Tell Me True (5 page)

WE MET JIM
at the bank the next morning and Ash used his clout to get a face-to-face with the president after the cashier proved less than helpful. Mr. Lemony, who, in an unfortunate coincidence had skin that resembled pale citrus and looked nearly jaundiced in his dark blue suit, and whose yellow hair and eyebrows did nothing to help that look, escorted the three of us into his office.

He sat behind his desk and Ash and I took the
chairs in front of him while Jim stood arms crossed by the door, looking particularly sinister with his bald head and thorn and rose tattoos trailing down his neck into his tight black shirt. When he saw me looking he flexed his muscles and winked, and I blushed and turned back to Mr. Lemony and Ash.

"What
can I do for you, Mr. Davenport? I trust your accounts with our bank are serving you well?" He fidgeted with his tie and his show of nerves reminded me again how much fear, respect and awe my soon-to-be husband commanded in others with his massive wealth and reputation.

"I'm actually not here about my accounts. They are fine."

Mr. Lemony let out a breath and his shoulders slumped imperceptibly. "Then what can I do for you and your…" He looked to me with a raised eyebrow.

"My fiancé
e, Miss Catelyn Travis."

"Of course. Congratulations to you both. And what can I do for you?"

"My brother was in here recently to withdraw a sizable amount of money. That kind of withdrawal would have taken time. I need to know how much he withdrew and if anyone else was with him at the time."

Mr. Lemony's hand hovered over his black desk phone, his fingers twitching, before pulling
his hand back into his lap. "This is highly irregular. I feel it's better that I talk to the detective on the case in this instance. I'm terribly sorry for your loss, but it's bank policy not to give out information about one account holder to another unless they're also on the account. Even with family."

Ash smiled, not the warm, spine
-melting smile he gave me, but the cold, chilly smile that made people scared to disobey him. "I understand completely. Actually, now that I have you here, I would like to discuss closing my accounts. I think my fiancée and I would get better service somewhere else. Can you get me the appropriate paperwork?"

Mr. Lemony's lemon-colored face turned white. "Oh, surely that isn't necessary, Mr. Davenport. We will do whatever we can to make your banking experience here the very best it can be. You're our most valued customer, of course."

Ash waited, silent, with a raised eyebrow, and Mr. Lemony sighed and picked up the receiver of his phone. "Miss Trindle, please join us in my office."

Jim stepped to the left to allow the petite banker into the office. With no other seats available other than a couch on the far wall, she stood by the desk, her eyes darting nervously to Jim and back to her boss. "Yes, Mr. Lemony?"

"Do you recall the day Jon Davenport came in to withdraw money from his accounts?"

"Yes." She turned to Ash and me. "You're his brother, aren't you? I'm so sorry about what happened. And at your wedding. That's just… terrible." Her brown eyes teared up and I wondered how well she knew Jon to be so affected by his death.

She noticed me looking at her and gave a sad smile. "Jon came in all the time to deposit money or talk investment strategies. He'd always bring in baked goods for the bankers and I was the one who managed his accounts. I didn't know him well, but what I knew of him was all good. He treated everyone here with a lot of respect."

I didn't know that about Jon
, and it made my heart hurt a little to hear someone else speak about the kind of person he is—
was
. It was hard to remember him in past tense, hard to imagine that everything that seems so alive and present in the now will some day live only in the past and in memory.

Mr. Lemony searched his calendar and pointed to a date. "I remember him coming in because we had a birthday party for one of our tellers. He joined us for cake after filling out the paperwork."

"Was he alone?" I asked.

"Yes," Miss Trindle said. "But he kept texting someone and it seemed important."

"Did he behave differently than normal?" Ash asked. "Did he seem distracted or… just anything unusual?"

Mr. Lemony shook his head. "He seemed relaxed and happy to me."

"Did he say why he needed so much money?" I asked.

"No," Mr. Lemony said. "And we make it a point to respect our customer's privacy. Though with all that's happened I wished I'd asked."

I noticed Miss Trindle drop her head to look at her shoes, and I turned to speak to her. "Is there something else? Please, if there's anything you can remember, no matter how small, we need to know. It could be important. It could help us figure out who killed him."

