40. Emphasis On The Criminal Mind

Riggs

He was standing in the observation room with Cade, Jess and Jace watching Sharon Swindell in an interview room clam up after what the men had reported to him when he'd shown, and what he'd seen himself for the last half hour.

Not saying much for the two hours they had her in there, outside pointing fingers at anyone but herself.

She'd just lawyered up on Harry and Rus, when suddenly, everyone in the interview room turned their heads at a knock on the door.

Harry called out at the knock, Wade swung his torso in and said, "You'll want to go speak to who's waiting in Conference Room A, sir."

"Give her her phone call, then book her for criminal trespass, criminal menacing, stalking, attempted burglary and accessory to murder. We'll start with that, until I can prove whether or not she's the one who pulled the trigger, twice, then forced arsenic down a man's throat," Harry said to Wade as he and Rus got out of their seats and left the room.

Riggs smiled massively at the expression they'd left on Sharon Swindell's face, because they'd been pressing her hard about what she was doing on Riggs's land, what she was looking for, if she was involved in a fifteen-year conspiracy to scare people away from his lake, and if that was true, why.

But they hadn't mentioned murder.

Wade went in the room, and Riggs, Cade, Jace and Jess turned to each other.

"Harry sure knows how to have the last word," Jace muttered.

That was when they all smiled at each other.

The door to the observation room opened and Harry was there.

"Cade, Doc, with me," he said.

Then he disappeared.

They all looked at each other again, before Cade and Riggs walked out.

Harry was following Polly, his assistant and overall mom to the department (and half the town) down the hall, and they followed him.

They hit the main bullpen and headed through it to one of two conference rooms at the back, both of them having one wall of windows, the one that faced the bullpen.

And in one of them stood a tall, straight, handsome man with sandy-brown hair and the unmistakable look of a Whitaker.

A man Riggs had seen in town years before, when he was still a boy.

Rus was already in with him.

Harry didn't look back, but Cade and Riggs exchanged glances before they hit the room.

Rus closed the door behind them and dropped the blinds.

"Dr. Truman Whitaker?" Harry asked.

The man jerked up his chin and cast his intelligent hazel eyes through the rest of them.

"I'm Sheriff Harry Moran. You've met Lieutenant Zachariah Lazarus, my chief deputy. This is Cade Bohannan, former FBI. And Andrew Riggs, who lives in your old house and is one of the victims in this scenario. You can ask for him to leave, but considering all that's happened to him and his family, and that he had to get out of his bed at three in the morning to chase your brother and your uncle's old assistant through his woods tonight, it's unorthodox, but I believe he's earned the right to stay."

Truman Whitaker gave Riggs a once-over before he looked him dead in the eye and surprisingly said, "I agree."

"Let's have a seat, then. Coffee. Water?" Harry offered.

"I had coffee at the hospital," Truman told him, pulling out a chair and folding into it.

"How's Jefferson?" Harry asked, doing the same, as did everyone else, with Rus on Truman's side, the other three men across from them.

"He'll live," Truman answered, like he didn't care either way.

And there might be something behind that indifference coming from the good doctor, seeing as Jefferson was the youngest Whitaker child, and he'd been arrested, then taken to the hospital after Gia did a number on his leg.

"I'd like to video this conversation if you don't mind," Harry put in.

Without hesitation, another surprise, Truman jerked up his chin.

Harry reached out and hit a button in a console in the middle of the conference table and a red light came on. Riggs looked to the corner to see the camera there had a red light illuminated.

"Record to reflect, Dr. Whitaker agreed to be videoed for this interview," Harry announced to the room, and to Truman, "Right, Dr. Whitaker, please tell us why you're here."

"You can all me Tru. I don't even let the nurses call me Dr. Whitaker, not even in front of patients. Dad taught me no man or woman is above another, to the point he felt it was at the root of society's ills. Even over money, though it's usually having money that makes people think they're better than others. I understand my patients need to feel I have the respect of the staff, but they also need to feel comfortable sharing candidly with me. In that scenario, the latter is preferrable."

