Chapter 6

 

 

IAN WALKED into the bathroom and set a mug of coffee down for me as I put product in my hair, raking my hands through it. I looked at him in the mirror and noted the crossed arms and scowl, the lines between his furrowed brows I always found sexy. I was getting the serious face, and so I took a sip of the French roast with the perfect balance of cream and girded myself for whatever he was going to say.

“Okay,” I said with mock seriousness, “release the Kraken.”

“This is not funny.”

I leaned toward him anyway, wanting a kiss, needing it before I started whatever the day was going to be.

“No.”

I froze, mid lean, mid pucker, and grinned. “No, what?”

“That won’t work,” he told me flatly. “You don’t get to be adorable or irresistible or any of the things I normally find you.”

This was news. “You find me irresistible?”

“And sexy and everything else,” he concluded. “But right now that doesn’t matter.”

“Why doesn’t it matter?” I really wanted to know, because him wanting me was always a very good thing, and he didn’t cough up the vault of his heart often.

Ian still, after so long, was not the kind of man who revealed much about his own thoughts and feelings. It simply wasn’t him. I didn’t know if it had to do with his mother and how emotionally closed off she became after his father left, or the military, or whether it was simply him. But I did know things learned and seen when you were a kid didn’t just poof into the ether when you hit puberty. Life lessons were just that: they stayed forever.

“We’re not going off on a tangent,” he explained, his tone, that fast, already irritated. “All kissing, touching, hugging, anything is off the table until we have this out.”

I was crap in the morning before I had lots of caffeine in me, and he knew that. I had no idea why he was trying to—

“Drink more of that,” he commanded, tipping his chin at the tantalizing cup of coffee. “Hurry up.”

I took several sips because it wasn’t scalding—it was drinkable, yet another truth he knew about me. “Okay, now, what are we having out?”

Arms crossed, legs braced, I got the picture. We were picking up where we left off last night in the street. This was us talking about our career paths.

“So we’re going to discuss me not wanting to wear Kevlar.”

He waited, those gorgeous clear eyes of his on me just as they were the night before. But now instead of blown pupils and the struggle to remain open, I had hyperfocus that was really a lot to deal with so early in the morning.

“And I get that this is serious, but why can’t I touch you?”

“Because I can’t concentrate if you do, and I wanna know what the hell is going on with you not wanting to be my partner anymore!”

And I got it, I did. He’d left the Army for him, not me, but still, being my partner, being there when I needed him at work in the capacity of being my backup, was also a big part of why he could give up being in Special Forces. So me telling him the path he wanted to take was not the one I felt was best for me was, to him, a betrayal of trust, hence the yelling. It all made sense; it was just a lot of volume in the space of the bathroom.

I left, taking my coffee with me. He caught up easily—he was not carrying precious liquid—and barred my path.

“Talk to me.”

“Then sit while I find something to wear.”

He grunted but let me pass, and I took several sips before leaving the cup on the nightstand to go rummage through my closet.

“Now,” he insisted, taking a seat on the bed to watch me.

“Kage and I went up to Custodial to speak to—”

“No,” he stopped me. “Go back to you getting hurt and go forward.”

Ian was a details guy; he liked to know all of them. It was not a surprise that me starting midstory wasn’t going to work for him.

“It all started with seeing Wen Li yesterday,” I began. “She was placed in a home that pimps out little girls.”

He didn’t say anything, so I glanced over my shoulder and saw the stunned expression on his face.

“It’s true,” I sighed, turning to face him. “You should have seen them, both girls with bruises, both of them—” I couldn’t tell him they both had STDs, both jumped at every loud noise, recoiling from every man who came near them except me. When Han saw me walking into her room, she’d hyperventilated with happiness. “It was horrible.”

“And where are they now?”

“With their aunt in San Antonio.”

“Where the hell was the aunt this whole time?”

It was a long story, so I hit the high points for him, running down the connections.

“Well, good,” he sighed, “at least they’re safe now, but what the hell does this have to do with you not working with me?”

“Because what happened to those two girls, no one looking out for them, has been happening to a lot of the kids in Custodial.”

The realization of where I was going with this spread slowly across his face. I saw the dread appear as he furrowed his brows and clenched his jaw, and then, of course, he crossed his arms over his wide, muscular chest.

“Fuck no.”

“Wait.”

He stood up. “No fuckin’ way, Miro.”

“Why?”

“You’ll be taking care of kids.”

“Exactly.”

“Yeah, that’s not gonna work.”

“And why’s that?”

“You know why.”

“Clearly not,” I said indignantly.

“Don’t do that,” he cautioned. “It’s not the right choice for you, period.”

“It’s not for you to say.”

“Oh no?” he said dramatically.

“Just—”

“You can’t do that. It’s not a good place for you.”

“Kage seems to think it is.”

“Well, Mills is the one who—”

“We both know that Kage eats Mills for lunch, and besides, I don’t know how much longer he’s even gonna have a job. I wouldn’t get too cozy with him.”

“I don’t give a shit about Mills,” he snapped, starting to pace. “Or me. I only care about you, and you in Custodial is a very bad idea.”

“What’s your problem with Custodial?”

“That should be obvious.”

“No,” I answered irritably. He’d never doubted my abilities before; I was at a loss to understand why he didn’t think I was up to the challenge of working with minors. “It’s not. Explain what you’re thinking.”

“Can you not see that you’re gonna get hurt?”

“How? I get a paper cut or something?”

“Don’t be an ass,” he hissed, the anger bubbling in his voice.

“I’m not trying to be. I’m really trying to figure out what you’re talking about.”

He took hold of my arms, staring into my face. “You will get hurt because you’ll get invested with the kids like you always do, and when things go wrong—again, because they always do—you’re gonna be devastated.”

I absorbed that, rolled it around in my head a second, him thinking I would be emotionally devastated if something were to happen to one of the kids. And while he was right—yes, it would hurt—that was part of putting yourself out there in any kind of relationship, be it personal or professional. It didn’t in any way change the need to act. “Are you serious?”

The answering growl told me he was.

“For crissakes, Ian,” I sighed, cupping his face in my hands. “Of course I’m gonna get hurt, but that’s part of it, right?”

“No,” he retorted, visibly choked up, easing out of my hands and taking several steps back. “You were a foster kid, Miro. You remember what it was like to have no one and be homeless—how are reminders like that good for you?”

“They’re not,” I agreed. “But they also make me damn empathetic, right?”

He shook his head. “That’s not our deal.”

“Deal? What deal?” I rasped, frustrated because it was like pulling teeth. He was being so closed off.

“You’re my partner.”

“Yeah, and you’re mine,” I reminded him. “I’ll bet you right now that Kage expects you to go with me today to start talking to the kids.”

“Which is fine for today,” he said pointedly. “But that’s it.”

“I’m the interim director.”

His scowl was dark.

“Speak.”

“You have to tell Kage to find someone else.”

“Oh? Just tell Kage?”

“Yeah.”

“Ian, I—”

“No. If you tell him you can’t because of being in foster care yourself, he’ll listen.”

“But that would be a lie.”

“I don’t care. I don’t want you to do it, so whatever you have to do to get out of it is fine with me.”

“And what if it’s not fine with me?”

He shook his head.

“Ian, you—”

“No,” he insisted, and I could hear the hard edge of anger in his voice. “I won’t let you do this to yourself. This is bullshit.”

“You can’t be serious,” I pressed, certain he would snap out of feeling like this at any second because it was so illogical.

“Oh, I’m dead serious,” he countered, and I heard how dug in he was, how he was so sure he was right.

“Ian, come on, this isn’t like you.”

“I have a say now,” he reminded me implacably. “We’re not just partners. We’re married, and my opinion means something.”

“It always meant something!”

“Yeah, but now there’s weight too. If I say no, it’s no.”

I loved him, but he was being ridiculous. “That’s not how marriage works!”

“I think that’s exactly how it works,” he ground out hoarsely, the emotion there in his voice as he swallowed hard, trying to breathe through his anger.

I had to figure out why he was actually mad. What was it he was so scared of? Because this wasn’t about control—Ian didn’t want power over me, but right now, at this moment, he was absolutely terrified. I just had to figure out of what.

“Are you listening to me?”

Ian was a natural protector, and the person he most wanted to keep safe was me.

