The House of Wolves (House of Wolves #1)(19)

None of them needs much encouragement to talk about their daddy issues.

“Is there any way your sister could have known he was going to leave the store to her? Two stores, actually.”

“I was in the room that day,” Thomas said. “She sure looked as if the news shocked the shit out of her.”

“Maybe she’s a good actress.”

“Aren’t they all?”

Cantor waited.

“You really think somebody might have killed him?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“Didn’t have to,” Thomas said. He took another sip of fake beer. “Well, if you’re asking me, if one of them finally decided they’d had enough, it wouldn’t have been her. What did she have to gain if she didn’t know how much she had to gain beforehand?”

Let him think you’re leaving him out of it.

“But if one of your brothers, or both, knew how much they had to lose, it could have thrown them into a rage, am I right?” Cantor said.

Thomas shrugged.

“Danny’s too weak, as much of a tough guy as he likes to think he is. Jack never had any use for Danny, to tell you the truth. Or for the rest of us, for that matter. He thinks he’s one of those strongman types. But now he wants Danny’s help, and mine, to take down Jenny.”

“You pick a lane yet?” Cantor said.

“Not until I have to.”

“Even though she just upgraded you?”

“Even though.”

Cantor walked over to the drinks setup and grabbed one of those small bottles of soda water.

“It sounds like you think Jack could have done it, especially if he knew your father was going to put Jenny in charge of the newspaper.”

“From the time we were kids,” Thomas said, “Jack was the one who would do anything, and I mean anydamnthing, to win whatever competition Dad had set up for us. If he needed Danny on his side, he’d get Danny. Same with me. The only one who wouldn’t ever go along was Jenny.”

“Kill or be killed,” Cantor said.

“So you know the family motto.”

“Sounds like an interesting way to grow up.”

“Interesting would be one way to describe it,” Thomas said. “Boot camp would be another. Or military school. Or reform school.”

Cantor said, “Say somebody did do it. They’d have to swim back to shore, correct?”

“Unless they rowed out, climbed up the ladder, got it done, pulled up the ladder, and jumped back down into the boat.”

“Who said the ladder was up?”

Thomas didn’t hesitate. “The world’s greatest detective agency. TMZ.”

“Your brother Jack was on the rowing team at Stanford,” Cantor said.

“Wasn’t he, though?”

There was another silence. But they never lasted very long with Thomas Wolf. Cantor got the idea that if Thomas went too long without saying something, his whole body might begin to cramp up.

“Who would your money be on?” Thomas said to Cantor.

“Maybe you.”

With that, he stood up and headed back up the stairs. Thomas followed him.

“How come you didn’t take any notes?”

“Trust me,” Cantor said. “I’ll remember this conversation just fine without them.”





Twenty



I FELT LIKE I had a very weird, very split football personality going. My kids on the Bears, they wouldn’t lose. The Wolves? They just refused to get me a win.

We lost to the Seahawks as badly as we did—as if they’d thrown us down a flight of stairs—because our coach decided to bench Ted Skyler and replace him with his rookie backup, Chase Charles, who proceeded to throw three interceptions. By the end of the game, Charles had me wondering from my seat in the stands if it might be time for him to consider a change in vocation.

I waited an hour after the game had ended before I made my way down to Coach Rich Kopka’s office, adjacent to our locker room.

He was alone in there when I walked in. I didn’t waste any time, since my coach was constantly reminding me what an extremely busy guy he was.

“What do you think you’re doing?”

He peered over his reading glasses at me. They were perched at the break in his nose, one he’d suffered at the hands of his best assistant coach a few years ago, after Kopka had fired him—mostly because the guy, Ryan Morrissey, was smarter than Kopka and a much better football coach. Morrissey was also tired of taking the blame for the boneheaded play-calling decisions that Kopka kept making.

“What does it look like I’m doing? I’m working.”

“What I meant was what were you doing putting that scared little boy in at quarterback today?”

“He’s six four,” Kopka said. “Maybe a little scared today. Definitely not little.”

“Question remains the same.”

“I needed to find out what we’ve got with him.”

“That’s what training camp is for,” I said.

“It’s not as if your boyfriend was lighting things up before I sat his ass down.”

“Ex-husband. Not boyfriend. And irrelevant to this conversation. We’re talking about you, Coach. Not him.”