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I blink and step back, shocked. “I… I’m locked in a room. Is that really all you came here to say?”
Raleigh jabs a finger at her own chest. “I broke you out of this room, remember? I stuck my neck out to help you escape.”
“And then three men attacked me at the bus stop!” I exclaim. “It’s not like I walked back here on my own!”
“But as soon as you were back, you gave up! All that big talk about wanting to get out of the mafia was bullshit! You just…”
She trails off, which isn’t like her. I square my shoulders. “You just what?”
Raleigh shakes her head, her jaw setting. “Honestly, Clara? You should have just stayed at Morgan’s house if all your escape plans hinged on other people doing everything for you.”
It stings like a slap. Worse to hear it from Raleigh’s mouth than to think it to myself in my lowest moments.
But is she wrong to say it? Especially after my actions brought her directly into danger? And last night, Thomas could have been killed when he tried to defend me. If I’d never left my uncle’s home and reunited with them, Raleigh and Thomas’s lives would be better right now.
It’s a devastating thought, one I don’t want Raleigh to see in my face. I turn my back on her, my arms crossed so tight it’s hard to inhale. “So, is that it?” I ask, my voice thick with grief. “I told you so?”
There’s the crinkle of paper, and the paper bag Raleigh had been holding lands on the floor at my feet. It tips over, and tubes of paint and brand new brushes spill out. I stare at them, uncomprehending.
“Since you’re going to be here a while,” Raleigh says, her own words tight. Before I can ask why she’d bring me a gift when she’s so mad at me, I hear the door close and lock behind me. I’m alone again.
Slowly, I kneel beside the bag and dump the rest of its contents on the ground. There are three different brushes, a cheap plastic palette for mixing, and a dozen different tubes of acrylic paint in every color of the rainbow and several shades in between. I pick up the tube of blue paint and turn it over and over in my hands, searching for some hidden meaning. After a moment, it clicks.
Raleigh doesn’t apologize. She never has, not as long as I’ve known her. Sometimes, I admired her for that brazenness. Other times, I was hurt twice over that if she said or did something that I didn’t like, she would refuse to admit her fault. But there were times, now and then, when we’d be in a bad fight, and although she wouldn’t say she was wrong, she would retreat. And when she came back to me, she would bring me a gift. Others might have thought they were being bought, but I knew her better than that.
I learned to accept those gifts as the closest thing to an apology as Raleigh’s pride would allow.
Raleigh might have come here today to chastise me, but she also came to tell me she was sorry, in her own way. I only wish I knew what she was apologizing for.
CHAPTER 25
Thomas
I brought Clara with me to the party to send a message about the internal discord in the Speare family. Today, Iris is by my side to send a message about the strength and unity of the Warwicks.
We go directly to Derrick Lindman’s office at the police department. I’ve made no appointment, but when I give the receptionist my name, she calls Derrick’s extension without any questions. We’re provided with visitor’s badges and welcomed into the elevator. I remove mine and tuck it into my pocket as soon as the doors are closed. The receptionist sees, but doesn’t dare comment.
Derrick’s office is the antithesis of mine. Sunlight spills through the wall of windows behind his desk. The stacks of unfiled paperwork and abundance of framed photos of his dogs cluttering its surface make my eye want to twitch. Various medals, certificates, and trophies are proudly displayed in a case on one wall. I believe that half of them are also for his dogs. A small sidebar is taken up by an electric kettle and stainless steel tea service. Not a coffee pot in sight.
Derrick is standing behind his desk, perhaps bracing himself for our arrival. His expression is, of course, perfectly pleasant. “Thank you, Georgie,” he tells the receptionist, warmly dismissing her. After she closes the door behind her, he goes to the sidebar. “Tea, Miss Agostinelli?”
“I’m deathly allergic to chamomile,” Iris says pleasantly, sitting herself in one of the two plush chairs across from Derrick’s desk and crossing her long legs. “Maybe next time, Mr. Lindman.”
How she was able to smell the kind of tea Derrick was brewing from several feet away, I don’t know. I tuck that into a box in my mind I keep for all of Iris’s most impressive quirks.
Derrick nods and returns to the desk with his own mug. “I apologize I don’t have any coffee brewed for you, Mr. Warwick,” he tells me with a smile. “I didn’t realize you were visiting.”
I return his smile with my own, just as false, and ignore that invitation to explain this walk in. “I had hoped to finish our conversation from last night,” I say.
“Yes,” Derrick says gravely, his smile falling for the first time. “Last night. I’m sure you’ve heard that the District Attorney was killed in the shootout?”
That is as much an accusation as it is a warning. The D.A. was a long time ally of mine, and the fact that I failed to protect him does not bode well to Derrick. Does he have reason to suspect the kill was intentional? It would be… resourceful of Morgan to track either my location or Clara’s to the party last night, start a public firefight, and then use it as a cover to kill the D.A.. In my experience, he isn’t that ingenious.
Whether or not the D.A.’s death was intentional, Derrick might also be saying he’s afraid to be the next victim if he continues to ally with me. I can either soothe his fears, or I can make sure he’s more afraid of me than he is of Morgan. I choose the first strategy to start with, but if he keeps trying to hedge through this conversation, I’ll begin to apply some pressure.
“Yes, a very unfortunate accident,” I agree. “Morgan Speare has outdone himself with this collateral damage.”
Stay focused on the real threat, Lindman.
