Fight for You: A Second Chance Romance (A Warrior for Her Book 1)

by Ayden K. Morgen

  "Were you aware that Adams, Adcock, and Cortez were suspects in the murders of Titan and Jana James?"

  "Nope. Last I heard, Detective Whitten was too busy stressing me to actually step foot in Crip territory to find out who murdered Titan and Jana. Matter of fact, the day January kicked my ass to the curb, he was on my doorstep, asking me the same bullshit they'd already asked me instead of beating down doors over there," I confess, holding his gaze. "I believe I told him to go fuck himself and get off my goddamn lawn."

  Something like amusement rolls through Hernandez's gaze before that hard-ass mask snaps back into place. "Do you remember breaking into Curtis Kaleo's house?"

  "Nope," I say, only half lying. Truth is…I don't remember much from that night. I know what I did, but I don't remember the particulars. As far as I'm concerned, I did what I set out to do and then I walked away. Kinda like that Rehab song. My girl hated me, I was choking on my own guilt, and I was done letting people like Kaleo and the Southside Crips destroy innocent people. I had no fucks left to give. So I did what I had to do and then I stepped away.

  I've done what I've had to do ever since because someone had to do it. Most cops do the best they can with what they've got, but it's not enough. And cops like Detective Whitten damn sure weren't going to get their hands dirty. As soon as I dragged my ass off the bus in Seattle, I started seeking out the worst neighborhoods and the biggest shitholes. I went where most cops were afraid to go and did what they were afraid to do. I've done it every day for the last decade because no one else was willing or able to step up and step to motherfuckers who think they're untouchable.

  "Do you recognize this?" Hernandez asks and slides a piece of paper across to me.

  I glance down, studying it for a moment. It's a crime scene photo of a receipt for a little over six thousand dollars. My chest aches at the sight of it. I have to fight to keep from pressing my hand to my heart to try to rub away the ache.

  "Yeah," I mutter and then clear my throat roughly. "I recognize it."

  The day before Jana and Titan's funeral, I found his drug money and the evidence he'd compiled against Kaleo. I took all the money and donated it to a gang prevention program. January wasn't ever going to touch it and I didn't need it. I figured the best thing to do with it was to give it to someone who might actually be able to make a difference with it.

  "The receipt was located in Adcock's backyard," he tells me.

  Fuck. I don't even remember having the damn thing on me that night.

  "Whitten actually was shit as a detective," Hernandez says softly. "He never even attempted to find out who made the donation. No one around the program now remembers who came in to donate back then, but they keep pretty detailed records. Whoever made this donation did so anonymously, in memory of Titan James. Seems strange to me that the Crips who killed him would make a donation to gang prevention in his honor."

  I stare at him, keeping my expression impassive.

  "I'm guessing you're the one who made that donation."

  "Never denied it."

  "You want to explain how the receipt ended up in Adcock's backyard?"

  "Not a clue," I say, still only half lying. Maybe I had it on me and dropped it. "Maybe Kaleo planted the shit. Maybe Disney birds picked it up and carried it there. Who the fuck knows?"

  "Hire a lawyer, Kincaid," Hernandez suggests, keeping his voice soft. He actually sounds like he feels sorry for me, sorry that he has to do this. Swear to God, I'm surrounded by good guys. "You're a good cop. I don't have anything against you, but I'm not Whitten. I can't just let this go and look the other way. If I find out you were the one who killed them, you'll be charged with three counts of capital murder."

  "I'll do that," I lie. I'm not hiring a lawyer. I'm not going on the defensive. If they nail my ass to the wall for this, so be it. I knew it was a risk back then and I accepted it. That hasn't changed. But if I go down for this, I'm not going down alone. I'll drag Kaleo with me, kicking and screaming the whole goddamn way.

  "You good?" Roman asks me two hours later, eyeing me from the driver's side of his truck as he drives me back toward Ma Rose's. A thousand questions roll through his eyes and then parade across his face, but he doesn't ask them.

