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Everly didn’t like what she was hearing. “Why would two men without ties to Maddox randomly torch his brownstone?”
She didn’t mention that she and Gabriel had seen the thugs looking for something—whether to swipe or destroy it, she didn’t know. She wasn’t here to give her informant information.
The man shrugged. “It won’t matter to the police. They’re petty criminals. No one will mourn them. They’re easy to mentally convict and forget.”
She recoiled. “That’s harsh.”
“But true. Miller and Hall brought no value to society, and the man whose house is in ashes is dead now, so there’s no true victim. As long as the police and public can assign blame and say the crime has been solved . . .” He shrugged. “Almost everyone will be happy.”
“But not all?” Everly asked. She hadn’t quite decided if he was a total crackpot. Maybe. Probably. But what if he really did know the identity of the second arsonist? What else might he know?
“Well, you shouldn’t be happy. In the next few hours, the authorities will close the case on Maddox Crawford’s death, too. They’ll either rule that it wasn’t a homicide after all or name a patsy. Either way, they will close every avenue of investigation and sweep it all under the rug.”
The man sounded like a conspiracy theorist . . . but did that necessarily make him crazy? “Why? He was murdered, right?”
“Of course,” he shot back as if it was obvious. “He knew too much and he couldn’t be allowed to live.”
“Knew too much about what?” When the man hesitated, Everly glared at him. “Your e-mail and texts indicate you have all the answers. If that’s true, tell me what Maddox died for.”
He bent his head and looked at her from under his brim as he spoke. She couldn’t see his face, but his low growl was unmistakable. “Good. You are smart, wanting to get to the heart of the matter. Everything else is background noise and distraction. Did pilot’s error kill him? Or was it a bomb on the plane? And what about the sudden appearance of that video showing Bond’s threat to kill Crawford? It makes your boyfriend look awfully guilty and will keep the public speculating. But all that merely scratches the surface of what’s really going on. You’re digging, but you’ve barely clawed a fingernail into the glossy coating yourself.”
“What do you mean?”
“You’re starting to get information, but the clues seem unrelated, like they don’t quite fit together, right? Don’t give up. The evidence gives false impressions when laid out in pieces as simple, individual truths. When you put everything together and look deeper, you’ll see.”
She really wanted to write this man off as a loon. But even if everything he’d said so far had been outlandish, she had a gut feeling he might be on to something. “Stop speaking in riddles and tell me what the hell is going on.”
“I don’t have tangible proof. You’ll have to find that for yourself. But believe me, if I laid the whole truth out, you’d call me a liar. Or you would panic.”
“I’m not a damsel in distress.”
“You’re not,” he agreed smoothly. “But these are huge stakes. Almost unimaginable. You may not believe me about that, either, but try. Your life might depend on it.”
Everly wished she could call bullshit on that, but after Mad’s murder and the intentional fire at his house, she didn’t have trouble believing it.
“Do your own investigation,” he went on. “If you uncover the layers as I have and keep asking questions—even if they seem crazy—you’ll figure it out.”
Why would the stakes in her half brother’s murder be so ridiculously high? And how was she supposed to know the right questions to ask?
Everly frowned. “I don’t understand any of this. I know why a jealous husband or a scorned lover might have wanted to kill Maddox, but they would probably have wanted the satisfaction of killing him with their own hands, not rigging his plane to go down.”
“Think bigger, Ms. Parker.” He scoffed. “Much bigger. Who benefitted most from his demise?”
“If you’re suggesting that Gabriel Bond killed him to inherit—”
“I’m not. This is bigger than simple greed.” He glared at her. “Who has the power to cover up a murder like Crawford’s? Research that and think really outside the box about why. I won’t say more now. It’s too much to lay on you at once without documentation. But I won’t leave you without resources. You can trust one person.”
This dramatic speech hadn’t made much sense, but Everly finally got a glimmer of where this was heading.
“You?” She raised a cynical brow at him.
He laughed, a deep chuckle. “Oh, heavens no. I wouldn’t trust me at all. No, I’m talking about Lara Armstrong. She’s in DC. Find her. Compare notes. She’s tugging on a few threads, but she hasn’t figured out which ones to yank yet. When she does, she’ll be in danger because no one wants this information revealed, as our friend Mr. Crawford discovered the hard way.”
Frustration bubbled up. Why couldn’t he simply tell her what he knew? “I don’t have time to investigate, and it’s not exactly my skill set. Just tell me who killed my brother.”
Even as he shook his head, his grin grew wider. “I was surprised you discovered that information so quickly. Tell me, did it make Mr. Bond feel better to know he hadn’t slept with his best friend’s mistress?” He sobered. “He might not be guilty of murder, but whatever you do, don’t trust Gabe Bond.”
Everly suspected she shouldn’t. She would always wonder what would have happened if he hadn’t learned about her true relationship to Maddox. Would he have ever believed that she hadn’t warmed Maddox’s bed? Or would he have decided that he couldn’t handle his friend’s leftovers and dumped her? Despite all that, she didn’t like this stranger talking badly about Gabriel.
“I don’t think my relationships are any of your business.”
“If your relationships get in the way of the truth, they are.”
Who the hell did he think he was? “You called me here to give me information—”
“No, I called you here to give you direction. So far, you’re not taking it well.”
He was talking in circles and it was irritating the hell out of her. “Say what you came to say and be done. At this point, I’m ready to write you off as a meddling conspiracy nut.”
“Ah, finally the feisty girl comes out. So you don’t like me badmouthing Gabe Bond, do you? You’re in deep with him.”
“Again, that’s none of your business.” Once they figured out who killed Maddox, she and Gabriel would only see each other occasionally, for the sake of Sara’s baby. She could resume her work and her thriller-novel-a-week habit. He could go back to his former life as a Manhattan manwhore.
Why did that thought hurt so much?
“I don’t object to Gabe in general. He’s simply involved with people who need to bury this information so deep, it never sees the light of day. Several factions are competing to come out on top, and some don’t even realize other teams exist. Once they do and you start putting the pieces together, you’ll be in danger. Trust me, this picture is only starting to come i
nto focus. What you know is one corner of a much larger puzzle.”
“Does this have anything to do with the missing money?”
He frowned. “Missing money?”
So her mystery informant didn’t know everything. Maybe he didn’t really know anything. Everly shook her head. This guy was probably a nut job after all.
“All right, what’s the scam? Do you work for Lara Armstrong, whoever she is? You know what? It doesn’t matter. I’m done listening.” She turned to leave.
“Wait. I’ll prove my knowledge to you. Tell me, did you find the pictures of the missing girls in the lockbox in the hidden room?”
She froze. Not even the cops knew about the lockbox. She and
