“That was before we knew she and her sisters were here because of the disappearance of their aunt.”
“You didn’t have anything to do with it. She’s not going to blame you if one of our pack members had something to do with her aunt’s disappearance.”
“That was before I talked to her about Dad.”
Brett stared at him in disbelief, then let out his breath. “Ah, hell, CJ. You should have let sleeping dogs—”
CJ gave him an annoyed look.
“All right. I guess if I were in your shoes, I would have told her too. Just to clear the air and ensure that if she learned from someone else, it wouldn’t be a sticking point.”
“Well, it is a sticking point.”
Brett raised his brows.
CJ served the salad and brought out a couple of beers while Brett loaded the T-bone steaks on their plates.
“Okay, so tell me what’s wrong between you and Laurel.”
This was the part that CJ had been avoiding. He really didn’t want to tell his brother what the ladies believed. “It was going great, I thought, until I had to tell Laurel about our father.”
Brett took his seat at the table and so did CJ.
“Okay, we’re back to that.”
“Yeah. I had to tell her what happened to him because I knew, with everything else going on, she was sure to learn about it. Then she might think I was trying to cover up his ill deeds. The problem was that Laurel’s mother spoke with our dad because he was serving as sheriff. Along with the hotel owner, our dad denied that Clarinda had even worked there.”
“Wait, what if she hadn’t? How had they come to that conclusion?”
CJ explained about the proof they had.
“Oh. Okay, so learning that our father was a murderer didn’t sit well with her, I gather.”
“Hell, she thinks Dad might have had something to do with her aunt’s disappearance too,” CJ said.
Brett stopped cutting into his meat and looked up at CJ. Apparently Sheridan had lied to Laurel’s mother. So what else might their father have been involved in?
“Hell.”
“Agreed.”
Brett continued to cut up his steak but didn’t say anything for a moment.
In the silence, CJ was processing all that he had learned in the past couple of years about their father’s deceitfulness.
“Maybe Dad didn’t know Clarinda worked there,” Brett said. “What if she didn’t join the pack and was stuck working at the hotel all the time? She might have disappeared before he even knew she worked there. On the other hand, Dad didn’t have a perfectly honorable track record, as we learned too late. Laurel has nothing to go on but a few scanty records and a whole lot of inconsistencies.”
“It’s possible he didn’t know about Clarinda, of course. I’d considered that too. But given his previous history, Laurel has good reason to suspect that he might have been involved in more shenanigans.”
“Hell. Have you talked to Eric or Sarandon about this?”
“No. She just mentioned it tonight, so I haven’t had a chance to talk to anyone but you.”
Brett sat back in his chair. “Why don’t we wait to tell them for the time being? If Dad was involved in the cover-up of Clarinda’s disappearance or—God forbid—worse, I don’t want to say anything to Eric or Sarandon until we know for certain.”
“Agreed. We’ve all taken the news about his criminal activities hard enough. I’d rather know something definite before we discuss it with them. I only mentioned it to you because you’re looking into this like I am, and you need to know everything I do.”
“Darien already has a number of us working on the case.”
CJ frowned at his brother. “Why didn’t he tell me? I should be working on it too.” Though CJ planned to do that every chance he got.
“He doesn’t have to tell you. He knows you’re working the inside job. You’re the key, the most important person in investigating this matter. You have access to the sisters and the opportunity to learn everything they know about their aunt’s disappearance. You have free rein at the hotel when everyone’s sleeping and can explore it for clues to your heart’s content. You’ll be keeping an eye on the Wernicke brothers, and who knows? During a conversation with one of them, you might learn something that will prove they’re frauds. Whatever. But you are at the heart of all of it.”
CJ hadn’t seen it that way, but he agreed. “So I take it that you’re researching more about the hotel for your newspaper article.”
“And the disappearances of the Wernicke brothers’ aunt and uncle and the MacTires’ Aunt Clarinda. Darien has both Trevor and Peter using their law enforcement background to dig deeper. They’re questioning anyone who remembers anything that far back. Anything that might trigger a memory of something that seemed odd before the disappearances. Anyone who has a recollection of a woman fitting Clarinda’s description who worked at the hotel. We’ll solve it one way or another. Although Darien needs to be informed about everything that is going on, he also wants you to know what everyone else learns, since you might not be able to listen in on conference calls while you’re watching the brothers.”
“Okay, sounds like a good plan.”
“Right. So I take it that this has become an obstacle in you getting to know Laurel better.”
“It could work against me if we learn Dad was involved in the disappearance of her aunt or a cover-up, yes.” CJ took a swig of his beer, then asked the question that had been on his mind since Brett first told him he was coming over tonight. “Have you ever seen the ghost wolf?” They’d never talked about it, so he really didn’t know if his brothers had seen it or not.
Brett finished his beer and got them another cold one. “So, I take it you saw it?”
“No.”
“I haven’t seen it. It’s just an old wives’ tale. Parents told that story to their kids to spook teens that were learning to drive, so they’d watch their driving and not run into a wolf on the road. Why mention it now? Are you sure you haven’t seen it?”
“No. But when we were driving back from Darien’s place after the meeting with the Wernicke brothers, Laurel thought she saw it.”
“The snowstorm has died down now, but it was going full blast there for a while, wasn’t it?”
“Yeah.”
“So it’s easy to think you see something when there’s nothing. I swear I’ve seen deer in the middle of a blinding snowstorm. I might have, or I might have just imagined it. I’ve never seen a wolf in that area while I’ve been driving. Then again, if one was running in that kind of weather, it would be easy to believe it was a ghost wolf and not the real thing.”
CJ glanced out the dining room window and watched the snow falling in tiny flakes now.
“Well, don’t you agree?” Brett asked.
“We went running after it in our wolf coats.” CJ looked back at his brother, who was staring wide-eyed at him.
“You chased after a phantom gray wolf?”
“It was white.”
“You saw it then? You said you hadn’t seen it.” Brett frowned. “An Arctic wolf? I didn’t think you saw it.”
“I didn’t. That’s what Laurel said. Some gray and some black wolves have been known to turn pure white. We don’t see that as much with our lupus garous unless they’re very old. But even traumatized wolves can turn white. I remembered reading about a gray wolf that had a leg injury and his coat began to turn white. When the injury was healed, the coat returned to its grayish-tan color. So it could be a regular-size gray wolf or a shorter-legged Arctic wolf, if Laurel really saw what she thought she did.”
“Okay, wait. Back up a bit. You’re coming up with an explanation for why a gray ghost wolf is white when you didn’t even see it?”
“Laurel saw it. And we chased after it.”
Brett smiled a little, and CJ was certain his brother thought he was just buying into Laurel’s flight of fancy because he liked her.