"I was never in the brownstone," I argued. "I was half a block away, listening in."
"They still could have found you," he argued. "I've already lost one brother."
I closed my eyes and exhaled softly. "You're not going to lose another. Neither am I, right?"
I wouldn't be surprised if he decided to do some vigilante work on his own to keep me out of trouble.
On the other hand, he didn't know what we knew. Chances were, he wouldn't be successful. He could end up…
I refused to finish that thought.
"What do you think I am, some kind of hothead?" he demanded.
"You've been known to do some rash things once in a while," I said with more than a hint of irony.
Hothead was the perfect description for him, if I was honest. He'd run into a burning house to save anyone he thought needed to be rescued. He'd also watch it burn if he thought they deserved it.
My brother was a complicated guy at best. Like me, now I thought about it.
"So have you," he said meaningfully. "Listen to me, Cassius. These people are dangerous. They don't give a shit who they have to step over or kill to get what they want. They'll slice your throat open and leave you to bleed without a second thought."
"That's not going to happen," I argued. "We know what we're doing."
Okay, Harlow and Boner knew what they were doing. Archer too. They weren't going to get any of us killed.
I trusted that.
I had to.
Jules' snort crackled through the phone again. "They overlooked a phone lying on the floor."
I glanced over to Harlow. "Is it possible the phone wasn't there when you were? If someone was waiting for us to act on Fairfield, they might have come in afterward and planted it."
Harlow frowned, but slowly shook her head. "I have no idea. I guess it's possible, but no one went after Jules when he was there. Did they?"
That was a good question. Why plant the phone there and not act when it was found?
"No, they didn't," Jules said. "If they had, wouldn't I have said something?"
I hated myself for saying it, but I had to. "I don't know, would you? You might have been the one who planted the phone."
That made much more sense than I was comfortable with. He knew what we were doing and he didn't like it. He could have set us up.
Setmeup.
"I didn't plant the fucking phone," he growled. "I saw no one else there, but I didn't take myself on a tour either. I got in, got the hell out."
"Did you shake it all about?" Boner quipped, shaking his wrists. He grinned when we turned to stare at him. "What? He could be doing the hokey pokey right now, for all we know."
"He's out of his fucking mind," Jules said darkly.
"Haven't you heard?" Boner asked. "All the best people are."
"Figures you'd team up with the Mad Hatter," Jules muttered.
"I'm more like the Cheshire Cat," Boner said. "Mysterious and always smiling."
"Was there anything else you wanted?" Jules asked. "I have to be at work in a couple of hours."
