“Correct.”
“As a former lawyer, sir, you’ll recognize the predicament I’m in here,” I say. “All I know is that Eric has been accused of killing your people. I don’t know what Harper told you. I don’t know what you might have found at the scene. There’s been no discovery. No formal laying of charges. So I’ll skip straight to the biggest missing piece. Motivation. Why did Eric do this?”
Harper tenses, but I nod for her to trust me.
Edwin waves the question off. “As you well know, Detective, motivation isn’t important. Fact is what matters.”
“Yes, motivation gets in the way of an investigation. It clouds fact. But this is a trial. Unless Eric has confessed, we need motive.”
“We have an eyewitness.”
I give him a look. Just a look. He grants me another point. Juries love eyewitnesses, but a lawyer knows how unreliable they are.
“Fine,” I say. “Set motive aside for now. What is the evidence beyond your witness? You returned to the scene to collect your dead, I presume.”
“Our people did.”
“And you saw how they died? Albie killed at his guard post. The older man in his sleeping blankets. Harper’s grandmother running for her life.”
A grumble runs through the crowd. This reminder does not please them.
“What evidence do you have that Eric did this?” I ask.
“He fled the scene, which means we can hardly search his belongings for bloody clothes or a weapon.”
“What you need then is a second eyewitness.”
I glance at Harper. Her face is glowing now. She sees victory—I will be that witness for her.
“I believe I have your motivation,” I say, and then I switch to Mandarin with, “Keep your eyes on me, please, sir.”
His brows lift, but he does as I ask. I nod discreetly to Harper, who is fairly quivering with anticipation. I do not dare implicate my lover when he stands right there, so I am using another language to do it, a language I share with her leader.
“Motivation,” I say to Edwin. I speak slowly, carefully—my Mandarin is rusty and probably the equivalent of a four-year-old’s. “You know Eric doesn’t have one. You can’t even think of one.”
His mouth opens. I continue, while sneaking looks at Dalton. Worried looks. Maybe guilty looks. For Harper’s benefit. Dalton doesn’t even frown. He trusts me.
“But I have a motivation for you,” I say. “A motivation for Harper to lie. That is right in front of your eyes. I have something that she wants.”
“The dog? That’s . . .” He doesn’t finish.
“I have something she wants,” I say.
He shakes his head. “Then she would know you’re telling me the truth now. She would be arguing.”
“Not if I’ve convinced her I want Eric’s job. And that she can have the dog if she sticks to her story.”
“What happened out there?”
I tell him. When I finish, I say, “Which story makes logical sense?”
Edwin says, in English, “So you were tasked with imprisoning a killer. You failed to do that, and we suffered. Is that your story, Detective?”
Oh shit. I haven’t fixed anything. Edwin never believed Dalton did it. This was all for show. We haven’t dodged a bullet . . . we just stepped back into the path of the one that’s been coming at us since we fled the massacre.
“Yes,” I say. “We accept responsibility—”
“You did not. You walked away. You failed to show the basic respect due my people.”
“Yeah,” says a muffled voice.
I look to see Dalton has managed to get the gag down just enough to talk over it. He twists, and it drops further, and he shakes it off, saying, “Yeah, I did. That was my choice. Because I knew there was no way in hell we’d come in here, confess to our mistake and you’d let us walk away. And there was no way in hell I was putting up with your bullshit while I’ve got a killer out there.”
“My bullshit?” Edwin’s voice lowers, heavy with warning.
“Yes, and don’t give me that tone. You’re in charge here. I’m in charge in Rockton. We’re equals. Which means you should have shown me the basic respect of marching me in here for a private audience. Not tying me up. Gagging me and talking to my detective instead. You know why I didn’t come here right away. I wish I could have. Would have saved us all a shitload of grief. But I couldn’t, and this is all fucking theatrics, so cut the bullshit and let me get on with my job.”
“I think perhaps we should put that gag back on.”
“Sure.” Dalton meets his gaze. “Go ahead and try.”
“He killed—” Harper begins.
Edwin spins on her, snapping as he finds a target for his frustration. “I don’t know what you thought you saw out there, girl, but no one from Rockton is going to murder our people for a few bows and supplies. You lost your head in those woods, and you won’t be going back out there anytime soon. Turn in your bow and hunting knife. You’ll help Mabel with the cooking now.”
Rage fills Harper’s eyes. Impotent rage. She tried to step out of her assigned role, and she is being smacked right back into it. I want to sympathize, but she accused an innocent man of mass murder because she wanted a dog. Sympathy is a little hard to come by after that.
“Give Casey her dog,” Edwin says with an abrupt wave.
Harper grips the leash. “She’s mine. In forfeit, for what they did.”
“You think we’ll share our food so you can have a pet?”
“It’s not a pet. It can track and hunt and—”
“The only animals in this town are the ones we cook on a fire. Give Casey her dog. Now.”
Harper looks at me, her eyes blazing. Then she drops the leash and knees Storm. The dog falls back in shock, and I race over, and whatever Harper sees in my face, she decides not to stick around.
I crouch beside Storm and pet her, soothing her as she keeps looking at Harper’s receding back in confusion.
“We demand justice, Eric,” Edwin says behind me. “We demand this killer.”
“When we catch—”
“You will not bring him to me. I know you won’t. Casey would promise to convey our demand to the council, but you know they’ll refuse. So you will tell me only that you’ll catch him, and justice will be served. That’s not what I want. I am keeping Casey until you bring me this man.”
“What?” I rise.
“Hell, no,” Dalton says. “Do not even—”
“Casey stays. With the dog if that helps. She will be our guest until you return.”
“Guest? We call that a fucking hostage.”
“She is my guest.”
“Yeah?” Dalton strides toward him. “If you keep her, this psycho is never going to be caught. She’s the goddamn detective. You want a hostage? Take me.”
“That is far more trouble than—”
“I remember how my mother was treated here.” Dalton stops in front of the old man and lowers his voice. “A child does not forget that. He does not forgive that. The answer is Fuck, no.”
“I realize Casey is now your wife and—”
“I would not let any woman from Rockton stay here. Casey is a fucking detective, which means she needs to be out there hunting for this guy.”
“So do you.” I turn to Edwin. “I understand what you’re trying to do, but you need to come up with a solution that won’t hinder the actual hunt for this man.”
“Take me,” says a voice behind us.
I look to see Wallace, who has been so silent I’ve forgotten he was there. Now he steps forward.
“This is my fault, not theirs,” Wallace says. “I hired Rockton to imprison the man who killed your people. They weren’t equipped to do so, which the council failed to tell me. Eric and Casey had nothing to do with that. I made the mistake here.”
“And who are you?” Edwin says.
“The father of the man who did this to your people.”
49