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“They want to speak to you, Theo. We have an appointment tomorrow morning at ten.”
“You’ll be there.”
“Of course.”
“Then what could go wrong?”
Over the meal she and Mac told Gus about Mary Cowell and her information.
Gus grimaced. “It was only a matter of time. I’ve tried to be careful, but it wouldn’t be hard to follow me back here. It’s probably a wonder that it’s taken two days.”
“Perhaps we shouldn’t be living in the same place,” Theo suggested. Surely if they weren’t living together, Gus could distance himself a little…maybe that would help.
“I’m not abandoning you, Theo.”
“You wouldn’t be abandoning me. I’m an adult. I could simply move into a hotel…”
“With the publicity our friend Mary Cowell’s given you, I can only imagine the kind of hotel that would be willing to take you—and you’d be on your own, Theo…and I wouldn’t be able to get any work done because I’d be worrying about whether someone had cut your throat in the lobby.”
“Theo could stay here,” Mac suggested cautiously. “You could move back to your place. I could make sure Theo was all right, and Philip Hayes might calm down and call off the dogs.”
Gus stared at him. “You know about that?”
For a moment, Theo thought Mac might give her and Jacqui Steven away, but all he said was, “I know everything, Gus. Private eye, remember?”
Gus turned to Theo. “What do you think?”
“It’s worth a try, Gus. I don’t want you to have lost everything by the time they find whoever really killed Dan.”
“And what if they don’t?”
Theo took a deep breath. She wasn’t consciously aware that she’d been thinking about this, but she must have been because she knew. “As soon as they decide that I didn’t kill anybody and allow me to leave, I’ll go home…to Tassie. I can still play the tambourine.”
Gus cursed. “So you’re going to let them run you out of town, out of the country, for God’s sake. Bloody hell, Theo!”
“It won’t be forever… I have dual citizenship, remember.”
“No. I’m not letting you go home with your tail between your legs like—”
Mac interrupted. “Look, guys, I think you may be getting ahead of yourselves. At the moment, with no other suspects, Mendes is not going to let Theo leave anyway.”
Gus exhaled. “Which means she could be living here for months as Mendes stuffs around trying to build a case out of nothing.”
“Yes…but you going back to your place might take the heat off a bit at the firm and the distance might have other benefits. You could concentrate on being Theo’s attorney rather than her big brother. It may make it easier. She’s welcome to stay here for as long as she wants.”
“And if you wake up tomorrow with a hundred reporters on your front lawn?”
“We’ll deal with it. You’ll be in the same town, Gus.” Mac glanced at his watch and stood. “I’m going out for a couple of hours, so you can talk about it without me here.”
“You don’t have to—” Theo began.
“You and Gus need to work this out. I’ll be back in a while.”
And so the Bentons were able to argue freely. And they did. Fiercely. Gus demanded his right to protect his sister. Theo insisted on the same right against him. “You’re less able to help me if you lose the firm, Gus. You can’t blow everything up just because you think this bloke Hayes is a bastard. We’re adults now.”
“This is not your fault, Theo.”
“No. But it is what it is. Mac’s right. You need to go back to your place.”
