“We all went to the club as friends,” Drina said, speaking up for Coco.
The agent let his glasses slip down his nose. “We’ll get to you soon, Drina. Give me a minute.” He redirected his attention to Coco. “Miss Baldini, were you aware that Paddles and Picnics has an outdoor surveillance system, one which covers each of the outdoor patios and balconies, both public and private?” He clucked. “Oh and uh, when curtains are left open their cameras pick up action in the master bedrooms of each independent suite.” He smiled. “Just for future reference, of course.”
Coco’s hand trembled. She covered her mouth, uncertain if she released a whimper or if it was in fact imagined. “No…no…I wasn’t aware.”
“Kane.” Peyton nudged her husband and put her arm around Coco as if to offer her a source of protection, or at least the illusion of safety.
Coco watched the driveway. She didn’t want the illusion. She needed the real thing. What was keeping them? It shouldn’t have taken the Blazier brothers that long to get there! Where were they? What was the hold up?
“Coco, these men want to discuss something with you,” Kane said, acting as if he were head of the family.
“Let’s go ahead and put everything out here on the table,” one of the older agents said. “Your boys aren’t coming, Ms. Baldini. At this very moment, their property is being raided and they are being questioned, just as you are. Now, you can either cooperate with us or we can take you in for further questioning, which you might prefer because then you would at least see some of your ‘friends,’ as you say. Either way, we’re getting to the truth today.”
Coco shook from her head to her toes. Her head spun around and around. Surely the agents were lying, playing mind games. Wasn’t trickery part of some agencies’ routines when questioning a suspect? Didn’t they use manipulative tactics in hopes of getting to the truth?
The agent with the fancy phone held up his cell again. “One of your friends, Kurt I believe, says he’s sorry but he won’t be able to make it. He’s tending to the pigs.”
She gulped. The Jacksons smirked. Even a few of the agents laughed.
The same agent said, “Let me guess. They don’t have pigs out at Blazier’s Farms?”
Jax and Tyler stifled laughs.
“Apparently not,” the agent grumbled.
“Kane, may I talk to you privately?” Coco asked.
He nodded at one of the agents who looked like he was old enough to have his own dedicated segment on The History Channel. The fellow said, “Five minutes.”
Kane thanked him and followed Coco into the study. Before he could say something to piss her off, she said, “Geraldine was killed because of us. The boys, too. I don’t know if the Blaziers know it but I put it together last night at the club when I saw the man who looked like Handsome, the guy who attacked Brianna last year.”
“He had a twin brother and the Feds are on to him. They are pretty certain he was behind most of what happened here last night.”
“Did they catch him?” She was almost afraid to ask.
Kane frowned and took a minute to answer. “There’s no way they’ll walk, not this group. There were too many witnesses.”
At least he hadn’t lied to her. “Not this group” meant these guys, the hit men who had been at the club, the fellows who had killed innocent people. They would serve time and pay for their crimes. In the meantime, others would come to finish the job. When was the question. Would it be three or four months this time or two or three years? How long before more men would show up there in the little town of Erwin, hoping to make a big city impression?
Coco focused on the present. “Anyway, I’m not sure what the Feds know or what they think they know but the truth is there’s really no reason for the Blaziers to be under investigation for anything, especially murder, if that’s why their home and farm are being searched.”
“Cut the shit, Coco.”
“What?” She gulped. Kane was brash at times, but he rarely cut her off or acted like he wasn’t interested in what she had to say.
If Kane didn’t help her, where would she be? Without the Blaziers there, she wanted to run and hide. She longed to pull one of Brianna’s stunts and run as far as she could until the Feds found the men responsible for hurting the people she loved, the men who killed Momma Blazier, the twins, and Nate.
“Coco, the Blaziers are going to prison and my guess is they’ll go away for a very long time.”
“No. That can’t be. They haven’t done anything wrong.” She shook her head. How had this meeting turned into complete chaos? How could the Feds use what had happened at the club to push their way inside her home and then turn their form of questioning into something entirely different? “No. That can’t be.”
“Yes. It can be. There’s been an ongoing investigation and apparently there’s widespread belief that they’ll have enough to hold several of the Blaziers. Now if you really want to help them or maybe even save yourself, you need to march out there and tell the truth. Do you understand me?”
She nodded once, remembering one of the last serious conversations she’d had with Geraldine. She could still picture her on the back porch, rocking back and forth with a distant smile. “I made them do it, ya know,” she’d said. “That’s something for you to remember. After I die, someone will come in, someone you least expect to meet and that’s when you’ll tell your story. All of you could be separated at that time so remember this Coco, remember it always. The business? The contacts? Everything that has happened here at Blazier Farms was because I ran the business according to me, not according to the law or the limitations thereof but on my own terms.”
“They want the truth, Coco,” Kane said, dragging her away from the Geraldine memory. “If you don’t give it to them, they’ll hold you as an accomplice or an accessory, and if one of those boys had something to do with the deaths over there then you could be an accessory to murder.”
The tears—damn them—started falling. She couldn’t stop crying. This was what Geraldine had feared. Perhaps she’d known their business was under scrutiny or maybe she wanted her boys out of it and perhaps even arranged for the bust. She was a conniving old woman when she wanted to be. Even so, Coco needed to believe Geraldine didn’t want her boys involved in illegal activities. What mother would?