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I let his words settle all around me, let myself get used to being the villain, the bad guy in my youngest son’s eyes. It would be a long time, if ever, before he forgave me. But he needed to know the truth.
“Calvin, I always want you happy. But Bonnie was dangerous to us all. I tried to talk to you about her behavior, but you wouldn’t listen. You accused me of trying to control everyone and everything, remember?”
I didn’t need his nod of acknowledgment because I tried to stop things before that night at the hotel.
“That’s because you’re always trying to control everything in your life.”
“Yes, well, in this instance, it needed to be done. Bonnie had files.”
Cal scoffed. “She could barely operate a word processing program.”
Maisie, the peacekeeper of the family, sighed. “Calvin, are you serious? Bonnie went to college in the twenty-first century. Of course, she had more than a basic knowledge of computers.”
He glared at Maisie, and she shrugged back.
Sadie broke in before they went after each other again. “She had files on your government hacks, files I received from Mueller. Other files on our operations, too. Guns. Girls. Drugs. Payoffs. All of it.”
I put the black thumb drive on the table. “Here. See for yourself.” I stared at him, daring him to pick it up.
“I don’t believe you.”
“You don’t want to believe me, but even you know I wouldn’t have manufactured a reason to kill Bonnie when scaring the shit out of her would work just as well.”
“Did you even try to scare the shit out of her?”
“I did. I tried more than once to change what happened before it got to that point.”
“You didn’t come to me!”
“I did, but you were too pussy whipped to do anything about it. You were so gone over a woman who tolerated you until she needed something from you, like access to your fucking computer. Was she on drugs again? You don’t even know do you?”
He opened his mouth to answer me, but I stood and smacked both palms on the table, making the glass and silverware jump.
“Did you hear one fucking word I said, Cal? She wanted to send all of us, your family, to prison, or worse, have us killed by Mueller and the Rhymers. All so she could have you to herself. All the money and prestige without the Ashby family. Does that not matter to you?”
He sighed, still angry, but logic was working its way inside his brain. “It matters.”
“Let’s not forget the one piece of information none of us had until it was too fucking late to be used for our benefit.”
The pause was dramatic, but this was my son, and I couldn’t stand the thought of him hating me forever.
“What Bonnie didn’t know at the time, what I didn’t know, was that Mueller was undercover FBI. She could have really fucked us all. She probably already has.”
A lightning bolt of shock ran around the table as that news sank in along with the shock of my actions. Only Jasper had known the truth before tonight, and he kept a familiar stoic expression while everyone else got used to the news that Bonnie was talking to a federal agent about the family.
“No.” The word left Maisie’s mouth on a hushed cry. The news hit her hard. “I’m sorry, Sadie. I didn’t realize.”
“I know you didn’t, honey. You were busy working and starting your life with Virgil, not living and sleeping right beside her.”
I had more than a little bit of anger of my own directed at my youngest son. “If Calvin didn’t know, how could you?”
Calvin’s glare darkened, and he smacked the table. “I’m sorry the murderer finds me lacking. How will I ever get over it?”
“Your sarcasm is childish.”
Calvin rolled his eyes, and then he stood, grabbing Ava Rose from Jasper’s arms.
“Like I said, I’ll do my part because it’s what the fuck I do. End of story.” He froze for a moment and handed Ava back to her uncle before rounding the table and towering over me.
“Tell me,” he demanded. “Tell me everything.”
I looked up and saw the anguished look on his face before he closed his eyes, ready to hear the gory details of his wife’s death. As if he expected I would enjoy killing Bonnie. Despite her betrayal, despite the fact that it was her uncle, Owen, who started me on the path that ultimately led to her death, I didn’t enjoy it. I did it because, just like my son, it needed to be done.
“Calvin,” I pleaded.
“Tell me, goddammit!” he roared.
“There’s nothing to tell. After I got that flash drive back from Mueller,” I pointed at the evidence still on the table. “Then I followed them to their next meeting at the hotel. They entered the room, and I was already there, waiting for them. I raised my gun. A head shot…for both of them. They fell where they stood, eyes open, lifeless.”
