Cavanaugh Watch (8 page)

What the hell did she care what he read, so long as he read it away from her?

Not bloody likely, at least not any time soon, she thought moodily.

Unaccountably, her thoughts turned to the phone call she’d taken from Marco Wayne. She hadn’t thought about it in days. Now that she did, the discomfort returned. Innocent of any wrongdoing, she still didn’t feel right about keeping this to herself. The man had sounded sincere, but then, he’d probably perfected that, lying to the police and to prosecutors under oath.

Damn it, Marco Wayne wasn’t innocent and neither was his son, but she was. No real information had been exchanged in that short conversation. All Marco had said was that he wanted what every father wanted, a fair trial for his son. His saying that Tony was framed was a feeble attempt at her sympathy, nothing more.

And it hadn’t worked, she told herself. She didn’t believe him, not really.

Her mind played devil’s advocate, reminding her that even though the conversation had been innocent, things could still be said, scenarios misrepresented. Rumors planted.

She had to be sure she was on safe ground.

Ordinarily, she knew she should go to Woods and then Kleinmann in turn, but before she went through all that, she wanted advice from a friendlier source.

Backup, so to speak. Her mouth curved at the familiar police jargon that had popped into her head. There was no denying that she was a cop’s daughter.

It was time for the cop’s daughter to call her dad, she thought. Instead of using the landline, she took out her cell phone and pressed a single number.

“Roz? This is Janelle Cavanaugh. Is my father there?”

“For you? Always,” the woman on the other line assured her. Roz Smith had been her father’s assistant/secretary since he’d taken the position of chief of detectives eight years ago. “Just hang on a minute, let me go round him up.”

Leaning back in her chair, Janelle drew in a long breath, then let it out. She was aware that Sawyer had raised his eyes from his book and was watching her even before she looked in his direction.

No doubt about it, the man made her feel naked and exposed. Maybe her father could take care of this problem, too. If she had to have a bodyguard, she wanted a man who truly did fade into the wallpaper, not who made every nerve ending in her body rise to the surface in anticipation of God only knew what.

The next moment, her father’s rich baritone voice was filling her ear. “So how’s my favorite daughter?”

Janelle grinned. She was his only daughter, a fact that she rather relished. “Still gorgeous,” she bantered.

“That would be your mother’s doing,” Brian assured her.

“Really?” She pretended to be skeptical. There was no denying that she looked very much like her mother. She also looked a great deal like all her female cousins—save for Patience—blond, small-boned and petite. “I always thought my looks came from the Cavanaugh side.”

“Can’t argue that,” he told her with a chuckle. “Not to rush you, honey, but I’ve a meeting to go to in ten minutes. Seems our illustrious mayor has some new idea about the patrolmen’s retirement benefits that just doesn’t sound as if it’ll go over all that well with our boys in blue. What’s on your mind?”

She didn’t waste time. “I need to talk to you, Dad. About Marco Wayne.”

There was silence on the other end. It lasted so long, she thought she’d lost the connection.

“Dad, are you still there?”

“I’m still here.” The humor had left his voice. “What about him?”

She knew he was in a hurry, but she still wanted to give him a little background before she dropped this little tidbit on him. “I caught the case against his son, and—”

“You’re the assistant A.D.A. on the Anthony Wayne case?”

She heard the note of surprise in her father’s voice and put her own interpretation on it. “I know, I know, you’d think he’d want someone with more time on the team at his side. But maybe the man recognizes talent when he sees it,” she quipped. “Anyway, when can we get together to talk? I dropped by your place last Tuesday, but you weren’t there.”

“I know.” Every word out of his mouth was an effort. He’d thought, believed, hoped that the matter was dead. Just went to show, nothing was ever really over. “Aunt Rose gave me the message. I expected you to call me sooner.”

“Yeah, well, so did I. But everything’s just crazy around here, Dad. There just doesn’t seem to be an end to the work. Someday, they’ll find me buried under a landslide of case files.” Probably soon, she thought. “How does getting together tonight after work sound? Just you, me and my shadow.”

A hopeful note elbowed its way into his serious tone. “You have a man in your life?”

“Unfortunately, I do.” She stretched her lips into a wide, phony smile as she looked at Sawyer. “Detective Sawyer Boone. The D.A. assigned him to guard my body.” Again, there was no response on the other end of the line. Her father was overworked, she thought, suddenly feeling guilty about dumping on him like this. “Dad?”