Cade shifted in his chair, his interest even more piqued, and yeah.

Tru hadn't said much, but what he said was seriously telling.

"All right, Tru," Harry replied. "And you're here because…?"

"I'm here because Kennedy is a mess. She's hysterical. She had to be sedated. She was in no place to make a considered decision about what I'm about to do, but I think her screeching at me, ‘Enough with the secrets, Tru!' fifty times, I get the gist. However, I agree with her. Because Dad deserves it. So does Mom. But mostly…Lincoln."

It was Riggs shifting at that, Harry, Rus nor Cade gave away that Cade had called it about their family situation.

"Dad" was Roosevelt to Truman Whitaker, the eldest Whitaker child. And Lincoln was "Lincoln."

"Do you know what happened that night outside your father's cabin?" Harry asked.

"I know what Lincoln told me. I think part of it he figured out. Part of it, Jeff told him. And the last of it, he knew, because he was there," Tru replied.

"And what did your uncle tell you?" Harry asked.

"Do you know that from what I said? That Lincoln was my uncle. Or do you know it because Sharon told you?" Tru asked back.

"It was our working theory that your parents had an open marriage of sorts, from Cade Bohannan, who was an FBI profiler," Harry told him.

Tru looked to Cade. "That's always fascinated me. I was going to get into psychiatry with an emphasis on the criminal mind. After what happened, I changed course and went into emergency medicine."

There was something off about this guy, Riggs just couldn't put his finger on it. He didn't know if the man was emotionless, or keeping a lock on it so he wouldn't fly apart or give anything away.

Tru returned to Harry. "Your working theory?"

"With the persistent issues that have been happening at the lake, we've reopened the case on your mother's and father's murders. We'd just begun reinvestigating, but I'll share, we had some concerns with the veracity of your uncle's confession," Harry informed him.

"Seems you're a lot sharper tack than the imbecile who used to have your job," Tru remarked.

Harry just dipped his head at the understatement.

"You probably want to know from the start," Tru announced.

"If it'll fill in the whole picture," Harry replied. "Yes. Please."

And that was when Tru put the puzzle pieces in place for all of them.

"As you now know, my dad was Roosevelt. He was also my sister's, Kennedy."

So Cade got one thing wrong.

No one was perfect.

Tru kept going.

"Jeff was Lincoln's. They were…" He shook his head. "There really isn't anything in normal society to explain what my parents were. Dad loved Mom, and they were committed to each other. Lincoln loved Mom, and they were legally married, but also committed to each other. Obviously, I've thought about it over the years, especially recently, since I've asked a woman to be my wife, and did it knowing I'd lose my mind if another man touched her, or she touched another man."

Regardless he had little affect, at hearing that, Riggs was leaning toward liking this guy.

"Maybe it was because they were twins," Tru kept on. "But they were two very different men. I just know, there was never any issue with both of them being with Mom." He shrugged. "That isn't to say there weren't arguments, disagreements. They each had their own partnership with Mom. I'm engaged. I've had other relationships. That happens with a partner. It happens between siblings. But it was never anything big. As much as no one will get it, and we were all very aware no one would get it, primarily Mom's parents taught us that, thus we kept it a secret, but it worked. We were a happy family."

"So your maternal grandparents knew of this situation?" Harry queried.

Tru shook his head. "No. But they guessed. They called Dad and Lincoln unnatural. Said they'd made Mom the same. Sinful. Filthy. I'm sure there are pious people who are quiet about their faith who are good people. The ones who are the loudest, though, usually are not."

Riggs couldn't disagree.

"They had an arrangement," Tru shared. "Lincoln had Mom in Seattle. She was with Dad when we were here. Lincoln had to come with her most of the time so it wouldn't seem weird, so no one would notice. But he gave them their privacy when they were here. Even when us kids were. He had that in Seattle. Dad had it at the lake."