"Well, it's just that, during the cake, he seemed a bit… standoffish. Usually he's a bit of a flirt, especially with the younger tellers, and we… they all just really like him, you know? He's cute and charming and funny.
But, on that day, he was polite and nice, but not as social as normal, so I walked over to him and asked if anything was wrong." She twirled a silky strand of brown hair at her neck and tried not to make eye contact with anyone as she talked. "I knew he'd withdrawn a lot of money and that kind of money in cash, well, who would need it if something wasn't wrong, right? So I asked him and he got this look on his face, like, I don't know, kind of sad but also a little happy, and said that sometimes fate changes course and we have to be willing to ride it in a new direction, or something like that. But I didn't know what he meant, so I was going to ask him when he got another text and then set down his cake half-eaten and said he had to go. He looked in a hurry so I didn't stop him."

We left the bank with more questions than answers.

Jim handed Ash a file. "This isn't going to answer much either, but it's interesting. Found it when I searched his room."

In the file were two first class tickets to Croatia and a flyer for a boxing gym in town.

"Why on earth would he be going to Croatia?" Ash asked.

I took the tickets and studied them, as if they would reveal Jon's secrets.
"He wanted to live there," I said, remembering.

Jim lit a cigarette and inhaled. "They don't have extradition in Croatia. Could be your brother was involved in something he didn't want to get caught in. Maybe he had gambling debts? That could explain the money and the tickets."

Ash shook his head. "I've never known him to have any addictions, least of all gambling. Surely we would have seen that sooner. We'll go check out this boxing place." He held up the flyer. "Jim, you keep poking around, see what you can find."

***

Bear's Boxing Club looked a little too seedy for the likes of Jon. The sign had a bear claw on it made into a fist and sat crookedly above the door, a few letters missing so it looked like
B ar's Box  g C ub
. The windows hadn't been washed since probably the Reagan administration and some kids had thought it funny to write vulgar words they couldn't spell into the grime. A chime dinged above us as we walked in and an older man who looked hard as nails, with a nose showing signs of multiple breaks and a few scars giving him a patched-together look, walked toward us as he took off his boxing gloves. "Help you folks?"

Ash handed him the flyer. "My brother had this in his room
. We need to know if he trained here."

The man studied us with the dark eyes of a hunter, letting the silence linger longer than was comfortable. "Why don't you ask him yourself?"

I squeezed Ash's hand. "He's dead. Murdered. Did you know Jon Davenport?"

Some people show every emotion on their face. Not this man. But I thought I detected a flicker of something when we said Jon's name. "You knew him, didn't you?" I asked.

"I did. He trained here a few months. Came in daily, worked hard, showed promise for an amateur."

"
Really?" Ash asked. "He finally decided to learn?" He frowned, biting his lip. I wondered what connections he was making. I had my own suspicions regarding why Jon took up fighting.

The man shrugged. "A man should know how to fight." He eyed Ash up and down. "You look like a man who knows how to do more than just defend himself."
Ash didn't respond to the challenging undertones. They stared at each other for a few heartbeats until the man smiled, a mirthless smile that revealed yellowed, crooked teeth. "Your brother, he was a prep boy, but he could have gone far with more training. He didn't seem interested in fighting for sport, though. No, he wanted to learn how to do serious injury to someone. But he never told me why and I didn't ask. Ain't none of my business. But I got the sense he was messed up in something big. No one trains like he did out of the blue unless they got problems. And now he's dead, so I guess he did."

Ash sighed. "Yeah, I guess he did."

***

I promised Ash I'd be safe as he kissed me goodbye and left me at Harvard for a few hours while he checked in on his investment firm. His role required minimal involvement from him while still making him a fortune, but he'd neglected that recently and I encouraged him to go check on things. "I'll be fine," I'd told him. "Besides, I need to talk with Professor Cavin about next year."

My first year of law school hadn't gone as well as I'd hoped. With everything that had happened, my final grades had suffered, jeopardizing my internship and career opportunities when I graduated. I was determined to turn that around for the next year, even while getting married and now dealing with Jon's death.

Cavin looked more disheveled than normal with his white mop of hair in tangles and his clothes wrinkled, but he greeted me with a smile and already had a hot cup of coffee waiting for me.