“I’m here, Janelle.”
And I should have been here for you a lot sooner.
He hoped he wasn’t going to wind up paying for that. “How does six o’clock sound? At our favorite restaurant.”

“Perfect.” She felt better already. Her father always had that effect on her.

He’d noted her recent absences at Andrew’s table. “It’ll probably the first decent meal you’ll have in a month.”

“I’ve been eating pizza pretty steadily,” Janelle admitted.

“Knew it. Andrew’s been asking after you, saying you haven’t been coming around lately.”

“I’ve been awfully busy.”

“You should never be too busy for family, Janelle.”

He sounded so serious. She wondered if there was something going on that she didn’t know about. “Dad, is something wrong?”

“No. I’ll see you later, honey.”

But something was wrong, Brian thought as he hung up the receiver.

He was going to have to tell her.

He had the meeting with the mayor in less than a few minutes, but somehow, that didn’t seem nearly as important to him now as it had just moments ago.

The day he’d been dreading for the last twenty-eight years had finally arrived.

In his time, Brian Cavanaugh had faced down homicidal criminals pointing their weapon at him, gone into the line of fire so many times he’d lost count. He’d done it all feeling a great deal calmer and more confident than he did right now.

His men always said he had nerves of steel. Those same nerves deserted him now. When he needed them most.

He was finally going to have to tell Janelle the truth. And he was more than a little afraid of the outcome.

Chapter 8

T
he restaurant was crowded. And, as always, rather dimly lit. Until this moment, Janelle hadn’t really paid that much attention to the limited visibility at the Three Queens Restaurant. The atmosphere seemed perfect for a romantic encounter.

Janelle glanced at the man inches away from her elbow. The man who had crowded into her life and, as far as she knew, ran on batteries instead of sleep because she’d never caught him at the latter. She had no doubts that to Sawyer, this was probably a good place for a shooting, or, at the very least, a meeting between two parties who didn’t want to be seen together. Having been surrounded by them all of her life, she knew how a cop’s mind worked. Especially one who rarely, if ever, cracked a smile.

Her father had chosen this restaurant, she knew, because it had been her mother’s favorite and whenever she and her father came to eat here, they both felt close to Susan Cavanaugh.

Janelle looked toward what had become her father’s favorite booth. It was the one he reserved each and every time.

Brian Cavanaugh was already there. There was a drink before him on the table. She thought that rather odd because her father rarely drank anything stronger than a beer, except on special occasions. Raising her hand, she waved to him. He nodded in response.

“Why don’t you get a drink at the bar?” she suggested to Sawyer. “I’ll be right there.” For his benefit, and because she was feeling magnanimous, she indicated where her father was sitting.

Sawyer swiftly scanned the surrounding area within striking distance of the booth, taking measure of everyone within the vicinity. “Can’t. I’m on duty.”

About to make her way to her father’s booth, she stopped and looked at him. She did
not
want the man at the table with her. “Okay, have a peanut at the bar. There’s nothing against nuts on duty, is there?”

His mouth curved ever so slightly as he eyed her. She had no idea why she thought that looked sexy, or why there was this minute tremor in her stomach. Probably had to do with the lack of food, Janelle assured herself.

“Run into them all the time,” he told her.

Not wanting to keep her father waiting any longer than he already had, Janelle didn’t bother answering. Turning her back on Sawyer, she made her way over toward her father’s table. He had a drink waiting for her. A whiskey sour. And there was a shrimp cocktail beside it. All the things she liked. Her father had always had an eye for detail, she thought affectionately.

“Hi, Dad, thanks for coming.”

She kissed him before sitting down across from him in the booth. Her father’s smile was strained. An uneasy premonition snaked its way up her spine. She thought of saying something flippant to forestall whatever was coming, but she liked to think of herself as her father’s daughter. That meant meeting challenges head-on instead of shying away from them.

“What’s wrong?” She spread her napkin out on her lap, then curled her fingers around the chunky glass in front of her.

Brian Cavanaugh ran a hand through salt-and-pepper hair that had once been as black as the inside of midnight. The wedding ring he couldn’t seem to remove caught a flash of sparse light before retreating into the shadows.

“Janelle,” he began, then abruptly stopped as fear took away his power of coherent speech.

She was a student of his face, of every nuance that came or went across what she’d always regarded as a kindly surface. As a kid, she could gauge just how much trouble she and her brothers were in by the way her father’s mouth was set, the way his eyebrows drew together. His cheekbones became really prominent when he was especially angry. They weren’t prominent now, but whatever was on his mind had him really worried.