“Honey, you can’t stand between me and the world for the rest of my life,” I explained, trying to keep my voice level so he’d hear me and not bristle. “And I wouldn’t want you to.”

“Well, clearly I do since you’re not using your head.”

Deep breath because, holy shit, did he want to have a knock-down drag-out or what? He was ready to throw down with me right there. “I know exactly what I’m doing.”

His snarl of frustration told me he was far angrier than I originally thought. “Listen, I know you have a natural drive to create families wherever you go.”

“What are you talking about?” I had him; he was it, my whole family. There wasn’t anyone else besides—

“I’m talking about the girls. You made a family there.”

“I didn’t even have one before—”

“Cabot, Drake, and Josue spent Thanksgiving with us last year, and they were right back again at Christmas.”

“Are you kidding?” I asked, surprised the boys were being thrown in my face since from seeing them all together, it seemed he liked them. “What the hell was I supposed to do? They have no one but us and… I… we—”

“Just—”

“I thought you liked having them over here!”

“I did! I do!” he shouted, back to pacing. “They’re all good, but think about it for a second. What’re you gonna do when you realize that you can’t bring home every kid that’s in Custodial to live with us?”

“I already know that.”

“Are you sure?”

“You’re being really fuckin’ snide,” I advised him, feeling my blood start to boil with how condescending his words were.

“I don’t care. The fact of the matter is that every kid that we’ve ever been in charge of, you’ve brought into our home.”

“There’ve been extenuating circumstances.”

“Won’t there always be?”

“A little credit here, please.”

“Don’t gimme that shit. This isn’t about credit or anything else but me knowing that you always think there’s something else you can do.”

“Are you listening to yourself?” He made no sense. “I haven’t even started yet. How can I know shit about what I can or cannot do?”

“Again, this goes back to your desire to create families—which is great, it is—but I don’t want one. I don’t wanna be anyone’s father, I don’t want to adopt, I just… I don’t.”

“Have you lost your mind? I don’t wanna be a father either.”

“That’s a lie,” he retorted.

But it wasn’t.

Even though thinking back on what Aruna had said made me start to wonder about what kind of father I would be, I still wasn’t ready to say I wanted to be a parent. She had faith and she knew me well, so there had to be some truth to her belief I had paternal ability in me somewhere. But that didn’t translate to fatherhood. And did that mean me being a caregiver meant I was there for a child, or was I there for mentoring, for guiding kids who didn’t have someone in their corner? I didn’t have the answer, but certainly I would never push a choice on Ian. I would never presume that because I wanted something, he had to as well. Our marriage was a partnership first, and in it, to me, he was first always, so to hear him think I could want something he didn’t, push him to do something he didn’t want—that hurt.

I was stunned, and the hurt must have shown on my face.

“You know it is,” he said raggedly, reaching for me but stopping himself. “You’re ready to be a father.”

“Ian,” I said, taking a breath so I wouldn’t say something wrong. “I—”

“You know what the worst part of this is?” he asked, heat in his tone. “I don’t think you even realize that you already are a father.”

“To who?” I asked sharply.

“Well, for starters, to Josue and Cabot and Drake.”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake, Ian, I—”

“No, you come on! You have any idea what it’s like for me to watch you bring home strays? I mean, Jesus, Miro, why do you keep doing that? Where’s that compulsion come from?”

“From a place of caring? From being a decent human being?”

“Don’t gimme that,” he snapped. “We’re not talking about having Sharpe over after he and his girl broke up, or babysitting for Liam and Aruna, or something like that. We’re talking about you not being able to separate yourself from people you meet on the job.”

“I had no idea this bothered you so much. I can stop having the boys over so you—”

“I’m not talking about the boys!” he yelled, arms flailing, flushed now, his voice shredded with emotion. “I like the boys! What I’m talking about is the precedent that you’ve already set.”

“I—”

“You have to nurture others. It’s part of who you are, and it’s one of the reasons I love you, but I thought that at home, I would be enough, but I’m not.”

“You’re more than enough,” I gasped, blindsided by his admission. He was everything! My whole life walking around in one person. How could he believe for a second he was not?

“I don’t mean… it, like… shit—what I mean is that you have to take care of more than just me. You have to take care of everyone.”

“But that’s not true.”

“That’s bullshit, and you knew it was the second it came out of your mouth.”

I shook my head because I wasn’t sure how to make him hear me.

“Listen, I don’t fuckin’ care about this right now, we can figure the kid part out later—”

“Ian, I’m not dying to be a father or—”

“Again, this is not my immediate concern,” he said, his voice rising ominously but not yelling, back to pacing. Apparently he was done shouting. “What I do care about is the fact that you are not going to work in Custodial WITSEC, and that’s final.”

I crossed my arms, watching him move back and forth like a caged animal. “Is that right?”

“Oh fuck yeah,” he warned, his voice all steely and honed.

“And why not?”

“I forbid it.”

I wasn’t certain I’d heard him right. “I thought you said you didn’t drink last night,” I challenged, half of me pissed he thought his word had suddenly become law, half of me mollified by knowing all of his bluster had to do with being scared to death that I would get my heart eviscerated every single day. It came from a place of love, but he was being an ass, and I had to get him out of protective mode and back to the rational man I knew.

“What?”

“I thought you said you—”

“I had two drinks to your nine or whatever,” he retorted, the judgment there in his cutting tone. “And what the hell does that have to do with the discussion we’re having right now?”

“Because clearly you’re drunk,” I apprised him, trying for playful, hoping maybe that would work.

“What did you say?” His voice went way up.

“Forbid me?” I repeated, shaking my head like he was nuts. “The hell is with that?”

“Miro.” He huffed a breath like I was trying his patience to no end, jolting to a stop in front of me. “Are you serious?”

“Yeah, I’m serious, and don’t treat me like an idiot.”

“Then please, love, stop acting like one,” he said softly, lulling, his tone, everything, shifting to coaxing, wanting me to hear him, to listen, and using the depth and resonance of his voice to soothe me.

“Ian—”

He shook his head. “You’re not listening to me, and you’re hearing it like an attack, and it’s not,” he said, shivering with the emotion, his hands trembling as he took a deep breath. “Please just listen to me.”

I took a step closer, but he took one back, hand up to keep me away from him as he turned and walked to the bed and sat down before lifting his eyes to me.

“We’re made different. You need more than just me to take care of, and I get that, I do. So when the boys trickled in, as Cabot and Drake got closer because we’re all they’ve got—I was okay with that. When you added Josue last year—again—made sense. But now you’re talking about going beyond the occasional witness pickup to being a surrogate father to hundreds of kids. I just don’t see how that ends well.”

“It won’t be like that,” I assured him, walking over to take a seat beside him. I got close, but I didn’t touch him, unsure if he would want that.

There was resignation now, almost like he was grieving, and honestly, that was worse. The fight in him had drained away, leaving only defeat. I almost preferred the yelling to Ian ever being hurt, and especially by me. “I think you’re being really naïve.”

He was killing me. “Ian—”

As he turned to face me, the sadness in his eyes made my stomach hurt. It hit me then that he was absolutely terrified.

“I’m not gonna leave you.”

He nodded, but I could tell from the response, automatic, that he didn’t believe me.

“Ian—”

“You have to imagine, for a second, what does our family become if you keep trying to add to it? And if you work in Custodial, will I ever see you again?”

“I—”

“No, you really need to think about this now,” he stressed, holding my gaze. “What does you working there do to us?”

It would be the same as what I did now. Yes, the things I did would be different, the people I saw, what I dealt with on a daily basis, but it would still just be me being a marshal. I shook my head. “I truly think you’re making too much of this.”

“No, I’m not. I don’t want anything to come between us. I picked you; I want you. If you persist with this, then you’re telling me that I’m not enough.”

“That’s ridiculous,” I bit off because, all of a sudden, this felt like blackmail. If I didn’t follow him to SOG or wherever else, then he was going to question my commitment to him? It was ludicrous! I was in love with him, but I knew where my strengths lay, and they were not in kicking down doors and arresting people. “Ian, you need to—”

“No, think about it. I want to do a job. We can stay like we are, investigators working for Kage, or we can both go to SOG. Either way, those jobs stop at the end of the day. If you’re in Custodial, does that stop?”

