Chapter Ten

 

 

 

 

 

Evan

 

 

 

 

“Damnit.” I kicked the chair and it went sailing into the wall, cracking the plaster. I reached up and put both hands on my head in an attempt to get my emotions under control.

“Evan,” Dominic said from behind me. “Stop beating yourself up. This isn’t your fault.”

It sure as hell felt like it.

Brian, one of my best informants, was dead. All signs pointed to an overdose but from the way his body was found, it didn’t look like he’d taken the drugs himself.

Just thirty-six hours before, he’d given me information about a huge deal that was going down. His information led us to arresting six dealers and three distributors while recovering over ten pounds of Sludge. It was a huge bust and got us one step closer to figuring out who was in charge but it’d come at a price.

Brian was dead.

I thought we’d been covering our tracks enough. I was meeting him at night, in obscure places, and we kept everything short and sweet. We even made trades to ensure it looked like a legit deal. Any other time he contacted me was via burner phones and that wasn’t too often.

How the hell had they figured out Brian was ours?

“Someone had to be watching him,” I told Dom as I turned to look at him. “Or they suspected and gave him the information as a test.”

“You can’t blame yourself for this.” My best friend took a seat in front of his desk, which was directly across from mine. “Brian knew what he was getting in to. He knew the risks.”

I let out a loud sigh and ran my hands over my tired face. “Let’s go over the crime scene photos one more time.”

“No,” a deeper voice said and we glanced up to find our boss, Lieutenant Messer, looking at us both with a sympathetic expression on his face. “You two need to go home and get some sleep. I don’t want to see either of you at all tomorrow.”

The bust had gone down the night before and both Dominic and I had been up all night arresting, interrogating, cataloguing, and trying to get our reports done. The sun had been up for about six hours that morning when we were both ready to leave but the call about Brian’s body being found came in before we could.

Now it was almost seven in the evening and even though I didn’t want to admit it, I was beat. Still, I opened my mouth to argue but he silenced me with a look instead.

“Get some rest, come in with clear heads, and figure out where these drugs are being produced.” With that, he turned and left Dominic and me alone. Dom tried to cover up the yawn that contorted his face, but it was no use.

“Let’s go. We’re no good right now anyway. I’d like to see my family sometime today, too.”

We gathered our stuff and walked out to the parking lot together. The sun was still up but it was low, like it was thinking of going down.

I mumbled a goodbye to my friend and drove across town to my house. I felt my eyelids grow heavier and heavier as I did so cranked up my AC, rolled down my windows, and blasted my music until I was safely under my carport.

When I stepped out of the car, I glanced to the house that I shared the small fence with. The rubble was still shocking to see at times.

Since weeks had passed since the fire that took out the Morris home and two since Grace and I had visited the fire station.

The house had to be completely demolished due to the smoke damage on the first floor. Keith and Ruby were staying with Dom and Becca in the meantime despite me offering my second bedroom to the couple.

Since that day in the hospital, my thoughts were firmly stuck on Victoria Jones. If I wasn’t thinking about the Sludge distribution, I was thinking about the blonde that hated my guts and it was only worse since our interactions at the fire station.

I wanted to contact her, to explain my side of the story, but Dominic insisted that that was a terrible idea. He felt that I should leave well enough alone and let her live her life. There was a chance he was right and if so, I didn’t want to disrupt her life. But if my apology and explanation could make her life better in any way, I wanted to do it.

I just hadn’t figured out how.

My tired body had to be forced out of my truck, into my house, and down the hall to my bedroom. I wanted to fall right into bed but I needed a shower first. I spent about five minutes under the spray, soaping myself down as quickly as possible, and then fell face first into bed while still buck naked.

After obsessing over the Sludge for two straight days, I was happy when the last thoughts I had before I closed my eyes were of Victoria Jones.

–––

“You should date.”

I turned to Becca and wiggled my eyebrows suggestively. “You thinking about leaving Dom and running away with me, beautiful?”

She let out a snort of laughter and Dominic beaned me in the face with a carrot, causing Ruby to reach out and smack the back of his head.

“No throwing food at the dinner table.”

“He’s hitting on my wife and I’m getting smacked in the head,” Dom complained good-naturedly, and I just grinned at him while shoving the carrot into my mouth.

“Your mom loves me more.”

“Yeah, but she loves me most.” Becca gave me a smirk as she spooned more mashed potatoes onto Jade’s plate. “And I bet she thinks you should date, too.”

“Oh, yes.” Ruby nodded enthusiastically and offered me a motherly smile. “You need to find a nice girl to settle down with. I need more grandbabies and you’re my only hope since these two refuse to give me more.”

