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  “Sure,” Sean said, and the two boys grabbed a baseball that was in a basket by the door and ran out with the dog.

  Jesse spread out his own homework. Not for the first time, Sean reflected how much he loved his kid. He might not have raised him, but Jess was a Rogan. His son. And he was certainly a better kid than Sean had been. Jess cared about school, he wanted to do well. He played sports, made friends easily, and was friendly. That was because of Madison. Genetics may have played a part in it, but Madison had raised Jesse and he’d turned out well.

  Sean wished everything had been different. He loved having Jesse living with him, but not how it happened. In an ideal world, Madison would have left Carson, moved to San Antonio, and bought a house in the same neighborhood so Jesse could have both parents nearby. But he’d lost his mother, and Sean knew exactly how that felt. The burning rage. The deep, unspeakable sorrow.

  Sean shook it off. It was foolish to dwell on the past. He had to find a way to move forward, to make sure Jesse felt loved, safe, and happy.

  “Here’s the study guide,” Michael said and handed Sean a green sheet of paper. They went over it for the next thirty minutes. Sean loved math, so it wasn’t a hardship for him, and Michael caught on quickly. His problem seemed to be memorizing the formulas because Michael was a kid who had to understand why. Sean had been the same way. So Sean explained why the formulas worked, and gave some history as to how they came about.

  Paolo ran in. “I heard you were here, Sean. Can you help me with something?”

  “Math?”

  “No, the computer isn’t working. Please? I have to type this essay for English and I think I lost everything and I don’t want to do it again.”

  Sean glanced at Michael. “You good? Any more questions?”

  “I think I understand.”

  “You’ll do fine on the test.”

  Sean got up and walked out with Paolo. The computer was upstairs in the study area, though most of the boys used the larger family room to do their homework. Paolo was chatty, and Sean sat down to fix the computer, listening to Paolo talk about school and Father Mateo and what he’d had for dinner.

  Michael waited until Sean had left the room, then said to Jesse, “Let’s go.”

  “Where?”

  “Brian is in Father Mateo’s office. He came in an hour late and didn’t call. Father is at the hospital giving last rites to a parishioner, and Sister Ruth told him to stay there until Father came home.”

  “You told Paolo?”

  “I had to do something, Jess. When Brian was late, I called a meeting with everyone and told them what was going on. They need to be careful. I can’t let Brian’s mistakes hurt anyone else. So I messed with the computer and told Paolo to come in at nine and tell Sean something was wrong. We don’t have a lot of time—I don’t know how long it’ll take Sean to fix it.”

  They walked through the kitchen to the small office in the back of the house. It had its own entrance and looked more like a principal’s office than anything—except that there were a bunch of religious things all over, and Jesse noticed a picture on the wall with the boys, Father Mateo, and Sean standing in front of the house. It reminded Jesse that he should have told Sean from the beginning what was going on. It was clear that Brian, Michael, and Jesse were out of their depth.

  Brian was doing his homework at the desk. His face was red and damp from crying. He looked up as soon as the door opened.

  “You can’t be in here,” Brian said and sniffed.

  Michael closed the door behind them. “This has gotten out of hand, Brian.”

  “Go away.”

  “Jesse is hurt. What would you be saying to Sean now if Jesse had been shot? If he had died?”

  “I told him to stay out of it!”

  “It’s Jose, isn’t it?”

  “You don’t understand. Just leave me alone, Michael.”

  His voice cracked and Jesse wondered what he’d already done. But he didn’t say anything. He sat down because his stomach still hurt from being punched. In the shower he’d noticed a big bruise, and he wasn’t surprised because it really hurt.

  “Is this the path you want? You want to join Jose’s gang? To kill? Did you like killing for the general? Did you like hurting other people?”

  “I hate you.”

  “Hate me. Leave. Go and join Jose and his gangbangers and you won’t live to see eighteen. You know the truth and yet you betray us!”