He was basically telling me what he thought I should do with my life. It was arrogant and hurtful and blind… but I knew it was coming from a place of loss. Ian had lost his father to divorce, his mother to death, had just made a huge choice to leave the Army, and now, if he didn’t have me—his husband—then what was left? So I had to reassure him while sticking to my guns at the same time.

“Of course it stops.”

“No, I don’t think so. I know you. You’re going to be thinking about the kids, about saving them, about fixing things for them all the time.”

“Ian—”

“I left the Army to be here with you, home with you, and be your partner at work. If we’re not partners anymore and I don’t get to see you because you’re going to be putting in ridiculous hours, then what was the point? Tell me what the point was.”

“The point was that we’re together, and you’re home and—”

His phone buzzed on the nightstand, and after a few beats of pained silence, he got up and walked around the bed to check it because we were required to. After reading the display, he picked it up and answered. “Morning, sir.”

I watched him listen, saw him furrow his brows as he slowly drew himself up, all the rippling apprehension that had drained away back in seconds, the strain easy to read on his scrunched-up features. In the past I would have thought he was about to be deployed, the call coming in to get his gear and head for the airport. But Ian had dropped his retirement packet, so he no longer went out on missions, just had to do his drills one weekend a month and two weeks’ AT in the summer. But the rigid stance I saw couldn’t be military, and so had to be something else.

“Yessir, we’ll be right there,” he said and then disconnected the call and turned to me.

“What?”

“This discussion isn’t over, but Kage wants us downtown now.”

I nodded.

He charged back around the bed, and I stood fast so that the second I could reach him, I reeled him into my arms. Wrapping him up tight, I pressed my face against his shoulder and simply inhaled, loving the fresh, clean detergent and fabric softener smell of his clothes, along with the trace of lime from the shampoo he used, and the vetiver and cedarwood from the skin balm he smoothed over his face every morning.

There was a truth here I needed to be smart about. Nothing was more important that Ian. I made him a promise the day we exchanged rings, and that was bigger than anything else. Remembering how it was when he was deployed, how I was, how lonely and untethered it made me, how I ached for him body and soul, made it even more obvious.

“I thought wherever I go, Miro goes. It was never a question.” Ian sighed, leaning his head on mine, holding me as fiercely as I was him. “I know that was an assumption, but—”

“No,” I insisted, even though I knew that in a way, he was right. It was an assumption, and truthfully, a wrong one. Because we didn’t have to do the same job to be together, and in that respect, he needed a reality check. We had completely different strengths, and what I was good at and what he was good at might not work on the same team. But there was one absolute, and I needed him to know. “I won’t sacrifice us for any job, Ian. I swear to you I won’t.”

“I don’t think that’s a promise you can keep,” he murmured before kissing my cheek and resting his forehead against mine so we were breathing the same air.

Taking the job or not had just become a much bigger decision than I ever imagined.

 

 

BY THE time we got downtown to the Federal building, I was stewing. It had occurred to me while Ian drove that, had he been with me when I got hurt, and had he seen Wen at the hospital and then gone to Cullen’s office with us, maybe he would have said something right then. And if he had spoken up when Kage was thinking about me in the director’s role, then perhaps Kage would have rethought his position, and none of this would have ever been an issue. Not that I didn’t want to help kids, not that this wasn’t the place for me, but maybe Ian could have stopped the whole cycle from starting.

On the other hand, had he done that, I might have died of humiliation right there, assuming Kage even let Ian get a word in, which was a stretch. I couldn’t imagine Kage letting anyone but that individual make decisions for himself.

The fact of the matter was, because Ian wasn’t there, he was coming late to the party after I had already given my word, and now everything was a huge fucking mess.

I slammed the passenger-side door to the truck and started toward the entrance to the building without looking at him. Ian caught me easily, grabbing my bicep and spinning me around to face him.

“What?”

He scowled instantly. “Tell me what you’re thinking.”

I shook my head. “It won’t fix anything.”

“Why’re you pissed at me?”

Really, the balls on the man, holy shit. “No,” I said, slipping around him to again head for the underground entrance.

“No?”

“I am not doing this when we’re about to go up in the goddamn elevator.”

He caught up to me easily, cutting in front of me, and when I went to walk by him again, he barred my path and put his hands on my hips under my John Varvatos suit jacket.

“I’m not stupid,” he said huskily, staring into my eyes. “I know if I’d been there yesterday that I could have said something to you—or even Kage—before this went down.”

Easing free of his hold, I stepped back and crossed my arms as I regarded him. “I was just thinking about that, and really, you would’ve said something to Kage when he was in fixer mode? Is that what you’re telling me?”

He was thinking about that, I could tell from the squint.

“When he gets all barky with the orders, and when he snaps all his words?”

The grimace was telling. No one I knew said a word when Kage turned into a steamroller. None of us had the balls.

“I’m just scared, all right?” he rasped, voice cracking. “We just locked this thing down, and I don’t want anything to fuck it up.”

“I don’t either, but you know how you’ve been saying that you want us together at work?”

“I do want that.”

“Yes,” I agreed, “but your actions don’t really convey that, right?”

“How do you mean?”

“Ian” was all I said.

He was quiet a moment before I got the grunt that told me he’d figured it out. “I have been spending a lot of time with SOG instead of backing you up.”

“Which is fine.”

“Except not yesterday.”

“That was a one-off. Doesn’t happen every day.”

“Yeah, but here I am telling you I want us to stay partners, and… I can see where I’d come off a bit hypocritical.”

It was one of Ian’s best qualities, his own self-awareness, given a little time.

“But SOG needs me,” he countered, still scowling. “They need us.”

“They need somebody to take charge, I’ll give you that, but I actually think you’re more qualified than is necessary, and I‘d be no help to them at all. Think about me there. Can you even see it?”

“Yes,” he said, crossing his arms as I dropped mine.

“Really?” I asked, taking hold of his biceps. “Ian?”

His growl made me smile. It was impossible for him not to see my side of an argument, had always been that way. He just needed time. And not that things were fixed—they were not, he was still scared—but I saw the thaw in his icy gaze.

“Yeah, well, maybe you can do some thinking for yourself.”

“Oh?” I taunted. “Can I?”

“You don’t have to be all—I mean, I can see where I could’ve come off like a dick.”

He wasn’t sorry, he wasn’t apologizing, but he had put himself in my place and saw himself from my perspective, and really, it was impressive.

“When you scare me, though, I can’t think.”

And I knew that too.

I held his gaze, marveling as I always did over the color. Every now and then, I was still amazed I had fallen in love with my best friend and that he’d fallen for me right back.

“I’m just—”

“Worried,” I offered, moving him back and forth a bit because I really wanted to shake him violently until he saw the truth of the situation. Because yes, I could be a bleeding heart, and most assuredly I was going to get hurt… but it would be okay because I had him to go home to every night. Wasn’t that the whole point of a marriage, of a union, to begin with? Having a partner who could strip away all the bullshit from your day, make you feel loved, help you enjoy life, and create a sanctuary that let you breathe? “But won’t you be there to pick up the pieces?”

“Yes.”

“Isn’t that what you signed on for?”

He nodded.

“Well, then.”

He searched my face a moment before leaning in and brushing a light kiss over my lips. It was fast, barely there, and then he took hold of my hand to tug me after him. Ian being possessive of me after we had any kind of disagreement was a usual occurrence, and since I liked it and it gave him comfort, I followed along behind him without another word.

Once the elevator hit the lobby, we had to move to the back of the car, and as more and more people crammed in, I found myself wedged into the corner with Ian in front of me, his broad, muscular back pressed to my chest as he stood there solid and strong where I knew he wanted to be, between me and everyone else. I would have grabbed him and hugged him if we’d been alone, would have let my head fall between his shoulder blades, would have simply kissed the back of his neck if we weren’t at work. And it hit me that was true for any two people who worked together in a professional setting, and there was something sweet and secret about our situation. As the elevator climbed floor after floor and became less and less crowded, I couldn’t help but give Ian’s hand a quick squeeze before he stepped away from me.

At our floor, we stepped out, and I immediately saw Kage was in the middle of the office—at Ian’s desk, actually, perched on the edge of it, addressing the room. Five men stood off to the side, and I thought at first glance I didn’t know any of them until I looked closer and saw that I did.

