Finally he asked, “Did you at least tell them I said that years ago, before I was elected?”

“Of course. I even clarified the context.” Sophie paused. “But you and I both know it doesn’t matter in the eye of the public.”

Every word must be parsed, reflected on and tested before a statement was made. He knew that. But he didn’t know that rule when he uttered that statement in an interview about the robbery in his parents’ store.

He exhaled. “I gotta go. I have a meeting with my lawyer in a few minutes.”

“Harry, we need a statement from you. We have to deflect this. Emma Dumond is having a field day with this.” Emma Dumond was a bright young lawyer who was running for his seat in Halifax. Ironically, she reminded him of himself just a few years back, before he had been forced to hide his cynicism from his constituents. Except she was much savvier with social media. Last month, she had milked his refusal to assist Frances Sloane’s assisted suicide agenda. Frances Sloane might be dead, but public opinion was alive and well. It hadn’t helped that the courts had performed a judicial about-face and had struck assisted suicide from the Criminal Code of Canada.

If only you knew the minefield I tread. “I don’t even know if I will be charged with anything.”

“But isn’t that girl almost dead?”

“That girl is a criminal.” The weight pressed on his chest. Those eyes…like a frightened doe when he shot her. “And so far, she is still alive.”

“But they are saying the gun was a prohibited weapon—”

“I didn’t know it was, Sophie. They can’t prove intent.”

“Harry,” she said, her voice low, “they are going to want to know how a MP on the Public Safety Committee could not know that his father owned a prohibited weapon.”

“Jesus, Sophie, do you know everything your father owns? I had no idea. He doesn’t tell me everything, just like I don’t tell him everything.”

Even though that was supposed to be an innocent remark, it sounded strangely ominous. As if he had a secret to hide.

He did. And now that his mother was dead, he was going to keep it that way.

There was a pause on the other end of the phone.

He cleared his throat. “Look, I gotta go.”

And then he hung up.

He left his phone by the bed as he took a shower. The warm water slid down his skin. His mind raced. He twisted the temperature knob to the cold setting. Icy drops pounded into his skin. He closed his eyes and let the water run over his face, his chest, his thighs.

Make it go away. Make it all go away.

That seemed to be his mantra for most of his life.