"Thanks for meeting me on such short notice. I wasn't sure you'd be in your office over summer break." I sat and inhaled the rich aroma of my coffee before sipping.

"Oh
, you know us professors. Married to the job and all that." He sat behind his desk, which was piled with papers and old law books opened to various, presumably important, pages. He always seemed to be working on something weighty, but I never really knew what it was and I'm not sure he did, either. I think he just liked to research and study for the sake of it, not for any useful application. It had been a while since his name had appeared in a law journal, something I knew the university was pressuring him about.

"How are you holding up?" he asked.

"Okay. Better than Jon's family, I'm sure."

Cavin leaned in close, the cuff of his jacket dipping into his coffee cup. "Any leads on who killed him?"

"Not as of yet."

He frowned. "Nothing at all? Surely you have some theories?
" He sighed. "So much death so close to you. I worry for your safety. You don't think it could have something to do with the Midnight Murderer do you?"

I froze. No one else believed that a possible scenario, not even Ash. "I… I don't know. It seems unlikely, right? I mean, we already caught two people connected with that night. How many more could there possibly be?" The question sat heavy on me, like a pile of blankets over my face.

"You're right, of course. It's probably not related at all. Still, it's quite a coincidence, don't you think?"

Yes, yes
, I did think that. But it terrified me to consider it too deeply, because what would that really mean? If Lucky and Lauren weren't the only ones involved, then what the hell was going on?

"Have you had any luck looking for your mom's research?"

I hesitated. The more people who knew about the notes, the more those I loved would be in danger. I couldn't risk anyone else.

"Um, no. I haven't. I think it's a dead end. I don't think she had anything else
… otherwise, someone would have found it by now, right?"

Cavin leaned back in his chair, just now noticing his wet cuff. He scowled at it as if it had deeply offended him, then rubbed the fabric with a napkin. "Right. Too many people have been looking for it for too long. You're right."

His eyes drifted to somewhere else, a vacant expression on his face, until he snapped back to attention with renewed focus. He leaned in and squeezed my hand. "Just promise me you'll be careful, Catelyn. This thing with Jon—it's bad. I don't want you caught in the middle of it."

"What do you mean?" I asked, my stomach fluttering from the intensity of his gaze.

"Just… maybe the Davenports have done this to themselves."

WE CHOSE TO
have a small, family-only engagement party. It was that or open it up to everyone and we didn't want that. Ash didn't want one at all, especially if his family had to be there, but Mrs. Davenport insisted on throwing us a party at the Davenport estate.

Which of course thrilled my husband-to-be to no end.

Ash poured his third scotch and downed it like water. He hadn't wandered too far from the bar since we'd arrived, despite my best efforts. And he wasn't the only one overindulging. All the Davenports had been heavy-handed with the drinks since we arrived, and even the Beaumonts weren't holding back as much as they normally did. The undercurrent of tension was thick in the air, and I felt like whatever was holding together the civility of the party could unravel at any moment.

"Ash, come mingle," I said.

"This was a bad idea, Catelyn. Why did we come?"

"Because it's in our honor. Because I want to get to know my new family better."

The Beaumonts, huddled at their own table, looked as uncomfortable as Ash.

I sighed, exasperated, and looked around.
The back yard had been lit with thousands of white twinkling lights that made it look like a fairytale with lilting music playing softly in the background and a table filled with enough catered food to feed half the neighborhood.

So far, the decoration was the best part of the night.

Bridgette sat talking with her family while also trying to mingle with Jon.

The back
door had been left open and we suddenly heard Mr. Davenport scream at Mrs. Davenport. "You're just a money-grabbing whore!"

I
started and looked down at my feet, uncomfortable and unsure what to do.

Mrs. Davenport fought back,
shouting obscenities at her husband and calling him a “lifeless prick.”

I shifted uncomfortably and leaned towards Ash.
"Are your parents always like this?" I asked him.

His unfocused eyes looked down at me. "Yes. They hate each other. My dad
is
a lifeless prick, though. He shouldn't be talking to my mother that way."

Jon came over holding his own drink. "Our father is a dangerous man. He's vicious to those who go against him." He turned to Ash and sneered. "But you know all about that, don't you?"

