get in before you get wet.”
On cue, the first fat raindrops splashed down, patterning his expensive suitcoat. Muttering a curse, he slid inside without sparing the driver a glance and was closed in nice and snug with his arch enemy. He glared at Savoie. Did the son-of-a-bitch control the weather along with every other damned thing in the city? Once settled in the cushy backseat, he impatiently tapped on the privacy petition to signal his hurry to leave.
As the car rolled forward, Cummings smoothed out any prospective creases from his jacket and tailored pants, snapping, “What do you want, Savoie, beyond raising my blood pressure with your mere presence?”
“A continuation of that conversation we started in your kitchen.” When he’d broken in to threaten the then mayoral candidate over his dealings with Rollo Moytes.
An audible swallow preceded a brusque, “I have nothing more to say on that matter.”
“Oh, I think you’ve been holding back one important detail that will eventually bite you very hard in the political and personal assets unless you do the right thing.”
“Right thing? For whom? You?”
“The city. Isn’t that what you swore to do, protect all those wide-eyed voters who believed you when you promised to be their white knight representative?”
He scowled, both suspicious and reluctantly curious. “And what good deed would I be doing?”
“You’d be the protected whistleblower bringing down a long-established ring of political and criminal corruption.”
“Against, who? Brady?”
“And Carmen Blutafino.”
His expression morphed from irritation to self-preservation. “No. Way. I will not speak out in a public forum against either of them. I’d be a dead man walking.”
“And the third player,” Max added with a sinister quiet, “who, so far, has been skirting just under the radar.”
Simon Cummings stopped breathing. Finally, he whispered, “You’re just guessing, trying to rattle me into saying something that’s not true.”
“I think you’re already rattled enough to know this is your one opportunity to save yourself.”
A few desperate breaths led to a faint, “I’ll lose everything.”
“Not everything. Not those things that have real value if you speak now, rather than when you’re subpoenaed. You could spin this and come out the hero you’ve always pretended to be. And I’ll use all my considerable contacts and influence to support you and applaud your courage.”
Cummings’ was no fool. He didn’t know what, if anything, Savoie had or could prove, but suspicion tended to create an impossible momentum once raised in the political arena. He’d be ruined and his family along with him. Just like Brady. And, damn him, the sleek Mobster was right. If he were smart and quick to grab this chance that would never come again, his future aspirations would be all but guaranteed.
A heavy sigh. “All right. If you want me to go on record, I’ll go on record. But I don’t have time to make a statement. I’ve got a plane waiting.”
The petition between front and back seats slid open, and Cummings got a look at their driver in the rearview. Savoie had planned for every outcome, the smooth bastard.
Detective Alain Babineau smiled. “I’ve got your conversation on tape already. Why don’t we make it official, and you can fill in the blanks, starting with the name of the third ringleader.”
Cummings exhaled and spoke what he hoped wouldn’t become his death warrant.
“Byron Atcliff.”
– – –
As they watched Simon Cummings hurry aboard the waiting charter, Babineau verbalized what both were thinking.
“Considering what we’ve got on him, what’re the chances he’ll be on that return flight?”
Max saw the hatch closing as a possible end to Cummings’ cooperation but chose to be optimistic. “His family’s here along with that reputation he thinks so highly of. He’s a player and loves a winner’s limelight. I think he’ll be busy plotting how he can turn things to his best advantage.” And if not, Turow Terriot, as a return favor, was in place to change his mind if he tried to run. “He’s a coward, not a hero or true villain. He’ll take our deal and convince himself it was all his idea.”
“And what about Atcliff?”
Grinding his teeth, Max could taste the red of the man’s blood until he took his mate’s partner’s meaning.
What about Charlotte?
Of all those she’d counted on who’d failed her, Byron Atcliff was her one foot on solid ground, the pinnacle she aspired to, the father figure she’d been denied.
“Maybe he was lying.”
Babineau’s words lacked conviction. They both knew out of the three top players, Atcliff was the brains, Brady the money, and Blutafino the muscle to make their