When I first met Josiah Redeker in the terminal of the Vegas airport, I thought he looked like a guy who ran a bar or belonged in a motorcycle gang. I’d been binge-watching Sons of Anarchy while Ian was deployed, so that was probably why that thought tumbled into my head. But as I got to know him over the course of a couple of days, I realized that under the carelessly kept surface was a man with laser focus and the ability to adapt quickly to any given situation.

He, like Ian, could go from complete stillness to an explosion of motion in seconds. There was also the whiff of loner that came off him, a sort of wandering cowboy quality complete with a gleam of danger in his dark eyes that was terribly appealing. There was no denying his masculine beauty, and I completely understood why his partner had it so bad. The fact that Bodhi Callahan was not standing beside him concerned me. If Redeker was in Chicago alone, the fallout must have been bad when Bodhi confessed his feelings. The last I knew, I thought that was the plan, but perhaps that was wrong as well. I hadn’t followed up, so maybe they had just gone their separate ways. And maybe not. Maybe I was reading way too much into him being here alone, and nothing had occurred at all. I was going to find out, though, just as soon as possible.

When Ian and I stepped into the bullpen, all five men turned to look at us, and when Redeker saw me, his face broke into the wide smile with the deep lines—not dimples, as they creased the length of his cheeks—I remembered well from my short time spent with him. I raised my hand, and he gave me a nod back.

“Who’s that?” Ian asked close to my ear.

“Josiah Redeker, out of the Vegas office,” I replied softly, not wanting to disturb Kage, who was saying something about changes. “I worked with him and his partner, Bodhi Callahan, when I transported Josue.”

Ian grunted, and we both looked at Kage, who had stopped speaking.

We were just inside the circle of desks on the outer edge, but I had no desire to move closer, especially with Kage being quiet as he scanned the room. Normally that meant he was deciding something as he stood there, and like in school when you didn’t know the answer, not making eye contact never helped. But being right in front of him was not the best idea either.

When the elevator dinged, Eli came into the room, followed closely by Maureen Prescott. She and Eli had not come together; that was clear when Eli stopped walking, noticing her behind him. Prescott said something to him quickly and touched his arm briefly as she scooted around him to join Kage at Ian’s desk. At the same time, Elyes stood up from her desk right outside Kage’s office and joined him and Prescott. They were all quiet for a moment, and only then did I see Prescott holding what looked like a large organizer with one of those Velcro closures, and Elyes had two smaller ones, as well as a handful of lanyards.

“Okay,” Kage said. He took a breath before rising to his towering height and crossing his arms, which always made them look like tree trunks. “In the last twelve hours, there have been some big changes here at the office, and because of those, this department will be impacted.”

Everyone was silent; nobody moved. Nobody even took a sip of morning coffee, which was amazing since we were a huge caffeine-fueled group.

“The only one I’ve spoken privately to is Becker,” Kage said, looking over at him, giving a slight smile that somehow conveyed warmth, even being no more than a faint softening of his eyes and a curl to his lip that was gone before he turned back to all of us, “as he is the only one who’s being promoted. The rest of you will receive your new interim assignments, and they will be assessed in ninety days.”

Still quiet.

“As our department grows, so does our reach into the community, and we need to be able to work seamlessly with other law enforcement. The task force opportunities will only grow as we educate and are in turn educated by other agencies. For that reason, I’ve added a deputy director position here that we haven’t had before—haven’t needed before now—that will coordinate this new interagency cooperation.”

Poor Becker. Really, God, poor fucking Becker. I couldn’t imagine the horror of being the guy who had to talk to Chicago PD and the Illinois State Police, the FBI, Homeland, ATF, and of course, the DEA. I got chills just thinking about being the poster boy of interagency clusterfucks. It made sense he’d choose Becker, as he was without a doubt the one of us who was the most unflappable, the most grounded, the guy who rowed the steadiest boat. But still, to be the center of the storm, the one who had to keep tabs on everyone, who coordinated who went where and how and what and when, required a level of professionalism and patience, organization and quiet, steely command I certainly did not possess. Becker was the best choice for the job.

“So,” Kage said, taking a breath, “as of today, Christopher Becker has been promoted to supervisory deputy of the Northern District of Illinois.”

It took a second for the words to sink in because that was not where I thought he was going at all. And didn’t we already have a supervisory deputy?

“Holy shit,” I gasped, stunned and sucker-punched but also very thrilled for my friend, who so deserved the promotion. Just working with Ching all those years should have gotten him some kind of commendation.

I started whooping and clapping along with everyone else, and anyone who wasn’t standing did, as did Becker, who smiled, nodded, and gave us a wave before flipping us all off. It was totally him.

He then turned to Kage, who walked over to him and offered this hand. The two men shook, with Kage squeezing his shoulder and Becker taking deep breaths.

“I won’t let you down, sir,” he promised as Kage passed him a new badge, new credentials in the small trifold wallet, and a lanyard we were all supposed to wear inside the building and never did.

“I know that,” Kage assured him with a true smile this time, patting Becker’s shoulder before releasing him and stepping back.

We rushed Becker then, Ching first, hugging his best friend and partner tight and whispering urgently.

All I heard was Becker’s reply: “Nothing changes with us.”

“No,” Ching agreed, pounding his back and then letting go so the rest of us could hug him, one after another.

After he and Ian embraced, when my husband went to draw back, Becker clutched at him, holding him there. “I promise to give you all the support you need, Doyle.”

Ian looked up at him, appreciative but also confused. “Why do I need support?”

Becker shrugged and then gave him a pat before letting him go.

“Settle,” Kage ordered, and we all went quiet. “Darren Mills has been reassigned to the Warrants division here and will be reporting to Becker as of today.”

He didn’t say the words no one ever wanted to be associated with: demotion, reclassification, reassignment. I noticed the grimaces on everyone and felt it too, the stab of guilt that came with the relief that it wasn’t me.

“As supervisory deputy, you carry a gun, but Mills does not in his new capacity,” Kage said, enunciating the “not” at the end so Becker, along with the rest of us, were clear. “I had him turn in his firearm last night, but if he comes in with his spare for any reason, he’s to be placed immediately on administrative leave.” He finished with a pointed stare at his new supervisory deputy.

“Yessir,” Becker acknowledged solemnly.

I glanced over at Becker, and his look of pain was unmissable. That was going to be a barrel of fun right there.

“Moving on,” Kage said quickly, facing the room. “The commander position that has been vacant in SOG will be filled by Wesley Ching.”

I was stunned, and clearly, when I turned to Ian, so was he. But Ching was a former Marine, a gunnery sergeant with years of combat experience, and he’d been a marshal a lot longer than the rest of us, except for Becker. So the surprise wasn’t that Ching couldn’t do the job, never that, it was just that Ian, with his Special Forces background—he was an ex–Green Beret, for fuck’s sake—was, in my mind, the more likely choice.

But… if I were Kage, maybe that’s the choice I would have made too. As hotheaded as Ching seemed, as dangerous as his reputation was, as badass, he was still, on a whole, more by-the-book than Ian. He didn’t charge in; he assessed, he made a plan, and he always, always had Becker’s back. There wasn’t a time I could recall when Becker couldn’t turn around and find Ching right there. The same could not be said for me, yesterday being a prime example. Ian went where he thought he was most needed, which was not always where the group consensus agreed he should be.

Before anyone could congratulate Ching, though, Kage lifted his hands to stop us. “I have more of these to get through,” he explained, and so we all stayed still except for Becker, who had his hand on the back of Ching’s neck, squeezing gently as Ching stood, looking dazed but with a trace of a smile lighting up his normally stony expression.

Elyes slipped over to Ching, passed him an organizer and a lanyard, and then moved quickly back to Kage’s side.

“That has a new department designation on the lanyard,” Kage said to Ching, “but your badge remains the same.”

Ching nodded as Kage continued.

“When he returns from vacation, Jer Kowalski will take over the director position of Judicial Support. That department has come under scrutiny lately, and I need someone I can depend on. I have no doubt that he will do an exemplary job.”

“Without a doubt,” Eli agreed, and I could tell from his voice the comment was bittersweet. He’d miss his partner.

“Beginning today, Miro Jones will take over as interim director of Custodial WITSEC.”

