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He blinked. Shook his head. “It doesn’t matter. I was there ... I helped ...”
“It does matter,” Finley argued. “You have a right to legal representation.”
“I don’t want a lawyer. I want to finish this.” He stood. “Now that you’re here”—he looked from Finley to her dad and back—“you can take care of Louise while I do what I should have done thirteen years ago.”
“Don’t let him go,” Cagle cried, reaching out as if she could stop him in her weakened condition.
Finley stepped in the man’s path, though she wasn’t entirely certain it was the right move or that she would be able to stop him from whatever he had in mind. “What is it you have to do?” Adrenaline roared through her, tightened her fingers into fists at her sides. Part of her wanted to put him back in that cell just to ensure he didn’t disappear, but the rational side of her brain warned that there was a hell of a lot she still didn’t know.
Ian stared at Finley with enough fury to make her a little worried that she didn’t have a weapon.
Her father was suddenly at her side. “Talk to her,” he urged the other man. “My daughter is the smartest person you will ever meet. She can help.”
As upset and frustrated as she was, Finley wanted to hug him.
Still, Ian said nothing.
“I planted Lucy’s purse at the warehouse,” Cagle said from where she still sat on the bench. “Ian had hidden it that weekend ... after what happened. He’d been devastated and wanted to hold on to the only part of her he had left. Once he told me where it was hidden, I retrieved it.”
“You?” Finley demanded. “Why? What made you decide to make a move after all this time?”
“I didn’t know he had her purse before.” Cagle stared at the water bottle she grasped with both hands. “Two months ago, I got sick again.”
“I was afraid she wasn’t going to make it that time,” Ian said. “It was bad, really bad, but she wouldn’t let me call for help. I realized I couldn’t ...” He looked away, his words trailing off.
This story just got more bizarre by the moment. When Finley would have prompted one or the other to go on, Cagle said, “He didn’t want me to die without knowing the truth.”
Finley turned to Ian. Maybe now she would get the real story. “What truth?”
“I didn’t kill Lucy,” he said, his eyes—his face—reflecting the torment he suffered, “but I was there. When the old man found out what I’d been doing, he promised they were only going to scare her off. And then as long as I stayed away from her that would be the end of it, but that’s not what happened, and I couldn’t stop it.”
“He hadn’t told me that part,” Cagle said. “He felt her death was his fault, and he wanted to pay the price. He knew if he gave me the whole story, I would probably get myself killed trying to take them down.”
If Finley’s head hadn’t been spinning, it sure as hell was now. “Who isthey?” she asked Ian. She wasn’t about to put the names in his mouth.
Ian said nothing, just stared at the floor.
“We devised a plan to make it right.” Cagle went on with her story as if Finley hadn’t said a word. “To bring the whole truth out.” Fury tightened her frail features. “But somehow he figured it out and changed things.”
“Who?” Finley repeated. “I need names.”
“I knew you were the best. That’s why I hired you.”
Her attention swung to the door.
Ray Johnson.
“Nice story. I was almost brought to tears.” He stood in the doorway, hands in his pockets like a kid trying to hide the candy he’d stolen. He scanned the room, made a surprised face. “Damn, bro, you’re looking good for a guy who was supposed to die more than a dozen years ago.”
The guttural sound that burst from Ian’s throat had Finley shifting toward him, but he pushed past her, planting himself squarely between her and his brother.
“You’re going to pay for what you did,” he roared, going nose to nose with the other man. His hands fisted at his sides, ready for battle.
“Is that so?” Ray tossed back, staring at his brother as if he were a bug, a nuisance.
Ian grabbed him by the throat with both hands. Ray’s eyes bulged.
Finley snatched for her phone. “I’m calling Detective Houser.”
