“Do you recognize this prick?” he asks as Valentina leans closer over his shoulder.
I watch as he replays the tape again, studying the thin man who hurls the thick metal pipe through the window.
“He looks familiar,” I say. “I’ve seen him before.” I squint at the screen, ninety-nine percent certain it’s the guy from the scrap yard, but I don’t want to say until Kane gives me the all-clear.
“Or you’ve seen him a hundred times since we’ve replayed the video over and over,” Trinity says.
Valentina claps her hands. “Wait. I know who he is. Shit. Iknow.That little douchebag ... How could I forget him?”
“Who?” Rix asks. “Because the last time someone put a brick through your window ...”
“We all know that was my fault, so let’s not dwell,” Trinity says.
Valentina reaches out to squeeze the girl’s fingers. “Don’t worry about that. Because these two things aren’t related at all.That,” she points at the screen, “is Gregor Standish’s assistant. Protégé. Or whatever the hell you call the man’s hanger-on.”
As soon as she says the name Gregor Standish, my stomach drops to my feet.Fuck.I knew it.
“Are you sure?” I ask, my gaze locked on Valentina.
“Positive. He came in a few months ago complaining that we didn’t have any Standish pieces in the gallery, and that made ussubparandwithout vision. Then he tried to get me to take a sculpture on consignment, and was adamant that I price it at two hundred thousand and not a penny less. I told him to take a hike.”
“Why in the fuck would he be throwing a pipe through your window now?” Rix asks. “Wait, Standish ... isn’t he the artist who killed himself?”
I bite my lip because I know there’s no way in hell Standish’s death was a suicide.
Valentina answers his question. “Yes. His pieces were ugly-as-hell modern art. He was supposed to have one auctioned off at the Seven Sinners benefit ...” She looks at me. “But yours went up in its place.”
Heat burns my face and my throat until there’s barely room to breathe. As much as I want to tell her what I know and even more, what I suspect, we’re standing in front of a cop, and I’m not stupid. I won’t say a damn thing that implicates Mount.
Rix’s gaze locks on me. “You know something about this?”
I attempt to wipe any guilt from my expression, but it’s nearly impossible. I’ve carried plenty of guilt about the situation along with me for months. The knowledge has been eating at me that if Standish’s artwork hadn’t been accidentally switched with mine, he’d still be alive ... and I wouldn’t have this dream of an opportunity.
“Temperance?” Rix prompts me when the silence stretches awkwardly long.
I have to say something. Anything. Because with each moment I stall, I sound guiltier and guiltier, even though my only crime is withholding my suspicions—that Mount had him killed for his smear campaign against the distillery, which upset Keira. And I know for certain that Mount would kill men for less than what Standish did.
“Standish was pissed that my sculpture was accidentally auctioned off under his name, like Valentina said,” I tell him.
“And?” Rix asks.
“And nothing. I never spoke to him again after we argued about it. He died shortly after.”
Rix’s pale, silvery eyes bore into me like he’s digging for the truth and can see directly inside my brain and soul. “Have you had any other issues that could be related to this?”
My brain reels. So much shit has happened lately in my life that I don’t know what is connected to what, but I can’t tell him anything without potentially jeopardizing Rafe or Kane.
I hate keeping secrets, but I have no choice. I keep my answers short and pointed. “I didn’t know he had an assistant or protégé.”
“Could he be out for revenge?” Trinity asks. “I mean ... if your stuff got auctioned off in his place and he was upset enough to kill himself, that seems like a motive for revenge. At least, on TV it would be.”
Rix studies me longer. “Do you know anything else about Standish’s suicide? Anything that would make this guy want revenge?”
From the knowledge in his silver gaze, he knows that Keira is connected to Mount, and there’s a chance that suicide could have been murder. Even so, there’s no way in hell I’m going to confirm that, because even I don’t know for sure. And I don’t want to.
Valentina elbows him. “Babe, instead of interrogating my newest featured artist, why don’t you go out and arrest the guy who threw a pipe through my window and interrogate him. He’s the criminal here.”
Rix rises from the desk and looks from me to Valentina. “If there’s anything you’re not telling me, I need to know now, Temperance.”