Page 165 of The Billion Heirs Boxed Set
I hang up and lean down to meet Sadie’s eyes. “You okay?”
She nods. “Yeah. Joey being with the EPA is good. Doesn’t make him any less dead, but I always wanted him to be a good guy.”
“I’m not sure if my thinking is on track or not, but it’s the only thing that makes sense. Too many flying parts for them not to be connected somehow.”
“I don’t want to share this with Peterson until…or if it pans out.”
“Only one way to find out.” I look at the house. “You want to say goodbye?”
She shudders. “Nope. It seems we both have shitty dads.”
20
SADIE
Miles and I don’t talk a lot on our way back to Bayfield, which is just as well. My mind is tumbling with facts and analyses, only everything is disjointed into words and phrases. I’m a good cop, a good detective. My thoughts aren’t usually this jumbled.
We grabbed any kind of papers and notebooks that were in boxes, leaving behind everything else, which I doubt is headed to the dump. That’d take too much effort for my father. I don’t want to miss a bit of evidence that might help find Joey’s killer.
When Miles pulls up in front of my place, I turn to him. “I don’t want to go in there.”
“Okay. Where do you want to go?”
“Can we go back to your place? I don’t want to be alone.”
“Of course, baby. But you know I have to talk to my brothers about what we learned today.”
“I know. I can deal.”
“No problem. I just thought you might want to be alone.”
I let out a sarcastic chuckle. “Alone is the last thing I want to be right now. Even though I hadn’t seen my brother in so long, I thought I’d made my peace with all of it. Apparently I haven’t.”
“Of course you haven’t. He was your brother.” Miles kicks the car back into gear.
“This is my case. Well, was, if Peterson didn’t pull me. But we’ve got some real leads in Joey’s stuff. I’m in this thing no matter what.”
He nods. “We’ll go back to my place. I need to talk to Chance and Austin, maybe even get in touch with our attorney.”
“Didn’t you ask Chance to do that?”
“Yeah, I did, but I don’t know if Shankle—that’s his name, Tom Shankle—will even talk to us on a Sunday.” Then he shakes his head with a low chuckle. “Although for what I’m sure we pay him, he’ll probably come out and give us a foot massage on a Sunday. If not, I know a guy in New York I can call.”
I smile, sort of. Miles does so much for me, and if he can get me to smile he’s sure doing something right.
We stay silent again as we drive back out to the ranch.
A car—a really nice car, a Lincoln maybe? I don’t know shit about cars—sits in the long driveway heading to the Bridger house.
“What did I tell you?” Miles says. “That’s Shankle’s car. I guess we can both get a foot massage today.”
This time a smile doesn’t come because I know, if an attorney is in the house, we’re going to be talking about Joey. About his body. Not just about the visit with my father today.
Maybe it wasn’t the best idea to come here.
“Hey,” Miles says, clearly sensing my discomfort, “I can show you where my room is, and you can lie down. Or you can sit out on the back deck. There’s a hot tub out there. It has soothed my muscles and joints many a night after Chance worked my ass off around here.”
“I don’t have a suit with me.”
