Remy walked us through the process, explaining what we could do and what we couldn’t. It made me feel better to have some legal guidance.

We left for the lawyer’s office a little after dusk, the ride a swift one through the dark streets of downtown Memphis. I stared out the window, grateful Alli was safe back at the bunker. Brent was driving, with Remy in the backseat. I could hear her talking softly into her phone, speaking to Sue about the baby as we drove to a lawyer’s office where we were planning to take down a potential killer. It was bizarre.

Raymond Grufoil was waiting for us outside the law offices where he was a junior partner. The zip drive that contained my testimony had been sent to the Arizona attorney general in the briefcase of her junior assistant, but copies had been made for each of the lawyers involved, including Grufoil. It was that copy that we’d decided to put into play tonight, using a series of phone calls and emails to Patrick to set Willis up.

Willis had learned about my travel plans somehow. He’d known I wasn’t supposed to stop in Las Cruces, giving that bit of information away in the note he left on my car in Dallas. Jack suspected the sheriff’s office had put some sort of virus on Stone Security’s computers back in Ellaville, allowing him to get a copy of my itinerary. If that was true, he’d show up tonight. The emails had made it too tempting.

If it wasn’t true, this could be a complete waste of time.

I was kind of hoping for the waste of time. The plan still made me deeply nervous because there were so many things that could go wrong.

At least Alli was safe. That was its only saving grace.

The SUV pulled up to the law firm. Brent came around and opened my door, caution in his eyes. I stepped out, forcing myself with every bit of control I had to avoid looking around. I didn’t want to give us away by looking for Willis. But I could almost feel his eyes on me. I knew he was there.

We walked inside the building, Remy at my side and Brent behind us. Grufoil greeted us, his palms sweaty when he came in for a shake. He had been let in on part of the plan—just enough so he wouldn’t be surprised when things began to go down, but not enough to give us away. Apparently, what little he did know was making him nervous.

“Let’s go up to my office,” he suggested.

We followed, the elevator seeming to take a longer time than usual to take us up to the fifth floor. Once there, we settled ourselves in the small office, Remy and I in chairs, while Grufoil took his seat behind his desk. Brent stood at the door, his hands clasped behind his back.

“As you know, we kept a copy of your testimony in order to make a written transcript. I have both here…” He touched a packet on his desk. “You’re sure you want to deliver this personally?”

“Positive.”

He inclined his head. “I should inform you that once this information reaches the attorney general, it is considered testimony given in a court of law. That means that if anything you said on these tapes can be proven to be untrue, you are subject to perjury charges.”

“I understand.”

“Perjury is a serious charge in the state of Tennessee, and because the testimony was given here, you will likely be charged here. You understand?”

“I do.”

Grufoil glanced nervously at Remy. She gave him a little nod.

“When the case goes to trial, you will likely be asked some of the same questions covered in this testimony.” Grufoil again gestured to the packet. “You will want to be honest and truthful, answering just as you did here.”

“I understand.”

“We’ve been in contact with the attorney general’s office. They’re expecting you in four days.”

Grufoil was clearly running out of things to say. I leaned forward, racking my brain for something to ask.

“How long will it take before he goes to trial?”

Grufoil shrugged. “He’s only just been arrested. It could take upwards of a year or more. There are also others in his office facing prosecution, and those cases could go forward first.”

I hadn’t heard that. I looked sharply at Grufoil. “Others?”

He nodded, slowly relaxing as he moved into territory he understood. “Five people from the sheriff’s office were also arrested when the sheriff was. They’re facing charges that range from corruption to assault.”

I tilted my head slightly, trying to figure out which of the people I’d worked with might have gone down with Donally. Several names came to mind, including Willis. How he had managed to avoid arrest was beyond me.

Or maybe he hadn’t. Maybe there was a warrant out there for him that he’d simply slipped thus far because he’d left the state.

That was an interesting development.

“What if they ask me to testify in these other cases?”

“That’s a possibility. You’ll want to be as honest and truthful as possible.”

“He doesn’t know how,” a voice announced from the doorway.

Willis was standing there, a mask over his head, but I’d know his voice anywhere. He had a gun pressed to the back of Brent’s head, another pointed at Remy. Remy and I stood, holding up our hands where he could see them.

“What do you want, Willis?”

“You can probably figure that out, can’t you?” He tilted his head slightly, his eyes the only thing I could see clearly through that thick, dark mask. “They’re charging Curtis and Franklin and Jones with corruption. They say they have security footage of me talking to some of the Guardians that they’ve charged with arson and assault. They say I helped them harass that little bitch you’re sleeping with.”

I dropped my hands, my eyes narrowing as I assessed him. “Did you?”

“What the hell do you think? She’s selling corruption and sin to the people of the church! We were just supposed to sit back and allow her to keep doing that?”

“You’re not in the church!”

“My wife and kids are. Do you think I could go home every night if I didn’t protect their souls to the best of my ability?”

“Looks like you won’t be going home at all any time soon.”

“Because of you.” Willis’s eyes narrowed as he stared at me. “You think the sheriff didn’t find that investigation you initiated? You think he doesn’t know that you emailed it to Jack Stone? That’s a felony, yet I’m the one facing charges, and you’re sitting pretty out here in Memphis! What kind of a screwed-up world allows that to happen?”

“I did what I had to do to make sure Harry Cravits got justice.”

“Fuck Harry Cravits! He was interfering in church business!”

“He was protecting a friend.”

“A jezebel.”

My hands clenched into fists. I wanted to hit him so badly that I could already feel the crunch of bone under my hand. Before I could move, however, he shoved Brent forward.

