Kate Sherwood - Dark Horse 03 - Of Dark and Bright (3 page)

Chapter 3

D
AN wanted to ride. He wanted to be on a horse, his will combining with the horse’s strength to turn them into one invincible creature. He wanted to be galloping over the hills behind the barn, feeling the thundering power of every stride, savoring the miracle that allowed his puny body to harness all that incredible energy.

Instead, he was stuck in his apartment, trying not to pace, waiting for a phone call. He felt like that was all he’d been doing for the last four days, ever since Krista had first contacted him. Sitting around, waiting for one damned call or another.

He was just checking his watch, wondering if it was too early to start drinking, when the phone finally rang. He answered it before it had a chance to ring a second time. “Hello?”

“Dan, it’s Susan. We got the preliminary deal.” The lawyer sounded exhausted, but still strong.

 

“Seriously? Damn, Susan, that’s incredible. Evan’s guys said it was a long shot.”

 

“There’s conditions. A lot of them. And you’re involved, so I need to run it all by you.”

 

“Yeah, okay. I mean… whatever it takes, I’ll do it.” “You said that before, Dan, but I really need you to listen to the conditions and be sure you can live up to them. Okay?”

 

“Okay, yeah.” Dan stood up and let himself move around the room.

“We got the deal because she’s pregnant, as far as I can figure. I made a strong argument, but really, we just got lucky to have a judge with a serious interest in child welfare. So the second she does anything to endanger the baby, this whole thing goes to hell.”

“Susan, it’s not like I’d let her endanger the baby anyhow.”

“She’s a grown woman, Dan, not a mobile incubator. She has her own interests, and you’re not necessarily going to be able to control her.” Dan still hadn’t met up with Krista, but Susan had, and he wondered whether there was a warning in the lawyer’s words. Krista had been strong-willed and impulsive as a child; maybe she hadn’t calmed down all that much. But that didn’t matter; she was family, and Dan would do what he could for her. He had to.

“Okay,” he said meekly, and he waited for more.

“The deal only lasts until she gives birth, and it only lasts as long as she’s cooperating
fully
with the investigation. We got her to a doctor, and apparently she’s closer to seven months than to six. So for the next two months, Krista’s full-time job is gestating and answering questions from federal and state investigators. If she is anything less than cooperative, the deal goes away. That’s clear?”

“Okay, but they can’t be abusive about it, right? I mean, they can’t call her in the middle of the night, or keep her down at the police station for twenty hours straight or anything, right?”

“If anything like that happens, you call me, and I call the judge. Until we have the judge’s instructions, we do
exactly
what the police want, in exactly the way they want it.” Susan sighed. “Look, Dan, I’ve been working with Chris, and he’s told me a bit about your background. We’re going to get to that in a minute. But you need to be thinking of yourself as a solid citizen, here. You love the police. The police are your friends. They serve you and protect you. Okay? Dan?”

“So, I lie.”

“Don’t do it under oath. But in terms of your attitude, absolutely. Lie away.” There was a note of something in her voice, but Dan wasn’t sure whether it was humor or impatience. “Can you do that? Because if you can’t, we need to find another arrangement.”

“I can do it.” He could. He wasn’t the rebellious kid he’d been, and even back then, he’d never really
hated
the cops. They had been the enemy, sure, but it was nothing personal.

“Okay.” She sounded like she believed him, and Dan had another flash of gratitude that Chris had found her. She was perfect for the job. She’d obviously managed to handle Krista, and she was tough enough to make Dan listen to her too. He needed that, and he forced himself to concentrate on her words before she noticed his distraction. “So, in short, Krista will be under house arrest. We didn’t even ask for her to be released into your custody, since you have your own history of police trouble. So the house arrest will be supervised by an independent, licensed security company. She will not be allowed to leave the premises unless she’s accompanied by law enforcement officers or by employees of the security company, and she can only leave for preapproved reasons. The judge has given us a list of allowable trips, and it’s pretty short. Essentially, she can go to meetings with the police, meetings with her lawyers, and medical appointments. That’s it.”

This had been discussed earlier. Chris and Evan had conspired to keep the cost of the security company secret from Dan, but he knew it had to be astronomical. He never would have suggested such a thing, even if he’d known it was possible, but Evan liked to think big. And in this case, it seemed like the best solution. “And there’s bail?”

