“You don’t like the police,” Danner noted grimly.
I smiled contemptibly, channeling my inner biker. “Maybe a long time ago I thought you all were heroes in blue armor, maybe before you arrested my brother for killing the man who tried to rape me, before you arrested King Kyle Garro in the middle of my classroom after illegally searching his belongings, but now, no, I don’t like the police.”
“Miss Irons, I urge you to let me speak on your behalf,” Mr. White murmured to me.
He didn’t seem annoyed though, only exhausted, and it occurred to me then that being the MC’s lawyer would be a relatively difficult job just given the nature of bikers.
“Sorry,” I told him sincerely, “I’m a biker babe in training.”
He blinked at me but Danner had to cough to hide his startled laugh.
“Now, Officer Danner, if we could get to the point here? I want to be home when King gets out of jail.”
“You’re close with Garro’s kids?” he asked, and I could tell it was more than professional curiosity that had him asking.
I filed that interesting tidbit away for another time.
“I’m close with King’s family,” I corrected even though I was terrified to do so.
There was no point in hiding it anymore though. I was no longer a teacher at EBA and people would know soon enough, because they would see us, that we were together in a very biblical sense.
Danner raised his eyebrows. “No kidding.”
“Nope, not kidding,” I replied firmly.
I tried to affect a good biker babe pose, my arms crossed under my breasts and my eyes narrowed. I couldn’t be sure how well it worked when my hair was pulled back into a high curled ponytail tied with a red scrunchy and my 1984 book tee was tucked into a flippy red and white checked skirt, but I hoped it would be at least a little intimidating.
“You sure you want to be telling me this as a teacher at EBA?” he asked, leaning in slightly, his stern face suddenly soft with sincerity. “I’d be honor bound to tell the school board about something like that.”
Another surprise, Officer Danner liked me. It was the only explanation for why he was giving me an out and it made me wonder, if he hadn’t called me in to talk about King, why I was there at all.
“I’m sure. Now, tell me what you want.”
He stared at me for another moment before leaning back and rapping his knuckles against the metal desk. “I need to ask you a few questions about your husband, William Trent Irons.”
“Excuse me?”
“Your husband. Mr. Irons is being tried for fraud and embezzlement,” Danner clarified.
“Um, what?” I asked, my eyes and mouth wide open with shock. “You’ve got to be kidding me. William is the most upstanding citizen in the province. He works hard, volunteers and goes fishing or golfing at Capilano Golf and Country Club at least twice a week. That is not the kind of man who commits so much as a minor infraction, let alone something like fraud.”
Danner stared at me then flipped open a folder that had been waiting on the table. He turned to the right page then twisted it to face me.
“Do you recognize these charges?” he asked.
I studied the list but I already knew that I wouldn’t. Even while we were living together, I’d known nothing about our finances, not really. I had a credit and debit card for our joint account and I’d known we had a fairly astronomical limit on our credit, but William had handled the money. It was the husband’s job, he’d always told me and because I’d grown up hearing the same thing from my father, I’d never questioned it.
Even then, I thought it was strange to see so many small transactions. William never kept cash on hand, because he said it was gauche.
“Did you know he was placed on a 90-day suspension four years ago for failure to preserve clients’ funds in a trust account? It appears that after that, he turned to less savory clients and began to embezzle funds for them instead of from them. The reason these statements may look strange to you, is because of the small but frequent cash deposits made over those four years,” Danner explained to me.
“I can’t believe this,” I said, because truly, I couldn’t.
The universe was playing some kind of cosmic joke. The man I’d married, who I had thought was too good for me, too boring and straight-laced and moral, had committed felonies while the man I’d fallen in love with, a man I’d thought was too much a boy, too wild and reckless and free to tame, was currently incarcerated for something he hadn’t done.
It was too much to take in.
“What does this even mean?” I asked.
“He’s being held on bail for $250,000 and he’s looking at up to five years in a provincial correction centre. The Vancouver PD asked me to talk to you, see if you could shed any light on the matter but it’s obvious you were kept in the dark. Got to tell you, they might want to get more involved in looking at your part in this if they knew you were dating a Garro.”