About Face (Wolf Within) (31 page)

“Goddamn you, Declan Byrne, and everyone who helped you,” I snarled beneath my breath as I mounted the stone steps to the castle entrance.

I hadn’t even reached the main staircase before Celine Ducharme pounced on me.

“Where have you been, Constance?” Her tone was accusatory, and resentment turned me sullen. What the fuck business was it of hers? I wasn’t late. I still had ten minutes before the tribunal was due to reconvene.

“None of your business,” I hissed, and her predatory face darkened.

“That is where you are wrong. It is my business. What did you do to Declan Byrne’s food? Or was it in his coffee? You know we’ll analyze everything. You, of all of us, here, have the herbal knowledge. Did you act alone or were you acting on someone’s orders? You cannot convince me you had nothing to do with it. Not this time,
madame
.”

What the hell? I stared at her, completely baffled. A thread of fear squirmed down my spinal column. Analyze his food? Herbal knowledge?

“Are you trying to say something happened to Declan?” I managed, past the mounting anxiety threatening to close my throat.

She snorted and gave a contemptuous toss of her head. The fine lines that bracketed her thin lips were more pronounced than the last time I’d seen her, nine months ago, at the chateau. Although she could easily pass for mid- to late forties, she was aging. She couldn’t age fast enough for me. Grandmothers didn’t serve on the Great Council. Was retirement next year for her? Or did she still have a decade left? It was never really clear with Pack. We held our own against the aging process for sometimes over a hundred years before we looked old.

“You could say that. He’s dead. There was poison in something he ate or drank for lunch. You didn’t stay to lunch with us. You barely managed to warm your seat before you were gone. Where did you go? Up to his room, perhaps? To the kitchen to put something in the food on his tray?”

“Are you insane?” I took a step back from her as if she might reach out and grab me with one of her skeletal claw hands. I reeled at the knowledge Declan Byrne was dead. “Why would I bother to murder him when I was the one who brought charges against him and wanted him to stand before a tribunal? It doesn’t make any sense, Councilor.”

“That was before he threatened to expose Ryan Kelly as an accomplice. I saw him come out of your room this morning. You are sleeping with him, and you want to protect him.” Celine’s smile was chilling.

“That’s bullshit,” I said. Movement on the stairs distracted me. Etain Feehery and Ryan Kelly stood frozen between one step and the next. Obviously they’d heard us.

“He didn’t sleep with you last night? What was he doing creeping out of your room at six in the morning then?” Celine Ducharme asked.

Etain Feehery’s expression was one of bewildered fear. Ryan Kelly flushed.

“We just slept in the same bed,” he said.

“It’s none of her business what we did or didn’t do, Ryan.” I was pissed and scared, not a good combination. “I didn’t poison Declan Byrne. I was at the lake, skipping stones.”

“A likely story,” said Ducharme. Her gaze moved to the stairs. “But if Constance didn’t poison him, perhaps your son did, Etain. He had the motive. Declan Byrne was about to reveal him to the tribunal.” Her beady eyes shone with malevolence. She was enjoying this, the bitch. God, I hated her so much. Why couldn’t someone poison
her
?

“How do you even know Ryan had a so-called motive?” I demanded as Etain Feehery’s face paled to the color of skim milk. She clutched at the railing either to keep from falling or from throwing herself at Councilor Ducharme. “You weren’t even in the room for that conversation.”

Ryan looked guilty. Why did he have to look like that? Had he poisoned Declan Byrne?

“Because Declan Byrne told me when I brought him his tray,” replied Councilor Ducharme.

“You brought him the tray? So you had the best opportunity of all,” I declared.

“Declan didn’t tell you definitely Ryan was involved, did he?” Etain Feehery ground out. I thought for sure she was going to faint. Ryan thought so, too, because he moved closer to her and put a steadying hand on her shoulder.

Celine Ducharme smirked. “Oh, he insinuated he might be willing to implicate someone after all. He suggested I ask your son what he was keeping back. He said Ryan Kelly had more knowledge than he was admitting to. I want to know what it is, Etain.”

“Of course you do,” snarled Etain Feehery. She turned to her son helplessly. “Ryan, do you have anything to say?”

