Under His Protection

by LaQuette

  “I don’t give a fuck about what your power-hungry father does to me. As long as we’re together, nothing else matters.”

  Camden’s mouth trembled, and his blue eyes shone with unshed tears. “It’s not just you. He’ll destroy all of you.”

  Elijah’s eyes narrowed as he sought to make sense of what Camden was saying.

  “Elijah, he filled out an official complaint against you for misconduct. He made it seem as if you used your influence as my assigned protector to coerce me into bed. I told him we’d fight it. He said we could. But when he was through with that complaint, he’d do the same to your mother and brother. He would come after your entire family if I didn’t agree to marry his handpicked candidate.”

  Elijah stepped back, releasing Camden, moving across the room to slap his hand against the opposite wall. “Son of a bitch! He threatened my family? I don’t give a fuck who he is or what title he carries, I will stomp his ass into the ground about my damn mama.”

  “He’s banking on that. I’m trying to prevent that. Please, just let me go, and your family will be safe.”

  The pleading in Camden’s voice broke through his anger and sat in the middle of Elijah’s chest, making it difficult to breathe. He let his head hang down for a minute as he pulled himself together before he faced Camden again.

  “Your father wants us broken, Camden. When we’re apart, we’re weak. Don’t let your father do this.”

  “I don’t see where I have much choice, Elijah.”

  Elijah balled his hands into fists, looking up to the ceiling, blowing a long breath through pursed lips. “So, you will make decisions for my life the way your father makes decisions for yours?” He gathered himself enough to risk looking at Camden again. “I’m not about being controlled by anyone, Camden. I want to be with you, and I don’t care what anyone else, including your father, my boss, or my boss’s bosses have to say about it. I love being a cop, but it doesn’t compare to what I feel for you. I love you. My choice will always be you. But maybe I’m the only one feeling that way since running away is always your choice when it comes to me, to us?”

  “Don’t.” There was a flash of fire in Camden’s eyes when he said the word. “Sacrifice and running are not the same thing. I’m trying to protect you, Elijah. I don’t care about what happens to me. I don’t care about my suffering. I don’t want to see you hurt, not because you love me.” He leaned against the wall again, as if that last outburst had taken more energy, more strength, than he had to give.

  “I hurt when you hurt. That’s why it nearly killed me when you were in the hospital holding on to life. That’s why I tried to trade my life for your mother’s. I knew I couldn’t watch you suffer if you lost her because of me. It would have killed me. I cannot watch you hurt, Elijah. You losing your job over this bullshit with my father would hurt you. Don’t you see? This is the only way I can protect you, all of you.”

  Elijah smiled as he listened to that last sentence. Camden may not have realized what he’d done, but Elijah did. Camden had admitted to loving his family. As far as Elijah was concerned, that’s all the proof he needed to believe in their future together.

  “I love you, Cam, and you love me. That’s the only thing I’m willing to acknowledge. Being together is the only choice I’m willing to make. If you’re ready to make your own decisions, I’ll be at my parents’ house visiting with the fam. I’m sure with the five of us together, someone is gonna want to get a game of Spades going. It would be nice to have my partner there with me. We’ve proven it several times over. We’re unstoppable together.”

  Elijah stepped forward, placing both hands on Camden’s face, gently cupping his cheeks as he wiped away the tracks of Camden’s fallen tears. “I love you, and my family loves you because I love you. You are mine, and therefore theirs. If you come for one Stephenson, you come for us all. Come to us, let us help you figure out a way to stop this. Don’t do this alone.”

  Elijah touched his forehead to Camden’s. It was a way of connecting, as if their minds and hearts melded into one when they touched like this. “We’ll be waiting for you. The choice is yours.”

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  “HE knows the truth.”

  Camden sat in Captain Heart Searlington’s office once again. This was the third time since all of this nonsense began, and he was no less pissed this time around.

  “You finally told him about your father’s complaint?”

