“What the hell was he doing at that dive anyway? I thought him and his wife were solid.”
Realization hits and I close my eyes, a fresh wave of guilt washing over me. “He was lookin’ for someone.” You and your shitty luck, Abe, for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. “Dammit, Dwayne, why the hell would you think I can get you out of your mess?”
“My mess? What, you think your best friend can stir up shit and some of that shit won’t land on you? Come on, Marshall . . .” He lets out a derisive snort. “If you can’t keep one cop quiet for the good of this department, Canning won’t be so quick to tap your shoulder for that assistant chief spot. Yeah, I know Canning wants a female. He needs to check off that box and get those diversity crybabies off his ass.”
I grit my teeth. Of course Mantis would assume that’s why Canning wants me there. That it’s not because I’m good enough to be assistant chief—and maybe chief, one day. “Abe and I aren’t exactly on good terms.”
“Why?” Mantis’s already beady eyes narrow even further. “What’d you do?”
“Who says I did anything?”
“Because Boy Scout never does anything wrong.”
My ears catch Noah’s voice, calling to me from inside the house. “Get outta here. We shouldn’t even be having this conversation.”
“You need to shut him the hell up.”
“Or what?”
Mantis gets right into my face, looking ready to pick a fistfight with me. For just a second, I wonder if he’ll follow through. I wouldn’t put it past him. “Or someone else will.”
Not until he’s back in his car and peeling away can I release a shaky breath.
“Oh, Abe, what have you gone and started?” I mutter, heading back inside and straight for my bottle.
CHAPTER 36
Noah
“I’m sorry, miss. There wasn’t anything that even remotely resembled a video or computer file or anything like that found, from what I know. And, as you can see, the renovations were extensive.” The woman smiles kindly, though I sense her patience is waning as Gracie keeps pushing for a different answer. A possibility. A “yes, actually, there was a videotape found behind the drywall when we gutted the kitchen. I’ve kept it all these years. Here, let me get it for you!”
Wherever Abe hid this video, it definitely wasn’t in this house.
“Thank you, ma’am. We appreciate your time. We’ll let you get back to your lunch.” I clasp Gracie’s hand in mine and tug her away, feeling the woman’s amber gaze on our backs as we take the narrow path down. It’s the only part of the house that has remained the same. We drove up and down this street three times, in search of the small white bungalow that I remembered. It wasn’t until I saw the carved porch door on the place to the left that I realized this modern two-story house was what we were looking for.
I expect Gracie to shake my hand off but she doesn’t, allowing me to hold it all the way until we reach my SUV, not saying a single word of rebellion as I hold her door open, and then shut it behind her.
“Do you think they knew who lived here before they did?” Gracie’s gaze drifts over the peaceful neighborhood as we drive. It’s fifteen minutes from my house. It’s not the nicest, but it has a certain charm.
“If they didn’t, I’ll bet they found out pretty quick. And we just gave them something to talk about with their neighbors.” I spied a curtain or two drift as we pulled over in front of the house. And the lady three doors down, digging up her front flower bed, watched us curiously as we walked up the pathway.
“Good. Let them talk. Let everyone talk about Abraham Wilkes. Maybe they’ll finally start questioning what they should have years ago,” she mutters bitterly. “How could all these people buy that bullshit story?”
“Because they had no reason not to buy the bullshit story. Especially people who didn’t know Abe from Adam.”
Her plump lips curl with disgust. “Is it because my father was a black cop?”
“Plenty of people don’t trust cops and it doesn’t matter what color their skin is,” I remind her.
“So you’re telling me that if my father was white, people would have been as quick to write him off as a dirty cop?”
“I can’t tell you that, Gracie, because you and I both know there are dumb-ass people out there who think the color of your skin decides how you’re going to be. I wish it weren’t true, but it is, especially in Texas. Hell, there’s plenty of people who think women shouldn’t be cops. I never could figure out how my mom landed that job.” I turn onto Congress Avenue and head for Austin’s downtown core. I should at least try to take Silas’s advice and show Gracie around. “But what matters is that whatever evidence was collected and presented to the chief made Abe look unequivocally guilty, white or black. We need to focus on that.”
“Fine. Did you ask your uncle about getting the police report? The unsanitized one that actually tells us something?”
Dammit . . . “With everything else we talked about, I didn’t get a chance to ask.”
“I’m guessing he won’t be in a rush to get it for us anyway, seeing as he lied about everything else.”
“He didn’t lie!”
“Oh, right. I’m sorry.” She snorts derisively. “He just didn’t tell the truth. I mean, it wouldn’t look too good on him if word got out that he knew about the allegations my dad made against Mantis and did nothing.”
I try to keep my voice calm. “There’s got to be an explanation.”
“Well, that’s the only explanation I can come up with for how someone got away with murdering my father.”
“Silas isn’t like that.”
“He doesn’t look out for himself? Bullshit. Everyone’s like that. Everyone.” Gracie shifts her body to face the side window, settling her gaze on the passing buildings as I weave through Austin’s streets, her hands balled into tight fists of frustration.
I can’t blame her for being suspicious. But is she including me in that “everyone”? Does she think I’ve been looking out for myself all this time? Because the only person I’ve been trying to protect has been my mother.
A wave of guilt washes over me. I need to tell her about Klein, before she finds out on her own and shuts me out, permanently.
It takes several blocks to work up my nerve. “Listen, Gracie, there’s something important I need you to know—”
“We’re being followed.”
At first I’m sure I’ve misheard. “What?” I check my rearview mirror. “Where?”
“That gray car.”
“The Civic?” I relax a bit.
“When you took that last right turn, it cut off two cars to follow us. And I saw it parked outside the DA’s office.”
“You probably saw twenty gray Civics parked there. They’re everywhere, Gracie.”
“Yeah, but this one had a hundred tree air fresheners dangling from the rearview mirror. It reminded me of my nan’s car. She’d do the same, to try and mask the smell of cigarettes.” She squishes her nose in disgust.
“You’re being paranoid.”
She folds her arms in that haughty way. “Fine. Prove me wrong.”
Three turns later, I realize that I can’t, and my scalp begins to prickle with unease.
All I can make out are two forms in the front, likely male. Who the hell could be following us? And what do they want? “Do me a favor and write down the plate number if you can catch it.”
“And then what are we gonna do? Lead them home?” Her gaze flitters between her side-view mirror and the keyboard on her phone, her brow tight with concentration.
I see the sign up ahead. “I have an idea.”
CHAPTER 37
Grace
The UT campus is crawling with students, book bags slung over their shoulders as they travel between classes. Plenty of others are scattered over the parklike setting, hiding beneath the shade of trees or lying on their backs on grassy patches, tuning out the world and soaking in the afternoon sun with either a book or music pumping through earphones.
“You went here?”