Page 33 of Free to Judge
“Wouldn’t you?” I retort. Before he can muster a response, I whirl around to confront my father and uncle. “Do you really trust him?”
Uncle Caleb speaks, his tone edged with exasperation. “Before he left the FBI, Declan was part of a task force where he worked as a handler…” My uncle’s voice trails off before he picks up with his more recent history with Hudson. “Since he joined our team, he’s worked exclusively providing intelligence to Jon and Liam.”
“Excuse me?” My heart pounds against my ribs.
“He’s not a criminal, Kalie,” Caleb defends.
Declan crosses his arms tightly over his chest, his voice a murmur laced with defiance and more than a touch of regret. “I can’t exactly say my hands are clean, Caleb. Not anymore.”
Liam’s patience snaps. “Doing what you’ve done undercover has been documented as necessary to maintain your cover.” With that, the two bicker in a heated back-and-forth, debating whether Declan will face prison time for turning a blind eye to burglary, carjacking, and a litany of other nonviolent offenses—crimes committed in the murky shadows while utilizing his apparently clever mind to bring down the Byrne family.
My mind whirls with the revelations. “Why didn’t anyone correct my assumptions right after the courthouse incident?” My question slices through the bickering like a knife.
Silence falls until my father strides forward, seizing both my arms in a grip meant to calm yet is undermined by his quavering tone. “Kalie, sweetheart, we had to let the lie play out.”
A pained admission follows from Declan. “Because you’re right, I got one of the bastard’s out who hurt your cousin.” Every word of his honesty stabs at me. He continues, and despite the turmoil he’s churning up, I find my heart twisting with reluctant empathy. “I willingly combed through every piece of evidence, searching for a reason to get Sal Tiberi out. Do you know why?”
“You tell me,” I challenge, voice cracking.
A heavy pause precedes his confession. “I did it for love.” His admission halts me in my tracks.
“You see,” he presses, his gaze dropping to his shoes. He scuffs them against the floor, uncaring of scuffing them as he’s lost in regret, “not long after, my partner—a woman with a husband and two children who I loved as much as you love your family—vanished. That is until her bare head was delivered to the FBI office.” He lifts his eyes once more, only this time they’re devastated by something only his mind’s eye can see. “Theforensic pathologists said her skin was peeled from her face while she was still alive.”
His words root me in place, my eyes never leaving his. “It’s been years, and I can still dredge up the memory of the agony on her face before someone did her a favor and severed her head from her shoulders. That’s what was on her face when they pulled her head from that box.”
“Oh God.” My whisper is as loud as a shout in the silenced room.
“So, yes. In trying to get justice for Tanya, I’ve shaken lives, broken trust, crushed innocent hearts—and until you threw a punch at my face, I was no closer to figuring out what happened.”
Then, like a mask slipping back into place, Declan transforms once more into the feared Mafia lawyer. Slowly, he steps forward until our shoulders align, his presence imposing. Without turning to face me, he murmurs coolly, “I’m sorry what I did in the line of duty harmed you, Ms. Marshall, but frankly, I don’t give a shit. I’m a little busy trying to hunt down murderers.”
In one swift motion, he strides to the door and hurls it wide open, storming out and leaving me flanked by men I’d loved and worshipped my whole life and another I’d grown to respect just as fully . Trusted implicitly with everything from family squabbles to broken hearts to celebrations. But now, after overhearing their whispered conversation and learning the raw truth behind Declan’s actions, I feel betrayed. “You both are the problem, not him,” I accuse sharply.
“Kalie,” my father snaps, his voice laced with exasperation and hurt.
I shake my head, stepping back. “No. It boils down to trust.”
“We trust?—”
“But you didn’t. You didn’t trust us, and here I am, caught right in the middle of your operation. Hell, Dad, before I was born, you didn’t trust Mama with the truth about your own stalker and you nearly lost both of us.” His face turns chalky with shame. “When are you going to understand that sharing your struggles doesn’t make you weak? It only gives us more reason to stand by you.” With that final proclamation hanging heavy in the air, I hurry out the door just as Declan had minutes earlier.
I decide against returning to work that day. Instead, I inform the agent assigned to me to tail me once I leave Hudson. I need to be away from probing looks and eyes that see too deeply for my own good. I know that if I were to cross paths with my mother or her sisters now, my face would announce that the world has gone mad. I’m now a custodian of secrets that push down on my chest like an unyielding weight.
Declan Conian is so much more than a gorgeous face in the crowd.
What he is to me is yet to be determined.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Storming out of Hudson,I slide into the seat behind the stolen Maserati Sal’s “boys” gifted me not too long ago once I got theirconsiglierereleased. I have the Hudson team fully inspect it for bugs or trackers on a regular basis.
For a few moments, I do nothing but breathe before I jerk my fist back and pound the steering wheel over and over until the sideof my hand throbs in agony. “What the fuck was I thinking?” I shout into the silence of the vehicle. Why did I admit everything to Kalie? I could have played it off—let her father absorb the fallout for me being in his office. I’ve gotten myself out of worse situations in the last few years.
But the lost look in her blue eyes as she stared at her father and uncle unraveled something deep inside me. It made something shift back in my chest I hadn’t felt in too long.
My heart.
From the first moment I spotted her across the tent, Kalie’s been an enigma, I admit. Starting the car, I put it in gear and peel out of the Hudson lot. Quick tempered and dangerous one moment, the look of open understanding on her gorgeous face the next almost brought me to my knees. I murmur, “It’s like she was absolving my sins.”