“Two million dollars. Four hundred thousand of that is required as surety.”

Damn it. Another favor from Evan. Dan hated it, but he couldn’t let his sister rot in jail because he was too proud to ask his lover for help. Couldn’t let his niece or nephew come into the world behind bars, not if there was any way he could prevent it. “Yeah. Okay.”

“If she violates the terms of this agreement, if she leaves—that money is gone, Dan. The full two million.”

“Yeah. I get it.” Dan had no idea how he’d ever make enough money to repay a debt that huge, but how could he refuse the deal? He was starting to feel trapped, and no amount of moving around the apartment was going to make that better.

“Okay, we’re almost done,” Susan said. Her cheerfulness sounded forced, as if she was fully aware of Dan’s reaction to all this, but she charged on anyway. “Krista can’t drink or do drugs, but hopefully that wouldn’t be a problem anyway, since she’s pregnant. She’s subject to testing for any illicit substances at any time. And, Dan, the point of all this is that she is confessing to some pretty serious crimes. We’re going to take the next two months to work out plea bargains with the feds and the state, and we’ll do the best we can for her. There’s a statute of limitations issue on some of the crimes, and evidentiary weaknesses on others, but quite a few of them are slam-dunk convictions. She’s absolutely going to do time. She’s asked me for an estimate, and I told her I really can’t give her one, but… I’d be
shocked
if she was sentenced to less than ten years. I think twenty to thirty is more likely, between the federal and state charges. Now, hopefully she wouldn’t serve her full sentence, but it’s still a lot of time.”

“Yeah. Okay.” Dan tried to imagine spending that kind of time behind bars. He couldn’t really wrap his head around it.

“Dan, I just want you to understand… right now, yes, Krista wants to turn herself in. She wants to stop running, and she wants to do what’s best for her child. I truly believe that. But as the time gets closer, she’s going to get spooked. She’s going to be very, very tempted to run, and she’s proven herself to be very good at that. We could go through a whole lot of trouble setting up a deal that she runs away from. And if she runs, it won’t just be time that you’ve lost, it’ll be a lot of money.”

“So what am I supposed to do?” Dan really wanted to know the answer to the question.

But, of course, Susan didn’t give it to him. “I don’t know, Dan. I guess you need to look at how much you can afford to lose. When I told Krista the terms of the deal, she seemed to think it was impossible. The two million dollars threw her, but so did the private security, and she’s not wrong. Those are two things that are beyond the reach of most Americans. My understanding is that they may not be out of
your
reach, but my understanding is far from complete, and even if you
can
reach them, it doesn’t mean it’s a good idea.” She paused. “I’m sorry I’m not more use, Dan.”

“I appreciate your honesty,” he said, and he meant it. He needed all the information he could get, and he needed it straight up. “When do you need to know by? I mean—I don’t have that kind of money. I need to talk to Evan.”

“The government lawyers have given us until tomorrow morning. But, Dan—as I said, Krista is pretty well assuming that the deal isn’t going to work. She’s staying strong for now, but it’s going to be a long night for her to worry about being pregnant in jail, giving birth in shackles… I think the sooner you decide, the better it would be. She’s not in any sort of custody right now. I’ve got her in a hotel room, but if she gets scared, she’s gone, and even if she comes back, she’ll have blown any chance of a deal.”

“Yeah, okay.” Dan felt like he’d been saying that a lot. He supposed there wasn’t much else for him
to
say. He was just absorbing information, trying to process it all somehow. Trying to figure out what the
fuck
to do about it all. “I’ll talk to Evan and get back to you as soon as I can. Thanks.” He ended the call and flopped down on the couch. He was suddenly exhausted, but his mind was racing, and he needed to calm down a little.

He wasn’t too surprised to hear the knock on the door a minute or so later, and he didn’t even bother to stand up. He just turned his head and waited. There were advantages to living in a small apartment, and one of them was that he could see pretty much the whole place from where he was sitting. He watched as the front door opened slowly and Evan’s face peeked in. “Chris called me,” he explained. “He said there’s a deal, but that you’ll need some help.”