  Camden nodded. “You sound as if you’d expected me to do so earlier.”

  Captain Searlington stood up and walked around to the front of her desk, taking a seat on its edge in front of Camden. “Of course, I did. You two are a couple. Why wouldn’t you discuss this and come up with a plan?”

  Camden’s gaze fell to the floor. Apparently everyone else in the world knew how people who loved each other were supposed to behave in crises.

  “I have little experience with relationships, I’m afraid.” He cleared his throat before meeting her gaze again. “I assume that ridiculously large wedding set on your finger means you’re an expert, Captain?”

  She wiggled her marriage finger, admiring the rings Camden mentioned. If his experience in expensive baubles was accurate, whoever placed those rings on her finger had paid a handsome price for them.

  “My husband comes from a world like yours. Old money, family business, overbearing parent who thinks they can rule the world through you. The only difference is, his dad and his godfather taught him the strength of family. I knew what it meant to have a strong family, but I didn’t truly understand how to tap into that until I met my husband. If you’re hiding things like your father’s complaint from Elijah, it means you don’t understand he’s supposed to be the source of your power. It took me a long time to realize my husband, Kenneth, was my center.”

  Camden leaned back into his chair, still weary from the earlier emotional exchange with Elijah. “What do you advise I do, Captain? My father will use every bit of influence he has to destroy Elijah and his family. How do I fight that?”

  “Camden, from what I understand, you’re an impressive lawyer. What would you advise someone to do if they were being blackmailed?”

  Camden closed his eyes to process her question. He hadn’t thought about his father’s actions as blackmail before. But what else could they be? The judge had been pulling this for years, demanding Camden behave in a particular manner and throwing the precise penalty at him that would threaten the thing Camden loved most.

  “I’d tell them to expose their blackmailers.”

  She crossed her ankles and offered him a comforting smile. “If you expose your own truth, how can anyone else hold it over your head?”

  Camden pulled his cell phone from his jacket pocket. “Have you got any immediate plans over the next hour or so?”

  She shook her head. “No. Why?”

  Camden smiled as he dialed, waiting for the line to connect on the other end. “Because I was hoping you’d give me a hand in telling my truth.”

  She clapped her hands together and rubbed them in a conspiratorial manner, smiling as she answered, “What the hell. It’s been a minute since I risked my career just to stick it to someone above my pay grade. I’m in.”

  ELIJAH plated the various meats he’d grilled to perfection on his father’s old-school drum grill. It may not be the latest in grilling technology, but that bad boy smoked meat like nobody’s business. If his dad left him nothing else but his grill in his will, Elijah would be a satisfied man. Well, mostly satisfied.

  He stopped what he was doing to think about Camden. It had been hours since Elijah had coaxed the truth out of him in that bathroom. He’d expected to hear something from him by now. His heart too full of love to let hope completely die, he continued to busy himself with prepping the food while his family played cards inside the house.

  It wasn’t summer; the hot days had turned to a crisp breeze. It wasn’t cold enough for a jacket, but standing out here grilling was pro
bably a testament to the instability of his thoughts. No time to worry about that. You’ve got meat to grill.

  He flipped the last of the jerk chicken, brushed more sauce on it, then flipped it again, enjoying the sizzling sound of wet meat being seared by hot metal.

  “A-yo, E, come inside,” Emmanuel yelled from the back window. If Elijah were home on his quiet block in Westchester, he would’ve been telling Emmanuel to shut his big mouth. But here, on the block he’d grown up on in East New York, Brooklyn, that familiar “A-yo” coasting across the air to greet him was a soothing balm to his tattered soul. “Your boss and your boy are on the news.”

  “Camden?”

  “You got another man you smashing right now?”

  Elijah rolled his eyes and shook his head. His brother’s crudeness was also something that was familiar. Too bad that particular trait didn’t make him feel as warm and fuzzy as his prior greeting had. He waved Emmanuel off, pulled the remaining food from the grill, and brought two heaping plates full of grilled food into the house.