And there was the explanation of why he'd built his house as he did, not to mention why Lincoln and Sarah spent six months a year in Seattle.

"The reason why your brother and sister contend she liked to spend more time with Roosevelt," Harry remarked.

Tru nodded. "They were doing what Lincoln told them to do, though. So was I. Giving him motive."

And there it was.

Lincoln didn't pull the trigger.

Rus glanced at Riggs.

Riggs cocked his head to the side.

"So Lincoln was okay that your mom was with your dad when he was at your house on that lake?" Harry asked.

"Yes," Tru answered. "It's how it was. It's how they worked it. It's how they shared. Mom was all about making sure neither of them, nor any of us kids, felt like she had favorites. She knocked herself out to do that. She was the one who asked Lincoln to figure out how to make our dining room have a circular table in the big house, because we always had dinner together when we were at the lake, and she didn't want Dad or Lincoln to have to give up the head of the table."

That explained his dining room.

And maybe, if Lincoln thought like Riggs did, when he sometimes used movement in design to communicate emotion, that explained the circling back on itself of the winding staircases.

Sarah wound her way to and from each of them in a continuous cycle, always circling back to one after returning from the other.

Tru carried on sharing.

"She even wanted to have another baby, because Dad had two, and Linc only had one. She got pregnant after Jeff, twice. Miscarried both, the second baby deep into her second trimester. Losing him so late, it destroyed her. Her going through that, it wrecked Dad and Linc. She was so into making sure it was all equal between all of us, she wouldn't hear of not trying again. So Dad and Linc both got vasectomies."

A ghost of a fond, sad smile hit his lips, the first indication of any emotion from the guy.

"When she found out they did, it wasn't an argument or a disagreement. That caused a fight. But it was two against one. She was outnumbered," he said quietly.

Okay, it seemed both men really did love the same woman, and they were all right with that.

And the kids, at least this one, were okay with it too.

When no one spoke, Tru continued.

"Like I said, it all worked. Really well. I know a bunch of crap came up in all the infighting. But Lincoln held up his side of the family, even after he quit writing with Dad. He managed the money, the accounts, the investments, paid the bills, the taxes. He went on the book tours, did all the interviews, because Dad hated that. When they negotiated Dad's third contract, he fired his agent, and Linc negotiated everything after that. Yes, Lincoln wanted to sell more movie rights and Dad didn't, but money is money. They owned a lake, for God's sake, managed three houses, and had three kids to put through school and pay for weddings, not to mention, they had three retirements to cover. Mom liked to travel. She liked to shop too. Linc and Dad both would have spent all their time at the lake if Mom didn't like having her time in the city to hang with her girlfriends and go to Nordstrom."

Tru put his hand to the table, seemed to be about to rub the surface with his forefinger, then he put his hand back in his lap.

And when he kept talking, they'd find that movement was because he felt guilt that they might have construed he'd just talked shit about his mother.

"That isn't to say Mom was greedy or flighty or all about money," he stated.

"We weren't thinking that," Harry assured.

Tru nodded.

And kept going.

"Linc also managed their website, responded to fan mail. He did all of Dad's research. Dad liked crafting stories. He wanted to have the time to branch out to a new series. He didn't want to be bogged down in doing all of that. Linc loved doing it. He also contributed more than anyone said to the books. Dad sucked at dialogue. It drove him crazy because he loved writing, but that never came easy to him. Linc didn't just do pass-throughs. He did a lot less than the first three books, but Dad counted on him to give them more depth. Bottom line, Linc knocked himself out not only for our family, but so Dad could be free to do the thing he loved to do."

When he stopped speaking, Harry inquired, "I'm afraid I don't understand why your sister was aligned with your brother in all the, as you referred to it, infighting. It's understood you spent a lot of time with your dad. Were all three of you kids not okay with the manner in which your parents formed your family?"

One side of the guy's lips hitched up and he said, "Kennedy was a mini-Mom. She's just like her today. She loved our dad. She was just not about fishing and hiking and stuff like that. She was about doing her makeup and getting coffees with her friends and talking about boys and gossiping with Mom."