Even knowing it was coming, I was still floored by the faith my boss had in me. And when I looked at Ian, expecting him to be shooting daggers out of his eyes, instead I saw resignation.

“Ian?” I said under my breath.

This was my moment, and the question was, would he be supportive or not? Would he ruin it or not? Because yes, he had concerns, and we were arguing and trying to come to some kind of compromise, and the road was about to get ten kinds of rocky, but… taking care of kids, caretaking, nurturing, there was just no way that wasn’t right up my alley. He knew that, didn’t he? If he knew me and knew what I needed and who I was, then couldn’t he put aside what he needed for what I—for what… I… for me. Just me.

It hit me like a bullet to the brain, what I’d been missing, what Ian had been saying all morning.

Holymotherfuckinghell, how goddamn blind was I?

“Miro?”

Jesus Christ, could I be any stupider?

“M?”

Oh, fuck me.

“Love?” Ian whispered, standing next to me beside Kowalski’s desk, which I guess technically wasn’t his anymore because he was leaving, and that was just one of many things that would be different and strange, and since it didn’t seem like Kage was anywhere near done, that meant there would be more strangers coming and more friends leaving, and it felt like everything was moving faster and faster and….

Oh God, oh God, oh God. Life-altering change along with deep, soul-sucking revelation equaled panic attack. I could see the spots in front of my eyes, and the room seemed to be rocking back and forth… back… and forth.

It was funny but, while being shot at, facing life-and-death things, I felt no panic, no hysteria. But anything to do with Ian—like at all—and I was a fucking basket case.

Why was that? What was it about Ian that made me go fetal with doubt?

“Miro,” Ian said, low and gravelly, “try and breathe.”

But yesterday my life was one way, and today….

I thought I’d just be upstairs from the guys I worked with and still see them all the time, and Ian would still be my partner both on and off the field, and I’d still be trying to figure out what Kowalski’s first name was, and Eli and I would hang out, and I’d see… and I would spend time… and….

People were leaving me and—how in the hell had I let myself get so close to all these guys? The girls were one thing. I knew they’d always be there, all four of them like rocks in my life, and then Ian—that was why he had to stay home with me, be home with me, because the idea of losing him was just…. I couldn’t, and now he’d been trying to tell me he was feeling the exact same way, and I—

Because he’d chosen me, us, our life, yes, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t change his mind back. It wasn’t like he had just one choice to make. He had unlimited options if, for instance, he stopped caring about having me in his life. And no, that wasn’t likely, but it was possible. He’d picked me, but he could pick the Army again if I fucked this up, if I showed him over and over again that he was not the most important thing in my life.

I thought that once we were together in the same place each and every day, that would be it. We’d be perfect. But the fact of the matter was, if you didn’t want what you had once you got it, then that didn’t work either. It wasn’t enough of a solution.

What if Ian decided he’d made an impossible choice to be with me, and he couldn’t live with it and wanted to go? Or, again, if he made the wrong choice and wanted to go? Then either way, he’d leave, and I’d be alone. Worse than alone: without him.

A wave of dizziness nearly put me on my knees, but Ian was there, right there, grabbing hold of my arm, keeping me steady and on my feet.

“Okay,” he soothed, his voice like honey as I held on, probably too tight, clinging as the surge of emotions rolled through me, ridiculously scared he was going to walk out on me.

I was not some kind of ingenue alone in the world. I was strong. I’d been alone before, I could remake my life from scratch if needed. I could. No doubt. But the issue was not if I could; the issue was I didn’t want to. Ian was it. Ian was the one, and losing him would make me different. I didn’t want to know what I would look like without him.

The epiphany was a whopper, and I’d been blindsided to boot.

“Jones?” Kage said my name irritably, but it was like he was far away at the other end of a long tunnel, and I could barely hear him.

There were no words. I had none for him.

“He’s just overwhelmed, sir. It’s a big deal,” Ian said quickly, and I heard it clearly because my hearing came back in stereo, even though my vison stayed blurred.

“He’ll do fine,” Kage declared like he was giving me his blessing, and suddenly Prescott was there at my shoulder, passing me a thick black organizer with the marshals’ star on the cover, and the lanyard I’d be wearing into people’s homes that had my employment photo on it, which was even more horrible than the picture on my driver’s license.

Still holding on to Ian, I realized Kage’s attention was elsewhere, and I felt the relief Frodo and Sam must have experienced when the Eye moved off them, because I could breathe a bit more, even though I was still right there on the edge of hyperventilating.

“Hey.”

Turning to Ian, I saw a trace of a smile before he took a deep breath in and then blew it out, softly, slowly.

I watched him intently as he did it again.

“What is this, Lamaze?” I teased, my voice cracking, going out on me.

He repeated the process, and the second time, I mimicked him, which was clearly what he was after, and finally pushed some air into my lungs.

“What’s wrong?” he whispered, his eyes locked on mine.

“I’m a piece of shit,” I husked, “and I don’t deserve you.”

“Oh?”

I growled softly, wincing, feeling worse by the second. “You left the Army for me.”

His smile was wicked as he shook his head. “No, you were right. I left the Army for me, because I wanted to be with you.”

“But you stopped doing something you loved for me, and I was just about to not stop doing something for you, and what about commitment? What about our wedding vows?” I choked out, reeling with everything running through my head.

Oh, I was seriously going to stop breathing and have a full-blown panic attack after having a goddamn revelation in the middle of the bullpen about how I had been just as selfish and singularly focused as Ian.

Everyone was clapping again as I bent over and braced my hands above my knees.

Ian put a hand on my back, began rubbing comforting circles there before leaning down so he could speak into my ear. “It’s not the same thing.”

“How?” I gasped, taking shallow breaths. “I needed you home; you changed your whole life. You need me with you; I’m saying no. It’s the same.”

“I was on the other side of the world. You just might miss dinner sometimes,” he clarified, chuckling softly, speaking into my hair.

“Why’re you being nice to me now?”

“Because you just saw things from my perspective, and that’s pretty great.”

“But nothing’s fixed,” I claimed miserably.

“Yeah, but nothing’s completely busted either.”

“You’re being very glass-half-full right now instead of empty.”

“I know, right? Lookit me with the growth and shit.”

God. “We won’t work together anymore,” I reminded him, trying to breathe around my fear.

“No.”

“And that was half the point of you staying home, wasn’t it? I mean, Kage was going to give me a new partner because you were gone so much, and neither of us wanted that, and you made a point of—”

“Maybe you should sit down, huh?”

“When this meeting is over, I’ll go tell Kage that—”

“No,” he insisted. “You won’t tell Kage a damn thing.”

I took a breath. “You’re the most important thing.”

“I feel the same.”

“Which leaves us where?” I asked, catching my breath, then swallowing hard.

“We’ll figure—”

“Are you okay?” Eli asked, moving in beside me, hand next to Ian’s on my back. “You look like you’re gonna barf.”

“I’m having some issues.”

“Well, yeah, you—”

Kage started talking again. “As of today, Eli Kohn will be the new director of the Public Affairs Division, the new face of the Northern District.”

I straightened up like I’d been zapped by a Taser, looked at Kage a second, and then turned to look sideways at Eli. To say he looked gobsmacked was an understatement.

“Now who’s lookin’ barfy?” Ian asked Eli with a smirk.

Eli opened his mouth, but no sound came out.

“As that post has stood vacant for the last six months since the retirement of Gordon Eames, Kohn will not be interim, but the direct replacement to the post.”

Deer in the headlights all the way.

Eli accepted the organizer and lanyard from Elyes as Kage assured him he’d do a fine job. “I have every faith in you,” he finished. “You’ll represent the office well.”

“Thank you, sir,” Eli said, his voice sounding like dried leaves.

We were all standing there looking shell-shocked.

“And finally,” Kage said in his deep rumble, “Ian Doyle will take over as deputy director and, going forward, will be the main point of contact in all interagency dealings. He’s the go-to guy for issues with anyone outside of this office.”

Oh. Holy. Fuck.

I turned to him, and Ian was gray. I’d never actually seen anyone do that. All color drained from his face—I had no idea that could actually happen. “Gobsmacked” didn’t do his expression justice anymore.

“I think I know what we’re gonna do after work today,” Eli ventured.

