He was met with silence for a few seconds before Holly said, “Holy schnauzers.Are you sayin’ that Martin Calloway is the biological father of Juliet Prince?”
“That’s whatyou’resayin’,” Brantley corrected.“Are you sure that information’s correct?”
“Yes.But I’ll gladly reach out to JJ with what I know.I’m sure she can backdoor her way into the adoption record to confirm.”
“Do that,” Reese said.“Please.We need to be solid on this.”
“Does it make that much of a difference?”Holly asked.“I mean, Juliet Prince is dead.”
“Yeah.And there’s a better than good chance that Calloway’s aware of that.”
“I’m sorry.I’m lost.How does that change things?”
“Well, it’s rather simple, Holly,” Brantley said slowly.“If Kylie—”
Reese reached over and smacked his palm against Brantley’s chest, cutting him off.He shook his head, warning him.They hadn’t clued the team into the information they had on Kylie.
“Are you there?”Holly asked, sounding confused.“Did I lose you?”
“We’re here,” Reese said.“Sorry.There’s an accident on the highway.Brantley needs to focus.”
“Oh.Okay.”
“Send that over to JJ.Have her confirm it.”
“Will do.I’ll let you know what we find out.”
“Later,” he said, then disconnected the call.
Before Brantley could instruct him to do so, Reese dialed JJ’s number.It went to voicemail, so he left a message regarding the information Holly had relayed to them.He informed her to do the search, but to keep the information from Holly for now.He hated to do that, but until they had some sort of confirmation that Kylie Walker was alive, he didn’t want to get anyone else’s hopes up.
“I think it’s safe to say this isn’t a coincidence,” Reese told Brantley.
“No.It’s not.It’s motive.”
Yeah.And that meant Kylie—provided she really was alive—could’ve been taken for reasons far more sinister than to take down the Southern Boy Mafia.If Martin Calloway took her for that purpose, then that meant he’d been aware of what was going on when they were attempting to find Juliet.
“What if Calloway took Kylie to cover up Juliet’s crime?”Reese mused aloud.
“Makes sense.He could’ve done it to keep her from bein’ prosecuted.His attempt to protect her.”
Reese nodded, seeing how that could be possible.“And if he found out that Max had a hand in Juliet’s death…”
He didn’t need to finish that sentence.Based on Brantley’s expression, he was on the same page.Which would mean that Calloway could’ve suspected that Travis had a hand in it, too.They were friends, right?Which meant there was a damn good chance Calloway had kept Kylie as payback.
And wouldn’t that be a bitch?
Brantley focused on the road as hismind raced, tossing around this new information in an attempt to make sense of it all.
He didn’t believe in coincidence.There was no fucking way that any of this shit simply fell into place.Hell no.Not this.
“Back to our initial assumption… Let’s say Calloway jumped on the opportunity to lure Meredith out by fakin’ Kylie’s death,” he mused, tapping his finger on the steering wheel.“He took her, intending to give her back if and when he strong-armed Meredith into testifying against Max.”
“I’m with you,” Reese said.
“Considering her injuries—” His phone rang, cutting him off.“It’s JJ.”Brantley tapped the navigation screen to answer the call.“Yeah?”
“Hey,” she greeted, sounding like JJ: no-nonsense with a hint of a smile in her voice.“I’ve got some info on the good doc.”
