The House of Wolves (House of Wolves #1)(35)

“Sonofabitch? Is the mourning period officially over?”

“There was never going to be a period of mourning once he married that whore,” she said.

Danny let that one hang in the air for a moment. Whore. He’d heard worse about Rachel, too.

Much worse.

“I did exactly what John Gallo instructed me to do,” Danny said. “I raised the stakes a little more by showing I’m willing to take down the coach right along with her.”

“How long did you give him to make up his mind?”

“I told him he had a couple of days,” Danny said. “But I can’t believe it will take that long to resolve itself. She won’t let him take the fall for her.”

“Even if it means giving up the team?”

“If she doesn’t, she watches Ryan Morrissey sail off to Weinstein Island,” Danny said.

“Where?”

“It’s like the lost island of Atlantis. Named after the movie guy. It’s the place well-known men get exiled to after they get accused of forcing themselves on women.”

They sat in silence. The housekeeper brought a fresh pot of tea. She asked if Danny wanted more coffee. He said he was fine. Mostly he wanted to leave. He never wanted to be here, at least not for very long. But then Danny wasn’t sure he’d ever wanted to be here.

“Are you sure you didn’t know what was in that will?”

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“Sometimes I wonder if you’re still playing us all off against each other,” Danny said, “the same as he always did.”

“To what end?”

“You tell me.”

“Don’t you give me that shit!” she snapped. “I’m doing what I’ve always done, which means protecting this family.”

“Aren’t Jenny and Thomas part of the family, too?” Danny said.

“Not if they won’t get out of the way.”

She took her lace napkin out of her lap and placed it next to her plate. He was being dismissed.

“We can’t allow our secrets to get out.”

“No,” Danny said, “we can’t have that, can we, Mother?”





Forty-One



“I DIDN’T EXPECT TO still be here for breakfast,” Ryan Morrissey said.

“When you told me why you were here, I didn’t expect you to, either,” I said.

He looked as if he’d slept in his clothes because he had, even though there were a few moments around two in the morning, after we were both all talked out, when I thought it might be touch and go where he’d end up sleeping. And whether he’d be alone.

“It’s like the line in that television commercial,” I said. “Life comes at you fast.”

“Like a blitzing linebacker.”

“You had a lot to drink,” I said.

“We both had a lot to drink.”

We were having coffee in the kitchen. I asked if there was anything else I could get him. He said more coffee. He said the last couch he’d slept on had been the one in his old office at Wolves Stadium, the couch on which he was being accused of forcing himself on one of the secretaries there when he still worked for Rich Kopka.

“I didn’t know they’d play this dirty,” Ryan said.

“Unfortunately, that makes just one of us.”

“I didn’t do anything that woman says I did.”

“I like you, Ryan. And I listened to you for a long time last night before we got solidly into the wine. But you have to know that’s what all men say.”

“But you know me.”

“I’ve known men longer. Including the ones in my own family. There was something with Jack about ten years ago that my father magically made disappear.”

“Was it true?”

“He said at the time that he didn’t do anything the woman said he did.”

“How did it go away?”

“How do you think? Money changed hands.”

“That won’t work with this,” Ryan Morrissey said.

“It won’t come to that,” I said.

“How can you be sure?”

“Leave that to me.”

“Jenny, for the last time, he made the whole thing up and got her to go along with it.”

“And for the last time, I’m the defense attorney, not the prosecutor, remember?”

“Money must have changed hands with her,” Ryan said.

“Gee, you think?”

Her. Donna Kilgore. She’d been the secretary for all the assistant coaches before Ryan had punched out the head coach. I’d met her a couple of times. Smart, pretty, ambitious as hell—you figured that out in five minutes. I always suspected she’d had something going with my brother Danny, not that I could ever prove it.

Two years ago, she left the team. Suddenly and without explanation. I hadn’t heard a word about her until Ryan Morrissey showed up last night and told me about his meeting with Danny, who’d said he had a sworn statement from Donna and one of her best friends that Ryan had sexually assaulted her after hours, and on more than one occasion.

Her leaving the Wolves synced up quite nicely with her version of things. Danny told Ryan she was living in Las Vegas now, working as a casino hostess. But she had decided she had to come forward after she saw that Ryan Morrissey was back with the Wolves.