The Departed

say to you. Would rather do it where it’s not freezing, but…”
    “Just give me a minute.” He shut the door and went to the front parlor where he’d kept most of his things. In his briefcase, he had his weapon. He checked the safety—awkward doing it one-handed, and left-handed at that. He tucked it into the back of his jeans. Not ideal, but he didn’t have a holster he could wear and still manage to draw it with his left hand.
    Not that he anticipated needing it, but too many things he hadn’t anticipated had happened over the past week. With Dez in the house, he wasn’t taking chances.
    It took under two minutes. When he returned to the front door, Moore was pacing restlessly on the porch. “If you want to talk, come on in.”
    “Oh, want isn’t the word I’d use,” he said gruffly. “But things just need to be said.”
    Taylor remained silent, gesturing to the parlor.
    Joshua walked along, hands in his trouser pockets, head bowed. In the parlor, he wandered absently while Taylor settled behind the desk. He casually palmed the weapon and slid it under the desk, ready, but out of sight.
    “How’s your wife?” he asked stiffly. He didn’t want to ask—but Anna had cared. He had to remind himself of that, damn it.
    Joshua shot him a narrow look. “How can you even ask?”
    Taylor lifted a brow. “Excuse me?”
    Joshua laughed bitterly. “Oh, come off it. I know what she did. I know…” He closed his eyes. Abruptly he jerked his hands from his pockets. Taylor tensed and then relaxed, seeing the empty hands.
    His tension returned in three seconds flat, though, as he watched Joshua press the heels of his hands against his eye sockets. A harsh, ragged sound escaped him, almost like a sob. He took a breath, held it.
    “I’ve spent most of the morning at the hospital, with Jacqui. She’s been committed for a psychiatric evaluation,” Joshua said, lowering his hands. He stared at Taylor. “She asked for this. And while she spoke with the psychiatrist, she asked that I be in there, told me she was tired of carrying all of this—felt like she was sometimes two different people. My wife…and somebody with all these secrets. How much of that is real, how much of that isn’t, I don’t know.”
    Taylor frowned, not certain why he was being told this. He didn’t want to hear this. He had to summon every last bit of self-control he had, every last bit of human compassion, to say, “It sounds like your wife went through a very trying time with that bastard who happened to father her. She might need a lot of help to deal with it.”
    “Help. Fuck. Yeah, you could say she went through a trying time.” Then Joshua shook his head. “That’s not what I’m talking about, either.”
    He reached inside his coat, and until Taylor saw the sheaf of pages in his hand, he held himself rigid, ready to do whatever he had to if Joshua Moore showed any sign of danger.
    But it was just paper.
    “I know what she did, Taylor.”
    His heart stopped as he stared at Joshua Moore. Blood roared in his ears, a cacophonic noise that drowned out everything else. He didn’t ever hear Dez enter the room. Until her hand touched his shoulder, he didn’t know she was there. He laid the gun in his lap and reached up, convulsively gripping her hand.
    “What are you talking about?” he rasped.
    “Anna.” Joshua looked at the sheets of paper he held. Then he looked up at Taylor, ignoring Dez altogether. “I’m talking about Anna.”
    Carefully, Taylor put the gun’s safety on, then, just as carefully, he slid it into a drawer. He wasn’t ready to hear this—wasn’t ready, wasn’t ready…Standing up, he turned away and stared out the window. He braced one hand on it, staring outside. His gaze fell on the spot where Anna had last been seen. By the fountain. She’d loved that spot. Almost as much as she’d loved their game room—their one place.
    “I don’t want to hear this,” Taylor said, his voice rough, ragged. It felt like he was speaking through a throat lined with broken glass. “Get the hell out.”
    “No.” Joshua’s bitter laugh rang through the silence of the house. “Look at it this way: you owe me. My son’s paralyzed, in part because of your actions. You can damn well stand there and let me tell you what my wife wanted me to tell you.”
    Taylor spun around, fury blistering inside him. “What, how she killed my baby sister?”
    “She didn’t.” Joshua’s voice, quiet and soft,