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“Shall we start spreading rumors?”
I peered over at him. “What kind of rumors?”
He shrugged. “Just a word here, a whisper there. Casting aspersions on the people he comes into contact with?”
The idea had merit. “That might be wise. Then, it’ll seem like one of his non-Five Pointer contacts killed him. Or, maybe, that he ran to avoid something.”
Bagpipes nodded, then tapped his nose. “Leave it with me.”
Gratitude filled me, followed quickly by shame. I’d doubted him, Forrest, and Tink, but these were the only bastards I could trust.
“Thanks, man.”
He shrugged. “No big deal.”
Temper still kindling, even though he’d doused water on it with his idea, I reached for my landline the second he shut the door behind him, connected a call to Da, and placed it on speaker.
When it rang a few times, I almost hoped the bastard wouldn’t answer, but I should have realized that was wishful thinking.
“Bren?”
“Yeah.” An awkward pause hit because I knew he wasn’t feeling bad about what he put Camille through, and I was verymuchfeeling bad about it.
“You got news for me?” he rumbled when the silence extended with neither of us saying a word.
“I got a whole lot of jack shit. This fucking rat’s nest is driving me insane. Whichever way I go, there’s something going down. It’s like living in a conspiracy theory.”
“That’s exactly what it is,” Da agreed. “Want to start at the beginning? You know I cut you a lot of sway, so I stay out of the loop until you key me in but you ain’t done that for a while.”
Thanking God for small mercies that he had no idea how in the dark he was, I muttered, “That kid, Quin, you got out, you remember the detective who framed him?”
“Lacey? Some chick’s name, right?”
“Yeah, Craig Lacey. We’ve had a tail on him for a while, trying to figure out his role in the group. He’s only a small fry in the 42nd, still considered a rookie from what Forrest hears, but the Sparrows use him as a courier to cross over into Jersey.
“Anyway, before we brought him in, we wanted to wait until he pulled another haul across the state line, maybe use that to blackmail him if whatever he’s carrying is illegal, but we think we’ve figured it out.
“Those thieves behind the robberies squealed. Said that some Five Pointer told the brains of the operation that Hummel’s wasn’t protected by the Points anymore.”
“What?” Da snapped.
“According to them, Hummel’s is involved in something shady, Da. Are you in on it?”
“If I was, then you’d know about it, boy. What’s he cutting us out of?”
“I don’t know. I don’t even know the fucking Pointer who told them that shit,” I lied.
“You didn’t get it out of them? Leave them to me.”
“Only the brains knew and he died with his trap firmly closed.”
“Fuck,” my father howled. “How could you be so clumsy?!”
“Getting that shit out of him about the shady dealings was hard enough,” I snapped, unapologetically lying once more about Callum O’Reilly, mixing up what both he and the thieves had told us, “but he dropped another name.”
“Craig Lacey.”
“Yeah.”