His gaze on Harry suddenly intensified.

He then asserted, "We honestly were happy, sheriff. No one knew, but close friends, and when they saw us together, they got it. We loved each other. Linc was more of another dad to Kennedy and me than he was our uncle. We had more than most people do, and that wasn't about money."

"Then what happened?" Harry asked.

"Sharon happened," Tru stated.

That made all the men shift in their seats.

Because here they were.

"Take us through that," Harry prompted.

"She had a crush on Dad. That caused a disagreement. Not with Mom. Mom got having a crush on Dad, obviously. And she knew Dad was all about her. With Linc. Linc got a bad feeling off Sharon. Called her Annie Wilkes."

Well, shit.

"Linc wanted Dad to fire her," Tru continued. "But she was devoted, and Dad could get distracted. You didn't bother him when he was writing, for one thing. He was all about the book. Wouldn't shower for weeks, another reason why Mom and Linc were good with being in Seattle and away from him. He needed his space when he wrote. But when he was out of a book, he was all in. He wasn't really sociable, a complete introvert. But he had good friends. And he was all about his family."

"And he didn't let Sharon Swindell go, like Lincoln asked," Harry noted.

Tru shook his head. "No. And I can't speak for her. I have no idea why she would do what she did. I thought she was okay. She could be a bit skeevy around Dad if Mom or Linc weren't around. But most of the time, she was just a normal person. An employee. Mom was nicer to her than Linc or even Dad was. But whatever reason she did it, she did it."

"What did she do?"

"She instigated a psychological campaign to turn Jeff against his family, one she succeeded in, I'm sure you've figured out by now, spectacularly."

Well…

Shit.

"And what came of that?" Harry pressed.

"In the end, she lost it. Why? You'd have to ask her."

"Lost it?" Harry kept at it.

"Jeff was here, sheriff. In Misted Pines. He was here when it happened. We had a long weekend off at school. I was going to drive Kennedy and her boyfriend to the lake for the weekend, because we had a party to go to in Seattle, but Mom and Jeff came out the day before."

"No one mentioned that," Harry noted.

"That would be because Lincoln forbade us to because Jeff shot my mom and dad and set fire to the stables."

Harry sat back.

Everyone remained silent.

"Linc didn't catch them," Tru said the last two words with such deep sarcasm, it was like a physical thing in the room. "He was at the big house. He saw the fire and ran to the cabin, terrified out of his mind. When he got there, Sharon was there. And so was Jeff, holding the shotgun, covered with blood. First thing Linc did, though, was ask after Dad and Mom. Jeff said they were in the stable, so he tried to go in and get them, but the fire was raging. Then he tried to stop the fire. Jeff was bloody, but Dad didn't know what that meant. If they were dead or not. He grabbed the hose, went after it. But there was no stopping it, not with a garden hose, so he just made sure it wouldn't spread, especially to the cabin. Dad loved that place. We all had happy memories in that place."

Cade gave Riggs a look, which Riggs returned.

And yeah.

Nadia was right.

Cade was good at this shit because he'd called into question the drenching of the area on the cabin side.

Tru sucked in a big breath, let it out and kept talking.

"Once he accomplished that, he had to deal with Sharon and Jeff. Dad never trusted her, but even if he didn't figure it out right then, he had a great deal of time with not much else to occupy his mind to figure it out later. So he talked to Jeff about it, and Jeff confirmed what Linc figured out."

"And what did Lincoln figure out?" Harry queried.

"That she'd been messing with Jeff's head about Dad, me and Kennedy being Mom's favorites, Dad being the man with the money and all the power, and how she knew, because Dad told her, when he did not, that Dad was done sharing Mom and his family with Lincoln. So he was cutting them off. Including Jeff. Especially Jeff, because he abhorred even looking at the child his brother made with the woman he considered his wife. That they were going to be cast out. No Mom. No brother and sister. No Seattle house. No home by the lake."

