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14
Declan heldKate’s hand as they walked the beach in the cove below the house in Marblehead, the tide rushing around their bare feet. They’d been home from Iceland for two days, and Declan had spent the whole time trying to figure out how to convince Kate to leaveBoston.
The sun was just beginning to set, and he looked out over the flinty water where a band of clouds clung to thehorizon.
“Feels like a storm,” Katesaid.
Declan nodded. “The first nor’easter of the season, Iheard.”
She kicked the sand. “Great.”
Declan drew in a breath. The last thing he wanted was to deliver yet more bad news, but there was no help for it. “You have to leave town with Griff and yourmom.”
“I’m not leaving town.” She didn’t sound surprised by the suggestion. “I’m notrunning.”
“It’s not running. It’s being smart, being safe. Ferguson is in town, and he’s obviously preparing to make hismove.”
It was impossible to know if Ferguson had enough shares lined up to initiate a hostile takeover of WMG, especially without Beth’s shares. If he did, he’d wait until the last minute to initiate the buy, not wanting to alert stock watchers that something was up with WMG’s stock. If he didn’t, he’d be ready to call his bid to takeover WMG aloss.
Either way, he was moving to eliminate any evidence connecting him to the death of Mac Walsh and the financial anomalies that had prompted the FBI investigation into Neil Curran. That’s how those kinds of investigations worked: once the first domino fell, the rest weredoomed.
“Doing anything I don’t want to do because of that… monster,isrunning,” Kate said. “Besides where would Igo?”
“We have a house in the mountains,” Declan said. “We never use it, but it’s nice. You’ll be safe there while we deal withFerguson.”
They hadn’t figured out what dealing with Ferguson would entail, but one way or another, it would end in death. It wasn’t about the takeover. That was business, something even Kate had acknowledged. It was about the way he’d done it, about the fact that he’d orchestrated Mac Walsh’s death, that he hadn’t played by therules.
Even more than that, he was and would forever remain a danger to Kate and Griffin, to the entire Walsh family, and now the Murphy family too. As long as Connor Ferguson was out there, they would all be indanger.
Maybe they’d get lucky and he wouldn’t come for them now. Maybe he wouldn’t come for them at all. But the possibility would always exist, and that was something Declan couldn’t livewith.
“What about school for Griff? What about my job? I can’t just pick up and leave indefinitely,” Katesaid.
“You worked from Iceland,” Declan pointed out. “And Griff is seven. He can miss a little school, especially if we get his work inadvance.”
“Exactly. I’ve already been away from the office for almost ten days. I need to go back to work, and I doubt Aiden will want to take an extended vacation in the Berkshireseither.”
“That’s his risk to take, but he is sending Miguel away for a couple of weeks,” Declansaid.
Kate looked up at him in surprise. “What? When did he make thatdecision?”
“I spoke to him last night,” Declan said. “He agreed the risk was toogreat.”
She kicked at the water rushing over her feet. “Well, that’s fine for Aiden. I’m not sending Griff away and I’m not going either.” She didn’t look at him but when she spoke again her voice shook. “Connor Ferguson has already taken too much from me, Dec. I’m not letting him take my home, my freedom, my sense ofsafety.”
Declan stopped at one of their favorite sitting rocks, a giant boulder with a large flat surface that had just enough room for the two of them and Griffin, if he sat on one of theirlaps.
He pulled Kate down next to him and rubbed her cold hand between his. He had to check his instinct to pressure her to see things his way. If he wanted her to honor their agreement, to meet him in the middle, he had to do thesame.
Besides, the best way to make sure Kate Walsh didn’t do what you wanted was to try and bully her intoit.
“Can we compromise on this one?” he asked gently. “Because we have to deal with Ferguson, and I’m going to be worried sick about you if you’re out in theopen.”
She drew in a breath and he knew she was thinking about their conversation in Iceland under the Northern Lights. She looked out over the water. “The mountains seem like a bad idea,” she said. “We’d be isolated, and maybe that makes it easier to post security, but it also means it’s easier for someone to breach it. No neighbors, no one to call if we get into trouble, free rein if someone decides to come for usthere.”
He checked his impulse to argue the point. She wasn’t entirely wrong, although in the mountains he could go crazy with security, post twice as many men as they needed, just to be safe, without raising any alarmbells.
“I see your point.” He wondered if compromise was supposed to feel so painful, like a chess match where every square held a stick of dynamite with the fuse already lit. “Another location then? Someplace you don’t mind being for a couple of weeks. Someplace I can still post security but that isn’t as isolated as themountains.”
