Chapter 10 - WHY THOMAS JOINED
The answer was in Thomas’s bank statements.
Micah had been born with a heart defect.
Minor now.
Not minor then.
Belle remembered the bills.
The denied insurance claim.
The specialist they somehow got into within forty-eight hours.
Thomas said a charity helped.
There had been no charity.
Renick’s father paid.
In exchange, Thomas started doing work.
Cameras.
Locks.
Surveillance.
One favor became another.
Belle sat at the kitchen table in the safe house.
Micah played cards with Brinley nearby.
She hated Thomas for five minutes.
Then missed him so badly she bent forward.
Renick sat across from her.
No speech.
Good.
After a while, Belle said.
“He did it for Micah.”
“At first.”
“That makes it worse.”
“Yeah.”
She looked up.
“You’re agreeing too much.”
“I’ve been shot.”
“That isn’t a personality improvement.”
He smiled.
Small.
Then Thomas’s final ledger showed something else.
After Maeve discovered Sebastian’s network, Thomas stopped taking Kavanaugh money.
He began moving evidence to federal contacts.
He was trying to get out.
Trying to clean up the thing that saved his son and trapped him.
Belle cried quietly.
Micah saw.
He climbed onto her lap even though he was getting too big.
“Dad was bad?”
Belle hugged him.
“Dad did bad things.”
Micah waited.
“He also tried to fix some.”
“Did he fix them?”
“No.”
Micah nodded.
“Okay.”
Children do not always need the ending adults want to give them.
Sometimes facts are enough.
Renick’s legal team began handing over records.
Not only Sebastian’s.
Kavanaugh records too.
Sully stared at him.
“You know what this does.”
“Yes.”
“People go to prison.”
“Yes.”
“Some of those people are ours.”
Renick looked toward Brinley.
“That’s the point.”
The old structure began cracking.
Men resigned.
Others ran.
Two were arrested.
Renick shut down three illegal businesses tied to his father’s era.
Boston noticed.
So did enemies.
Then someone fired six bullets into the front of Belle’s empty basement apartment.
Nobody was inside.
But taped to the door was a note.
KAVANAUGH GOES LEGIT.
May you like
YOU DIE FIRST.