Jesus.

What a fucking cunt.

Some bitterness crept in when Tru said, "What gets me about that is, not only did Dad love Jeff like Linc loved me and Kennedy, but also how hard Mom worked at making us all know that wasn't the case. He was only fourteen when it happened, but he wasn't thick. And it wasn't like he was eight. By fourteen, you should be forming a moral compass. You should be able to rationalize things, especially when everything around you is screaming the exact opposite of what a woman your own father openly distrusts is spewing at you. They gave me that. They gave Kennedy that. The only way I can make it work in my head is that we all pampered him so much, somehow, it was underdeveloped in him. He shot Mom to death, and still, that seems the worse betrayal."

Riggs could see that.

Tru kept at it.

"At the scene, Sharon told Linc that she'd tell everyone about their ‘sordid' life, and how fucked up Jeff was. That he'd be tried as an adult, and even if he wasn't, his life would be destroyed forever because he murdered his mother and uncle, and everyone would know it and guess why. She really did a number on Lincoln, who had just, it shouldn't be forgotten, lost the love of his life and his twin brother, and his son committed the murders. She knew that, I'm sure, so she went in for yet another kill. So he told Jeff to take off his clothes, which he threw on the fire, and ordered him to go home and take a shower and not to say a word or leave the house. Then he called the cops."

"Are you sure of this story?" Harry asked.

"I'm not sure of anything. I wasn't there," Tru answered. "I know what Linc told me, because it was up to me to make sure everyone kept their mouths shut so Jeff didn't get into trouble. At the time, he just said there had been a terrible accident, Jeff was at fault, things were going to be out of his control, and we all had to do what we could to protect Jeff. Imagine my surprise when I found out that ‘accident' was my fourteen-year-old brother shooting my mom and dad to death then burning their bodies. At least they let the horses out."

Riggs didn't want to imagine it.

But yeah.

At least they let the horses out.

"I know when Linc got out of prison," Tru carried on, "he came to me and shared how he was concerned that Jeff and Sharon were still close. Something I had no clue was happening. I hadn't seen her since before we lost Mom and Dad. Though, Lincoln didn't share about Sharon's psychological manipulation, I know he had deep concerns about her. Before he was sentenced, and after he went to prison, he'd warned me multiple times to be certain she had nothing to do with Kennedy or Jeff. He was also upset that I'd become estranged from them."

"And Kennedy in all of this?" Harry pressed.

Tru blew out a sigh before he said, "Jeff was our baby brother, sheriff. You don't know it's stupid to spoil him and let him get his way and do everything for him when you're doing it. He's cute and your little brother. You just do it. Though, Kennedy learned how stupid that was tonight. Hence her being hysterical. But we got the full story at the hospital, which is why I'm here."

"And what was that?" Harry asked.

"Sharon was messing with Jeff's head. And for her to get at the money, probably in another effort to screw over Linc, and posthumously, Mom and Dad, she used Jeff to mess with Kennedy's head. Though, I'll say, that might be jaded when it comes to Sharon, since Jeff is after the money himself. My sister and I aren't estranged. Medical school is no joke, and residency sucks all your time and energy. So there's that. We also just don't see eye to eye on some important things, the unending lawsuits being the biggest one of them. Though, she's more about keeping Mom's folks from getting the money. However, we were all flabbergasted Dad's folks and Aunt Mary got in on the act. Greed, I've learned, makes people do shitty things. They saw the money was possibly up for grabs, and they pounced."

Greed sure did that to people.

Riggs was living that nightmare in his own way with Angelica.

Tru continued, "But Kennedy's always been the worst, along with Mom, in spoiling Jeff and seeing to his every need. Now Jeff," he nearly spat the name, the emotion coming out of him now, "he and I were estranged. But this had a lot to do with him killing my mother and father in an ‘accident' and ruining a man I loved very much, who busted his hump and gave, essentially his life to cover for him."

