The Angels' Share (The Bourbon Kings Book 2) by J. R. Ward

anything Pford needed exposure to. He was not to be trusted. “Richard, please take her back inside.”
    “Lane?” When Gin went to step down, at least her fiancé caught her arm. “Lane, what is it?”
    “I’ll be right in and I’ll explain things.” Which would be a stretch—because he had no clue what the hell was going on. “Richard, please.”
    Pford started to pull her back inside, but Gin broke free and ran across the lawn in her high heels. As she came up and looked in the hole, an expression of horror made ugliness out of her beauty.
    “What is
that
,” she demanded.
    Samuel T. steadied Gin and spoke to her in a quiet voice. Then, as he began leading her back toward the house, he looked over his shoulder. “Do you call or shall I?”
    “I will.”
    AsLane fired up his iPhone with Deputy Ramsey’s well-dialed number, he absently noticed that his hands weren’t shaking. Guess he was becoming an old pro with nasty surprises, bad news, and the police coming to his family’s home.
    Oh, hey, Officers, long time no see. And to make you feel more welcome, we’ve got designated parking for you right here in the front of the house.
    One ring. Two rings—
    “I was about to call you,” the deputy said by way of greeting. “They’re going to release your father’s body for cremation tomorrow—”
    “No, they’re not.”
    “Excuse me?”
    Lane focused on that pale slice of flesh that was all smudged with fine Kentucky topsoil. “We found something buried. Right under my mother’s window. You and your boys in the homicide department are going to want to come back here.”
    “What are we talking about.”
    “It’s a piece of my father. As far as I can tell.”
    There was a heartbeat’s worth of pause. “Don’t touch anything. I’m on my way. Have you called Metro Police yet?”
    “No.”
    “Call them—”
    “So the report is logged.”
    “—so the report is logged.”
    Lane laughed in a hard burst. “I know the procedure by now.”
    As they both hung up, Lane let himself ease back onto the grass so that he, Lizzie, and Greta were all sitting in a semi-circle around the hole in true campfire fashion. No s’mores. But there could be a ghost story coming, he thought.
    A moment later, from the mansion’s open front door, sounds of an argument boiled out into the pretty morning, Gin’s voice the loudest, Samuel T.’s right behind hers in terms of volume.
    Too bad he wasn’t murdered.
    Samuel T.’shypothetical echoed around Lane’s head as he wished he hadn’t emptied his glass into the boxwood hedges by the front door.
    This could be a game changer, he thought to himself. Whether it was good news … or bad, remained to be seen.
    “Edward,” he whispered. “Edward, what did you do …”
    O ut in Ogden County, Edward sat back in his Archie Bunker chair and refused to greet his visitor properly. “There is no reason for you to be here.”
    Dr. Michael Qalbi smiled in his gentle way. The guy was thirty-five going on twelve, at least by appearances, his handsome face and jetblack hair belying his half-Iraqi heritage, his miss-nothing brown eyes a warning shot across anyone’s bow lest they were fooled into thinking his kindness could ever be manipulated. His intellect was so formidable, he’d Doogie Howser’d his medical school and residency programs, and then stepped in to help with his father’s concierge practice here in town.
    Edward had been a member of their service for years, but he hadn’t paid his dues since he’d come back to Charlemont. Good soul that he was, Qalbi didn’t seem to care.
    “I truly don’t need you,” Edward tacked on. “And is that a Scrabble tie you’re wearing?”
    Dr. Qalbi looked down at the multicolored, multi-lettered silk strip that hung from around his neck. “Yes, it is. And if you don’t need me, why don’t you get up and show me to the door like the gentleman you are?”
    “We live in PC times. I wouldn’t want to run the risk of