Me too. Drinking. Lots and lots of drinking.

“Jesus, Doyle, you look like ass.”

Ian sat down hard in Kowalski’s chair, and I stepped in close, hand on his shoulder, squeezing gently.

“That makes no logical sense,” Ian whispered like his brain was offline.

I was at a loss myself. I could not imagine anyone being less ready to be a liaison than Ian. But at the same time… Ian was very similar to Kage in a lot of ways. Meeting Kage, hearing him bellow, seeing his size, and being the subject of his glare, you wouldn’t guess he was unflappable under pressure and the rock we all clung to.

So maybe, just maybe, Kage saw the same in Ian.

Still, the announcement made my chest explode with a flock of flapping birds. I couldn’t even take one more surprise today. Not. One.

Kage then cleared his throat and indicated the back of the room with an open hand.

“With the changes I’ve just implemented, we need an additional six men here in the investigator office, and we have five—oh, four—here today.”

Attention shifted to the men standing along the back wall close to the exit. Our floor was set up so there was glass at desk level to the ceiling and concrete block from desk level to the ground. There was no door that let out of the bullpen. The only door that could be closed was the one to Kage’s office.

When Kage was promoted, he was supposed to move to the chief deputy’s office, one door down from where we were now, but he’d stayed in the supervisory deputy’s office. I wondered what would happen now.

“Joining our team are Senior Investigator Josiah Redeker, from the District of Nevada,” Kage announced, and Redeker lifted his hand, “Deputy Marshal Gabriel Brodie, from the Southern District here in Illinois, Probationary Marshal Leo Rodriguez, who moved here from New York, Probationary Marshal Sen Yamane, from LA—” Kage paused as another man came in, all smiles until he saw Kage furrow his brow. “—and Deputy Marshal Eric Pazzi, from the Northern District of California.”

We all remained quiet as Kage took a breath.

“We arrive on time here in Chicago, Pazzi.”

“Yessir,” he said quickly, grimacing.

“There will be one more joining us in the next few days, but at the moment, I’m still awaiting transfer paperwork.”

Ian put a hand on my shoulder, drawing my attention.

“All the transfers meet me in the conference room. Everyone else remain here so I can give you your—yes?”

A man I had not seen since the past fall stood in the bullpen doorway, and even though seeing him shouldn’t have signaled alarm in me—he was just an FBI agent, not some harbinger of doom—I still jolted. After a moment two more joined him, all in trench coats, and Special Agent Tilden Adair, who I knew, the one in front, opened his badge to reveal the familiar FBI credentials and pulled them for Kage.

“I’m Special Agent—”

“Tilden Adair,” Kage finished for him. “I remember. What can I do for you, Agent?”

He gave Kage a nod as he put his wallet away. “We have a situation, Chief, and we need Marshal Jones.”

“And what situation is that?”

He coughed. “I have three dead men in an art gallery in the West Loop.”

“Which has what to do with Jones?”

I knew what the answer was before the words were even out of his mouth. There could be no question, not really. The FBI only came looking for me, to me, for one reason.

“We believe it’s Craig Hartley,” Adair announced, and everyone in the room turned to look at me.

I read it on the faces of the new guys, the surprise and then shock that turned fast to sympathy. They all felt bad for me, and even if they didn’t know the whole story—and how could they, only my most inner circle did—still, they were sorry. Because when you had a serial killer kidnap and torture you and then pay you house calls and save your life… it was weird and twisty, and there was a blurring of good and evil there.

In the beginning, when Hartley had put a kitchen knife into my side, a singular emotion could be dredged up when his name was spoken, and that was fear. But over the years, as he had escaped from prison and found his way back to me twice, now what could be fished from the depths of my soul was still panic and dread, but also humiliation, gratitude, and rapport. So when Adair spoke, the jolt of terror was followed almost instantly by resignation.

“Believe or know?” Kage growled.

“We know,” Adair said before turning quickly, grabbing Kowalski’s garbage can, and vomiting, I was guessing, both his breakfast and morning coffee.

I turned to look at Kage, who looked over his shoulder at Prescott. “You might need to start this morning without Jones.”

 

 

IT WAS a field trip, but not everyone went. Kage was sending Becker in his place, and since Ian was the new liaison, he was going, which was good since, one way or another, he was going with me. Before I could follow Ian out of the room, Kage called me over.

Stepping in front of him, I was surprised when he took hold of my shoulder.

“Listen, make sure you let Kohn talk to any reporters that are there. If you have to vomit, do it like Adair and not at the scene, and if the Feds or anyone gives you any trouble, sic Doyle on them because that’s what he’s there to do, corral the interagency bullshit.”

“Yessir,” I agreed, smiling slightly over the vomit part. Leave it to Kage to remind me of something ordinary like throwing up to somehow inject normalcy. I appreciated it more than I could say.

He nodded and tipped his head toward the door.

“Thank you, sir,” I said and pivoted and darted to catch up to Ian.

I could tell, as I walked out of the office, that some of the guys were unsure about me. It was weird, I would guess, to be that close to someone they’d read about or even seen on the news. My name had been in print in conjunction with Hartley a lot over the years. The Wikipedia entry on him had my marshal picture, and while the whole thing with Hartley cutting out my rib wasn’t in there because it was not common knowledge, there was still the part about him kidnapping and torturing me. There were also some lurid bits about what he’d done to the women he’d killed, as well as Special Agent Wojno, and his picture from the FBI Most Wanted list. The fact that he had eluded the FBI on a number of occasions was also in there, and the opinion that, while dangerous, he was not a rampaging psychopath.

The men I rode the elevator down with cast surreptitious glances at me, wanting, I knew, to ask about Hartley. I had been asked about Hartley since he first became a suspect and was still unsure how to answer. The big question, why I was still alive, was one I certainly had no response for. Only Hartley could say. But as I stood there silently, back against the cold steel as we descended toward the parking garage, I could feel how thick the tension was around me. Adair himself was eying me warily.

“Listen, Jones, it should only be you coming with us. This is an FBI inves—”

“You heard Kage,” Becker interrupted. “You get me and Doyle, Kohn, and four others, and that’s how this is gonna go. If you don’t like it, you can have your boss call mine, and maybe Jones will—”

“Yeah, all right,” Adair agreed with a grunt, clearly annoyed. “Just don’t turn this thing into a circus.”

“That’s hysterical, coming from you,” Ian retorted, his voice a sarcastic drawl. “You’re the ones who shared what happened to your agents with the press before Thanksgiving last year. That was fuckin’ brilliant.”

Becker bumped Ian, and he crossed his arms and exhaled sharply. Apparently the new liaison needed to calm the hell down. Ryan and Dorsey were there to show Rodriguez and Brodie, the new guys Kage sent with us, how we ran things, and both of them were suddenly staring forward, trying not to make eye contact with Ian. I understood. If it were me, I wouldn’t have wanted to deal with him either. He looked like he was ready to tear someone’s head off, the way his jaw was set, clenched with the muscle working in his right cheek, how flat and cold his eyes had gone, and the rigid battle stance. The whole soldier mantle was drawn tight around him, and he was bristling with seething menace.

Gently, quietly, I put a hand between Ian’s shoulder blades before sliding it up into his hair. He closed his eyes for a second, and when he opened them back up, he looked better, settled, grounded, and as he took a breath, I saw him relax a bit. He wasn’t calm, but he was better. Nice to know just my touch could do that.

We took the gigantic Chevy Suburbans that normally went out only for fugitive pickups or if the whole department was involved in a task force. The last time we all went on assignment as a group was before Halloween last year, when our Most Wanted included a child predator. Now, loaded up with Becker driving, we moved out, following the Feds to the gallery.

No one said a thing during the ride, only Ian’s hand on my thigh, where no one could see, keeping me calm. I wasn’t scared—Hartley wasn’t there waiting for me—but there was that anxiety over what had been left for me to see.

Once we reached the street and parked, we all piled out and waited for Adair and the rest of his team to join us.

“So how do you know it was him?” I asked when Adair motioned for us to follow him.

I remembered him because of his looks. I had never met anyone with black eyes that were so striking under heavy black brows, framed by long, thick lashes in his pale—like alabaster-white—face. He didn’t look sickly, but you could see the blue veins under the skin of his throat and hands.