Ryan gulped. My heart sank. He did know something. I didn’t want him to be involved in this. Had I slept with my arms around a traitor last night? Had I let one of Paddy’s murderers into bed with me? I felt sick.

“No.” Ryan abruptly turned and floundered up the staircase.

“What a liar, Etain,” observed Celine Ducharme with a complacent smile. She inspected her flawlessly manicured fingernails for a moment. When she looked up, her eyes were like flint. “I want to see everyone in the conference room in fifteen minutes. We will get to the bottom of this—do you understand? And if we don’t, I’m calling in more Councilors, and Mac Tire will be in a worse, more awkward situation than it already is. I’m sure you don’t want that, Etain. Your family’s fingerprints are all over this crime. How do I know you aren’t the mastermind behind it all?”

Councilor Feehery’s mouth tightened, but she said nothing at all.

Chapter 19

No one had an alibi. That became clear after ten minutes in the conference room with Celine Ducharme leading the charge.

Jason’s expression gave away nothing. Apart from offering a brief explanation of his whereabouts after lunch—it turned out no one had stayed long in the dining room, although I had been the first to leave—he fell silent, fingers steepled on the tabletop.

Ryan was miserably defiant. He kept his head down and refused to speak.

“Your silence is damning,” remarked Ducharme after thirty minutes of badgering. “I believe I will have to call in other members of the Great Council. And press formal charges against you,
Monsieur
Kelly.”

“Really?” challenged Etain Feehery. “Exactly what charges have you in mind, Councilor Ducharme?”

“
Alors,
the usual. Conspiracy against the Great Pack. Attempted murder of a Councilor. Declan Byrne’s words are enough to get things started.”

“It’s interesting that only you heard these supposed words,” said Jason in a quiet, musing tone.

“Ah, Constance herself admitted there was another conversation about Ryan Kelly. One I believe you were privy to yourself, Councilor Allerton. So there are two conversations. Enough to go on,” crowed Ducharme.

Jason looked startled, but only for a second. Short enough time to make me doubt what I’d seen. However, the reproachful glance he sent me was long enough to make me feel like complete and utter shit. Me and my fucking big mouth.

Glenn Murphy’s expression reminded me of one I’d seen on his son’s face when he tried to mask his anger.

“I can’t believe my Advisor has anything pertinent to do with this fiasco, Councilor Ducharme. Bring on your damn Councilors. They’ll all be in your pocket, of course, and my man won’t stand a chance, but if he says he’s not involved, he’s not, and it’ll be on your conscience what happens to him.”

“The problem is, Councilor Murphy, your man hasn’t said anything either way. He has yet to deny or confirm any of my suspicions. He’s tying my hands.” Celine Ducharme looked positively elated at this fact.

“Then tell the Councilor you’re not involved, son,” demanded Murphy’s father. The timbre of his voice jolted me with its familiarity to Murphy’s.

Ryan gave his Councilor an agonized look and then bowed his head.

“Mother of God.” Glenn Murphy shoved his chair back. “I can’t help you if you won’t deny the charges.”

“Yes, Ryan. Say something,” begged his mother.

Instead, Ryan fled the table even though he had not been excused. That was probably a smart, although doomed, move. He hadn’t yet been formally charged but his own actions made it just a matter of time.

I escaped the conference room before Celine Ducharme could corner me for yet another imagined transgression.

* * * *

In the hallway outside of my room, a suit of armor stood guard complete with a jaunty plume atop the metal visor. This castle was almost a frigging cliche. I examined the armor and thought it seemed incredibly small. I doubted even I could don it. Medieval men had been impossibly short, I decided, and turned to go to my room.

Ryan was sprawled across my bed on his stomach, face turned toward the window. He scrambled into a sitting position when he heard me enter.

“I needed a place to escape everyone.” He got to his feet.

“It’s a castle. You pick my room as the only hiding place?” I wasn’t sure I wanted to deal with him. I had to think about everything and sort my feelings. His presence complicated everything because when he looked at me with his soulful brown eyes, all my thoughts that he might be complicit in Paddy’s death seemed stupid and unfair. Goddamn, I sometimes hated gorgeous men.

Always attracted to the shiny surface, never the substance beneath
, I heard my father’s lecture in my head for perhaps the thousandth time in my life.