“I want cousins,” Grace chimed in and I looked at her with wide eyes.

“I thought you were on my side, Gracie.” She giggled when I pursed my lips into a pout. “You little traitor.”

Dinnertime with the Morris family had been the same amazing chaos since I was a teenager. Someone was throwing something, someone was hitting someone, and there was lots of laughter to go around. It was perfection.

Even before the fire had forced Keith and Ruby to temporarily move in with Dom and Becca, the six of them were used to getting together for dinner weekly. I had an open-ended invitation to join and did about twice a month. Ruby’s cooking was too-die for and the company was even better.

“You’re not getting any younger, son.” Keith put his fork down and shrugged slightly when I groaned. “What? I’m being honest. You haven’t dated more than a handful of times in the past few years. What could it hurt?”

It’d been a long time since my surrogate family had jumped on my back about dating but I couldn’t really fault them too much. Their obnoxious comments were made out of love.

“We’ll see.”

Becca took my comment as surrender and let out a small squeal. “I have a co-worker I want to set you up with. You’ll love her. She’s pretty, smart, and only single because she’s so shy. Can I set it up?”

“Take a breath, Bec. I don’t remember agreeing to this.”

Dom gave me a knowing look. “Like you’re going to tell her no.”

He was right, of course. Rebecca Morris wasn’t a woman you refused. She and Dominic had started dating during high school and she’d always had an authoritative air about her. Sometimes she was kind of scary.

So, it came as no surprise to any of us at the table when I rolled my eyes and added more food to my plate.

“Fine, but only after we close this case and I reserve the right to my own opinion.”

The patronizing noise she made let me know that Becca didn’t believe that any more than I did but she didn’t say anything else.

Dinner was over and I was getting ready to go when Dom’s phone rang. He frowned at the screen before bringing it to his ear, stepping out of the living room so he could talk.

I hugged both of my nieces and was just accepting a container of leftovers when Dom reappeared with the phone still at his ear.

“I would if I didn’t have these re-certification classes on Saturdays for the next six weeks. But Evan is here and he might be willing to do it, if that’s okay with you.” He paused and offered me a smirk. “Perfect. One second.”

He held the phone out towards me and I took it reluctantly, frowning as I held it up to my ear. “This is Evan Coleman.”

“Evan, hey. This is Simon Owens from the New Hope Fire Department. We met last month?”

“Yeah, of course. What can I do for you, Simon?”

He coughed once and I could hear papers shuffling around in the background. “I’m not sure if Dominic told you but he signed Grace up for fall soccer and as it turns out, she’s on my niece Kendra’s team.”

“Oh. That’s a nice surprise.” I eyed Dominic, who was still smirking, and wondered where this was heading. “I’m sure the two of them will have a blast together.”

“They’ll be best friends by the end of the first practice.” He laughed for a moment before it tapered off. “I’ve run into an issue, though. When my niece and nephew signed up to do this, I said I would coach both teams but through some scheduling error, they both happen to have games and some practices at the same time. I decided to coach Hudson’s team and I found a co-worker for Kendra’s but I still need an assistant coach for the girls’ team. I was calling all of the parents to see if anyone was interested.”

“And Dom just threw me under the bus.”

“Yeah, that’s basically it. I have another parent willing to do it but I’m not entirely comfortable with him. Anyway, the assistant coaches will have some days where we’re on shift and they’ll need to act as the coach. I need someone trustworthy.”

I looked down to where Grace was looking up at me with hopeful eyes, obviously having been told to suck up by her father. I reached down and ruffled her hair before sighing. “Yeah, of course. I was probably going to be at all of the games anyway so I might as well be useful while I’m there.”

“That’s awesome.” Simon let out a long breath. “You’ll need to go through a background check but if you give me your email address, I’ll send you everything you need right now. The first practice is next week so I’ll have the league rush it all.”

We exchanged contact details and he promised to email me within the hour. I’d barely ended the call before Grace was in my arms.

“Thank you, Uncle Evan! It will be so fun!”

“Of course, noodle.” I squeezed her tight and narrowed my eyes at my best friend. “Just remember that I love you more than your daddy does.”

“Do not,” Dom replied with a scoff. “I’d totally do it if I could.”

“Uh huh.” I put Grace onto her feet and gave everyone one more round of hugs. “I don’t mind being the favorite.”

I finally escaped the Morris house and headed back to my own with one thing on my mind.

If I was going to be hanging around Simon Owens, was there a chance that I’d see Victoria Jones, too?

And why did the possibility of that make me smile?