“He—” Quick breath, and I took a step away from him because he’d already shown his stomach was iffy. “—signed it, and there’s an inscription on the wall.”

I stopped walking and looked at him because that hit me as all kinds of wrong, and I felt it physically, the tremor that shuddered through me, but also, and more importantly, instinctively. Because while Hartley did leave messages, he didn’t sign his work; it wasn’t his way. He wasn’t prideful in that respect, and that was part of the point of knowing who you were chasing. He made you have to get to know him, which I did.

“We would have kept this from you, Marshal, but even though you’re not involved with our ongoing pursuit of Craig Hartley, you are, in fact, tied to him until he’s back behind bars.”

“Right,” I concurred as Ian slipped a hand up my back, resting it on my shoulder for a moment before letting it slide off. He couldn’t very well hold my hand, but I could have really used the contact.

The Sanderson Gallery down by the Loop was only fifteen minutes from the office. CPD was keeping a crowd back. I saw the yellow tape up, and then inside of that, as we closed in, the spray of what I thought was probably blood on the front windows.

“Is that what I think it is?”

“Yeah, it’s blood.”

“Is there more inside?” I asked Adair, already knowing the man I knew was not responsible for whatever horror was behind the door. The last time I saw Hartley, I got the feeling murder was no longer in his repertoire. He did it to sort out something horrible in his head, to make a statement about who was weak and able to be seduced, and who was not.

There were women who came forward afterward, horrified it could have been them if they had, in fact, decided to cheat on their husbands. There was one woman who implied murder was what an adulteress deserved. I had roared at her at my desk, sent her scurrying from the bullpen because it was such shit that I couldn’t stand to look at her. But all of that, the women Hartley killed, the way he did it, the people he murdered during his last escape and the man he dispatched to save me… none of that was ever rage. He was methodical, steady, and… what, tidy? There was never a mess, never blood splatters and over-the-top shows of power. It wasn’t him, and as my stomach turned into a block of ice, a feeling of dread sank over me.

What the hell was going on?

“Jones?”

“Yeah, sorry. So is there more blood?”

“No, that’s all there is, period, and it only belongs to one of the men. There’s no more blood anywhere than that in the gallery.”

Which was more like Hartley, but still not likely.

I kept pace with everyone, and a part of me wished it was just me, Ian, and Becker, and maybe Eli. I didn’t like the new guys seeing how closely I was involved with a psychopath.

The cop at the door gave us booties to cover our shoes and gloves for our hands, and then one by one, we entered the gallery.

It was a beautiful space, with an open-beam ceiling, polished hardwood floors, and industrial lighting. The exposed brick wall along one side would have made it feel warm, but it contrasted with a lot of glass and chrome and modern furniture that made the room seem cold. Of course the three dead men hanging from the moveable walls added to the morgue vibe of the place.

At Becker’s direction, all of us, as well as the agents, fanned out so they could take in what I was sure the papers would call a horrific tableau. They liked saying shit like that.

“This is new,” Ian said to no one in particular, scanning what was clearly a presentation before pointing to the words For Miro done in beautiful flowing cursive. “What is that?”

“Paint,” Adair answered with a cough. “Like I said, the only blood in here is on the front window.”

“So where do we think their blood is?” Ian continued.

“We have a—oh, here,” Adair said quickly before gesturing to the other side of the room, where a man stood surrounded by several others. It looked like a trench coat convention. “Kelson! Here!”

I expected him to be talking to one of the older men, but a younger one I hadn’t noticed stepped out from the circle and strode, almost strutted, across the room, followed closely by two others.

“This is our behavioral profiler, Kol Kelson, from Langley.”

Kelson had to be older than he looked because, if I had to go on a guess, I would have said twenty-three, twenty-five tops. He was about five nine, thin, with lean muscles, golden-brown skin, delicate features, and honey-colored eyes. He was easily one of the prettiest men I’d ever met in my life.

“Oh, Marshal Jones,” he said reverently, rushing forward, hand out, eyes wide, staring at me like I held the secrets to the universe. “I wish we could have met under better circumstances, but really, it’s a pleasure.”

“Likewise,” I muttered, shaking his hand as he put his other over the clasp.

It was eerie. I felt strange, like the air in the room was slowly being sucked out, and I was starting to have that prickling, uneasy feeling where my clothes felt too tight and my skin started to itch, and there was a cramp in the back of my neck.

“What do you think of your love letter?” he tossed out nonchalantly, almost arrogantly.

“I’m sorry?” I snapped, pulling back my hand, glaring at him because these were men he was talking about, people who were now dead, and his callous disregard made me want to punch him in his smug elfin face.

“Did you not tell him?” Kelson asked, squinting at Adair.

“No, I-I thought you would want to.”

Kelson’s face brightened. “Thank you, that was thoughtful.”

He made me uncomfortable. I felt that quirk of something I didn’t like. Kelson was… off somehow. His reactions didn’t match what was happening. He should have been horrified like the rest of us, sickened, but instead he was enthralled. And I wasn’t stupid; I knew people processed trauma differently. At her grandmother’s funeral, Catherine could not stop laughing until I finally took her out of the synagogue to the car, where she dissolved into a deluge of tears. But this wasn’t that. This was Kelson hopped up on adrenaline, and I had to figure out why.

After taking hold of my bicep, he walked me closer to the three bodies, letting go once we were within touching distance of the wall.

The three panels were arranged as a trifold, like those pieces of posterboard kids bought to stick their projects to when they presented them to the class. Each man hung on a separate moveable wall.

The man on the left was turned on his side, facing the middle, stuck to the wall with what looked to me like fishing line, posed as though he were running and throwing roses in the air. Each petal was glued down, and a small mound of petals lay on the floor in front of the wall. The man on the right had his left hand on his chest, and in his right, he held out a bouquet of roses. Another mound of petals on the floor. The man in the middle faced front, holding a human heart, presumably his, in his cupped hands, along with several roses, as though offering it to whoever was standing in front of him. It was horrifying and stunning at the same time.

“Jesus,” Ian said, his breath rushing out as he stopped beside me, his hand on the small of my back, not caring who might see him touching me.

“Marshal Jones.” Kelson almost sang my name.

“Do we—” I coughed. “—know who these men are?”

“Yes,” Kelson said, “and that’s why Hartley dedicating them to you is interesting.”

I waited, irritated he wasn’t just telling me, instead making it more dramatic than it needed to be.

“These are three of the FBI’s Most Wanted.”

“Are you kidding?”

He shook his head. “No. And from what the forensic team has been able to determine already, one of them has been dead for a month, and the other two between one and two weeks.”

“So he hunted these guys down and killed them.”

“Yes.”

I stared at the dead men because this was getting further and further from anything Hartley had ever done in his life.

There had been copycats over the years, and the second I thought it, the idea took hold because, really, the man I knew was not some kind of vigilante. And honestly, if he were going to make an overture of love toward me, he would have probably kidnapped me, gutted me, and filled my cadaver with flowers. That was more his speed—the statement, not this. I had no idea what was going on, but the longer I stood there, the more alien the scene became.

I had visited nineteen scenes where Hartley had killed a woman, and each was reverently arranged in a way that if you didn’t touch them, you would have sworn they were alive until you saw the other side of their body or their face or really looked at what they were holding—one woman had a suitcase filled with her own organs—or sitting on. Another woman was lounging on a chaise, arranged so that’s what you saw, ease and grace, the drape of her body over the expensive piece of furniture, but when you walked around to the other side, her torso was hollowed out and filled with various toys, stuffed animals, and dolls. It turned out her company employed child labor in China, and the toys represented the playtime, the childhood, stolen from the kids. Horrifying, yes, but not the act of a man killing for any other reason than making a statement. The bodies in front of me were not that.

“Who are they?” Becker asked Kelson.

“The middle one there, missing his heart, that’s Emile Stigler. We had Interpol looking for him because he was supposed to be in Brazil.”

I turned to Kelson. “Do you think he was actually there?”

He nodded. “I do. I don’t know if Hartley killed him there and transported the body, or if he brought him back to the US and killed him here—we have no way of knowing.”

“No,” Adair chimed in, joining us. “We can’t guess when the killing was done or how without an autopsy. What we can say for certain is that the top three men on the FBI’s Most Wanted are now here, dead, apparently as a gift.”

