Chief Shaw licked his lips, and his fingers ran across the supplies on his desk: pens, paperclips, a couple of stray booklets bound in plastic spirals. “You were right before when you asked if he had made a deal. I called the prime minister with the details, and he accepted. It killed your father to do it, madam. He wanted Senator La Roux to pay a steep price for his actions, for what he had done to you, but the needs of Bullstow must come before vengeance.”
“What deal?”
Shaw shifted in his chair. It squeaked in the quiet room. “Senator La Roux told me that he didn’t want his children to suffer for what he had done, and he knew that your father and I would not want Bullstow to suffer for it either. You understand our position, madam. The prime minister would rather this whole affair did not come out. What good would it do if the people of Saxony found out that a senator had tried to bribe his way into a better seat? That’s not how the men of Bullstow are raised. Besides, if the idiots out there knew you were watching BullNet, they’d be harder to catch. It would also put you, me, and your father in danger.”
“I don’t understand.”
Chief Shaw rubbed his mustache. “One of the cooks at Hotel Emeraude prepared a meal for him, and I left him my gun for dessert. One bullet.”
“Just like that?”
“If it makes you feel any better, he needed two. I was slow to help him.”
Lila stretched her hands out on Shaw’s desk, uncomprehending. Her mind didn’t call forth her last images of La Roux, with his face scowling and angry, his hands around her neck. No, her mind pulled deeper. Her mind reached for the La Roux she had
met on the night of the ball, teasing her with his cocky smile.
The La Roux who had lain atop her, naked and hard, thrusting in and out of her body.
The La Roux who had ticked her ribs.
The La Roux who had needed her help.
“It’s not as if this is the first time a deal like this has been struck. The senate interns are told about it by their mentors after they win their first nomination. The senate is not as clean as we’d like for people to believe. We wash away stains of dishonor with blood, just like the families.”
“How often do you wash it with blood?”
“I’ve lost my gun three times in the last fifteen years. Two more senators didn’t have the nerve. They went to trial.”
Lila crossed her arms over her chest and leaned back in her seat. “Senators Hardwicke and Jackson.”
“Yes, madam.”
She remembered the two well. Their scandals and trials had been in the media for months, flooring the country.
“What will Saxony know?”
“Senator La Roux suffered a horrible car accident this morning, and Dr. Booth cremated the body soon after. He’s signed off on the official report and classified the autopsy. No one will know the real story. If I’m not very much mistaken, it’s already in the papers.”
“And Commander Sutton?”
“Your father has spoken to her personally, not that she knows the truth. He claimed she’d listen to him.”
“What about his family?”
“Senator Pierre La Roux spoke to his son last night and vowed to keep the secret. He’s a Unity senator, so he knows the score. He won’t tell anyone but Chairwoman Masson. It would bring shame on him, his children, and his son’s children if the secret got out. It would render his son’s sacrifice as pointless in the end.”
“And his mother?”
“The senator promised to break the news if she questioned the report. She won’t, though. Parents tend to know. She won’t look too closely and spoil the fairytale image of her son.”
Lila shook her head in disbelief. “Just like that, you’ve erased everything he’s done.”
“Nothing can erase it completely. You’ll always remember, and it will be in my records. Some might guess, of course, after we arrest the highborn and hackers who infiltrated the government servers. But from what Senator La Roux told us, he was careful for them not to know who pulled the strings. The things he had them to do were subtle, much more subtle than his treatment of you, or he would have been in the Saxony Senate by now. In a few weeks, Bullstow will exile Sergeant Muller and Sergeant Davies. Things will sort themselves out.”
“I don’t know if this is right or if it’s wrong.”
“Maybe it was just the best end to a bad situation. Everyone benefited from the deal, and he knew it. He would have been hanged within the month. At least this way, his family’s honor and the honor of High House are both upheld.”