And Evan had come right over to offer it. After living with the man’s generosity for two years, Dan really hadn’t expected anything else. But just because Evan was offering, it didn’t mean Dan should accept.
E
VAN flopped down on the couch next to Dan. Then he stood up and shifted over to the armchair. Proximity was good, but he wanted to be able to see Dan’s face for this conversation. “So, Chris told me about the deal,” he started. “And he told me that you were more or less going along with letting me pay for the security guys. Well, he said you were being a whiny bitch about it, but that we should ignore you.”

“That sounds like Chris,” Dan agreed tiredly. Evan wanted to wrap him up in blankets and put him to bed, but there was no time for that, not yet.

“He also said you needed four hundred thousand cash. And that if Krista booked out, you’d be on the hook for that plus one point six more.” He waited for Dan’s nod. “So, obviously you don’t have that kind of money, and obviously I do.” This time, he didn’t wait. “But I don’t want to lend it to you,” he said.

“What?” Dan frowned. “I mean… yeah, okay.” He stood up. He didn’t seem angry, just confused, and Evan wasn’t sure how to feel about that. How many times had he
encouraged
Dan to count on him, to take him for granted? And now Dan finally needed him, and it seemed like Evan was backing out, and Dan was just going to accept it? He didn’t think he deserved better? Didn’t think the
relationship
deserved better? It was frustrating.

And Evan didn’t want to see any more of it, so he decided to clarify. “It doesn’t make sense. If she sticks around, I’ll get the money back, and it’s not like I was going to charge you interest or anything. And if she doesn’t stick around, you’d… I don’t even know what you’d have to do to get that kind of cash. It’d be impossible. So I just want you to take the money. The four hundred thousand now, and the rest if she goes. I’ll cover it. It’s not a loan, it’s just… yours.”

And there was the expression on Dan’s face, the wild, almost hunted look that Evan hadn’t seen for a long time. It was the way Dan looked when he was feeling trapped in the relationship, intimidated by the closeness all three of them had worked so hard to build. It was a look Evan had hoped to never see again. “Evan, that’s too much—” Dan started, but Evan cut him off.

“Don’t say it, Dan. It’s bullshit. If we were a traditional couple—one man, one woman—we’d probably be married by now. Unless you were being a pissy bitch about the ceremony, like you probably would be, but I bet we’d have fought through that, and my money would be yours.” He stopped, and smiled. “Well, you’d probably have come up with some insane prenup, but I wouldn’t have signed it, so you’d have been out of luck. You’d be rich.” Evan stood up and took the two steps to stand in front of Dan. “I love you, Dan. You love me. We both love Jeff, and he loves us back. It’s not traditional, but that doesn’t mean it’s less. Right?” He made his face strong, challenging Dan to disagree. He’d thought this out on the way over, and he knew he’d found the way past Dan’s defenses. It was foolproof. Or at least he’d thought it was. Dan seemed to be trying pretty hard to find a loophole, though. Evan forced himself to wait quietly.

“It’s not less,” Dan finally said. “But….”

“But nothing.” Evan smiled in what he hoped was a firm but kindly manner. “It’s
our
money, okay? Yours and mine and Jeff’s. And Jeff and I totally support your decision to spend some of
our
money on a member of
our
family. Okay?” He buckled one of his knees, let it shoot forward and jostle Dan’s. “Okay?” he asked again.

“Evan—” Dan started to say, but then he stopped. He looked down at something… their knees? His feet? Evan wasn’t sure, but he didn’t really care, either, because when Dan looked back up, his face was calm. “Okay,” he said. “Yeah. Thank—”

“Nope!” Evan interrupted. “No thanks necessary. It’s no more than what you should expect.”

Dan paused as if letting himself absorb that. Then he shook his head and smiled. “I was going to say, ‘Thank you for getting me one of
our
beers, when you go to
our
fridge to get one for yourself.’”

Evan grinned. Dan could be stubborn, but he also had good common sense. And, Evan liked to think, he knew who to trust. “I see. I’ll get on that.” He leaned down and kissed Dan, and then leaned in a little further, letting their bodies connect. “Or maybe we could take a quick trip to
our
bedroom?”

Dan pulled away, but Evan could tell he wasn’t going to stay away for long. “Too far,” Dan said. He grinned as he raised an eyebrow and cast his eyes sideways. “Our wall is a lot closer.”