‘And skills,’ Cal said. ‘I learned the craft back before there were computers.’
Beside her, Diesel sighed. ‘And if you turn us in, we’ll have to stop.’
Scarlett shook her head. Their big concern was being forced to stop their work, more than being prosecuted. Or killed. ‘But this is dangerous. Phillip’s proof of that.’
‘Phillip knew the risks,’ Lisette said quietly. ‘He accepted them. I want the man who hurt him caught, but none of us want to stop. Phillip wouldn’t either, if he were sitting here.’
‘But why?’ Scarlett asked, looking around the table at each of them. She understood that Marcus and Stone had suffered a childhood trauma, but losing their baby brother to a murdering kidnapper didn’t automatically translate to helping abused women and their kids. The rest of them . . . She was perplexed. ‘Why do you care so much?’
‘We have our reasons,’ Diesel said stubbornly, and the rest of them nodded.
It was clear she’d get no further with them, at least not here and now. ‘All right. So you break some rules, put some abusers behind bars and “gently coerce” others to step away from the family.’ She tapped the paper on the table in front of her. ‘Are any of the names on this list viable suspects?’
‘No,’ Marcus said. ‘That’s why I chose them.’
Of course you did. Because he hadn’t trusted her – then. Of course, she hadn’t trusted him, either. In her mind he’d been a reporter, making his living digging up news. How much difference a few hours made. ‘Can I get a complete list?’
Marcus pulled a flash drive from the pocket of his pants. ‘Here it is.’ He put it in her palm and curled her fingers to hold it, covering her hand with his for a long moment before releasing her. ‘I’ll need to walk you through the names.’
Her skin tingled, missing his warmth as soon as he took his hand away. She had to fight the urge to lean into him. ‘We’ll figure it out. My next question, I need you to be honest with me, because I don’t like surprises that bite me in the ass. How far did your “gentle coercion” go? How physical did you get? Specifically, did any of these names report you for assault?’
A long, long hesitation around the table had her heart sinking. What had they done?
‘Report?’ Diesel asked, drawing the word out. ‘As in, file a police report?’
‘Yes.’ Her eyes narrowed. ‘What kind of report are you talking about?’
‘No, no,’ Diesel said, waving his hands. ‘Police report is what you wanted to know. The answer to your question is no. I don’t think so.’
‘No, or you don’t think so?’ Scarlett asked.
‘Well, any kook can file a police report,’ Diesel said with a shrug. ‘So anything’s possible.’
She sighed. ‘What exactly did you all do? I need to know.’
Stone folded his arms over his chest. ‘A few assholes might have fallen a few times.’
‘Into doors,’ Diesel added. ‘Or asphalt. Or knuckles.’
‘How hard might they have fallen?’ Scarlett asked.
‘The worst time was when the boys beat some asshole up,’ Lisette said.
‘Which boys?’ Scarlett demanded.
Stone shook his head. ‘Not me. I got an alibi. I was covering an election in Colombia.’
Scarlett looked at Marcus. ‘You?’
Marcus nodded, unrepentant. ‘He was stupid enough to throw the first punch. Look, the SOB had tricked his daughter’s best friend into telling him where his wife and kids were hiding, and had gone to their house to drag them back once he got out of jail for molesting his own kids and a few of the neighbors’. The daughter’s friend warned them he was coming when she realized she’d been tricked. The man’s soon-to-be ex-wife called us.’
‘Why didn’t she call the cops?’ Scarlett asked, and another hush fell over the table.
‘He was a cop,’ Marcus said quietly.
Scarlett exhaled. ‘Shit. You beat up a cop?’
‘A little,’ Diesel said.
‘A lot,’ Marcus corrected. ‘And I’m not sorry. He was not going to be satisfied until they were dead. We threatened to call the cops on him, and he attacked us. So we convinced him to leave and not come back. He did leave – for that day. I worried he’d come back, so we installed a high-tech alarm system in the woman’s house and got her a very large dog. He never came back. A few weeks later he died, but not because of anything we did to him.’
Scarlett rubbed her temples, trying to recall the case. Cops going to jail for molesting children didn’t happen every day. In a rush, the man’s name and face came back to her and she blew out a breath. ‘You’re right. I knew him. He was a prick who liked to bully anyone weaker than he was. He moved to California and died there. A bar fight or road rage, wasn’t it? He was beaten up pretty severely, but I can’t remember all the details.’ She narrowed her eyes. ‘Were you responsible for that?’
‘No,’ Marcus said. ‘We had our run-in with him before that. But none of us cried for him. It happened when I was in the hospital. Stone was recuperating at home. Diesel was with Cal and Lisette, keeping the paper running.’
Scarlett turned to look at Diesel and he met her gaze without flinching. ‘I didn’t do it,’ he said. ‘The asshole got drunk and got grabby with a waitress in a bar, which made her steroid-juiced bodybuilder boyfriend very unhappy. Boyfriend is sitting in jail, waiting for his trial.’ He smiled nastily. ‘I wrote the article about it, though.’
‘O-kay,’ she murmured, hoping that she never saw Diesel truly angry. That evil smile of his was enough to raise the hairs on the back of her neck. She looked at Marcus. ‘Were there any other incidents?’
‘A few. Mostly we just had Diesel pay them a visit. He rarely had to do more than raise a finger to convince them to walk away.’ He pointed to the flash drive. ‘I’ll tell you all the details when we go over the list.’
‘What about names that aren’t on this list?’ she asked. ‘People you’ve investigated that haven’t made threats? Or the targets of ongoing investigations that haven’t been closed, or who you haven’t exposed or “gently coerced” yet?’
Lisette drew a sharp breath. ‘Mr Arrogant. Phillip was asking questions in his office today.’
‘But that doesn’t explain the alley or the sniper,’ Marcus said.
Lisette’s shoulders slumped. ‘You’re right.’
‘Who is Mr Arrogant?’ Scarlett asked.
‘His real name is Rich McKay,’ Lisette said. ‘He’s a corporate attorney. Works for Wesman Peal, the department store chain. He’s a vice-president there.’
‘And attorneys know just how to slither around the law,’ Scarlett said coldly. ‘What was Phillip doing in his office?’
‘Trying to find an employee list,’ Marcus said. ‘We figured if he’s beating his wife and kid, he may have been aggressive with his office staff too. Phillip posed as a courier.’
‘Then we can use that,’ Scarlett said, thinking. ‘We can say we’re checking out all the places that Phillip’s been today as part of our investigation into his attack. Anything else? Any other ongoing cases we need to consider?’
‘No,’ Stone said. ‘Things have been very quiet since the fall.’
Since Mikhail’s murder.
‘We were just starting to gear back up,’ Marcus added.
Scarlett nodded. ‘I understand. But you’re right,’ she said to Marcus. ‘I don’t think Mr Arrogant is involved in Phillip’s attack, because of the shooting this afternoon. If we assume you were the target, the sniper had to either have been waiting at the Anders house or he followed us there.’
Marcus’s face suddenly paled. ‘Oh shit. Delores.’
Stone stiffened. ‘What about Delores?’
The brothers’ gazes locked. ‘We’d just come from her house,’ Marcus said. ‘She identified the dog that Tala had been walking in the park. That’s how we got the Anderses’ address. We drove straight from Delores’s shelter to Hyde Park.’
Stone also paled. ‘They could have hurt her. Goddammit to hell.’ His hands visibly shaking, he pulled out his cell phone and hit a number from his speed dial while the rest of them looked on in stunned surprise. After a moment, he relaxed. ‘I was just wondering about your hours,’ he said into the phone. ‘Thank you.’