  “Hey,” Jesse said. The emotion and intensity made him very uncomfortable. He didn’t really understand why Michael wanted him here, the whole good cop, bad cop conversation not making much sense. “Brian, I’m okay, really. But they had guns. What do they want you for?”

  “Jose is my brother. You can never understand. He’s blood. He’s family.”

  “The same family as your father who sold you,” Michael said, his voice low and filled with quiet rage.

  “Jose didn’t know.”

  “Lie to yourself all you want, Brian. I don’t care. But you are putting everyone here in danger. You don’t care about me or Jesse, fine. But Tito is innocent. Frisco and Kevin and everyone else. They have a chance for more. For better than what we were all born in. And you would bring the violence back to our door?”

  “No. I won’t. I promise, it’s not like that.”

  “What is it like?” Jesse asked quietly. “What does your brother want from you?”

  Brian clung to the question like a life preserver. “He just wants to be a family again.”

  “Then why hasn’t he petitioned the court to be your guardian?” Jesse asked.

  “He has a record—he doesn’t think he would be allowed.”

  “You know, my dad can move mountains,” Jesse said. “If you really want to live with your brother, Sean can probably make it happen.”

  Brian paled. “No. You can’t tell him.”

  “Why? This is your family. Sean understands family.”

  “He wouldn’t understand. Because of Jose’s record, he would think—”

  “Fuck that,” Michael said. “You are making excuses. He has a record and he carries a gun, what does that mean? He’s already back in the gang life. He’s living in Saints territory. He doesn’t care about you, he cares only because you’re young and stupid.”

  “Screw you.”

  “You need to leave, right now,” Michael said. “I will not risk everyone here because you are weak and stupid.”

  “No, Michael, don’t,” Jesse said. Was he serious? Would he really force Brian to go? “We can fix this.”

  Brian closed his eyes and fought with tears. “I—I—”

  “Tell me what’s going on,” Michael said. “Tell me the truth, right now, or I will call Kane and he will find it for me.”

  At the mention of Kane’s name, Brian shook his head. “Please no. Kane would kill my brother. He’s the only family I have left.”

  Jesse didn’t know what to think about this conversation. Why would Michael call Kane? Why not just tell Sean? Or Father Mateo? Would Kane really kill someone?

  Jesse knew the answer to that. He’d been in Guadalajara when Kane, Sean, and others came down to rescue him and take his stepfather into custody. But they wouldn’t kill in cold blood. Not without a threat. Without a reason.

  Michael stared at Brian. Brian looked from him to Jesse. “Jess—I’m sorry about today. I didn’t mean for any of that to happen, and I was scared.”

  “I know,” Jesse said. “I’m not mad at you.”

  “I don’t know what to do, Michael! I want Jose to have the same chance I had—but he doesn’t understand that there are options outside of the gang. He calls them his family. Says I am family, too, that I need to be with him.”

  “He knows there are options, but he doesn’t want to take them.”

  “They’ll kill him.”

  “He’s not scared of the gang,” Michael said. “He’s a part of it. If he was scared, there are ways to disappear. You and I both know
that. But that would mean hard work and sacrifice, and Jose only believes in himself and the gang, in violence and money and drugs. Tell me the truth: What does he know about Saint Catherine’s?”

  “Just that it’s a group home run by the church. I didn’t tell him everything.”

  “But he knew about the general.”

  “He was in prison, he couldn’t come for me.”

  “Do you think he would have? Do you really believe he would have rescued you and taken you away from the life?”

  “I—I—”

  “If you can’t be honest with yourself, you can be honest with no one.”

  “I don’t know,” Brian whispered. “I want to believe, but … I think he would want me with him, in the Saints.”

  Jesse leaned forward and put his hand on Brian’s arm. Moving made his chest hurt, but he tried to conceal the pain. “We’re here for you, no matter what. Okay?”

  “What’s he up to?” Michael demanded. “What do you do with him and his gang?”

  “Just stuff.”

  “Drugs? Guns?”