  He made a quick stop at the kitchen counter to make sure the plates were secured, and then he rushed into the family room where his parents, brother, and sister-in-law were sitting with their eyes focused on the television. Elijah sat on the arm of his mother’s armchair and joined the viewing. As the commercial ended and the nightly news theme played, a picture of Camden, Heart, and the anchorwoman came into view.

  What the hell are you up to, Camden?

  “WELCOME to the News at Six with me, Marie Jennings. This week the good guys checked a mark in the win column by convicting the leaders of the notorious cult, the Path to Unity. Earlier today I was granted this exclusive interview with two key members of the task force who accomplished this feat. Discover how a joint operation between the Brooklyn District Attorney’s office and the seventy-fourth precinct made our streets safer as we roll tape.”

  Camden swallowed, then patted a dry handkerchief across his brow as he listened to Marie Jennings shoot the interview promo. In a few seconds, they’d be filming again, and it would be time for him and Heart to put his plan into motion.

  “Executive Assistant District Attorney Camden Warren and Captain Heart Searlington. The two of you were directly responsible for the capture and conviction of the now defunct Path to Unity, and their leader, Lee Edwards. How did you two accomplish that?”

  Camden cleared his throat before he spoke. He’d called his mother and Evelyn shortly before they filmed to make certain his father and Elijah were watching this interview when it broadcast. He wanted his father to see this broadcast, but he needed Elijah to see it. “It was definitely a joint venture. After the Path bombed my car, Captain Searlington did her best to impress upon me how important it was for me to allow the NYPD to protect me. I understood her, and she was absolutely right, but I wasn’t willing to walk away from this trial and let the Path win. So, I refused to go into protective custody.”

  “It sounds like he wasn’t easy to convince, Captain Searlington.”

  Heart gave a barely there smile, which made Camden’s lips curve into a full-on grin. “ADA Warren was difficult to convince. No matter what I told him, how I tried to scare him, he didn’t listen. So I brought in my lieutenant, Stephenson, to talk some sense into him.”

  “Why was Lieutenant Stephenson successful where the captain wasn’t, ADA Warren?”

  Because he kisses me breathless and fucks me stupid. That was certainly the truth, but Camden was sure getting the show censured by the FCC was probably not a good thing if his plan would work. “Well—” Camden held the breath sitting inside his chest. This was the moment of truth, and if he botched it up, he’d have so much more to lose than a career. “—he’s the man I love, so his words weighed a bit more than Captain Searlington’s.”

  “Wait, the man you love? You’re romantically involved with the lieutenant?”

  “Yes.” Camden looked directly into the camera as he spoke. “I’ve loved him since our first date five years ago, and no matter how much time has passed, that feeling has never waned. It’s powerful, it’s mutual, and the love we share gets through my stubborn defenses when nothing else will. He told me he was scared for me. That was enough to make me listen to the captain with one caveat. I still refused to allow her to put me in protective custody, but I agreed to get out of the city with Elijah while she and her team worked the bombing case. I strongly believed no one else would protect me the way he would.”

  The reporter placed her hand over her heart, giving Camden the sweetest fake smile he’d ever seen. “You apparently were right. Can you share with us how he did that?”

  Heart placed a hand on Camden’s arm to let him know she would take the lead on the last question. “The NYPD obviously can’t reveal all of its tactical secrets, but Lieutenant Stephenson is a fourteen-year decorated officer who has always had a gift for strategic takedowns of suspects and criminal organizations. As his captain, I am proud that he represents the best of what NYPD offers.”

  “Wow, that is remarkable,” the reporter responded. “Who would’ve thought love would literally save your life when you met and fell in love with a cop?”

  Camden smiled. “I’ve known from that first moment that Elijah would breathe life into my world. I didn’t think he’d have to actually draw his service weapon to protect me, but I’ve always known I was safe with him.”