  "I'm straight." My leg bounces up and down, giving away my lie. Truth is, I'm real fucking worried Hernandez is going to take me down for this. It's what I deserve, but I'm not exactly sure how I'm supposed to take care of my girl from inside a prison cell.

  Back when I killed them, I thought I'd never see her again. I was determined to leave Los Angeles to give her what she wanted. But shit's done changed. Sort of. She hates me even more now than she did then, but I made a promise to her and I plan to keep it.

  "I need a favor."

  "Talk to me," he says instantly.

  "If I go down for this shit, I need you to make sure January is taken care of," I mutter, looking everywhere but at him. I'm not good at asking for favors. It's not something I do often.

  "I'll make sure she's looked after," he promises.

  "I'm a millionaire."

  He snorts and shakes his head, an amused smile twitching at his lips. "You think I didn't already know that?"

  "You never brought it up."

  "Not my business what you do with your own goddamn money," he mutters, shooting me a look that tells me he's not lying. He genuinely doesn't give a shit if I'm the poor son of a bitch everyone thinks I am or not. Makes me wonder who else in our circle knows about the money and just doesn't care.

  Growing up, I think maybe I was naïve. I assumed if people knew, it'd change things or make me like the grandparents I never knew. Now I see things a little differently. T has a trust fund of his own, but never let it change him. Hell, if anything, he works harder than anyone else. It's not money that changes people. It's greed. And that's one thing I've never felt about anything except January.

  "She's stubborn as hell and will fight you on it the whole goddamn way, but if I go down for this, the money is hers. All the paperwork is in order. Make sure she gets it."

  "You aren't going down for this," Roman practically growls at me, pegging me with a hard glare. "Not fucking happening, Kincaid. You aren't a killer."

  "You clearly haven't seen my personnel file," I snort, ignoring my phone as it buzzes in my pocket. It's been blowing up all day, but I haven't answered. It's Ames and I don't know what I'm going to say to him when he asks me if I did this shit.

  "Fuck that," Roman snaps. "You think you're the only one who's killed someone in the line of duty? My file is about as long and storied as yours. You and I aren't normal cops, dealing with normal fucking criminals. We deal with the sort of people not even hell wants to see darkening their doorstep. Way I see it, you did what you had to do to get home at the end of the day."

  "Not always," I murmur. "Sometimes I did what the fuck I wanted to do."

  "Two sides of the same shield," he tosses back at me, pulling to a stop at an intersection near the elementary school where January works.

  My eyes immediately turn in that direction like I can see her in there or something. I can't though. I haven't set eyes on her in over a week and it's slowly driving me out of my mind. I just need to see her so I know she's okay. I'll give her space for as long as I can stand it, but I need to know she's not torturing herself with guilt that doesn't belong to her.

  "Some motherfuckers deserve what they get," Roman murmurs as he pulls off. "The three who murdered Jana and Titan James deserve to rot in hell for what they did. You though? Different fucking story, Kincaid. You may think you're some monster, but you've saved more people in ten years than most cops could in two lifetimes. And we both know you did it to keep some other family from going through what your girl went through because of Omar Adams, Jermaine Adcock, Deshawn Cortez, and Curtis Kaleo." The way he puts all their names together makes it pretty clear he knows a hell of a lot more about my past than he's let on.

  "How much do you know?" I ask him, grinding my palm a
gainst my chest like always. You'd think I'd have learned by now that it doesn't make shit hurt less. You'd also think I'd know not to confess my sins to another cop, especially one like Roman, bound by duty and obligation and his own sense of responsibility…but I want to confess anyway, lay all my sins out so they stop weighing so goddamn heavily on me.

  "Enough," he says, glancing at me out of the corner of his eye.

  "How long have you known?"

  "Since Curtis Kaleo hit my radar about eight and a half years ago." He turns onto my street and we creep past the park.

  The grass is green and inviting. The equipment is still in working order. January's worked her ass off keeping trash off this street. I'm proud as hell of her for it. She thinks she isn't strong, but she's fierce when it comes to defending what's hers. She always has been.

