The edges of my vision rocketed inward. I reeled, and Garrett caught me. Sat me back on the bed. Went for water.

I couldn’t talk for the longest. The image was in my heart and in my head, and it was there to stay.

Then it hit me. “Where does he find him? Uncle Bob?” I asked, my voice rising. “Where does he find the guy? Go there. He’s probably there.”

“We have people posted there. When he shows, we’ll know.”

“So, we can stop this.” I nodded, calming a little. “We can—wait.” I gaped at Reyes. “My uncle, Robert Davidson, amazing detective, wonderful human being, incorruptible cop, was slated for hell two years ago. Really? And how did that happen?”

“Dutch—”

“Don’t. Reyes, just tell me.”

“He killed someone,” he said from between clenched teeth.

“In cold blood? No. Two years ago? That shooting? They investigated that. He was cleared. He was shot twice. He fired in self-defense.”

“Not that one.”

Garrett had come back with a glass of water, but he looked away as Reyes shifted in discomfort.

“Are you saying my uncle murdered in cold blood?”

“Yes. Ice cold. It was rather impressive, really. At the time, I—”

“Why would he kill someone in cold blood?”

He lowered his head. He had no intention of telling me.

I stepped closer. “I can make you.”

He said nothing. Offered no argument. Or explanation.

I inched forward and gave him one more chance. “Why?”

“All you need to know is that he had good cause.”

“Reyes, I swear by all that’s holy—”

“For you,” he said, the words barely a whisper on the air.

“What?” I asked, my voice just as faint. Just as airy.

“He did it for you. They were—they found out what you can do.”

“Who?”

“A low-life drug gang from Colombia, trying to get in good with their boss. Your uncle got a tip from one of his CIs they were going to kidnap you, take you back to Colombia, and present you to him as, kind of, a gift.”

I couldn’t have been more shocked if he’d punched me in the stomach.

“So, he found their hideout. He had nothing to bring them in on. He didn’t want to risk arresting them, anyway, and them, in turn, telling another member in their organization about you. So, he broke in, took them out one by one, and then set fire to the place.”

“No way. Uncle Bob would never.”

“Your uncle knew the drug baron, Dutch. He knew what he was capable of. He’d witnessed it firsthand when he was in the military. He knew he had to kill them all to silence them. If word got back of your abilities, the Colombian drug baron would come after you himself.”

“Why?” I asked, questioning everything I’d ever known about my uncle. “What does it matter? What would a Colombian drug baron want with me?”

“He was a collector. Fascinated with the occult. He believed that if he took the souls of those who were gifted by eating their flesh, he would inherit their powers. He’d already killed several people in the villages surrounding his compound, searching for the gift of sight.”

“A drug baron wanted to eat me?”

“He would have, if he’d found out about you. He would’ve considered you quite the coup.”

“Why are people so batshit crazy?” I railed, pacing the room. “Uncle Bob did this for a good reason.”

“Hell seems to think otherwise. It doesn’t matter that he did it for you or that they were bad. It was lives taken on purpose when there were other options … it wasn’t self-defense. It was a conscious decision.”

“So, even if you do something bad for a good reason, you automatically get a reservation at the Fire and Brimstone Inn?”

“Actually,” Garrett said, “you might be able to help us out. Seems the only person who might know where Grant Guerin might be is your new BFF Parker. He was Parker’s CI back in the day, and some think he still is. But he’s not talking.”

“Parker was a cop?”

“He started out there.”

“Parker certainly likes to play by his own rules, doesn’t he?” My mind raced with all the implications. “Okay, first we have to stop this walking corpse from killing my uncle. Then I can worry about what to do with his sentence.”

Reyes smiled. “That was kind of already the plan.”

“Yes, but I wasn’t in on it then.” I started to leave to pay Parker a visit when I stopped and turned back to my husband. “Any more secrets? You know, while we’re on the subject.”

“None that I can think of.”

“Good to know.” I needed to catch Parker by surprise. And how better to surprise him than by showing up at his house at 3 A.M.?

I walked back to Reyes and pulled his mouth down to mine. He tasted like fire and salt and lime.

“Don’t wait up.”

Garrett called out as I stalked out and closed the door. “But I got taquitos!”

29

Would someone please poke holes in the lid of my jar?

—T-SHIRT

I pounded on Parker’s door for ten minutes before he opened it, as furious as I’d ever seen him. He hadn’t bothered closing his robe, and his light blue boxers didn’t hide much. You’d think he’d be blond there, too.

“Nick?” a woman said from the dark room beyond him.

“Go back to bed. I’ll be there the minute I have Mrs. Davidson arrested.”

“You wear socks to bed?” I asked.

“What the fuck, Davidson?”

“I need to know where your CI, Grant Guerin, is.”

“How the fuck should I know?”

“Fine. Educated guess. Where, in your humble opinion, might he be?”

“You have thirty seconds to get off my property.”

“Come on, Parker. I just got your college buddy off a murder charge and saved your ass from prosecution for obstruction of justice and whatever else Joplin could’ve thrown at you. He would have nailed your ass, and you know it.”

“I have no idea where Guerin is,” he said.

I scooched my mouth to one side in disappointment. “Just when I think you’re all noble and shit, you do something stupid. How do you think I’m so good at what I do?”