Page 111 of Freeing Denver

“Why were you helping her?”

“I think that’s a conversation you should have with Denver.”

The back of my neck prickles. “It’s one we’re having right now.”

He pauses outside a door and pushes it open without answering me. The bedroom is empty.

Kitrick takes his phone out, his palm bloodied. “I’ll show you the CCTV. Maybe you’ll recognize her.”

It’s been years since I’ve seen Marnie, but I know I’ll recognize her face. If this is her, it means she betrayed Denver,but we also have no idea what she went through to get to this point. The things she had to do to survive.

He shows me the phone—the footage of a brunette entering the house with Spider.

“It’s not her,” I say, hiding my relief from this stranger. “Do you know if Marnie could be alive? Did you hear anything about?—”

“If Marnie Harland is alive, the only people who knew about it are Spider, Eli, and whoever bought her last,” he says simply. “I started working for Spider after he took her, but she was a big deal. The only people who knew her whereabouts were the ones who would never tell a soul. Wasn’t worth how they’d die over it.”

I run my hand across my beard. There’s still hope. There must be.

“We should get back to Denver,” he says.

For a reason I can’t explain, the way he says my wife’s name crawls under my skin and gnaws at me. I search his expression as I move forward. “Let’s revisit my earlier question. Why did you help her?”

“That’s a weird fucking way to thank me.”

“I’m not a patient man, Kitrick,” I say. “This is me remaining calm for my wife’s sake. I’ll continue where Spider left off regardless of what you did for her. So answer my fucking question.”

He eyes me for a few seconds before cursing under his breath. “I’m a fed.”

Now, that was not the answer I expected. “Undercover.”

“Yes.”

“How long?”

He rolls his shoulder, as if revealing his secret doesn’t unburden him but only adds to the weight. “Two years. Spiderrecruited me from prison after the bureau manufactured a sentence for me for taking bribes.”

My frown deepens. “You trashed your own career to go to prison and get in with the Eddardses?”

“Yes.” He bites out the word.

“A selfless cop.”

“Fed. And yes. Funnily enough, I came into this job wanting to do good.”

I snort, and he looks so wildly offended that I laugh. “Sorry, kid, it’s just been a while since I heard idealism like that.”

“Kid? We’re the same fucking age.”

“And how do you know that?”

“Because I know you, Colt Harland,” he says and squares his shoulders as if that could give him the extra inches to meet my height. “I know the shit you’ve done. The people you’ve killed. You may be known as a gangster who doesn’t dabble in drugs, but you cozied up with people who did. Protected them, too. You’re scum. All of you are.”

“And yet, you protected my wife.”

He doesn’t hide his blanch quick enough. “She’s pregnant.”

“So you’d have let her die otherwise?”