“It’s more than that,” Kelson said, studying me, scrutinizing me. “May I be frank?”

“Go ahead,” I granted, crossing my arms, waiting, realizing that normally my skin would be crawling with just the feel of being so close to something Hartley had done. But I wasn’t getting that. It was horrifying, yes, but the longer I stood there, the less I felt like this was his doing.

“It’s like he’s courting you.”

I heard Ian catch his breath, so I turned, gave a subtle shake of my head that had him squinting with confusion, and then returned my attention back to Kelson.

“Courting me? That’s ridiculous,” I said, shooting that down with a quick shake of my head. “Where are you getting that?”

“From Kelson. He’s one of our top profilers. We brought him in because no one knows Hartley better,” Adair explained, gesturing at him.

That would have made sense if I weren’t there, if I didn’t know better. And while there was no surge of pride like I had knowing no one knew Ian better than me… still, I was absolutely confident Kelson was out of his depth with Hartley. “Since when?” I prodded.

“I’m sorry?” Adair asked, clearly annoyed. It was in his tone and his scowl.

“Since when does your guy know Craig Hartley so well?” I asked flatly. “I’ve never heard of him, and I’ve certainly never met him before today.” The fact of the matter was, when they needed to talk to Hartley, to have him answer questions—they asked me to ask him. It had been like that since he first tried to kill me and I saved him from being shot by my partner at the time. Cochran Norris had wanted to put a bullet in the serial killer; I wanted him rotting in jail. I won the argument and nearly died in the process, and now, these many years later, I would have loved to not be his favorite law enforcement officer, but that ship had long sailed. So what Adair was saying was total crap. I was the authority on Prince Charming and always would be.

“Kelson is the—”

“No one knows Hartley like me,” I advised him solemnly, and my words sounded hollow and pained because it hurt to say, even though it was the truth. “So I ask again, where are you getting this whole courting crap?”

“It’s not crap,” Kelson almost snarled, and I saw it then, the anger. It was there in the glint in his eyes, the flush on his cheeks, the flared nostrils, and the thin line of his lips pressing together so tight the muscles in his jaw corded. More words clearly wanted to come out, and he was mustering all his strength to stay silent. I had too many years of talking to people not to see the signs. Ian’s hand on my shoulder was not a surprise.

“You have no idea what you’re talking about,” I baited him, hearing my own breath, my vision tunneling down to only Kelson.

I swore I could hear the click of my watch on my wrist as I looked into Kelson’s eyes, which he narrowed in cold fury. It was almost possible to taste the hatred in the air between us.

“Gun!”

The fact that nothing changed in Kelson’s eyes as he pulled his Glock told me something scary. His focus was solely on me; no one else mattered. He wanted me dead.

Had Kelson done his homework, he would have known better than to try to hurt me while Ian was standing right beside me. He also would have learned that, being a Green Beret, Ian had no delay in his reaction time. So he yanked me out of the way before Kelson even figured out what was happening.

“No!” Kelson howled as Ian hurled him to the ground and pinned him there with a knee in his back while Becker trapped Kelson’s hand under his right foot. I was on the ground, dragged to my knees by Eli, and I distantly noted the Magnanni punch-trim cap-toe oxfords he was wearing.

It was weird, and I’d had it happen before. When Hartley was cutting my back open to remove a rib, I watched blood splatter his Cole Haan brogue medallion double monkstrap brown shoes. They were images I held on to and again, in this moment, I had focused on the mundane.

“I have a pair like that,” I told Eli, turning to look at him.

“I have a pair of Magnanni calfskin chukka boots that are really comfortable,” he offered since we were just shootin’ the shit and all. “You should get some.”

I nodded.

“Miro!” Ian snarled.

I snapped my head up and faced a glare that should have stopped my heart. Me being in danger had scared him to death.

“I’m good,” I told him.

“I’m going to—”

“Freeze!”

The federal agents drew their weapons in rapid succession, a chain reaction that made no sense because the threat was already dealt with.

Ian turned to face them, and I realized that in the confusion, the Feds assumed Ian had attacked Kelson without provocation. I didn’t want to get shot accidentally, so I stayed on the ground with Eli as the FBI held guns on us.

It was one of those insane standoff situations.

I thought it would be Becker’s voice that boomed out, or even Adair’s, so I was surprised when it turned out to be Ian.

“Put your guns down,” he ordered, his voice deep and thunderous. “Your man attacked a deputy US marshal. His gun’s on the floor and—Adair! Call off your men!”

“Stand down,” Adair yelled, using both hands to signal everyone to lower their weapons as he moved closer to us, holstering his own.

“Eli.”

He looked up at Ian.

“Take him.”

He moved quickly, changing places with Ian, his knee now between Kelson’s shoulder blades as Ian stood slowly and put up his hands, not offering any threat to Adair or his men but clearly in control.

“Fuck,” Adair growled, clearly flustered and embarrassed by the fact that his men weren’t listening to him. “Put your goddamn guns away now!”

And then, finally, looking at Ian standing there with his hands up, the rest of the marshals poised to act, Adair’s men all slowly, one by one, holstered their guns.

“For the record,” Eli said snidely to Adair as he dragged Kelson to his feet, “if any of us took that long to lower our guns once the chief deputy gave us a direct order, we’d be suspended for days or weeks and then demoted.”

Adair muttered something under his breath.

Becker passed handcuffs to Eli. None of the rest of us carried them; we carried zip ties in our TAC vests—which none of us were wearing at the moment because the plan was that we were looking at a crime scene, not apprehending anyone.

“I guess with my new position, I’ll carry cuffs again,” I mentioned to no one in particular.

Once the room took a collective breath, Eli spun Kelson around to face me as Adair moved up beside me.

“No,” Ian barked, snapping his fingers, making sure Kelson, Adair, Eli, anyone close by was looking at him, not me. “We have no idea what’s been contaminated at this crime scene because of him.”

Which was true.

“So we’re going to have CPD take this over until we figure out what’s going on. Everybody clear out.”

I saw Becker nod, and I thought, but wasn’t sure, I saw a faint smile. “You heard him,” Becker said, his voice carrying throughout the room. “Everyone get back to the office but me and Doyle.”

Instantaneous movement, a far cry from what had happened with Adair’s men.

“Dorsey, secure Kelson—”

“We’ll take him,” Adair barked, reaching for Kelson.

“No,” Becker cut him off, signaling to Dorsey, who moved fast, taking custody of Kelson. “We clear this attack on Jones first, and then you guys can have him and take his brain apart.”

Adair opened his mouth to argue, but clearly, between Ian and Becker, he was outmanned.

Dorsey moved with the speed and confidence of a man who’d performed his job a thousand times, hand on Kelson’s bicep as he led him toward the door, Ryan walking behind him. They’d been partners so long they even walked with the same stride.

“Rodriguez and Brodie, you guys go with them; you’re their backup.”

“Yessir,” both men said quickly, and as they all headed for the door, I saw Rodriguez grab Brodie’s barn coat when Brodie was about to walk into one of the agents. Brodie gave him a smile and moved quickly to match Rodriguez’s stride. I hoped Ian or Becker saw that. It was nice when new partners started out even being thoughtful of each other.

“Eli,” Ian said, and I saw then how his eyes flickered over to me. He wanted to go with me; it was taking a lot for him to accept that he needed to stay there. But I wasn’t in imminent danger, and we all had jobs to do. “I need you with him like a shadow, yeah?”

“Absolutely,” Eli agreed quickly, reaching out to give Ian a quick touch of reassurance.

Ian nodded, swallowing hard before stepping in front of me. “You lose Eli for any reason, I’ll assume that you want to be single.”

My gaze met his, and I saw how steely his was, how level.

“Do you understand?”

“I do.”

“And you will answer your phone when I call,” he said flatly. “Do you understand?”

“Yes.”

“Okay.” He took a breath. “I’ll see you soon.”

He turned away from me without another word, pulling out his phone as he moved, and I was suddenly faced with Becker.

“We’ll head back to the office, Jones, so you and Eli can make a plan for the day. It looks like he’ll be going with you to meet some kids.”

I glanced over at Eli in time to catch his look of horror. Oh yeah, he was thrilled he got to babysit me, I could tell.