startled. Don’t startle us, we don’t attack.”
“Unless you’re really hungry.”
He gave an excruciatingly sweet grin. “Unless we’re really hungry.”
Charlie laughed and decided to bite the bullet. “Okay. Your help would be greatly appreciated.” She glanced at the front of her phone and checked the time. “Uh . . .”
“What?”
“I’m just wondering if Livy would let us stash our stuff here for a couple more hours before we bail.”
“Securing the place shouldn’t take that long.”
“Oh, it’s not that. We’re just here in the City to identify our father’s body and we were supposed to be at the morgue, like, an hour ago.”
“Wait a minute.” He held up his hand, palm out, his head cocking to the side before he asked, “Your father’s dead?”
Crossing the middle and forefingers on both hands, Charlie raised them and said with a big smile she truly felt, “Here’s hoping!”
chapter SIX
Will MacKilligan sat down on the steps behind his house and stared at the kennels where the dogs were kept.
They were usually barking. They barked all the time. Vicious beasts used for protection and, as Will liked to call it, “persuasion” when necessary. A bloke would reveal all with one of the MacKilligan dogs growling at them.
But those same noisy dogs were quiet. Because they knew, instinctually, if they made one noise, Will was likely to kill every last one of them.
To say he was angry would be a gross understatement. Since he was a teen, he’d been putting up with this bullshit, and he was done.
For more than fifty years he’d had to deal with the American side of the MacKilligan family, caused by his father’s insatiable libido, and it was mostly not that big an issue. He had two half-sisters in the United States that he could tolerate on a good day and another half-brother he never saw. But that idiot. That fucking idiot.
Freddy MacKilligan.
That idiot Will wouldn’t put up with any more. Not for a second longer.
But trying to find him would be the challenge. Like the snakes they all loved to eat, the bastard was wily. Could hide in plain sight sometimes. Or so it seemed.
But Will was done playing this game with him. Especially now. Especially after what that bastard had done to him. Had done to the family.
He didn’t even bother contacting his other half-siblings in the States. He doubted they would care any more than his own brothers and half-brothers here at home did. Not when it came to Freddy MacKilligan. And business-wise, they had no connections. The Scottish MacKilligan finances never mixed with the Americans. That’s how their father had set it up and that’s how it stayed.
His eldest son sat down beside him on the step.
“The uncles are calling,” he said calmly.
“Let ’em call.” Will shook his head. “I can’t believe Freddy did this.”
“I can’t believe he’s smart enough to do this. The man’s an idiot.”
“A wily idiot. He’s maneuvered his way out of more shite than you know.”
“We have our people in the States looking for him but—”
“But he could be anywhere,” Will finished for Dougie.
“Maybe his sisters know where he is. I know he keeps in touch with them.”
“They ain’t that close. They hate him.” He thought a moment. “What about Freddy’s girls?”
“The daughters?” Dougie snorted. “They hate him more than you do. They wouldn’t help him. Besides, they got their own problems right now.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Someone’s trying to get the youngest again.”
“What? Another drug dealer looking for designer meth?”
“No idea, but I can find out.”
Dougie made the offer, Will was sure, without really thinking about it. It was just his way to always get his father the information he might need as quickly as possible.
But instead of dismissing the suggestion, Will looked at his son and said, “Yeah. Find out.”
Surprised, Dougie asked, “Really? You sure?”
“I’m sure. Find out. Find out everything.”
“And then what?”
“Then we see what we can do with that information. See how we can make it work for us.”
“Even if it involves the girls?”
Will nodded. “Their father doesn’t care about them, but if there’s one thing the man does fear . . . it’s that oldest girl.”
“Charlie.” Dougie stood. “I’ll see what I can find out.”
Will stood as well, already feeling a little better. Still angry, but now with some hope. “And, if we’re lucky, and all this gets fixed . . . I’ll be able to kill me brother with me bare hands.”
Dougie patted Will on the shoulder. “We’re all hoping for that, Da. We’re all hoping for that.”
* * *
Max glanced over her shoulder, cringed when a corpse hit the glass window, followed by a desperate scream of rage.
“So,” the detective standing next to her said, “I’m guessing that was not your father?”
Max ducked before the leg torn off another John Doe corpse could hit her in the head. “Yeah. That’s not our dad . . . unfortunately.”
“Then you’d better get your sister out of here before I have to arrest her for desecration of a corpse. Or multiple corpses.”
Max reached out to pat the shifter cop on the shoulder as a thank-you, but he jerked away from her so violently, she decided not to push it. She knew that sometimes honey badgers made other shifters nervous.
Besides, it was one of those days, wasn’t it? When everybody was just a little more sensitive than usual.
“Put that torso down right this second, Charlie MacKilligan!” Stevie yelled, pointing her finger at their outraged sister and using her own body to protect the poor morgue attendant. “Right this second!”
* * *
Berg walked into the room, cell phone in hand, eyes on Charlie.
She