  "He kept trying to get into the gun game," Roman says, "but no one would deal with him. He's a fucking moron and everyone knows it. He went running to Bennie Bones, offering to trade him girls for guns."

  "That shady motherfucker," I growl, pissed he was back in the game that soon after I left. I should have been checking in on him, making sure he was playing by the rules.

  "Said he needed firepower in case the Crips came after him for some shit that went down," Roman continues like I didn't say anything. "He was convinced they were going to kill him, but they never even spared him a second glance. I did some digging, found out enough to convince me to stop fucking looking."

  "Why?"

  "Like I said, some people get what the fuck is coming to them," he mutters. "You were already doing your thing in Seattle, taking down people like the Southside Crips and Kaleo left and right. Seemed to me justice was served."

  I open my mouth and then close it, losing what I was going to say when my gaze falls on January's house. She's home.

  Mariah's car is in the driveway. They're standing beside it, talking. January looks good. She's dressed in a pair of jeans and a red t-shirt, her hair pulled up in a ponytail. She doesn't see me at first. I stare at her, too greedy to move my eyes away. She looks like an angel, so tiny and perfect.

  My chest pulses and my cock stirs. Christ, I miss her. I just want to hold her. Kiss her. Never fucking let her go ever again. But I can't do that. Not yet. Not until I know whether or not I'm going to prison for murder. Until then, I have to keep my promise and keep my distance.

  She turns like she feels my gaze on her. Our eyes lock, those bright emerald eyes stripping me bare. She appears stronger, less fragile. Like maybe she's been facing some demons of her own and has finally realized she's always been strong enough to do it.

  I'm so goddamn in love with her that it borders on obsessive. I don't even care though. For her, I'll gladly be a lovesick puppy. I'll follow her anywhere, anytime. All she has to do is crook that tiny finger and I'm hers. I always have been. I'm pretty fucking certain I always will be.

  Not yet, I remind myself. Not yet.

  By some miracle, I manage to tear my gaze from hers. As soon as she's no longer in my sights, I feel cold and adrift. She's always been the sun, anchoring me in ways I still don't understand.

  Yeah, I miss her like crazy.

  "Don't do anything stupid, Kincaid," Roman urges me when he pulls to a stop in front of Ma Rose's house. "You aren't going down for this. Just trust me and don't do anything you can't take back."

  "Okay," I agree easily enough. I don't plan on doing anything stupid. If I go down for this, it certainly won't be because I was stupid enough to stroll into Hernandez's office and confess. They're going to have to work for it if they want my head on a pike because my girl is standing not even ten yards away and there's no fucking way I'm willingly going anywhere she isn't.

  That's just not gonna fucking happen.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  January

  Present Day

  "Are you sure you're going to be okay here on your own?" Mariah asks for the fifteenth time since she picked me up an hour ago. She nibbles on her bottom lip, clearly reluctant to leave me by myself. Not that I can blame her after how she found me last week, but I'm fine.

  Okay, maybe that's a stretch. I'm still working through a lot of things. The anxiety medication the psychiatrist put me on is helping. So is talking to her. But something inside of me is broken and probably always will be. My mom and brother were murdered, and I'm finally trying to deal with the aftermath instead of simply ignoring it like it never happened. Post-traumatic stress disorder, Dr. Jenner calls it. It seems more like torture to me.

  I've been seeing her for the last week. I spent the first three day as an inpatient at a rehab facility so she could monitor me around-the-clock. She was too polite to call it suicide watch, but we both know that's what it was. I don't want to die though. Not anymore. I want to find a way to live with my demons.

  Once Dr. Jenner realized that I genuinely meant that and wasn't just feeding her a line to get myself out of there, she let me leave. I've spent the last few days going to group therapy and individual sessions during the day, and crashing with Mariah at night. But I can't hide out forever.

  It's time to come home and start figuring out how to do things on my own. How to be okay without someone breathing down my neck at all hours.

