Finally he couldn't stop himself being sick and pushing himself to stand he stumbled to his room and the small attached bathroom and lost the hot coffee and breakfast in the space of seconds. He wasn't entirely conscious of someone following him but when hands helped him to stand and cross to the sink he hoped to hell it wasn't Morgan. He couldn't face the man who had seen his dad kill.
"I'm pathetic," Josh moaned miserably.
"Look, Morgan's sorry. We're all sorry. We didn't think," Manny started. He opened the tap and cold water sluiced over Josh's hands. The immediate icy reminder of where he stood was welcome.
"That girl… it's my fault."
"You were in college," Manny offered sensibly.
"How can it be your fault?"
"He killed her. My dad. He killed her so that the Bullens wouldn't hurt me. She died because of me."
Manny shook him quite briskly and Josh snapped from his immediate reaction to being sick. "What drove your dad to kill Elisabeth Costain had nothing to do with you."
"But—"
"It was his own decision; it was the only way he saw out of the mess. He was weak and scared. He didn't put a gun to her head and shout some kind of war cry like 'this is for my son'. He simply shot her. You didn't tell him to do it."
"No. I didn't. But—"
"You need to stop. We don't have time for you to lose your freaking breakfast every time real life hits you in the face. Enough wallowing in what is and isn't your fault.
Okay?"
Josh blinked at Manny. Saw strength in the man that he wished he had himself.
"Okay?" Manny insisted. "You need time to get yourself sorted, 'cause I know you can. Brush your teeth okay?" With that he left the bathroom and pulled the door shut behind him.
Josh, boneless, slumped on the side of the bath.
Brush my teeth. Focus on brushing my teeth.
Shaking himself, he found a sliver of determination and pushed himself to stand. Manny was right. Josh wasn't stupid—at the core of it he wasn't responsible for his dad pulling the trigger. That was what he needed to focus on.
He could push the guilt and horror down and the rest of it?
Well he'd work through that clusterfuck in his head later.
Yes, he felt responsible, but he could pull that out later to examine it. Right now he needed to be out there listening to intel and breaking the Bullen family into single pieces as soon as he could. He pulled his toothbrush out and squeezed mint paste in abundance. The mint turned his stomach but he pushed through the feelings of wanting to be sick again.
Pushing through the rest of the shit in his head would be harder.
But he was Joshua Headley. He wasn't his dad. He could do this.
Manny was right.
CHAPTER 7
Between them agreement was reached that this place was as good a place as any for Morgan and Nik to use as space on this case. Manny sensed Nik would be happier actually out doing something but ever since the cop had turned on the Bullens and Alastair was in jail Morgan had become Nik's number-one priority. Manny sat watching them as they bickered and laughed like an old married couple. Morgan decided the whole murder web needed to be up on the wall and Manny didn't disagree. Visual representation of what had happened to date was the best way to get his head around it all.
He had caught Josh on more than one occasion with a wistful expression on his face as he too watched the others. The sheets of paper were succumbing to gravity and Manny could swear Morgan was doing it deliberately just so he could have Nik bending over and scrabbling on the floor. To be honest, with an ass like Nik's, if he was Nik's lover he would demand Nik stayed bent over all day.
At the moment, with all the sheets finally tacked to the wall, Morgan and Nik were standing and staring and Josh moved to stand next to them. Well, next to them was perhaps a bit generous, near them more like. With enough space to be out of arm's reach.
"Can I ask a question?" Josh asked uncertainly.
Both Morgan and Nik turned to him expectantly and Manny saw the instinctive move that Josh made backward.
"Go on," Morgan said and then smiled.
Shuffling sideways Josh touched his fingers to the paper, which stayed in position. "You have evidence of Alastair being involved in some kind of murder on the estate that they lived on." He traced a purple line to the photo of the dress and some kind of forensics report, and then up to the photo of his dad which he tapped. "Does he not know anything about it?"
Morgan shook his head, "It's in the report from interviews that he knew nothing."
"And we trust him?"
Silence. Uneasy silence. Morgan evidently didn't know what to say and Nik was looking at his feet. It was evidently up to Manny to answer Josh's question.
"He has nothing to lose now. You're safe and so is your mom. I'm convinced he told us everything."
Josh considered the response for a second. "Then we have two things to think about if I'm correct. One, we need to link a body to the murder and that will take down Alastair once and for all. Two, we need to dig into the connection the senator has to his brothers and if we find one single thing we take him down