"At least I'm not a Daddy's Boy."

"No, you're a screw
-up who got lucky a few times. No wonder our father regrets giving you his name. You don't deserve it."

Ash looked down at his drink,
paused, then threw it in his brother's face. Jon stepped back, dripping with Scotch, a scowl over his good looks. "See what I mean? You're a barbarian. No class. You're a disgrace and Cat deserves better than an untamed animal like you."

Ash stuck out his chest and got within an inch of Jon's face. "Keep talking and you'll find out just how untamed."

I reached for Ash's arm just as Bridgette pulled Jon away. Jon shrugged it off, wiping off his face and pouring himself a double, but Ash still seemed riled up. When he calmed enough to light a cigar, I pulled Bridgette into the house. "Come with me to the bathroom. My makeup needs… something," I said by way of an excuse to get us both out of there.

She closed the door behind us and snorted. "Your makeup needs 'something
?' Sometimes you make a terrible girl, you know that?"

"Well, if our men are any indication, I wouldn't make a very good man
, either. God, they can be so stupid." I took lipstick from my purse and applied another coat of red as Bridgette patted her nose with a light cover up.

"I love Ash more than anything, but sometimes I just want to smack him," I said, dropping my
makeup back in my purse.

Bridge
tte looked at me, head tilted. "I think Jon will propose soon."

"Wow. That's…" My smile faltered.
"…great."

She frowned
. "I know tonight has been… off. But you do like him, don't you?"'

"Of course."

"Then what's wrong?"

"Nothing."

"You don't…" She paused, frowning. "There's nothing going on between the two of you, is there?"

I
glared at her in anger. "I can't believe you would accuse me of that, Bridgette. That you would think I would, A: Cheat on Ash, and B: Cheat on Ash with
your
boyfriend. What kind of person do you think I am?"

Bridgette reached for my hand. "Ah, shit, I'm sorry Catelyn. That was a stupid question. Of course you would never do that to me. Or Ash. It's Jon I worry about."

I let my anger diffuse, knowing she didn't really mean it. Hoping she didn't really mean it. "Has he—"

"He's been faithful. As far as I know. But he's a Davenport. Women see him as a prize more than a man. Maybe on
e day their games will work and he'll forget about me, even just for one night, and it'll be enough to crush me."

"Don't worry. You've already won him over. Everyone else is too late." I hugged her and smiled.

We walked arm in arm out of the bathroom and she leaned in and whispered, "Now I'm just playing for keeps."

Something crashed outside and we both ran out in time to see Ash push Jon down to the grass. Jon got back up and held up his fists as if ready to fight.

Ash just stood there, body deceptively calm and still. I knew better. "Come on," Ash said. "Do it."

Jon's face was red and he and Ash both looked a bit wobbly from too much liquor. Jon backed away but Ash stepped forward. "Come on, Jon. You want what's mine, come take it."

"Ash, let's go inside," mumbled Jon.

"So you can hide behind
Dad again? Scrawny Jonny hiding behind his fucking daddy, like always."

Jon's face contorted into something ugly and angry and he swung at Ash, but I could tell he didn't have much training and Ash easily stepped out of his way, then spun around and put Jon in a neck hold, pushing him to the ground. He choked Jon as Jon fought to escape.

Bridgette and I rushed to them. "Stop!" I pulled on Ash's arm. "Stop! Let him go, it's not worth it!"

"Say she's mine," Ash screamed at his brother.

Jon, stubbornly refusing to reply, kept fighting.

"Say she's mine
!"

Jon still struggled to free himself.

Ash let go with one hand, made a fist and was about to bring it down on Jon's face. "Say—"

"She's yours," coughed Jon. "She's yours
!"

Ash looked up and finally noticed us standing there
, staring. He backed away, kicking Jon in the leg with little force. "Don't forget it." He stormed into the house and toward the front door. I chased after him, the alcohol finally catching up to me as I ran in my heels. "Ash. Ash! What happened?"

Ash turned, the anger rolling off him like a storm of waves. "He said you're marrying the wrong Davenport."

"Ash—"

"Are you?"

"No!"

Ash nodded. "And that's what I told him. In my own way."