When he said nothing beyond her name, she felt her stomach tightening into a large knot. “Dad, you’re scaring me.”

He thought of taking another sip of his drink. But that was cowardly. Just as not facing this years ago had been cowardly. But he had wanted to protect her. Protect her and protect Susan. And now, matters had taken this out of his hands. He hated not being in control.

“Janelle,” he began again. “You have to recuse yourself from the case.”

The case. She almost felt giddy with relief. There wasn’t anything wrong, her father was just overreacting to the threats. He was just being a dad. She could deal with that. And he was just going to have to deal with her being in the D.A.’s office.

“You had me worried there for a second.” Taking one of the prawns that hung over the side of the frosted goblet, she popped it into her mouth without bothering to dip it into the sauce. It felt good to get something, however small, into her stomach. She couldn’t remember eating lunch. “Dad, I can’t just turn and run because someone fired shots outside the courthouse that might or might not have had anything to do with the Wayne case.” His expression remained unchanged. She wasn’t winning him over. “We’ve built a solid case. I’ve worked hard working up the background for this, I’ve been researching cases, we can—”

“You can’t,” Brian cut in.

He sounded so final, she thought. So abrupt. And he wasn’t giving her a chance to state her side. This wasn’t like him. She could always reason with her father. “What? Why?”

This was his fault. The facts only became harder to face with each passing year. “Because if the defense finds out,” he said bluntly, “the case could get thrown out of court.”

Damn it, how had
he
found out? “You’re talking about the phone call,” she assumed.

Her temper immediately flared. Sawyer was the only other person, besides Marco, who knew about the call that the crime lieutenant had made to her. Had Sawyer given her up to her father? Why? To make his job easier? To get rid of her as an assignment?

She turned and sought out her bodyguard, scanning the people lined up along the bar. Finding him was not a difficult matter. The man had a way of standing out in a crowd, rather than blending in. She imagined he probably found that annoying. As annoying as she found him right now.

Sawyer was staring straight at her. She suppressed a few choice words that popped into her head and turned back to look at her father. Because she’d been raised to be fair, she asked before mentally castrating Sawyer, “How did you find out?”

Brian shook his head. “What phone call?”

Okay, now she was lost. If he didn’t know about the phone call from Wayne, why was he behaving like this? Was he just being overprotective? She knew he worried, but until now, she would have said that he was good at keeping his concerns under control.

For his benefit, she went over the event. “Marco Wayne called my office. Called me,” she corrected. “I know I should have hung up right away,” she followed up quickly, before he could voice the same sentiments, “but I did talk to him.”

Janelle saw anger rise in her father’s eyes. She had never seen him look this angry. “What about?”

That seemed like an odd question, considering that she was part of the D.A.’s team trying Anthony Wayne’s case. But pointing it out would only fan the flames of a fire whose origin she didn’t quite grasp yet.

“About his son. He said that he wanted to make sure that Tony got a fair trial. He also said that Tony was innocent, that his son was being framed. You know, the usual.”

No, Brian thought, not the usual. Not when it involved Marco Wayne and his daughter. He looked at her darkly. “You shouldn’t have talked to him.”

She didn’t want a lecture, especially not here. This just
wasn’t
like her father, she thought again. What was going on? Was there something more going on here than she was aware of? Was this personal?

“I know, I know, but it was just that for a minute, Marco sounded very sincere and I guess I was caught off guard.”

A feeling of déjà vu passed over him. It was almost as if he were hearing Susan’s voice instead of Janelle’s. “Funny, your mother said almost exactly the same thing to me twenty-nine years ago.”

Janelle stared at him, stunned by this unannounced, unexpected piece of information. “Mom? Mom knew Marco Wayne?”

Brian regarded the amber liquid in his glass, seeing something else. Seeing his past. “We both did. The three of us grew up together. Same neighborhood. We weren’t exactly friends.” He raised his eyes to Janelle’s. “More like rivals. Marco always had a thing for your mother. And he had more money to shower on her. And he had that sexy, sophisticated thing going for him.” His lips twisted in an ironic smile. “I was surprised when she picked me over him.”

“I wouldn’t have been.” She reached across the table, covering his hand with her own. Talk about their mother always made him sad, she thought. “It’s a no-brainer. You’re a hell of a lot more man than he could ever be.” The worried expression remained on her father’s face. “I’ll be all right, Dad, I promise. I not only have Neanderthal Man as my protector, but half the Aurora police force. And that’s not counting you,” she said, smiling at him warmly. “We all know what a difference you make.”