  My stomach churns uncomfortably at the thought of being alone, but I fight through it. I'm strong enough to do this. I've been doing it for years. It feels different this time though. Maybe because it is. I used to get through it by burying everything I felt and refusing to even acknowledge what happened to Titan and my mom. I got through it by being angry with Cade and blaming him for leaving me alone. It pushed me through the hardest days. Now though? I can't ignore it anymore. I can't pretend I'm mad at him or that any of this is his fault.

  I miss him so much it hurts.

  Mariah keeps telling me that he calls to check on me two or three times a day. I begged her not to tell him what was going on and she's kept that promise. It's something I think I need to tell him myself. There's a lot I need to say to him, beginning with an apology.

  A truck starts up the road, pulling me from my thoughts.

  "I'll be fine," I tell Mariah who's still watching me with wide, worried eyes. "I'm just going to settle in and get ready to go back to work on Monday."

  I've been off for the last week and a half. Since I've never missed a day of work in my life, they were more than understanding when I told them I was ill and needed to take some time off. I didn't explain exactly what was going on. But I'm ready to go back. I miss my kids.

  I feel someone's eyes on me and turn. My eyes lock with Cade's and my breath dies in my throat. He's in the passenger side of a massive truck, his gaze riveted to me. He's so handsome with his messy blond hair and sharp jawline. Those blue-gray eyes are shadowed and haunted which kills me a little. He's watching me like he can't look away. I can't either. My gaze is stuck on him.

  Just seeing him again makes the last week and a half of stress and all those worries and doubts about whether I'm strong enough to face this lie quietly for a minute. For the first time in a week, I feel like I can think through them, breathe through them. Somehow, just being this close to him makes me feel braver, stronger…better.

  I start to lift my hand to wave at him, but he yanks his gaze away from me suddenly. As soon as those steely eyes aren't focused on me, a shiver rolls through me and I feel brittle once more. Sadness floats through me, welling up from within my soul.

  Does he think I don't want anything to do with him since I asked him to leave? Or has he decided he doesn't want anything to do with me?

  "He loves you," Mariah whispers as if reading my mind. She reaches out to squeeze my fingers.

  I bob my head in the semblance of a nod, fighting the urge to cry. She's right. I know she is. But I think Cade and I both have things we need to work through…things we need to face before we stand a chance of making this thing between us work. And I do want to make it work. That hasn't changed, not once since I was a little gi
rl. I've loved him through every important moment of my life. I'll keep on loving him through the rest of them.

  But I need to focus on fixing me right now, so maybe it's a good thing he's keeping his distance. Maybe.

  It still sucks though.

  "Are you sure you-?"

  "Yes," I say before she can ask for the sixteenth time if I'm sure I'll be okay here. Even if it hurts, I will be okay. I know that now.

  Eventually, Mariah caves and leaves me to my own devices, promising to call me later. I stand where I'm at, watching out of the corner of my eye when Cade hops out of his friend's truck and jogs up the steps toward Ma Rose's house…his house. He keeps his head down, not looking in my direction.

  Once he gets inside and the door closes behind him, I turn to look at the truck still idling on the curb. I frown when I notice the driver. He's big, like giant big, with dark hair and incredible blue eyes. He's watching me, his eyes narrowed like he's deep in thought. I've seen him around here before. He's been driving through the area for the last few years, keeping an eye on things, but I don't know who he is. A cop, I think. He certainly has that badass vibe to him like Cade does…like they're both more than capable of handling business.

  Did Cade send him around to keep an eye on me?

  The giant cop tips his head up in a nod, his lips curving up in an amused smile when my eyes narrow on him. I'm not even sure why I'm glaring at him. It's not like I don't appreciate him watching out for me or whatever he's been doing for longer than I honestly remember, but it would have been nice to know he was doing it.

  He lifts two fingers in a wave and then pulls away.

  I grab my overnight bag off the ground and head inside. The alarm beeps when I get inside and I have to drop my bag to disarm it. Cade never gave me the code, but he gave it to Mariah the night he sent her over here to check on me. I think it's supposed to be a random number—3859—but there's nothing random in what Cade does, so I'm sure it has some significance I don't yet understand.