He laughs. “You’ve read the files, Agent. You know the things he’s done. Now you’re telling me he’s a good man? Have you forgotten which side you’re on?”
I feel my anger rising. “And who the fuck are you to judge?”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Tell me about his sister. Tell me about Artemis.”
There’s just a moment’s hesitation, then he says, “That has nothing to do with any of this. You’re there, Agent Divine, you can find the evidence. And if you do, I’ll forget we ever had this conversation, and you’ll—”
“No.” I stand up, taking a step down the stairs. I can see the bowl with the keys. “I want to know. Tell me what you did.”
“I don’t have to answer to you, Agent—”
“I know where the evidence will be. I can get it. But I want the truth. Right now. You want to get Volos? You’ll tell me what happened.”
Silence stretches.
And stretches.
After about a minute, I take the phone away from my ear to check it’s still connected. I hear a creak, and my heart jumps into my throat. Staying still, silent, listening to the clock tick tick tick as it draws closer to chiming the hour. But there’s nothing else and I put down the noise to the house settling.
“Fine,” Jackson says, and I put the phone back to my ear. “Fine. Whatever. But you have to understand, this was forty years ago. A lot’s happened since then. We did things differently in those days. I was a different person.”
“Save it,” I tell him. “Just tell me what happened.”
“We needed to get something. It was Volos senior back then, Apollo’s father. A real nasty piece of work. Worse than his son in some ways, I’ll admit that, but it’s like comparing two Great Whites that are both looking to chew your leg off. The Bureau had nothing and they were floundering, but he had kids, OK? Apollo and Artemis. Twins. We knew Apollo was already deep into the family business, even at sixteen years old. Chances of scaring him were slim to none. So we—”
“Used that girl?”
“Sure, yeah, we used her. So fucking what? You’ve gotta see the bigger picture here. Bringing down the Volos family would have made a lot of people happy, a lot of higher ups were looking for just that. So we brought in the girl. Made up some shit about prostitution. These old crime families, that sort of thing is the worst possible sin. Some sort of honor thing. Anyway, Artemis also had a girlfriend. She was a fucking clam licker, can you imagine what her family thought of that when they found out?”
My spine straightens at the mention of it, at the use of the slur. They used her sexuality to rile the family, and for what? “You bastard.”
“I didn’t say it bothered me, but you can bet your bottom dollar it upset Volos.”
“You made sure it came out in interview.” I’m putting it all together, imagining how frightened that girl was, how she would have known it would get back to her father. “You fucking piece of shit. What did that achieve, huh? You know she died, right?”
“Good riddance. Don’t kid yourself that this girl would have been anything except another scumbag. But I didn’t kill her, Agent Divine. Her family did that. They kicked her out, made her live on the streets. She wound up dead six months after the interview, I can hardly be blamed for that.”
I’m seething. So that’s what happened? He made sure the truth came out and it led to that poor girl’s death. And what about Apollo? What about how much it must have hurt him to lose his twin sister like that?
“I’m hanging up now. Don’t call me again because I quit,” I tell him. I want to go to Apollo. I want to hold him, I want to tell him I know and let him share that pain.
But before I can end the call, Jackson shouts into the phone.
“Yeah? Well, you’d better hear some truths of your own before you make that decision, sweetheart.” He laughs. “Oh, you’re going to find out what sort of a monster you’re throwing your lot in with.”
“I don’t care. I know what he’s done, I—”
“Don’t think you know this. Number one. Yesterday, a man went missing from a fucking hospital ward. Three hours later, his corpse washes up on the shore of the river, and he’s been through some kind of hell. Broken fingers. Bones smashed with a heavy instrument, probably a baseball bat. Teeth missing, pulled out one by one while the guy was still alive. Balls cut off with something blunt.”
I shake my head, clearing it of the image. “So what? Bad things happen every day—”
“This guy, he had only one ear. Ring any bells?”
I draw a quick breath. Pete. No, it doesn’t make any sense. Apollo let him go. He wouldn’t…
Or would he?