Ryan’s cheeks flushed, and he looked so young and terrified, my traitorous heart melted.

“How old are you?” I demanded as he headed for the door. He stopped and looked at me for a moment before he answered.

“Twenty-three.”

A fucking baby. Goddamn it.

“You want some whiskey?” A decanter and glasses decorated one of the small tabletops. I shuddered at the thought of sipping the stuff, but Ryan’s eyes lit up with hope, and he nodded.

We took our glasses to the cushioned window seat that overlooked the front of the castle. From this bird’s-eye view I could see the fountain and the precise spot where Paddy had fallen as he’d clutched at the stab wound in his stomach. My gut clenched.

We drank in silence because I didn’t want to interrogate the poor bastard, and I’d bet he sure as hell didn’t want to talk to me about any of it. We sat with our knees touching, and I saw tears glimmer in his eyes, although he didn’t let them fall.

“What’s going to happen to me?” he asked as he neared the bottom of his glass and his fears got the better of his tongue.

“What do you think? The Councilors who Ducharme will ask here will condemn you, and you’ll be put to death,” I said. I knew I was brutal, but he had to hear it. Maybe it would make him think.

He paled, and one of the tears in his eyes slipped down his cheek. Goddamn it.

“Tribunals suck, Ryan. I should know. I’ve been through two of them. You don’t want to go there if you don’t have to.”

“I’m the one who took the photographs you brought to An Puca,” he confessed before he leaped to his feet and escaped. He dropped his whiskey glass on the slate floor as he ran, and it shattered. Just like his life.

The pressure of my fingers around the crystal whiskey glass turned to pain. The pungent scent of the alcohol burned the insides of my nostrils.

Ryan took the photographs. He wouldn’t have done that if he were a part of the plot. He must fucking know who set everything in motion, and he was protecting one of them—his mother or his mentor, the man for whom he worked as Advisor. He’d had just enough doubts to take the photographs, but even now, with his life on the line, he maintained his silence rather than betray the person responsible for Paddy’s death.

Why was he protecting that person? Because he’d been ordered to, or because he was a scared and confused young man whose ideals and naivety combined to render him helpless to figure out what to do?

He’d turned to me as if I could untangle the fucking web and make it all right again. What a fucking laugh. What a colossal joke.

I heard him in my head telling me he wanted to become a Councilor, just like his mother.

What kind of selfish mother would let her own son take the fall for something she’d done?

“It doesn’t make sense,” I whispered. Avoiding the shattered pieces of glass and the spilled whiskey, I ran after Ryan. Maybe it wasn’t too late to catch him and beat some goddamn sense into him. I couldn’t help the idiot if he wouldn’t tell me which Councilor he was protecting, could I?

* * * *

I nearly knocked Glenn Murphy down the stairs. He was coming up as I tried to plunge down.

“Whoa, watch yourself, woman,” he cautioned and grabbed me so I wouldn’t fall. He sounded so much like Murphy, but he didn’t look like him.

Anger gripped me so hard I choked. Ryan Kelly couldn’t possibly be one of the Guardians who used murder to fight the debate. He was too young, too idealistic. He wouldn’t willingly help kill his Alpha or a Councilor. But I thought he might cover up for an idol that did. Or try his damnedest until his fear overcame him.

When he broke, he’d betray everything and everyone who meant anything to him. I couldn’t let him do that to himself. It was the kind of thing nobody could ever really recover from. It would haunt him all the rest of his life.

He would cover for his mother, no question. But would she let him?

He would also lie to protect his mentor, the man he served as Advisor. And that was a person who might let him—might even expect him to.

“Ryan Kelly has nothing to do with this shit, and you know it,” I snarled, and Glenn Murphy let go of my shoulders, his expression cautious.

“Then why won’t he say that?” he countered.

“Because he’s protecting you. He’s covering for you. You’re one of his idols. He thinks that’s what you’d want him to do.”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about.” Glenn Murphy’s eyes darkened. “Does my son know you’re fucking my Advisor?”

What an interesting defense. Cloud the issue and go after my vulnerability—my feelings about Murphy and his about me.

Was he really the outraged father, or was he the calculating member of the underground movement?

I said, “What difference does that make? We’re Pack. We can fuck whoever we want.”