  Brian slowly nodded.

  “Is that what you want?”

  “No,” he whispered.

  “Are you sure? Are you sure you don’t want the gang life?”

  “I don’t. But … he’s my brother.”

  “Grow up. Stay away from him. That is your only choice if you want a life.”

  “I don’t know how. He expects—” Brian stopped talking.

  “What does he expect?”

  “My help.”

  “You cross that line, there is no coming back. Before you had no choice. Now you do.”

  “I don’t know how to stop. I don’t—he knows where we live.”

  “Did he threaten you?”

  “Not me.” Brian looked at the picture on the wall.

  “Fuck!” Michael kicked the desk, the sound loud in the small room. “Why didn’t you tell me? From the beginning?”

  “You can’t fix everything, Michael. But I can do this. To protect everyone. He saw you, Michael! When you were following me. He knows who you are and what you did last year. He thinks you’re a traitor. But I can protect you! If I do what he wants, I can protect all of you.”

  “You are not responsible for me,” Michael said.

  “This has gotten way out of control,” Jesse said. “We have to tell Sean.”

  “No—Jose is part of the Saints,” Michael said. “He has the power of the gang behind him. Alone, Sean can’t defeat them. We can’t let him get on their radar. We have to figure this out.”

  “I’ll leave,” Brian said quietly. “I’ll go to El Paso and blend in. I’m good at that.”

  “I’m not letting you run away.”

  “But you said—”

  “I know what I said. But if you’re willing to fight for what you have, for what we have here, then tell me the truth, right now. Do you want to be part of the Saints or do you want to live here? Are you willing to give up Jose? Because he will not change, and you know it. In your heart, you know it.”

  Brian was crying again, but he wiped the snot and tears away with the back of his hand. “I am so sorry about all this. I didn’t know what to do when he found me. He’s my brother, I wanted to try … but I’m scared, Michael.”

  “I have an idea, and it will work—but there’s no going back, Brian. You have to cut all ties.”

  “I will. I promise, Michael.”

  “Tell me everything about what you’ve seen. I need to know where the drugs and guns are. If the police raid the house and find Jose with anything illegal, he will go back to prison. He’s on probation. He doesn’t get another chance.”

  “You want me to send my brother back to prison?”

  “I want my brothers—and that includes you—to be safe. You brought Jose and the Saints into our lives again. You have to help get them out. Or you go with them, and I pray you survive.”

  Brian looked to Jesse, as if begging him for another answer. Another idea.

  “Michael is right,” Jesse said. “We do this or we call my uncle Kane and let him take care of it.”

  Brian took a deep breath, put his head in his hands. A moment later he looked up. “You are right. I can’t risk Father Mateo, Tito—everyone. I will help. The Saints have a house on East Santiago Street. That’s where they package drugs for distribution. They get new shipments late Friday afternoon, package them all night, and their distributors come by and collect for the weekend. I’ve never seen so many drugs in one place—not even when we were mules.”

  “I need the layout, quantities, anything you remember. And you have to make sure Jose is there tomorrow—and you’re not.”

  “I can do that. But they have a lot of guns, a lot of people.”

  “That’s why I’m going to call the DEA. I know exactly what to say to get them to act. Listen to my plan. We won’t have a second chance.”

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Thursday Morning

  Joyce Witherspoon, William Peterson’s partner at Allied Accounting, was a crisp sixty-year-old wearing a professional gray suit with clean, white tennis shoes.

  “I’m so sorry I couldn’t meet with you yesterday when you were here,” she said after shaking their hands and sitting behind her desk. Jerry and Lucy took seats across from her. “With Steven gone … we’re juggling a lot, even nearly a month later. His shoes will not be easy to fill.”

  “You haven’t replaced him?” Jerry asked.

  She shook her head. “We hired someone to help, but it’s not someone of Steven’s caliber. He had a true gift—you know how someone can play music by ear, or a great athlete who breaks all the records? Steven intuitively understood accounting at a level I’ve never seen. And he loved it. I know, sounds weird.” She sighed. “I miss him.”

