Mark Del Franco - Face Off

Laura pulled more documents out of the folder. “Indeed. Aran was clearly the likely suspect. He had access to other accounts, so it wasn’t out of the realm of possibility he had access to the account in question. MacGrath and Carr were more affiliated with him than with Brinen. And he had motivation since Aran is the more likely successor to Draigen. Exactly what Brinen wanted us to think. Aran suspected the frame-up, and our sources have confirmed that Brinen made the payments.”

Terryn stared at Brinen. “Why would you do such a thing, brother?”

“She’s lying, Terryn. I would never try to kill our own sister,” he said.

“Killing wasn’t the plan,” Laura continued. “Fear was. Brinen is afraid of where Draigen is taking the Inverni, with Aran’s support. As you told me, Terryn, he’s pressed you to assume leadership for years. He thought he had found a way to force Draigen out and blame Aran in the process. He hoped your fear of Draigen’s being killed would pressure you to take the underKing crown and blame Aran for attempted murder. But you didn’t take the bait because of Cress. Brinen never thought you would choose her over Draigen.”

Brinen laughed with a sneer. “This is getting more preposterous all the time.”

The level of falseness in his voice brought Laura satisfaction. She was right. “It was at that point that I think things truly went out of control because of Cress.”

Terryn became still. “What does she have to do with this?”

Laura took a deep breath. She was about to accuse a head of state of attempted murder. “You and Draigen don’t agree on how to deal with the Seelie Court over this Treaty mess. Draigen fears you won’t stand up to Maeve, so she looked for a way to discredit you to keep her regency. She found an unlikely ally in Orrin ap Rhys. Rhys suspects you might be able to resolve your differences with Maeve, and he doesn’t want that to happen. He would rather see the Inverni destroyed, and with Draigen in charge, that’s much more likely. Draigen encouraged Orrin ap Rhys to remove Cress from InterSec and have you suspended in order to discredit you among your own people. It fit Rhys’s agenda, so he did it. I have confirmed private electronic communications between them that they had to use because the wards in this building blocked sendings.”

Draigen did not react. A flutter of sendings passed in the air, and Terryn tilted his head in consideration. “Continue, please.”

She dropped the photocopy from Davvi in front of Brinen. “Can you identify that?”

Surprise swept over his face. “It’s the security-shift schedule change.”

Laura moved the sheet to Draigen and Terryn. “With the correct times. That was the final piece of evidence that convinced me of what happened next. Brinen insisted that he gave Aran the correct time to switch Cress’s security. I believed him, and this order shows Brinen was telling the truth. Aran set up the gap to allow Cress’s kidnapping. He despises the leanansidhe , and when he saw opportunity to rid the clan of Cress, he took it. He was paid well for his efforts by the Legacy group that attacked last night.”

She paused, then decided to provide proof that only Terryn would truly understand. “DeWinter asked Fallon Moor to transfer the money into the Inverni account at Aran’s direction. I traced the transaction and have confirmed proof.”

I’m sorry, Terryn, she sent.

Terryn looked stricken. You are not to blame.

Sendings fluttered through the air. Terryn turned to Laura. “Thank you, Mariel. This is now a clan matter.”

She hesitated. “I have one more thing to say. While you played games with the leadership of your clan, people have died. If you keep on this course, more will. Find a better way because I think you are all doomed otherwise. If you can’t, you deserve to lose everything.”

She walked to the door, but Terryn called her name. She turned, expecting an argument.

“Please tell Agent Sinclair I expect to see him report for official duty,” he said.

A bittersweet smile crossed her lips. “I will.”

You need to make a decision about your own life, too, Terryn. Good luck, she sent.

She didn’t look back. Despite everything—Brinen’s misguided plans, Rhys’s machinations, Terryn’s love for Cress—she knew that what she had exposed to the macCullens would probably cause more problems among the Inverni than any of the others.

She had one more stop to make. When the elevator arrived, she held her InterSec badge up and ordered the brownie security guard out. In the long run, it didn’t matter who knew she went to the Guildmaster’s office, but given that she had attacked him the night before, she wanted as little security around as possible.

As Laura entered the anteroom to Orrin ap Rhys’s office suite, it occurred to her that she had never been there before as Mariel. She had a sense of wrongness, as if she had crossed personas, something she avoided at all costs. There was no conflict, though. Her business with him was a personal matter between him and Mariel Tate.

His Danann assistant glanced up and paused at her typing. She placed a trembling hand on the desk blotter near the phone. “Can I help you?”

“Mariel Tate to see the Guildmaster,” she said.

The Danann paused, a professional smile on her face. “The Guildmaster says you should coordinate communications through his lawyer. Would you . . .”

Lifting her hand as if she were brushing her hair back, Laura tapped the ambient essence in the air. “Sleep.”

The assistant froze in midsentence. Laura opened the office door. In irritation, Rhys turned in his seat at the sound of her entrance. He drew a subtle charge of essence into his hands when he saw her but didn’t activate his body shield. She sensed that his body essence was damaged from her blast. Even a short burst of essence without his shields would kill him. She wasn’t sorry he was alive, but at that moment, she wished she had put him in the hospital

“Nervous about something, Rhys?” she asked.

“I had you banned from this building,” he said.

She stopped in front of his desk. “Indeed. Yet here I am. Keep that in mind for the future.”

“Security is on its way,” he said.

She withdrew papers from her jacket and dropped them in front of him. “I won’t be long.”

He glanced at the top sheet, empty except for rows of numbers. “What is this?”

She leaned her hands on the front of his desk. “Financial transactions. InterSec tracked down the original sources of a significant amount of money. Funds moving from you personally to Legacy to fund the kidnapping of Cress Leanansidhe.”

He chuckled. “You’ll have a hard time proving that.”

“And you will have a hard time defending yourself against conspiracy charges as well as attempted murder,” she said.

With a smug look, he extinguished the essence in his hands. “Shall I point out the flaw in your amusing little plan, dear? As High Queen Maeve’s representative, I have complete diplomatic immunity. You won’t be able to file charges on your rather creative claim.”

Laura straightened. “That doesn’t mean you won’t be deported from the U.S. Once the evidence is made public, no government will grant you credentials again. You’ll be trapped in Ireland for the rest of your illustrious career . . . dear.”

Rhys narrowed his eyes, a feeble light flickering in them. “You don’t know what you’re doing.”

She gave him the coldest smile she knew how. “Oh, it’s much worse than that, Rhys. I don’t care what I’m doing. I’ll be watching. Have a nice day.”

As she strode through the anteroom, she withdrew the sleep spell on the assistant. “. . . like to make an appointment?”