“A lot of other people thought that too, Sweet,” Micah continues, his voice dripping with sympathy and tinged with condescension. “The papers didn’t buy it, but the rumors were there. There were a few coincidences that guided suspicion in that direction. The cops checked into it . . . and discovered nothing.”

“You trust the cops?”

Micah smiles. “About as much as I trust the stock market. There are a few good stocks and a lot of bad ones, and there’s a whole bunch of corrupt bullshit going on behind the scenes that nobody gets to see. Still, I gotta admit, while they harass innocent people all the time, they’re not in the habit of sending innocent people to prison. Occasionally it happens, but it’s rare. And if the cops had any evidence, boy they would have loved to have sent even one of the Gables to prison. It would have been quite an impressive bust, a career maker for some blue-collar detective eager to bust a banker. But there was nothing, Sweet. I checked. As for Travis, well, I do a little business with him.”

“Wait, you—”

Micah holds up his hand to stop me. “All aboveboard of course. But if I thought Travis was capable of doing what you seem to think he’s done, I would have brought him into my operation.”

“Micah!”

“Sorry, Sweet, but it’s true. See, there are a lot of people who are capable of giving themselves over to violence. For those people, violence is a drug that they get a euphoric high from. And like all addicts, they end up using their drug recklessly and in excess so that in the end they make a big mess out of everything. I’d wager you’ve met a lot of people like that in your life, am I right?”

I give a curt and impatient nod, silently urging him to get to his point.

Micah continues, “But to set someone up as effectively as you seem to think your mother was set up? A man who uses violence as a drug couldn’t do that. He would have slipped up, made some careless mistake in the heat of the kill. He would have shot Nick at an angle that would have been impossible for someone of your mother’s height or shot him when your mother had a clear alibi. It’s the rare individual who is capable of mastering violence and applying it with discretion and care so that it can grant specific results. A man who can turn every gunshot and punch into a business decision? That’s a man I can use. But Travis is not that man. Neither is Lander nor their father, Edmund. The sad truth is, they’re simply not that ruthless.”