He sat quietly for a moment, memorizing her smile. Absorbing it as he wondered if she would even forgive him for not having the courage to tell her years ago.

“Janelle,” he finally said, “I have to tell you something.”

She could feel nerves tap dance through her body. Her father wasn’t given to melodrama. She braced, telling herself to think positively. “Okay.”

Brian sighed. He would rather have faced an army of snipers than have to tell her this. Leaning forward, keeping his voice as low as he could and still be heard, he began.

“I should have told you this a long time ago, but the time never seemed right.” There was another reason he’d held his peace. “Besides, it was your mother’s secret to tell.”

She could almost taste the metallic bite of fear along her tongue. “Go on.”

He detoured for a moment. Perhaps the last moment he would ever have with her like this, he thought. “You know I love you, Janelle.”

“Yes.” Her eyes never left his face. “That’s not where this is leading, Dad.”

He tried again, aching for what was about to be lost. Trust. Innocence. A bond. “Your mother and I had a couple of rough patches.”

She was aware that while her parents had loved one another, theirs was not exactly a storybook marriage. Her mother had been high-strung and, in the later years, given to depression, although she’d tried to keep it from her children. “Yes, I know.”

“It wasn’t easy for her,” he continued, making excuses for the woman who no longer could defend herself. “She was a little anxious and I was working a really rough section of town then. She worried and we argued a lot about that. One thing led to another.” He shrugged, not wanting to talk about the separation, that chasm that existed in their marriage right after the last of his sons had been born.

He paused, taking Janelle’s hand in his. Mutely asking for her understanding. Her forgiveness for tearing down the image of her mother. For shaking her faith in him.

“I was hoping to never have to tell you,” he admitted. “I didn’t want you thinking any less of your mother.”

Janelle was desperately trying to pull in the pieces so that they made some kind of sense, offered her a reason for her father’s strange behavior. “So what are you going to tell me? That Mom had an affair with this Marco character?”

Even as she said it, she hated to think of her mother with anyone else other than her father. It shook the foundations of the happy family unit she had always wanted to believe existed. Her mother had had pockets of depression, pockets that had grown worse just before she’d died. Was this why? Because she’d felt guilty for having betrayed her husband and her vows?

“This is the twenty-first century, Dad,” she pointed out, trying to cover up the disappointment she felt about her mother. “They don’t attach the sins of the father to the sons, or sins of the mother to the daughter—”

As much as he wanted her to get sidetracked, he knew he had to see this through to the end. No more lies. No more hidden truths. “There’s more.”

The knot in her stomach grew larger, threatening to cut off her air supply. Janelle felt the roots of her hair tightening, tingling along her scalp.

“How much more?” And then, the reason behind her father’s discomfort suddenly came to her. “Is Tony their son? Is that why Marco called me? Because Tony’s my half brother?” Oh God, she thought, this was big. Very big. Her poor father—

As far as Brian knew, Marco didn’t know the truth. Only he and Susan did. And Andrew. In a fit of despair, not knowing whether he could forgive Susan for what she’d done, he’d turned to Andrew for support. He’d gotten advice, as well. Advice to put the past behind him, reap only the good out of whatever presented itself before him and never look back.

Except now, even though it was against his will, he had to. “Tony’s your half brother,” he confirmed. “But he’s not your mother’s son.”

Now he was talking in riddles. “I don’t understand.” But even as the last word left her lips, she did. She suddenly understood.

And desperately didn’t want to. Wanted more than anything in the world to be wrong.

She felt her eyes stinging as she fought against the truth. “You’re not telling me—” she began hoarsely, then tried again. “You’re not telling me that Marco Wayne is…is my…”

He didn’t want to hear her say it. Didn’t want the word
father
to leave her lips and be applied to anyone else. He’d earned the right to be the man she thought of when she said the name.

“You were mine from the moment you came into the world, Janelle,” he told her, his voice so filled with emotion, he had to block it in order to talk. “Mine even before then. I was the first one you looked at, the first one to hold you. You were always my daughter,” he insisted fiercely.

Everything went pitch-black as the noise in the restaurant swirled around her, echoing the rhythm of her throbbing brain. Janelle took a deep breath to keep from giving in to the darkness that beckoned to her, that threatened to swallow her up whole, offering comfort within its belly. Comfort along with oblivion.