Chapter 17: Who Let Him Out

Maeve's POV

Niall's door stood open at midnight, and his bed had not been slept in.

I knew before I looked in the hall.

His boots were gone from the landing, and his sling lay on the floor.

I stood in his room with the black notebook against my chest and a cold, flat certainty in my gut.

His father had done something.

I went down the stairs in my socks.

The kitchen was empty. The study light was out.

The cellar door stood at the back of the hall, with the big man planted in front of it on a kitchen chair.

He had a shotgun over his knees, and he was the man who had wrenched my arm out of its socket.

He smiled at me.

"Go back to bed, little girl."

"Where is he?"

"Where Fergus put him."

"The cage."

"He told Niall to think about his fifteen years."

My stomach turned over.

I did not shout.

I went back up the hall, through the kitchen, out the back door, and around the side of the house.

The oldest of the five sat on the back step, where he had been sitting all night.

His coffee had gone cold in the cup. He didn't look surprised to see me.

"I thought you'd come," he said.

"Niall said you'd only talk to me."

"I've kept something fifteen years, girl. I'd like to put it down."

He set the cup on the step.

"The night of the killing," he said. "I was on watch behind the warehouse."

"Go on."

"A man from another club died inside. Fergus was in the room, and so was Wolf, his vice-president."

"My father."

"A young man then, smiling all the time. I saw him come out the side door with a pistol in his hand, and I saw him wipe it down with his shirt."

I couldn't breathe.

"He put it in Fergus's truck. Under the seat. Then he shut the door softly and went back in."

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