting you go. Not for any reason, not ever.”
“Quentin, you have gotten sucked into a huge mess…my mess. You’re making all these grand statements because you’re feeling heroic, but that’s not who we are. I’m not a damsel in distress. I can handle this.”
He laughed at that. “I know you’re not, Lowey. I never thought you were. But just because you can handle it doesn’t mean you should have to handle it alone. As for heroic…no. I’m not feeling heroic. I’m fucking terrified.”
“What the hell are you scared of? I’m the one Silas wants dead or in prison! ”
He went quiet, thinking about what he needed to say to her. “I’m scared of losing you. I can’t lose anything or anyone else in my life, Lowey…but especially not you. So just let me help you with this.”
“I don’t understand you, Quentin. Not at all. What happened that you’re suddenly this guy?”
“What guy?”
Her head fell back as she sighed with frustration. “ This guy—the one who talks about his feelings, who admits that he actually has feelings! Where the hell did this come from?”
“It isn’t that I don’t have feelings. God, could this conversation make me sound like more of a pussy?
” he asked. He hated these kinds of conversations.
They were the primary reason that he typically avoided relationships.
But avoiding one with Lowey wasn’t an option.
She was as necessary to him as breathing.
So, if that meant he had to talk like they were on a damned episode of Dr. Phil, he would.
“Talk to me, dammit,” she snapped.
“I don’t let many people in. I never intended to let you in.
” The admission was uttered softly, but with complete conviction.
It was true. He’d thought for the longest time that he could just have fun with her, just indulge his rather healthy lust for her, and then move on, like he had with so many other women in his life.
But she drew him in, maybe because she was so much like him.
Their backgrounds couldn’t have been more different, but the way they approached the world, the way they guarded themselves, it was the same.
And he’d needed to know what her secrets were, he’d needed to know why she protected herself so fiercely.
That had been his first clue that she was different and that somehow, he would be different with her.
“But it happened. And now that you’re there, I’m not letting go, not now, not ever.
I will do anything—whatever it fucking takes—to keep you safe and to keep you mine. ”
“So what do we do now?” she asked. “I don’t know how to be this way with you, Quentin. I’ve spent so much time trying to pretend that this was nothing more than sex, mostly because I was terrified that any hint of emotion would send you running for the hills.”
“The only running I plan to do is whatever it takes to catch you,” he promised. “But first we need to get Matt Crawford out here.”
“He’s a Lexington cop. What’s he going to do?”
“Put us in touch with someone at the state level who we can trust,” he answered. “Silas is a son of a bitch, but he’s not without allies. We’ve got to be careful with this thing. ”
“So how do we get in touch with him? I know he moves in your circle, but he doesn’t really move in mine.”
“Ciaran is sending him out…to the house. I think the best bet for us is to be where there are witnesses. Silas can’t take out the whole Darcy clan without raising a shit ton of questions, but he could take out the two of us without giving it that much thought.
You resisted arrest, and I interfered with the intent to harm an officer of the law…
yes, it would be suspicious, but not entirely unbelievable. ”
She shook her head. “I miss the days of thinking Joey was the only member of the Barnes family who actually wanted to see me dead.”