  “Mr. Peterson suggested that you would be best able to explain how Abigail James’s trust works,” Jerry said.

  “Yes, I audit the trust. It’s managed by the longtime O’Connell family attorneys—a firm in Santa Barbara. I can give you their contact information. But because Steven believed in checks and balances, he hired me—through Allied—to audit the trust every two years.”

  “Did Mr. James have any say over the trust or how the money was disbursed?”

  “Yes and no. The trust was managed by the law firm and the money invested in a conservative manner. Once a year, Steven would analyze the investments and suggest changes. The partners in the firm would then vote on any changes, with the primary goal of protecting the trust for Abby’s future. So he could offer changes, and he had a vote on whether they were implemented, but he couldn’t unilaterally make any changes.”

  “And Mr. James didn’t receive any money from his first wife’s death?”

  “Is that relevant?”

  “Honestly, Ms. Witherspoon, we’re facing dead end after dead end. So we’re going back into the lives of all three victims to see if there is anything that may connect them, or any motive for their death. So far, we have nothing.”

  “I don’t put much weight on the media, but press reports floated the idea that this was the work of a serial killer.”

  “Trust your judgment on that, until you hear an official statement from the sheriff’s office,” Jerry said.

  “I am privy to Steven’s finances. He has always been extremely frugal. The O’Connell money—family money, I guess you would say—all went into the trust. But everything that they bought during their marriage—the house in Santa Barbara, a vacation home in Hawaii, cars, jewelry, art—that was left to Steven, even if it was bought with O’Connell money—aside, of course, from certain specific bequests. He sold the Santa Barbara home and bought the house here in Olmos Park. He retained the Hawaiian home and goes there once a year for two weeks. I believe he put the jewelry in a safe-deposit box for Abby to decide what to do with when she’s older. He made a very good salary here, more than enough to support his family.”

  “But he had no life insurance policy
, which seems odd,” Lucy said. “From a fiscal point of view, wouldn’t he want his wife and daughter protected?”

  “Like I said, he was frugal and he had no debt. The trust will provide for Abby’s living expenses—there is a provision that if Abby is orphaned, the trust will increase her allowance in order to provide her day-to-day living expenses. And everything purchased during the marriage is now the property of Teri. I also believe Steven has in his will that Teri gets the house here, and Abby will have ownership of the Hawaiian house. But I’d have to double-check.”

  “So,” Jerry said, “there’s no way that if Steven James dies, anyone else can get their hands on Abby’s money.”

  “No. Abby herself can’t even make decisions on expenditures until she’s twenty-one—if she needs funds, she applies with the trustee. Education will be paid for. The trust pays for her private high school. There have been too many times when young people are persuaded by unscrupulous people to part with their money. For example—I audited a trust where, on his eighteenth birthday, a boy signed over half his trust to a so-called charitable organization to save the Amazon forest. He’d been conned by a young, unscrupulous woman—a long con. She was in high school, and she and her older sister came up with the plan. She dated him for a full year. It was a sadly brilliant scam, and the women were never caught. When Abby’s twenty-one, she’ll control half the trust, and when she’s twenty-five she’ll control the entire trust.”

  “What about her guardian? Could Mr. James have changed the terms of the trust?”

  “No. The basic terms were set by the O’Connell estate—such as the age at which Abby would receive the money. Abby’s stepmother, as her guardian, would fill Steven’s role on the board of the trust until Abby is twenty-five, where she will then serve as her own advocate. But again—it’s one vote out of five. Three are partners with the law firm who handles the trust, one is Abby’s great-aunt—a woman as frugal and responsible as Steven. When Abby’s grandfather died, she became the matriarch of the O’Connell family. Abby’s grandparents had one daughter, Bridget; Abby’s great-aunt had one son who has only one child, about Abby’s age. There’s a few cousins, but I don’t know much about them. They all live in California.”