Edge of Midnight (McClouds & Friends #4)(119)

“Nobody,” Sean said quietly. “We didn’t have any proof at all that you were involved. Until now, that is. It was just a bluff. Worked, huh?”

Beck blinked frantically.

Sean took a step closer. “Let’s cut right to it. Tell us everything.”

“About, ah, what?” Beck sidled back against the wall.

Davy blocked him. “Kev, the Midnight Project, the Colfax Building, drug experiments. Flaxon. Charles Parrish. Helix. Missing college kids. Body bags.”

Beck shook his head. “I don’t know. About any of it. I swear.”

“No? Then why didn’t you let Emiliana call the cops?” Sean leaned closer and sniffed, smelling fresh alcohol on the man’s breath. “You’ve been at the hard stuff, bright and early. Trying to calm the demons?”

Beck’s eyes watered. “I don’t know what on earth you’re talking about. Please, keep your distance.”

Thud, rattle, the letter slot emitted a slice of sunlight. A wad of envelopes was shoved through. They scattered around Miles’s feet. Miles picked up a handful of envelopes, sorted through them. “You guys.” His voice vibrated with excitement. “This is from the Helix Group.”

Davy twitched it out of Miles’s hand and ripped it open.

“Hey! That’s my private correspondence!” Beck squawked.

Davy leafed through the papers. “From a guy who knows nothing about Helix, you own a lot of stock in it.”

“My financial affairs are none of your business!” Beck blustered.

“Is that where you got the money? From Helix?” Con wandered down the corridor, peering into the next room. “Wow. Check out this solarium, guys. That’s a thirty-foot plate glass window. Pricey.”

“Yeah. How about that money? We’re curious, Beck,” Sean said. “Do you have family money? Or is this Helix money?”

“Helix has nothing to do with your brother.” Beck’s voice shook. “Helix has only existed for ten years, and it’s only become a prominent player in the last eight. Poor Kevin has been gone for, how long now?”

“Fifteen years, five days and approximately six hours,” Sean said.

Beck’s mouth worked. “Ah. Just so. I’m very sorry for your loss, Mr. McCloud, but I think that you should be talking to a qualified psychotherapist about these issues, not to me. I’m sorry I can’t help—”

“Where did the money come from, Beck?” Connor repeated. He strolled back from the solarium. “This is a five million dollar home.”

“I hardly think that is an appropriate—mmph!”

Sean gripped the guy’s throat, shoving him against the wall. Not hard enough to throttle him, but hard enough to shut him up.

“Appropriate?” he hissed. “Nah. Hit men, secret drug experiments, bloated, self-interested slugs sitting on top of piles of money, my twin brother’s charred body—things like that make me mad. So talk to us. Give us names, dates, addresses. Or else…” He squeezed, and Beck let out a strangled squeak. “I move on. To Plan B.”

Beck’s mouth worked, soundlessly. Sean eased up. “That better?”

Beck coughed. Tears leaked out of his eyes. “I just know…a name. It might not even be his real name. And it may have nothing to do with this.”

“Spit it out, Beck.”

“I gave his number to Kevin,” Beck babbled. “He needed intelligent research subjects. There was a fee involved. I knew Kevin needed cash, so I passed on the name. That’s all. I swear, that’s all I ever did.”

“Except for keeping your mouth shut when people started dying?” Sean snarled. “Except for raking in the dough for decades afterwards? You’re nothing but a turd with arms and legs, Beck. You make me sick.”

“The name, Beck,” Connor reminded him.

Beck started to sob. “O-O-Osterman,” he stammered.

“Where does he operate?” Davy asked.

Beck shook his head in frantic denial. “As God is my witness, I have no idea. It’s been fifteen years since I spoke to him, and I—”

“Bullshit. You talked to him the day before yesterday, to sic a hit man on my wife’s sister. Give us the number you called,” Con said.

Beck kept shaking his head. His body shook with sobs. A puddle of urine pooled around one of his shoes on the gleaming blond parquet.

Sean sighed, and dropped him. The guy fell to the floor with a heavy plop, like an overripe fruit. He wept noisily, covering his face.

“This one’s played out,” Sean said wearily. “Let’s go.”



Davy got the SUV in gear and accelerated away from that place.

“Christ, that was depressing,” Connor muttered.

Davy shot a furious glance back at Sean. “You pushed him too hard. You need to use a lighter touch. Unless you’re practicing up for when you get tossed into a maximum security prison, of course.”

Sean was too lost in thought to respond. “Drunk off his ass, at nine AM,” he mused. “He smelled like fear. I scared him bad, but he still held back. Which means that this Osterman guy scares him worse.”

Miles swiveled around, his eyes big. “What was Plan B?”

Sean looked at him blankly. “Huh?”