Rake (Wolfes of Manhattan 4)

I was never so thankful to be a cub.

“This meeting is over.” She held her hand out to me. “Come on, Zee.”

“I agree,” Zach said. “The Wolfes will hear about this.”

“The Wolfes don’t scare me,” Morgan shot back.

“Maybe they should,” Zach said.

“Are you kidding me? Half my colleagues were on—” He stopped abruptly.

Zach’s eyes darkened. “Go on,” he said through clenched teeth.

“Nothing,” Morgan said. “Ms. Bancroft, please have your client take a seat.”

“No way,” Moira said.

“Yes,” Morgan said, “because if you don’t, I’ll have her arrested and dragged down to the station.”

I gulped audibly as my heart pounded.

Moira whipped her hands to her hips. “On what grounds?”

“Failure to cooperate in an ongoing criminal investigation.”

“Try it,” Moira said. “I’ll tie you up in court for years.”

“You’ll regret that.”

“I’ll take my chances. Let’s go, Zee.”

I walked, sandwiched between Moira and Zach, out of the conference room.

Two lawyers protecting me.

But they wouldn’t always be there.

Had I done the right thing? Telling my story to the detective?

One thing I’d learned in my relatively short life—the what-if game served no purpose. What if I’d stayed at a different hotel in Queens? What if I hadn’t gone to New York? What if I’d driven straight to Smith?

I’d be a doctor now.

“I’m so sorry,” Moira was saying.

“I am too,” Zach agreed. “Mr. Wolfe will take care of this. Plus, you’ve given Morgan enough to call Father Jim in for questioning about the murder.”

Had I? Would justice truly be served?

I’d given up on justice long ago.

“I’ll take you to Mr. Wolfe,” Moira said, smiling.

Mr. Wolfe. Reid.

Yes, Reid would protect me. I felt certain.

But who would protect him?

38

Reid

Back at the office, I called in a team to thoroughly search Rock’s and my offices for surveillance equipment of any kind. I’d had my own searched after we all became implicated, but it didn’t hurt to be sure.

Besides, I was rapidly learning to trust no one but my family and Zee. I looked around. Terrence. Any of the others. A fucking mail clerk, for God’s sake. My father could have gotten to any of them. Already Terrence was a suspect, given the issue with his calendar.

This was a nightmare that was getting more horrific each day.

I was lost in thought when my phone buzzed. Good. It was the PI who’d searched St. Andrew’s, a colleague of Leif’s.

“Give me some good news, Buck,” I said into the phone.

“Got lots of it,” he said, “but also some bad.”

“Fuck.”

“I don’t want to talk on the phone. I’m heading to your office.”

Trust no one. The words emerged in my head seemingly of their own accord. “I’d rather go somewhere public. The café a block over. It has outdoor seating. I was just there with Rock and Lacey to discuss some stuff.”

“Are they still there?”

“I have no idea.”

“Let’s go somewhere else,” Buck said. “I need to talk to you alone first.”

Icy fingers gripped the back of my neck. This couldn’t be good. “All right. Text me with a location. I need to check on something first.”

“Good enough.”

Buck was a good man. He’d never worked for my father and he came highly recommended by Leif, who I trusted.

First, though, I had to check on Zee.

I walked swiftly to the conference room where she was meeting with Hank Morgan but wrinkled my forehead. Morgan sat alone in the conference room.

I entered. “Where’s Zee?”

“She left.”

“That’s obvious. What happened, Morgan?”

“I don’t owe you any explanation.”

Hank Morgan was an enigma. At first, he’d seemed highly cooperative. He wanted to get to the truth, and he seemed to believe that none of us, especially Rock and Lacey, had been behind the murder of our father.

Each day, though, he seemed more distant. More ready to pin this on someone just to get it out of his hair.

Was he crooked?

I wasn’t sure.

“Fine,” I said. “If you’re done here, get off our property.”

He slammed his file folder shut. “I’m leaving, but I’m far from done here.” He picked up his files, shoved them into his briefcase, and then brushed hotly past me.

Yeah. Not good.

I walked out the door only to run into Zach Hayes. “Hey, Zach. What the hell happened in there?”

“It was ugly,” Zach replied. “He asked Zee why she didn’t get into prostitution in Vegas.”

Anger erupted through me like hot lava from a volcano. “That mother—”

“He’s a dick,” Zach interrupted, “but something else bothers me even more.”

“What’s that?”

“He said something out of anger. Or he started to.”

“What?”

“He said the Wolfes didn’t scare him, and then he said, and I quote, ‘half my colleagues were on…’ and then he just stopped.”

“My father’s payroll?”

“That was my first thought.”

“What an idiot. Why would he even let something like that come out of his mouth?”

“I don’t know,” Zach said. “He knows better. He’s not brilliant, but he’s not stupid either.”

“I was just thinking about how he’s been less cooperative each day,” I said.