Page 66 of Defenseless
“Let’s play this out just for fuck’s sake,” Ethan said. “How would you do it?”
“We,” Chad corrected. “How wouldwedo it? Kara is right in that if Jacobs agreed to talk to anybody, it would only be them. But that doesn’t mean they are on their own.”
Ethan nodded. “I stand corrected. How would we do it?”
“Trick him?” Kara suggested.
“He’s going to be looking for something like that,” Sabina said. “I think we’d need to catch him off guard, but not try to trick him.”
“You mean like show up at his favorite coffee shop and ask him if he murdered our mother?” Kara asked, only somewhat sarcastically.
Beside her, Chad narrowed his eyes at Kara’s tone. Sabina couldn’t say for certain, but she thought Ethan might have nudged him under the table. When Chad turned to look at his cousin, Ethan gave a small shake of his head. Chad’s jaw tightened, but he nodded in return and held his tongue.
“His staff would never let us near him. If he even has a favorite coffee shop,” Sabina said, ignoring her sister’s snark.
“Then what?” she prompted.
“I was thinking more along the lines of making an appointment to see him.”
“And how is making an appointment to see him catching him off guard?” Kara asked.
This time, Chad didn’t stay silent. “Because it will give him time to develop a false sense of confidence.”
Kara’s gaze bounced from Sabina to Chad then back again. “I don’t get it.”
“If you call and ask for an appointment, what do you think he’s going to think?” Chad asked.
“That we’re stupid?” Kara answered without hesitation. Then she stilled with the implication.
“Exactly,” Chad said.
“He’ll think that we’re stupid and that we’re trying some last-ditch effort to get him to talk because we have nothing else on him,” Kara continued.
“And he’ll get more confident that he has the situation under control,” Sabina said.
“But won’t he?” Kara asked.
“We’ll go double wired,” Sabina said.
“What?” Ethan and Kara asked at the same time.
“They’ll wear an obvious wire and a secondary wire,” Chad jumped in. “They’ll ask him straight up if he killed Emer. When he doesn’t answer, they’ll cry and wring their hands, then finally pull off one of the wires.”
“And when he thinks we’re not wired at all—that we only want to hear the truth for ourselves—hemightbe willing to talk,” Sabina said.
“I’m sure it will do his ego good to see you both crying and appearing to crumble at his power,” Ethan commented, bobbing his head as he appeared to mull over the tentative plan.
“Uh, how is that different from my suggestion to trick him?” Kara pointed out.
Sabina rolled her eyes. “Fine, it’s a trick. But when we pull the first wire off and appear to give up the chance to prosecute him, it will also catch him off guard.”
Kara narrowed her gaze at Sabina but opted not to argue the point. It was only relevant insomuch as it was a sibling quarrel that she wanted to win. Sabina could have been annoyed at getting sidetracked. The truth was, though, she and her sister hadn’t been able to have a sibling quarrel in a long time, and it felt kind of good. Petty, sure. But good.
“I still don’t like it,” Chad said.
Ethan chuckled, and Kara rolled her eyes in much the same way Sabina had moments earlier. “Color me surprised,” Kara said.
“I’m shocked as well,” Ethan chimed in.
