“Let me think. Talk to the DA, I don’t know, but I promise you… I will fix this.”
Darren and Vaughn left, and as soon as Jack closed the door on them, he called Robbie who was a floor down in his own room. “I need you up here,” Jack said without introduction. Robbie said, “Yep,” and ended the call.
Together the two of them would fix this. They had to. There was no way that Hank Castille wasn’t going down for what he’d done to Liam and the other boys. No way.
When Jack answered the door, it wasn’t just Robbie, but Vaughn as well.
“I said you should go.”
Vaughn straightened. “You said Darren should go and I sent him home, and that’s a good call, but me? I’m part of whatever you’re doing here.”
Jack let the two men in. Robbie was confused, but Vaughn was focused and intent. Between them they could sort something out. They had to.
Before talking, though, he was phoning Riley and Jim, and he was gathering intel on this PI and what the hell he could have on any of the four young men hurt by Hank. Jack was nothing if not sure that you didn’t go into a situation unprepared. Fuck if Jack was letting this PI cause everything Liam had fought to face to disintegrate in a mess of doubt in the jury’s minds.
* * * * *
“Are you sure this is the address?” Robbie looked dubious. What they had pulled up in front of was a laundromat that had seen better days, and no actual note of house number. Jack glanced left and right and yes, this was the spot. After locking the car, they walked toward the laundromat, and it was Robbie that spotted the door to the side with the number they were looking for. 2234A. There was also a small sign “Clinton Asprey” but no indication of what Clinton Asprey did for a living.
“Let me do the talking,” Jack said as he tried the handle. The door was locked but the lock was so small and the door so wrecked that a judicious use of Jack’s broad shoulders had the door opening with a crack. Jack, Vaughn, and Robbie moved in quickly and pulled the door shut behind them. The area wasn’t the kind that looked to have citizens eager to call the cops, but Jack couldn’t be too careful.
They made it up the stairs and to another door. Jack hoped to hell that meant the noise of the front door wasn’t obvious. Who knew what kind of guy this Clinton Asprey was. He could be armed and they had officially just broken in.
Jack tried the door. It wasn’t locked so they walked in, Jack first, Robbie right behind him, and Darren bringing up the rear. A man scrambled to stand from where he was napping on his chair and narrowly missing falling on his ass. A near empty bottle of whisky sat on the desk. A suit in plastic hung from a window hook, the smell of mold pervaded the room, and the man himself was rough-looking, over fifty with a paunch and a comb-over.
Clinton made a move to his desk drawer, but Robbie beat him to it, slamming a hand down on the desk right where Clinton had been reaching.
Clinton subsided and he had very real fear in his expression. The three men had dressed the part, cowboy to the core, as big mean and intimidating as they could manage. Neither Jack, Vaughn, nor Robbie were small men.
“I don’t have any money,” Clinton defended. He had his hands up like one of the men in the room was about to draw a gun.
“Sit the fuck down,” Vaughn growled. Then with a firm shove, he had Clinton sitting back in his chair.
Jack made a deliberate check of the single chair opposite Clinton, brushed off some dirt, then sat down and faced the man.
“Clinton Asprey,” Jack said. “I hear some things.”
“What things? I didn’t do anything.” The fear was now evidenced in a slick of sweat and the way Clinton tugged at his shirt collar. Jack considered backing off the intimidation a little. What if the guy had a heart attack?
“Simple,” Jack began. “I hear you’re taking the stand in the Castille case.”
Clinton blinked a little, then with a sly smile he seemed to relax. “Yep,” he said. That was all he said, as if he was daring Jack to say a word. “And I already passed on all what I found to my client, so if you think you can intimidate me into—”
Vaughn laid a hand on Clinton’s shoulder and just the weight of it there had Clinton go silent and instead look up at Vaughn apprehensively. Jack didn’t blame the man, Vaughn was a big, broad-shouldered, scary-looking cowboy in his worn denim with his black Stetson low on his forehead. Add in the scowl and the stubble, and you wouldn’t want to get in a fight with Vaughn.
Jack continued. “When you get on the stand, you’re gonna say that you found nothing about those kids Hank abused. That you were mistaken.”
“I wasn’t. At least one of them sold himself for sex,” Clinton spat. “Deserved everything he got—”
Vaughn pushed again, and Robbie took a step closer. Clinton abruptly looked like he wished he was somewhere else.
“You talking about a kid who had no family and nowhere to go,” Jack said equably. “Doing what he had to do to survive. One of them, just one.”
“Don’t pay no mind to how many kids were selling it, not sure he even was, but most of these fags use their bodies to get on,” Clinton said. He was being very brave considering who was up in his space. And if he only knew all three of the men in his office had men as lovers, that would surely make him shut the hell up.
“Well you should. Because what if one of them had been your brother…” Jack deliberately trailed away and felt more than a little satisfaction when Clinton paled in front of him. He had his own file from Jim and Riley’s research, and he knew way more about Clinton than the guy would want, including a younger brother who was thrown out of the house and ended up dead after a hate crime outside a bar.
“I want you all to go,” Clinton snapped, his voice urgent.
“Not going anywhere,” Vaughn growled as he clenched his hand on Clinton’s shoulder.
“Don’t kill him yet,” Jack said.
Vaughn released his grip with another growl, but the small exchange had Clinton looking past intimidated and on to full-on terrified.
“What do you want?” he asked.
“Look into your heart,” Jack said. He leaned forward in his chair. “You know what Hank was, the same person as your dad.”
Even with Vaughn’s hand on his shoulder Clinton stood up, his hand shaking as it pointed at Jack. “You don’t know anything about me.”
“You’re wrong,” Jack said calmly. “I know a lot about you, your brother, and your dad. You wanna go up on there and give the jury any reason to doubt so a man like Hank can go free, after what he’s done…”
Clinton subsided into the chair and Vaughn underscored the movement by patting him on the shoulder.
“We’ll let you think on that,” Vaughn growled.
Jack was really very impressed with the growl, as impressed as Clinton was terrified. He placed the papers on Clinton’s desk, pictures, reports going back a long way, everything to do with Clinton and his family.
“I’ll be watching you,” Jack said.
Then Robbie moved to the door, opened it, and Jack left with Robbie close behind. They left Vaughn for a moment but he quickly joined them in the car.
“You okay?” Jack asked Vaughn.
“Warned him I knew where he lived,” he mumbled. “And yeah, I know that’s stupid.”
The comment lightened the situation. They wouldn’t know what effect it would have that they had done this. They could just hope it was enough.
Chapter 7
Riley was never happier to count down to a call from Jack. Even though they’d talked on the phone, and skyped with the kids, today had been stressful and all he wanted was to hear Jack’s voice. He closed the door to the twins’ room and walked past Hayley’s empty room. She was on a sleepover, and that was probably what was half of the problem tonight. The twins were asleep, Carol had gone to bed early, and Max was settled with a DVD of Thomas the Tank Engine. Riley just felt lonely. Actually he’d moved past lonely a few days ago. And how bad was that? He had more than most people: four kids, his best friends Eli and Steve just down the road. Hell, Eli was literally a few steps away. Just… there was a Jack-sized hole in his heart. I’m a damn sap.