“Goddamn it, Charley,” Eamon grumbled into my ear. Intimate memories tumbled over me at the sound of his morning-gruff voice, and I hated the power of that emotional wallop, despite everything I’d done to put it all behind me. “I haven’t heard from you in more than a year, and now you’re blowing up my phone at seven in the morning. Does this mean you miss me?”
“This isnota joke.” I chewed rapidly, rushing through the bite I’d taken when I’d thought he wasn’t going to answer. “Why the hell didn’t you tell me about Billy? And why haven’t you been answering your phone?”
“I was asleep. My phone was in ‘do not disturb’ mode. And what is it that I didn’t tell you about Billy?”
As Marshal, he’d never put his phone on do not disturb. A Marshal was always on call.
Civilian life must be nice.
“I’m talking about his father, Eamon. How could you not tell me about Billy’s father? How the hell could you let him live with you, after all that?” And why on earth didn’t I bring a drink to wash down my burger?
“I honestly have no idea what you’re talking about. I have no clue who Billy’s dad is,” Eamon insisted. “As far as I know, he doesn’t either. Why are we talking about Billy, anyway. Has something happened? Should I call him?”
I shoved my plate back in disgust. “You could try, but his phone is sitting right here on my desk, so you’re just going to wind up in anotherinfuriatingconversation with me.”
“Charley,whatis going on?” A familiar whisper of skin on skin told me he was scrubbing one hand over his face, a frustrated gesture he made every time he was woken up too early. “What happened to Billy?”
“Nothing happenedtohim. We took him into custody an hour ago, and he didn’t resist. He didn’t even ask why we were there. It was fucking weird. I’ve known him for years, yet I feel like I’m somehow just now meeting him, and I really need to know what’s going on with him, Eamon. I need to know everything you know about Billy and his dad.”
“Okay, let’s start over,” he said, and I heard a squealing sound like chair legs skidding across the floor. “Pretend I have no idea what you’re talking about and start from the beginning. Why the hell have you arrested Billy?”
“For killing Yvette Graham-Mattheson! And possibly all the others!”
“Wait.” That skittering sound echoed over the line again, and then I heard footsteps. Eamon was pacing. “Wait. You thinkBilly Bullenis your serial killer? He’s a kid, Char! He was barely eighteen when you were infected, and—”
“Human kids kill people all the time. Why would that be different for shifters?”
“ButBilly? He’s—”
“I went back to Silas’s cabin.”
Silence echoed at me from the other end of the line. “Wow. Well, that couldn’t have been easy.”
“Don’t—” I stood, pushing my chair back, and nowIwas pacing. “Just…don’t be nice to me right now, okay? This isn’t about me or how I feel. This is about the fact that we have a serial killer infecting and killing human women, and you basically unleashed him on us when you talked me into hiring Billy. When you failed to tell me that his dad was Silas fucking Morelock!”
I was shouting by then, and which meant they could definitely hear me in the dining room. If not for the extra insulation in the basement, Billy would be able to hear me as well. “I know he’s Billy’s dad. I found the photo.”
“He’s not— Why would you think that? What photo?”
My eyes narrowed at nothing. “You really expect me to believe you didn’t know?”
“I expect you to believe it isn’t true!” And suddenly he was shouting too. “But now I understand why you’re so mad; that’s one hell of a misunderstanding.”
“There was a photo of them together in the cabin, Eamon, from when Billy was a child. It was stuck between the pages of an old book on the nightstand, and it was probably there the day he took me. If I’d opened that book while I was cuffed to that goddamn bed, I’d have seen Billy’s face staring out at me, and none of the rest of this would have happened. I would have known. I could have stoppedallof this.”
“You saw a picture of Billy and Silas together? You’re sure it was Billy, and not Denny?”
“Oh my god, just give it up!” I was practically stomping now, wearing grooves into the hardwood behind my desk. “Iknowthat Denny and Billy are the same person. Tucker’s online proving that right this minute. I know thatyouknow that. That you covered it up. That you, like… You must have given Denny a new name, to keep us from associating him with what his dad did. I get that you probably had no idea he’d strike off down the same path. That you thought you were protecting an innocent kid. But how you could not tell me?Me, Eamon?”
“Okay, wait. Just slow down a second and think this through, Charley. What you’re saying doesn’t make any—”
“Don’t fucking patronize me. I’m holding you accountable for this.”
“Yes. Okay, hold me accountable.” The very slight wiggle in his voice told me he was nodding compulsively. That he understood just how much of a threat the larger shifter community was about to become to him. “I knew about Billy’s connection to Silas, and when I found out that Silas was the one who attacked you, I should have told you. But that connection isn’t what you think. He isn’t Silas’s son. Billy and Denny arenotthe same person, and if they were, that timeline would make no sense. You hired Billy—under the name William Bullen, his real, true name—a full year before you were infected. A full year before I would have had any reason to change Billy’s name to protect him. So—”
My office door flew open, just as my printer whirred to life from on top of a filing cabinet in one corner. Tucker burst into the room and marched around me. “It’s not him, Charley,” he said. “Denny Morelock is not Billy Bullen.”
“See?” Eamon said into my ear, clearly having heard him.