"It's my understanding, in the lawsuit, Kennedy asserted that you didn't get along with Lincoln and your mom," Harry commented.

"No, Jeff asserted that," Tru contradicted. "They filed those papers, and Kennedy didn't read them before she signed them. She lost her mind. Called me and apologized. Told me she read Jeff the riot act. But I don't blame her. Honestly, there's so much paperwork with that crap, it's a wonder I got through my residency with all the stuff I had to wade through. I could see just signing your name and being done with it."

"Right, so with all of that, I'm wondering why all of you kept this secret even after Lincoln died," Harry noted.

"Because he told us to from the very beginning. Because he didn't want everyone all over the globe talking shit about Mom and Dad. The books have been translated into over thirty languages, sheriff. It'd be everywhere. Also because he knew Jeff was a fuckup, and he wanted him to get help, not be sent to juvenile detention, but he wasn't in a position, considering he was in prison, serving Jeff's time, to get it for him. And if Lincoln was going to put himself that far out to protect their secret, and his son, I loved him too much to go against it."

Couldn't fault the guy for that.

Tru still had more.

"And I have to say, things didn't get better after it all happened, because we went to live with Dad's parents, and they were devoted to Dad more than Linc, in a way that, I loved them before they got in on the legal action, but even I thought it was weird. I think they sensed, too, that things were not as they seemed, even if they weren't in on the secret. As such, they sensed Kennedy and I were their precious son's children, and Jeff was their less precious son's. Don't ask me how. All I know is, they treated him differently, not spoiled and nurtured and cosseted. And I think that got under his skin, the reality he murdered two people who adored him got under his skin, and since Sharon somehow managed to stay close to him, she worked that angle too, because it corroborated all the shit she was filling his head with."

"Did Jeff tell you this?" Harry queried.

Tru shook his head.

"Not back then, though Linc knew it, because Jeff told him. Even Kennedy didn't know it, until about an hour ago at the hospital, when Jeff told us. I knew bits and pieces. Nothing about Sharon, except Lincoln's concerns about her. I only knew that Mom and Dad were dead. For some reason Jeff shot them. Linc was going to go down for it. And we all had to look after Jeff because he was fourteen, he got his head mixed up, so he was troubled." Again, he nearly spat his last word. "The rest of this is brand-new to me."

And now they had the explanation behind his detached demeanor and the slow leaking in of emotion.

He was just finding this crap out.

Christ.

He had to feel like he'd been hit by a train.

Harry asked Riggs's question when he said, "Why do you think Lincoln didn't tell you about Sharon?"

"At first, because I was only seventeen," Tru answered readily. "Then, I was in college, grad school, residency. Frankly, sheriff, Linc loved me, and his son took my mom and dad. Jeff had already fucked up my life. It was a lot, and all of this is a whole lot more, specifically, Jeff being weak enough to fall for her crap. So I don't think he wanted dealing with Jeff fucking up my entire future."

Lincoln Whitaker was clearly a solid guy.

Tru was still talking.

"Now, Jeff's freaked that he's finally going to have to face up to what he did to our family, and he's freaked Sharon is going to throw him under the bus. And mark my words, she will. So, now, he lays this quagmire on Kennedy and me, asking us to help him out. Consequently, Kennedy is also freaked. Though, I don't think she's too broken up about Jeff. She's pissed as hell he's still been hanging with Sharon, when, after we lost Lincoln, he promised her he'd ceased all communication with her."

"Why didn't your uncle deal with his estate appropriately?" Harry asked another question Riggs wanted to know.

"Honestly?" Tru asked in return.

Harry nodded.

"I don't know," Tru said. "It's been a total headache. I'm done with it. When he came to visit me after getting out of prison, he was all about us getting back to the lake. Pulling together the pieces of our family. Seeing to Jeff. Helping him heal. Like I had a lot of interest in doing that, which I didn't. But I had interest in helping Lincoln pick up the threads of his life, and I was all in to do that. And if part of it was dealing with Jeff, okay. Linc was the only parent I had left, so I loved him enough, if that was what he needed, I was there. So when I got the call the day after he left me, telling me that he'd committed suicide, I was heartsore, sick with it, but also, I was utterly staggered."