“I’ll take the zip drive and the transcript, thank you. No reason to give you the fuel to hurt us any more than you already have.”

“Do you really think getting rid of that will do any good? You think I won’t testify anyway?”

“You won’t. Because, if you do, we’ll take out your girl. You think you can protect her, but no one can watch another person twenty-four seven. The Guardians are many and patient. They will wait as long as it takes to get to her. And then they’ll make her suffer in ways you can only try to imagine.”

“You touch her…”

I took a step toward him, my fist raised. He pointed one of his guns between my eyes and squeezed the trigger. I actually saw the pin fall, the barrel twist. I ducked to one side and landed a punch to the side of his head. To hell with the plan. He’d threatened Alli, and I wasn’t going to sit there and let him do that.

Willis stumbled backward into the hall. I followed, raising my arm for another punch. This one landed squarely on his jaw, the next in his belly. A third connected under his chin, but there wasn’t a fourth. Brent grabbed me from behind and yanked me away from Willis as Gentry and Jack burst into the hall and disarmed him.

“Christ, Crispin!” Jack cried, staring at me like he couldn’t believe what he was seeing.

“Give me a minute with him, and he’ll tell you everything you need to know!”

I was still seething, jerking at Brent’s hold on my arms. But he was strong, stronger than I would have imagined. I wasn’t breaking free without doing some real damage.

Jack got up into my face, real anger in his eyes. “You need to calm the fuck down! You nearly got yourself killed.”

“You heard what he said!”

“I heard it. But you know as well as I do that it’s all just hot air. This man isn’t seeing the outside of a jail cell for the next twenty years. You know that!”

“And if he does? If this goes wrong?”

“We’ll protect her.” He slammed his fist against my shoulder. “Nothing will happen to her.”

I nodded. “Okay.”

“Okay?”

I nodded again.

Jack shot Brent a look, and he let me go. And we all turned to face Willis, where he still lay sprawled on the floor. I marched over to him and bent low, grabbing his shirt and jerking him up close to me.

“One hair on Alli’s head is harmed, and I’m coming after you. I don’t care if you had anything to do with it or not, so you better hope that none of your friends decide to take up where you left off. Or that she doesn’t trip and fall walking into the house. Because you will be a dead man either way.”

Willis just stared up at me, his eyes dead.

Gentry jerked him up off the floor and tightened a plastic cuff around his wrists.

“What, now you’re all cops?”

“You’ll wish we were when we’re done with you,” Jack said, gesturing for Gentry to take him out. Brent and Jack followed. Remy came up beside me and slipped her hand into mine.

“That was very brave.”

“No, Jack’s right. It was stupid.”

“You were protecting Alli. That’s romantic.”

“Don’t tell her what happened.” I glanced down at Remy. “She’ll never let me out of the house again.”

She laughed, but there was real fear in her eyes. Made me wonder if she was thinking about her own husband and the things he did when he was on a case that he didn’t tell her about.

 

 

They wouldn’t let me into the room with him, and I couldn’t really blame them. But I sat out in the control room and watched as Jack asked him quick questions, peppering him with so many questions all at once that he didn’t have time to stop and think. At first, Willis didn’t answer. But the night dragged on, and everyone grew tired, including him. He started answering questions just to make it stop, inconsequential questions. But then more important questions. I was still sitting in front of the monitor, listening to the interrogation, when Alli came looking for me.

She crawled into my lap and held my face between her hands, forcing me to look at her.

“You could have come and told me you were still alive.”

“I’m sorry,” I said, brushing the back of my fingers over her cheek. She’d taken to not wearing makeup at night and toning it down significantly during the day. As a result, her skin seemed to be coming to life, blooming now that it could breathe without those layers and layers of artificial color. She grew more beautiful every day.

“You got him?”

“We got him.”

“Did it go according to plan?”

“Pretty much.”

She studied my face, aware that I was hiding something from her. But she must have decided not to push it because she relaxed, her eyes moving slowly over my face before she moved in for a kiss.

“Come to bed, Crispin.”

“I want to hear what he has to say.”

“I’m sure Jack will tell you all about it tomorrow.”

“I thought we should head back to Ellaville tomorrow.”

Excitement brought color to her cheeks. “Yeah? Just the two of us?”

“Yeah. Do another road trip. Maybe head up to Chicago before we go back to Arizona.”

“You want to visit your kid.”

“Would you mind?”

“Of course not.”

I’d been thinking about it a lot lately. When I was in the hospital with that stab wound, I found myself wondering what Conor would have said at the news of my death. Would he have cared? Would he have bothered to come to the funeral? Just the fact that I wasn’t sure of the answer made me wonder if maybe it wasn’t time to reconnect with my kid. We’d been buddies when he was younger. He’d always been closer to Gloria than to me, but I thought we got along pretty well. We had our moments.

A part of me wanted to make sure that my memories of those moments weren’t skewed by time and pride.

And I wanted him to know Alli. I knew it wouldn’t be easy for him to know I’d moved on, but I didn’t want him to hear about her from one of his old high school friends and get the wrong impression.

“I think it’s time.”

She pressed her forehead to mine. “I think that’s a brilliant idea.”

I ran my hand slowly down the length of her back. “This isn’t over, Alli. The Guardians are still—”

“I don’t want to worry about that now. I want to be happy, to enjoy this thing that’s between us. And I want to meet your son.”

“Okay.”

I stood, her body wrapped around mine, and walked her down the hall to the concrete bedroom that had been ours these last weeks. We’d been gone from home for far too long. It was good to make plans, to prepare to go back.

It was good just being together.