  “Now that the case is closed, and you have put away the leaders of the Path for their crimes, what comes next for you, ADA Warren? Will there be wedding bells, or maybe a promotion?”

  Camden’s heart swelled with the reporter’s question. “If I’m lucky, both,” Camden answered quickly. “Although Elijah and I have made nothing official at this moment, I do believe we’re headed in that direction. Marriage, family, and building ties within the community are things our parents modeled for us. The Stephensons are probably the only family I know of who believes in truth, justice, and taking care of your community as strongly as my family does.”

  “That’s saying a lot, considering your father is the chief judge of the New York Court of Appeals.”

  “I know.” Camden laughed. “But it’s true. I don’t know who got away with less as a kid, me as the judge’s son, or Elijah as the cop’s. Service, it’s part of who we are at our core.”

  “Judge Warren must be thrilled to know his son has made such a solid choice in a love interest.”

  Camden thought of the rage that might nearly choke his father when this interview aired. “I’m not sure happy is a strong enough word to describe what my father feels about Elijah and me. But you know how dads are when it comes to their sons.”

  “So, you’ve given us a little peek into your personal future. What about your professional one? What does a win like this mean for you? Are you next in line for the position of district attorney of the borough of Brooklyn?”

  Camden turned again to the camera. “Well, I hadn’t planned to announce anything, but since you’re putting me on the spot, I may as well. I am throwing my hat into the political arena and running as a candidate for the office of the district attorney of Kings County.”

  “You heard the exclusive here on the News at Six. Not only is ADA Warren in love with a man who loves justice as much as he does, but he’s also campaigning to be the next DA of Brooklyn. Nothing is impossible when you’re fighting on the side of justice both on and off the battlefield. Thank you, ADA Warren. Thank you, Captain Searlington. And thank you, Lieutenant Stephenson, wherever you are tonight.”

  ELIJAH sat still, frozen by the affection he’d just witnessed from both Captain Searlington and the man he loved. “You all right, son?”

  Elijah looked down at his mother, unsure of how to answer her, so he nodded. His father leaned forward to catch his gaze. “What the hell was that all about?”

  Elijah’s lips trembled before he spoke. “That was Camden saving my career, this family, and our relationship all at the same time. That was also my captain making it
almost impossible for IA to come for me over that bullshit complaint by the judge.” Not to mention embellishing his involvement in the case. Elijah hadn’t been part of the investigation. He’d simply hidden Camden, and even that he hadn’t done all that well. He’d have to thank her for that later.

  “It sorta made it seem like you two have been dating for five years, and that the judge knew about it?”

  Elijah smiled at his sister-in-law’s comment. “It does, Viv, doesn’t it?” He shook his head as he replayed the interview over in his head. It was brilliant. In a few moments he’d matched the Stephenson family’s integrity right up there with the Warrens’. If the judge came for Elijah’s family now, he’d be painting an ugly mark on the Warren name too. Damn, Camden was smart.

  Elijah stood up quickly, checking his pocket for his wallet and keys. “I’m gonna head out.” Elijah gave a nod to his family and noticed the large grins the four of them were wearing. They all knew exactly where Elijah was going. To find his man.

  He made it to the driver’s side of his car before he heard a familiar voice call from behind him on the other side of the street.

  “Excuse me, Lieutenant. I hope I’m not too late to accept your invitation to demolish your brother’s winning record again?”

  A smile spread across Elijah’s face as he recognized the voice. The sound of it made his heart dance with excitement. He took a deep breath before he turned around, trying to calm some of the giddiness threatening to burst through him. As soon as he saw Camden walking toward him from across the street, his smile broadened. “I just served them dinner. After they finish eating, they’ll be ready to start.”

  Camden stepped in front of him. The woodsy scent of Camden’s cologne tickled the night air. “What are you doing here, Camden? I thought you decided to bounce?” That last part was supposed to sound serious. Instead, the permanent smile on his face coupled with the bubble of laughter that escaped his lips kept Elijah from presenting his practiced, serious cop voice.