Chapter 28 #2
Craine reached into his jacket—slowly, deliberately, the motion of a man who knew that reaching into a jacket in front of trained operators required telegraph and transparency—and produced a folded document.
"New information has been uncovered regarding the death of Special Agent Trevor Klein," Craine said. His voice matched his face—precise, controlled. "Wyatt Dane is being brought in for additional questioning."
He extended the document. Ryker took it. Read it. He’d clearly been reading legal documents under pressure for years and could separate the operative language from the boilerplate in seconds.
"This is a material witness request," Ryker said. "Not an arrest warrant."
"Correct," Craine said. "For now."
The for now sat in the morning air like a held breath.
Ryker's eyes came up from the document. "Our attorneys will need to review—"
"They're welcome to meet us at the field office," Craine said. "The request is lawful. I have the authority to compel Mr. Dane's presence for questioning. I'd prefer to do this cooperatively."
The word cooperatively was delivered without warmth. It was a courtesy wrapped around a mandate, and everyone present understood the wrapping.
Wyatt appeared in the doorway behind us.
Changed—jeans, boots, a plain shirt. His face was composed in the way that faces got composed when a man had spent thirty seconds explaining to the woman he loved that the federal government wanted to talk to him about the time she'd pushed a man off a bridge, and had then walked out the door before she could see the fear underneath the composure.
"It's okay," Wyatt said. To Ryker. To me. To the morning itself. "I'll go."
One of the tactical men stepped forward, producing a set of handcuffs with reflexive efficiency.
"No," Ryker said. The single syllable carried the weight of a man who had drawn a line.
Craine looked at his man. Nodded once. The handcuffs disappeared.
"For now," Craine said again.
Two of the others moved to Wyatt's sides—one on each arm, their grips professional and firm. Wyatt went with them. Didn't resist. Didn't tense. Walked between them down the steps and across the gravel toward a blacked-out van parked behind the Bureau sedan.
I watched my brother walk toward the van.
The brother I'd hugged on this patio last night.
The brother who'd poured me stolen tequila and told me our father was alive.
The brother who'd ridden horses with me to Mexico when we were kids and gotten grounded for two months and said it was worth every penny.
Fuck this.
I leaned toward Ryker. Close. Low.
"Make sure Louisa is okay," I said. "Tell her I'll be fine."
Then I stepped forward.
"Agent Craine."
Craine turned. The slate eyes found me. Assessed.
"I'm coming with him," I said.
"That's not how this works, Mr.—"
"Dane," I said. "Grant Dane. He's my brother. I'm coming."
"This is a federal matter. Family members aren't—"
"I'm coming."
I held his gaze. Didn't blink. Didn't soften. Gave him the full, unfiltered weight of a man who'd spent twelve years in rooms where the stakes were measured in lives and who was not, under any circumstances, going to watch his brother get loaded into a van alone.
Something flickered in Craine's eyes. Brief. Barely there—a micro-expression so small that most people would have missed it entirely and I caught it only because reading micro-expressions was the difference between coming home and not coming home in my line of work.
It wasn't surprise. It wasn't anger.
It was interest.
The flicker of a man who'd just seen something he hadn't expected and was filing it for later use. The look of a predator who'd come for one thing and had just noticed something else worth watching.
"Fine," Craine said. His voice didn't change. The concession was delivered with the same flat precision as everything else. And then he really surprised me. "You can ride with your brother."
He turned and walked toward the sedan. The tactical team continued to the van, Wyatt between them.
I looked back at Ryker. The man's face was stone, but his eyes—Ryker's eyes, which I was learning to read the way I read Louisa's, for what lived underneath the surface—were calculating.
Running scenarios. Adjusting the operational picture to accommodate a variable he hadn't planned for, which was me, walking voluntarily into federal custody alongside my brother.
I nodded once. Ryker nodded back. The nod of two men who understood that what was about to happen was necessary and possibly stupid and definitely happening regardless.
I turned and walked down the steps. Toward the van where my brother was already inside, seated between two men in black gear, his face calm and his eyes carrying everything his face wouldn't show.
I climbed in. Sat down across from him. The doors closed.
Wyatt looked at me.
"You didn't have to do that," he said.
"Yeah," I said. "I did."
The van started. Pulled down the drive. The gates opened. Dominion Hall receded in the small rear window—the stone, the oaks, the stables where Valentine was eating his breakfast without knowing that the man who'd named him was leaving.
Beside me, through the wall of the van, I could feel the morning—warm, salt-threaded, the Charleston morning that had been golden and good an hour ago and was now something else entirely.
Craine was in the other vehicle. I could see the back of his head through the partition—the silver at his temples, the stillness of his posture, the quality of a man who was thinking about something he wasn't going to share.
That flicker in his eyes. I hadn't imagined it.
Special Agent Dominic Craine had let me come too easily. A man that controlled didn't make concessions without a reason.
Which meant I wasn't an accommodation.
I was part of whatever this was.
I just didn't know whose side I was on yet.