“They’re onto him, Jamie. Wright’s been taking bribes from all kinds of criminals in Los Angeles, as well as blackmailing prostitutes to give him part of their take to keep the cops off their backs.”
That son of a bitch. I curled my lip in disgust.
Wethers wore a similar look. “He got a new partner two years ago. This guy clocked him. Internal Affairs have been on him ever since.”
There was no part of me that wanted to like Lincoln Gaines after seeing him kiss Jane, but I couldn’t help it. Jane had been right. Gaines was a good guy.
“You need to back off Wright. You go poking around while they’re investigating him, you’ll just draw unwanted attention.”
“You’re sure about this?”
“Absolutely. That guy is going down, and soon.”
The uncertainty didn’t sit right with me, but rationally, I knew Wethers made sense. I couldn’t be caught doing illegal shit like planting a bug in a cop’s apartment. It was out of my hands now. A waiting game to see what IA did.
Feeling a mixed bag of emotions, I thanked Wethers and left his office. If IA took down Wright, then I had my justice. I just had to hope they didn’t fuck it up.
There was only one person I wanted to see, to tell, so I drove back to the apartment. My phone rang while I was driving, and a New York number popped up. My agent.
“Are you ignoring my emails?” Susan asked without preamble when I picked up.
“No.” I wasn’t. I’d just been preoccupied. “Just got some stuff going on.”
“Well, I need an answer, Jamie.”
Knowing Susan referred to her phone call of three weeks ago and the subsequent emails, I sighed. A popular streaming service wanted to buy the rights to Brent 29. They had a vision of turning it into a miniseries. Considering my complicated feelings about the TV and movie industry, I’d been dragging my heels.
Now, though, I had someone else I could talk to about it.
“I’ll call you back tomorrow with an answer. I promise.”
“One more day, Jamie.”
We hung up just as I swung into my space at the apartment complex. I was unclipping my seat belt when the damn phone rang. This time it was my sister’s number. Heart racing, I got out of the car and hit the answer button.
“Jamie …” The line crackled as she breathed heavily.
I hurried into the building, stomach roiling as I waited for her to say more. “Well?”
Taking the steps two at a time, I heard my sister crying. Instinct was to protect, but I held fast to my anger as I let myself into Jane’s apartment. She was sitting at her kitchen counter eating toast, and I lifted a finger to stop her from speaking. Then I hit the speaker button on my phone.
“Lorna, I’m not going to listen to you cry. It’s not gonna work.”
Jane’s eyes widened and she dropped her toast to slide off the stool. She’d showered too, her hair still damp, but piled on top of her head in a messy bun. Wearing jean shorts and a tank top, she was so beautiful, it was a sting in my chest.
Despite my tangled emotions, something in me eased as she sat on the sofa and took my free hand, pulling me down beside her.
Finally, Lorna’s sniffling stopped. “I’m just … I’m afraid she’s lied to you about me.”
Jane’s eyes narrowed in outrage, and I squeezed her hand in reassurance.
“No lies, Lorna. You gave her a letter I wrote to Dad when I was fifteen, and you pretended I wrote it to her. Why the fuck—” I cut off at Jane’s returning squeeze. Looking at her, she shook her head. Stay calm, she mouthed. I took a deep breath. She was right. Losing it on Lorna would only make her hang up. “Why would you do that? You knew I needed her.”
Lorna was silent so long, I thought she’d hung up. Then, “You couldn’t see it, but I could. She ruined everything. She read Skye’s diaries and gave them to you, knowing how you would react. She should have burned them.”
Anger boiled inside me. “You really believe that? What about Skye?”
“What could we do for her now? She’s gone.” Lorna’s voice broke. “We couldn’t reveal what had been done because it wasn’t our story to tell, and she couldn’t give us permission to do that. It would’ve been better to have just left it alone. But, no, Jane had to tell you, knowing what