No longer could I keep my family in the dark.
I called a meeting less than thirty minutes later in my office without Darla.
My wife didn’t need to be burdened with this.
My family listened patiently as I relayed to them the chain of events that occurred over the past four months.
Armel Lancaster murdered for touching Éva by yours truly. Miles Moretti anonymously tipping the MPD, then winding up dead with a joker card in his pocket. Taunting text messages arriving with pictures of my wife after our wedding. Gustave Melrose gunned down in his office with a joker card on his thigh after I contacted him for help. Geoffrey Smith caught taking pictures of Darla and killed once revealing the alias of his employer—An individual named Pierrot who communicated using joker cards and was responsible for said text messages.
And now St. Victoria set on fire with a final message delivered.
Ben and Yves knew bits and pieces of the story, but it was the first time my mother and sister were hearing it from the beginning.
Évangéline stared at me with a fearful expression that tore at my conscience. She was young and innocent, but privy to our business. Guns and knives were stashed in every corner of the estate. She knew what happened behind closed doors, even if she didn’t know the entire length of our depravity.
I wished I could keep her protected for a while longer.
“Zeno, you should have told us everything,” Céline chastised. She rarely got mad, but when her children’s safety was concerned, this little woman turned into a vicious mother hen. “How can you be quiet about this for months? We are family. We always communicate.”
“He didn’t want to worry you,” Ben defended. “Zed did what was right for the family.”
I crossed my arms over my chest and stared at my feet. “That’s why I upped everyone’s security. I didn’t want to take any chances and I didn’t want to tell anyone what was going on until I had a concrete idea myself. This grudge was personal and it was with me. None of you.”
I could sense Yves wanting to disagree, but we were now undermyregime. I ruled as I saw fit. Keeping my family in the dark while I solved this was the best course of action in my opinion.
“What do you propose we do now?” Yves hedged disdainfully.
“You must have an idea who’s behind this,” Céline chimed. “Right?”
I downed my whiskey and turned around to fill two more fingers, taking a page out of Ben’s book, who was sober and clean as a whistle today. My younger brother stared at me with a knowing gleam. “When that photographer said Pierrot, you went all berserk. It’s almost like you…figured it out.”
Ben knew me too well.
I smirked.
“I should have seen it coming.” Ben’s expression grew somber. “There’s only one person you called Pierrot.”
“What is he talking about, Zeno?” Yves asked impatiently.
How did I rip the bandage and explain to my family that it was someone we trusted?
“I suspected it in the very beginning, yet I didn’t possess enough proof to fortify my lead,” I started, gazing at the burning fireplace. My idiosyncrasy was killing my opponents before they got too close to me. The fact that I missed this one—the fact that I let Pierrot frolic alive for so long—was perhaps one of my biggest mistakes and failures. “Until St. Victoria burned down and I received the last joker card that confirmed Pierrot’s identity.”
The flames sputtered in the background.
“Antoine Toussaint is Pierrot.”
My family fell quiet.
Too stunned to formulate a sentence.
I plucked the last joker card and message from my desk and handed it over to Benjamin. His eyes bulged and he stared at me in question, not understanding why Violette’s name was there. Yves snatched it from his hand and cursed before Céline stole it and gasped.
“I was in a four-month long arrangement with Violette until the night before she died.”
Ben stumbled back.
Éva slapped a hand over her mouth.