Harry didn't give anything to that, like the fact that there was a reason to be surprised, seeing as his uncle might have been killed.

But at least that was an explanation of why the estate was a mess.

As far as Lincoln was concerned, he'd given instructions as to how to use the money on the kids while he was in prison.

Then, he was out, and since he was alive, and fresh from doing time for a crime he didn't commit, he was intent on dealing with other things. Not seeing immediately to his estate, when he was only fifty years old, he thought he had a lot of life left to live.

Harry moved them in a different direction.

"Do you know what they were looking for at the lake?"

For the first time, straight out, the guy showed his feelings.

He smiled, huge, and said, "Yeah. That was something Lincoln did tell me."

"And it is?" Harry prompted.

"Lincoln didn't write the books after the first three, but he worked closely with Dad, and bottom line, he was still a thriller writer. And I know this was to get back at Sharon. So, when she visited him in jail, he told her he printed out Dad's last manuscript after she'd left, deleted the digital files, took the pages and some contracts he told her he'd persuaded Dad to sign, which sold the movie rights to the next six books in Dad's flagship series, put them in a lockbox and buried them somewhere by the lake before he called the cops."

"Why would he bury those things?" Harry inquired.

"He didn't," Tru declared. "There wasn't a last manuscript, and there wasn't a contract. Lincoln had given up on talking Dad into selling more, because the attention made Dad uncomfortable, and Lincoln felt that, literally. But Sharon came to Dad first as a huge fan. The main character of the books has an identical twin, no surprise, and I think in her twisted head, she thought Dad was Lucas Washington. And if there's a missing Roosevelt Lincoln book, it'd be worth a lot of money. And if there was a contract for film rights, that'd be worth a lot more. And those were what I figure Jeff was after. And for his part, he couldn't have any of the rest of us knowing until he figured out how to cut everyone else out and get a lock on my father's estate."

Fucking pissant.

"But Sharon would kill to read that manuscript," Tru went on. "Which makes it even more insane she machinated the author's death. Because she could have had a lot more. But Lincoln knew that it would drive her even crazier than she already was, the idea there was a Lucas Washington story she hadn't read yet. And if there were more movies, she'd have even more Lucas Washington."

At least Lincoln got a little of his back, sending her on a fifteen-year quest to find nothing.

"However, saying that," Tru carried on, "I can't imagine he had any idea that she'd spend fifteen years doing what she did. I know in my soul, he did it just to fuck with her. In the end, she had a hand in taking precious things from him, and as a father who loved his son, a husband who adored his wife, and a devoted brother, he had no choice but to do what he did. That was his only way to take something precious from her."

Tru turned to Riggs.

"And he'd be gutted to think anyone shattered the peace on that lake where we were all so happy. The only place we could be a family as we truly were. Absolutely gutted that the people who came after us weren't as happy as we were."

"We're happy, Tru. Sharon and your brother were just occasional pains in our asses," Riggs assured him.

That urged another smile to the surface from Tru.

"I'm going to have to speak to your brother about the murders, Tru," Harry warned.

Tru turned back to Harry.

"Not that I have a say, but I'm good with that. Lincoln's name needs to be cleared. I know what you videotaping me means, and I'm fine to go on the record with all of this. I shouldn't speak for her, but my guess at this juncture, Kennedy will be too," Tru told him.

"This will mean your family will have deeper scrutiny," Harry warned.

"Sheriff, I've spent the entire thirty-three years of my life hiding the fact I'm Roosevelt Whitaker's child. My father was a good man. He was a good dad. He loved me deeply, and he didn't hide it. He taught me to be all the good things I am. I owe him everything. I miss him every day. People with small minds who do not know my family will think whatever they like. I can finally claim my dad. So bring it on."

Right, then.

There it was.

Riggs liked this guy.