Cavanaugh Vanguard. Marie Ferrarella
Brianna told him with a touch of impatience in her voice. Was he deliberately making things difficult? “Work with me here, Muldare.”
“Doing my best,” Jackson replied in a voice that couldn’t have sounded more disinterested if he’d intentionally tried.
She gave him a penetrating look that would have made any other man squirm. “No, you’re not,” Brianna countered.
Without a word in his own defense, Jackson spared her a quick glance before looking back at the road.
The path to the mansion was growing progressively narrower. Jackson half expected to see mountain goats dotting the area any second now. He hadn’t thought that any part of Aurora was still this pastoral looking.
“Is this where I’m supposed to argue with you?” he asked. “Because if it is, you’re going to have to let me in on the game plan, O’Bannon. I’m not much on picking up subtle cues.”
That was for sure, Brianna thought. Out loud she said, “The plan is for you to get your head back in the game and pay attention.”
A dark expression came over his face. “I thought that was what I was doing.”
She shifted in her seat. The hell it was. She only had half his attention, if that much. As far as Brianna could see, there was only one explanation for something like that.
“You don’t want to be here, do you?” she asked point-blank.
“Going to talk to some rich guy who thinks because he has enough money to buy a city, that means he’s above the rules?” Jackson guessed. “No, not particularly.”
“Okay,” Brianna allowed. “Then what would you rather be doing?”
That was easy enough to answer. “Identifying the victims. Finding out how they became victims and then tracking down the person who made them victims.”
Jackson braced himself for an argument. He knew that his mode of operation and his view on things were never the kind to win him popularity contests. But he wasn’t in this for popularity. He was here to act on behalf of the victims. To take their side and, whenever possible, to avenge their deaths.
He was surprised when O’Bannon didn’t attempt to take him apart.
“All very good goals,” Brianna told him, and she genuinely seemed to mean it. “But in order to reach any of those goals, we have to start at the beginning, and the beginning, in this case, is to notify the man who was the last owner of the property of exactly what was found on his property. Who knows? He might say something that will point us in the right direction to find the killer or killers.”
Although he appreciated that she didn’t attempt to belittle his viewpoint, he couldn’t bring himself to agree with what she’d just said.
He laughed harshly. “You really believe that?”
Brianna regrouped. She did her best not to take offense. That would be petty, and she’d been taught to rise above pettiness. Especially when the stakes were high, as they were here.
“I believe in a lot of things you probably don’t,” she answered.
“Well, it probably doesn’t matter what you believe, because I don’t think we’re ever going to get to this guy’s house,” Jackson retorted. The road continued to wind and weave before him like a serpentine river, irritating him no end.
“Oh ye of little faith,” Brianna scoffed, irritating him even more. “Look,” she said, pointing in the distance. “There. Straight ahead,” she told Jackson, then amended, “Well, maybe not so straight, but it’s right there, up ahead of us.”
One more twist of the road and then he saw it—a mansion that looked as if it had its own zip code.
“I’ve seen cities that were smaller,” Jackson commented under his breath.
Brianna heard him nonetheless. “If I lived here, I’d need a ton of bread crumbs,” she said. “Better yet, my own tram.”
He thought of the tiny room where his father spent his days and nights. Part of the time, Ethan Muldare was oblivious to not only how small his surroundings were, but where they were as well.
“Who needs this much room?” Jackson muttered as he pulled up into the circular driveway.
It was a rhetorical question, but Brianna answered him anyway. “Apparently, Winston Aurora and his family.” She had just got out on her side when she saw a young man dressed in what could have passed as valet livery hurrying up to them.
“May I help you?” the man asked in a crisp voice that was far from welcoming.
“We’re here to see Mr. Aurora,” Brianna said, answering for both of them. “Winston Aurora.”
The man’s eyes washed over them disdainfully. “Do you have an appointment?” His tone indicated that he was certain they didn’t.
Jackson took out his badge and ID, holding both aloft. Less than half a beat behind him, Brianna displayed hers.
“We do now,” Jackson informed the man he took to be the mansion’s head of security.
The man looked at each badge and ID individually. Then, appearing annoyed, he nodded. “Wait right here,” he told them curtly.
Turning away, he took out a walkie-talkie and spoke into it in a hushed voice. The unit gave off a loud, piercing squawk, and then a deep voice ordered, “Send them in, Rollins.”
Leaning in toward Jackson, Brianna said in a hushed voice, “Looks like we get to see the wizard after all, Toto.”
Jackson frowned. “Toto was a dog.”
Brianna merely smiled. “He followed Dorothy wherever she went,” she replied, as if, in her opinion, that was enough of a reason for the nickname.
The man who had detained them was back. “Mr. Aurora will see you.”
“Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus,” Brianna murmured under her breath.
Eyes like highly polished small black marbles narrowed as the head of the estate security looked at her. “Excuse me?”
She was aware that Muldare had taken a single step in front of her, putting himself between her and the powerful-looking head of security.
“Nothing. Please lead the way to Mr. Aurora,” Brianna requested, gesturing ahead of the man.
Rollins muttered something unintelligible under his breath as he turned away from them and began to walk toward the mansion.
“That was very noble of you,” Brianna whispered to Jackson, looking up at him, a smile flickering over her lips. “Unnecessary, but noble.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Jackson responded in an unemotional voice. The expression on his face was completely unreadable.
The hell he didn’t. Under that dour demeanor, the man was a Boy Scout, Brianna thought. She vaguely remembered that from last time.
“I can take care of myself,” Brianna reminded him.
“Never questioned it for a moment,” Jackson replied in the same nondescript tone.
How could a man be so annoying and yet so intriguing at the same time, Brianna asked herself. But there was no question in her mind that Jackson was both.
You don’t have time for this. You’ve got bigger things on your agenda right now, remember? Brianna reminded herself as she and Jackson walked behind the estate’s head of security and into Winston Aurora’s residence.
After a lengthy walk through the first floor, Rollins led them into a room that was