Piper snorted. “And what’s to stop you telling them to let me rot once I deliver Franklin?”
“Because he doesn’t like me that much,” Cade said. “Trust me, if I told him I wanted to keep you behind bars? He’d turn up with a crowbar. Never mind the billable hours he can charge.”
Piper inhaled audibly. “See,” he said. “I’m not sure a ‘best efforts’ promise is worth what I’m risking. I want assurances that I’m not going to end up on the short end of this deal and that there’s a life out there for me when I get out. Maybe—”
“Maybe you don’t have anything,” Marlow said. “You think you’ve been pulling Franklin’s strings all this time? Yet you’re the one behind bars, just where he wanted you.”
Piper snorted. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Franklin’s the one who told you I was an informant, right?” Marlow said. “Convinced you that you had to shut me up.”
“What do you want? An apology?” Piper snorted. “Maybe I should have asked more questions, but you fit the bill. I never did manage to buff all the shine off your conscience, and Bennett was the last person I thought would blow the whistle. Never expect an ex to keep your secrets, I guess.”
Marlow rubbed his hand over his face. “There was no informant,” he said. “No case being built behind your back. The only reason that Bennett went to the brass and dropped you in it was because you’d gone too far. All those rationalizations about what we deserved and how, really, what you did made our job easier? They all fell through the minute you shot me and chucked me to the wolves. She couldn’t make that for the greater good. And ask yourself… how did she find out? Bennett wasn’t there that night. I was in a coma, and I don’t think you told her. So tell me something, did Franklin know you had something on him before IA knocked at your door?”
A slow, controlled exhalation was the only answer he got.
“Call your lawyer,” Piper said, his voice flat. “Once he’smylawyer, I’ll get you what you need to take Franklin down. Maria knows how to contact me.”
He hung up.
Cade picked up the phone to set it on the bedside table. “Is it true?”
Marlow zipped his hoodie up slowly over his bare chest. He shrugged one shoulder. “I don’t know,” he admitted. “I think so. More importantly, it seems like Piper does too.”
“It worked,” Cade acknowledged. He kicked the tangled sheets out of the way and swung his legs over the side of the bed. The rug was rough against the soles of his feet. He studied Marlow as he tried to read how the conversation with Piper had affected him. It wasn’t easy. Marlow was reserved at the best of times. He didn’t look happy about it, but hedidlook resigned. “If we do this, Piper will get something out of it. Can you live with that?”
Marlow pushed the frayed cuffs of the hoodie up and crossed his arms. “I haven’t spoken to him since it happened,” he said. “He told me I was a good cop; then he had me thrown out into the street. If I lived with that…”
Cade wrinkled his nose. “That’s when you knew he was locked up, that he was paying for what he did to you.”
“Yeah, well, to be honest? The fact he let Franklin get one over him, that probably hurt Piper more than any one of those five years he spent inside,” Marlow said. “Five years, and he’ll never be Night Shift again? I can live with that. He’d have been up for parole in a couple of years anyhow.”
He didn’t sound entirely convinced. That was actually reassuring. It was honest, and Cade could work with that. People who lied well enough to fool themselves—for a while—were the ones who came apart at the worst times and in the worst places.
“I need to go and talk to Piper’s new lawyer,” Cade said as he collected his clothes off the floor. “We’ve got a few hours before the moon rises. He’ll want to speak to you.”
Marlow pushed himself up out of his slouch, even as he looked confused. “Why?”
Cade pulled his shirt on over sweat-damp shoulders. “Because he’s a bastard,” he said. “And it’s the sort of thing a bastard would do. There are T-shirts in the wardrobe if you want to borrow one.”
“One question?”
“Just one?” Cade asked as he leaned back in the slick metal-and-leather hammock chair. It felt precarious under his weight.
“What gave you the idea that I’d doanythingto help you?” Justin asked as he sat down behind his desk. He picked up a pen and twiddled it between his fingers as he enjoyed the moment. “I’d not piss on you if you were on fire, Deacon.”
They’d been friends once.
It had been for a month—drunk on adrenaline and disbelief they’d gotten bonus checks instead of coffins after they’d faced down with Russians. Just long enough to plan and commit money to the idea of their own security company. They’d quickly realized that being friends and business partners did not work. Not for the two of them, anyhow.
“Ned Piper,” Cade said. He laid the folder he’d put together about Piper’s business on the desk between them and flicked it open. Justin’s fingers twitched, just once, as he looked at the plain cardboard. It was enough. Cade had played enough poker with Justin—in winter, half-pissed, just to keep their blood moving—to know his tells. He was at least eyeing the hook. “He was a Night Shift—”
“I know who he was,” Justin said. “What does he have to do with you? He’s pretty enough, but I’d hope you’ve not been reduced to Men Behind Bars dating sites.”
“You know I can’t after we both signed that non-compete clause,” Cade said. “Although youdidtry and poach my employee, which is also against the conditions.”
“Lem has a big mouth,” Justin said with a thin, humorless smile.
