Unspoken (Shadow Falls: After Dark #3)(87)

Didn’t he? Right then Chase saw two guards standing at the back of the property.

“Is this a bad time?” Chase asked, knowing the council inside were listening.

“Yeah, but you’re already here,” came Kirk’s reply. “Come on in.”

*

“They never arrested your dad back then, right?” Steve asked Della when he finished reading.

“No,” Della said. “But according to Derek’s detective buddy, who read the old case file, he was the only suspect. They just didn’t have enough proof to take it to court.”

Steve looked back at the file. “So we know he called 911, but then he says he couldn’t remember anything. Was he checked for a concussion?”

“The file doesn’t even say if he was taken to the hospital. My dad’s not much help. He says he doesn’t remember, and my uncle told Chase that when he got to the house my dad was unconscious.”

“And you don’t believe him? Or you do?” Steve asked.

“I don’t know,” Della said. “I mean, this Douglas Stone guy really exists. He’s bad, and he was out to stop Chase from trying to prove this. So maybe I do believe my uncle didn’t do it. Oh,” she grabbed the file and flipped pages and pointed down, “and I just found in the transcripts of the 911 call that my dad told the operator ‘he’ broke in but that ‘they’ were hurting his sister. Doesn’t that mean there were two people there that night? And that kind of supports my uncle’s version, because he said Douglas Stone got there first and then he arrived.”

Steve sat there thinking. “But why would he think your uncle was hurting his sister?”

“I don’t know. Maybe he was unconscious when Feng got there and just heard them screaming or something. But the thing is that my mom said that shortly after all this happened they had to put my dad in St. Mary’s hospital, that hospital for crazy people. Which is more proof that he saw something. But my dad’s lawyer is afraid to request the files because he thinks something in there could hurt the case.”

“Or it could prove that he got attacked and that’s the reason his blood was on the knife. Those files might help his case.”

Frustration welled up and started spilling out of her and she moaned. Really loud.

Realizing how crazy she looked, she said, “I’m sorry.”

“For what?” Steve asked.

“For bitching. I told you I wasn’t good company.”

Steve hesitated. “Are you sure it was St. Mary’s Psychiatric Institution?”

“That’s what my mom said, why?”

“Well, what if you could get your hands on those files and find out if they would help or hurt your father’s case? And if they help, you can tell the lawyer to get them opened and used for evidence.”

“How?” Della asked.

Steve shrugged and looked hesitant to say it. “My mom works there one day a week. Well, she volunteers and visits some of the people who don’t have insurance. I don’t know if they have the old files there, but they might.”

“Your mom would actually give them to me?” Della asked, not believing it.

“Oh, hell, no,” Steve said. “I’m thinking if I found out where they keep the files, I could go, then leave a window open and you could take a peek at them.”

“God, I love you,” Della said and hugged him.

It only took a second for Della to realize what she’d said and to realize how awkward it felt. Her arms around Steve. Steve’s arms around her.

Surely Steve didn’t think she meant that she loved him like … “love” love.

Or did he?

Oh, hell!

*

Chase moved faster up the steps. He saw the two guards start toward him as he entered the door.

Kirk, along with the other councilmen, waited in the entryway.

Chase stared at Kirk’s face, trying to read him. “What’s going on?”

Chase heard the guard’s footsteps move up the porch.

“Stop,” Kirk growled. “There will be no bloodshed!”

The two sets of footsteps halted.

Chase looked at the man whom he’d grown to love and trust, and just like that he knew he’d been wrong. Kirk knew about Stone. The whole council was in on this. “Why are you protecting Douglas Stone?”

Councilman Powell’s shoulders gave, as if in defeat. “The guy you call Douglas Stone is my son.”

Chase looked from Powell to Kirk. “And you knew who killed Eddie’s sister and you lied to him all these years?”

“I didn’t know at first,” Kirk said.

“None of us did,” Powell snapped.

Chase felt his eyes grow hot and stared at Powell. “Your son is a monster. He not only killed Eddie’s sister, but he recently killed another woman. I watched them take her body, piece by piece, out of a house just yesterday. And someone in the gang he runs nearly killed a child.”

“I’m not surprised,” Powell said. “I stopped trying to excuse his behavior years ago. I know what he is. I know he has to be stopped.”

Chase looked back at Kirk. “Then what’s the problem? Tell me where he is and I’ll bring him in.”

“That’s the problem,” Kirk said.