Page 89 of End Game

“Are you disputing an estrangement with Governor Stokes prior to her death?”

“You mean murder, don’t you, Agent Blackwell?”

He said nothing. Simply stared at her. Most people were uncomfortable with silence. Conversation voids tended to be an investigator’s promised land. Interviewees attempted to fill them with chatter, which often turned up the best morsels of information.

“Look,” Linda said a few seconds later, proving him right. “I might not have agreed with all of my mother’s policies, especially her more recent ones, but I loved her and she loved me.”

“No one’s questioning your affection for your mother,” Ash said. “But your relationship with Governor Stokes changed after your father’s untimely death, correct?”

Her pale blue eyes narrowed on him. “Why exactly did you come here today?”

“My job is to help the police track down the governor’s murderer. We have to search beneath every stone, no matter how unlikely.”

Her wariness turned to shock. “You think I had something to do with her murder?” She turned on Kayla again. “Is this what you told him? That I hated my mother enough to kill her?”

“No!” Kayla reached for her friend’s hands. “It’s just . . . you’ve been so angry of late.”

She batted Kayla’s hands away and lurched to her feet again. “Leave now.”

“We’re only trying to get answers,” Kayla said, rising.

Ash followed suit. “Who told you about your parents’ argument?”

“What argument?”

“The one that sent your father to their home on Lake James.”

Linda closed her eyes. “Get out.”

“I’m sorry to upset you, Ms. Collier, but the more I know, the better able I am to do my job.”

“Someone who cared enough to tell me the truth.” She turned on Kayla. “I suppose Mom told you about Daddy’s diagnosis.”

Kayla swallowed. “It was necessary in order for me to form a strategy around?—”

“I don’t want to hear about her damn political maneuverings.” Linda swiped away a stray tear. “He was my father!” She slapped a hand over her chest as if stopping her heart from exploding out of her ribcage. “Go.”

He placed a business card on the coffee table. “Thank you for your time, Ms. Collier. If you think of anything that could help with our investigation, please give me a call.”

“Yeah, I’ll be sure and do that. Now, get out of my house.”

“Linda, please understand—” Kayla began, but Ash cut her off, motioning her toward the door.

They’d just reached the sidewalk leading to their vehicles when Linda wrenched open the front door.

Kayla turned back to her friend, hope in her eyes.

“Don’t ever, ever come back here, Kayla. We’re done.”

The door slammed shut, and Kayla closed her eyes for a moment. When they reopened, moisture glistened at the edges, but no tears fell.

Ash followed in the lobbyist’s wake, placing himself between her and the anger pulsing from within the house. Regret clamped around his chest.

He should never have brought her here. Kayla was strong, but the human body could only take so much trauma before it either broke apart or shut down.

In the span of five days, Kayla had experienced a lifetime of shock and heartbreak. Much of it because of him and his need to keep her close—and his evident inability to say no to the woman.

Both of which, he must change.

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