Page 57 of Dead Man's Alibi

Hayes didn’t spare him a glance, just kept walking.“I have no reason to talk to you, Bennet.”

“Thought we were friends.”

“Go to hell.”

He ignored that, kept walking in stride with Jake.“And since wearefriends, I think I’ve started to figure out what this isreallyabout.”Ever since he’d really started to focus on Hayes, thanks to Jill, Hayes was about the only thing he could focus on.

Maybe Jake was a bit of an enigma, but if Cal put all the pieces together from what he knew about Jake’s childhood, and used his own understanding of the way a messy childhood could fuck someone up, he’d started to peel back some of the layers he hadn’t tried to look under before.

Jake stopped walking, looked up at the ceiling and let out a long sigh, like he was exasperated but was going tohumorCal.“Yeah?Ready to admit your brother’s a murderer, just like dear old Dad?”

“I think you’re jealous.”

Jake shook his head with a disdainful scoff.“This idea Sam is the be-all and end-all—”

“Not of Sam.Notonlyof Sam.You see, I got to know you last month, Jake.Not just who you are now, but who you were growing up.The deadbeat dad who didn’t show up for you.The mom you don’tevermention.”

Jake’s expression got so hard, Cal wondered if he might actually lose his cool and swing.But he wasn’t here to poke at Jake’s old wounds, even if it was what he had always beenverygood at.This was aboutmakinga point.Notscoringa point.

“Trauma recognizes trauma,buddy.And in your case, you’ve built yourself into some kind of seemingly infallible mountain because of all that shit.I can’t hold that against you.We all do what we need to in order to get by.”

“I was so looking for your approval, Cal.”He started walking again, but Cal followed, and he didn’t shut up, even when he probably should have.

Because once he started, he couldn’t stop himself.“You’re used to being in charge, and you’re used to being right.You make snap judgments about people based on instinct, and it’s served you well.Your snap judgment about Nate was negative because Nate representseverythingyou wanted and didn’t get.”

Jake shook his head.“I don’t give one little shit about your brother aside from making sure he pays for all crimes committed.”But he shoved those courthouse doors open hard and stepped out into a pretty afternoon that contradicted all this tension going on inside both of them.

Cal chose to ignore what Hayes said and just keep talking—what he was good at.“Nate left Marietta, made a hero out of himself.While you stayed and became a detective in a tiny police department in the middle of nowhere.Then Nate comes home and gets a job much like yours and does it as well, if not a little better.People like him, because for all his stoicism, good and honorable just ooze out of him.War hero, right?But you?You hate him.You want the Benjamin Bennet stain to stick, because of that cop black-and-white thinking, and maybe even because deep down you think sons should bear the weight of their father’s sins.Wonder why?”

Jake was getting close to his car, so Cal said the rest in a rush, determined to get it all out.To get under Jake’s skin, and maybe, just maybe, in the desperate hopes he could getthroughto Jake.He didn’t want to believe the guy was behind all this.He wasn’t even sure he did believe the planting evidence leap.

But like he’d told Nate back in the courtroom, something wasn’t right, and Cal didn’t know who else it could stem from except Hayes himself.

“But Nate doesn’t have that stain, does he?He knows he’s not like our dad.He knows he came home and put that son of a bitch behind bars.In your mind, he should feel some weight of guilt for being born a Bennet, like you feel some weight of guilt for being your mom’s affair kid.”

Jake whirled then, but Cal figured some sense of self-preservation was the only thing that kept Jake from bloodying his nose.Pisseddid not begin to cover the emotion of rage on Jake’s face.

But Cal didn’t stop.Backing off when he should was never his MO.“And sure, you could hate all three of us, but Landon stays up at his ranch, and you think that means he’s kept in line, feels bad about his role in things.He might.And you know I’ve got enough mental problems for a handful of people, so that’s my punishment.Landon and I are paying our dues, in your mind, just like you feel you are, by being Mr.Upstanding Detective.But Nate?He’s got it all—war hero, the job, and yeah, the girl.”

“Fuck off, Cal.I mean it.”

But Cal couldn’t stop when he was so close to his final point.He stepped in close, almost willing Jake to break, to land a blow, to make a threat.

Somethingneeded to break, and maybe Cal had gotten better about not always being the source of that… but sometimes old habits came in handy.

“Nate’s proven that you’re fallible, thatyoucan be wrong about someone.Instead of admitting that, you’re going to go down in a blaze of being dead-ass wrong.Because you want him to suffer.Just.Like.You.”

For a moment, there was nothing but the sounds of the parking lot.A car door slamming.An engine turning over.And the ragged breaths coming out of Jake.

But second by second, he locked all that fury down and away.Impressive.Good quality for a cop, Cal supposed, his own breath not quite so steady.

“That’s a fun story,” Jake finally ground out.“Maybe you should share it with your shrink.”

It was meant to be a dig, but Cal wasn’t embarrassed by his therapist.

He was too well aware of how fucked in the head he was.“I happen to think my therapist would be very impressed with my emotional intelligence in this matter.I can’t recommend talking to a professional enough, Jake.You might figure out what in your shitty childhood made you so incapable of admitting you’re wrong.And why you’re so willing to fight to convict an innocent man rather than show a little personal growth.”

Jake jerked his car door open.Said nothing.