He unlocked the door and opened it.
Cop knock because they were cops.
Plainclothes.
But he could smell it on them.
Though there was something off about the scent.
“Is this the residence of Kathryn Jansen?” the one in front asked.
“Who’s asking?” he returned.
They both pulled out badges.
He studied them closely and made a “hup” noise when they moved to stow them before he was done memorizing the badge numbers.
They seemed impatient with this, but Boone did what he had to do before he looked between them and asked, “What’s your business with Ryn?”
The one in front was spokesman.
“Is she home?”
“I’ll repeat, what’s your business with Ryn?” he said.
This time, the one behind spoke up.
“Corinne Morton was found dead last night. Homicide.”
Corinne Morton.
Cisco’s attorney.
And the person who set Ryn up for a chat with the guy.
Fuck, fuck, fuck.
“It was reported by her husband that Kathryn Jansen is an acquaintance and she was at their home two nights ago. That’s what this is about,” the guy in back said.
No, what it was about was that husband shared Ryn had a chat with Cisco in Corinne Morton’s house two nights ago, something Cisco asked Morton to arrange.
“Names,” Boone grunted.
“Detective Mueller,” front guy said.
“Bogart,” back guy said.
“Straight through to the living room,” he instructed. “I’ll get her.”
He opened the door farther, but stepped the other way, so he was blocking the hall to her bedroom, which had its door at the end.
Him doing this didn’t stop both men trying to see past him as they moved in.
When they were through, he closed and locked the door, checked they stopped in the living room, and turned to hoof it down the hall.
She was standing in the door, nightie gone, and thank fuck she didn’t put on those seriously sweet, but also seriously sexy-short cutoffs. She had on a pair of joggers that ended just below her calves and were camo, except the camo was tans and beiges and pinks. She’d pulled on a tight pink tank up top under which she had a bra.
She was also wearing an expression that stated flatly she was freaked.
She’d heard about her friend.
He made it to her, put a hand in her belly, and shoved her back into the room, stopping her and dipping his face to hers.
“Brush your teeth. Come to introduce yourself. Excuse yourself to make coffee. This all will give me time to feel them out and I’ll get the story,” he ordered.
“Corinne,” she breathed out in horror.
He cupped her jaw in both hands. “Brush your teeth, Kathryn. Take your time. Pull it together. I’ll keep them occupied.”
She nodded.
He should let it go.
But it was now very clear he could not let it go.
“Cisco is a bad guy,” he said gently.
She nodded again.
He touched the tip of his nose to hers and he liked it that she did not hide that settled her, before he took his hands from her, turned and walked swiftly to the living room.
He hit the room intent on making a number of points very clear.
He didn’t delay doing that.
“We were still in bed. Ryn’s gonna brush her teeth and make coffee. Then she’ll talk.”
Point 1: She’s mine.
Point 2: This means you’re on my turf.
Point 3: This is going to go like I want it to go, and if it doesn’t, I’ll stop it.
That last point was inferred, but he saw it register and didn’t like the sour feeling in his gut that they didn’t hide they didn’t like it.
He could get they wanted to talk to her.
He could get they’d want to know why Cisco talked to her.
But any cop with a possible witness who might conceivably have reliable intel on a decent lead for a homicide would not walk into a woman’s house on a Sunday morning and not like the fact her man was demonstrably protective about the fact there were cops on his woman’s doorstep on a Sunday morning.
Mag had shared with the team that Cisco told Ryn he’d been framed.
By dirty cops.
Not a one of them believed this story.
But Boone could not shake the feeling he was standing in Ryn’s dark cave of a living room.
With two dirty cops.
“You are?” Mueller asked.
“Boone Sadler,” he answered.
“How long have you known Kathryn?” Bogart asked.
“This is pertinent to your business here, how?” Boone asked back.
“He’s just making conversation,” Mueller mumbled.
“No, he wasn’t,” Boone returned.
Mueller, cottoning on that Boone was not just any protective boyfriend, started to study him a lot more closely.
Time to make another point.
“You know Mitch Lawson and Brock Lucas?” he asked.
Now it was both men focused more closely on him.
“Different shop. We’re Englewood PD. But yeah, we know ’em,” Mueller said.
“Yeah, they’re tight with my boss.”
Mueller shifted.
Bogart’s scrutiny of Boone intensified even further.
Yeah.
They also knew Hawk.
Point 4: I work for Hawk Delgado. Mitch Lawson and Brock Lucas are decorated cops on the force, they’re his closest buds, and so no shit will be eaten this morning in Ryn’s living room with you trying to show what you think are your big cop dicks.
He felt her before he saw both men’s eyes go to the doorway as Ryn walked in.
She went right to Mueller, hand up. “Sorry. We had a late night and lazy morning. I’m Kathryn.”
Mueller took her hand, tipped his chin down. “Detective Lance Mueller.”
She nodded, pulled her hand from his and offered it to Bogart.
“Detective Kevin Bogart,” he said when he took it, and Boone clocked the asshole’s eyes drifting to her tits.
Ryn didn’t miss it.
She pulled from him a lot less friendly and went to Boone.
He clamped an arm around her waist.
“I’m going to make coffee really quickly. Do you two want coffee?” she asked Mueller and Bogart.
“They’re not staying that long,” Boone said.
She looked up at him and then looked to the men. “Okay, I won’t be long. Please, take a seat.”
He gave her a squeeze and she looked back up at him.
“Baby, they’re not gonna be staying that long,” he repeated.
“Right,” she whispered, skimmed her gaze through the cops and muttered, “Be right back.”
She took off.
Boone crossed his arms on his chest.
“We have a number of questions,” Mueller warned.
“Maybe, but it still won’t take long for Ryn to answer them,” Boone replied.
“And you know this, how?” Bogart asked, and Boone didn’t miss his snide tone or that he phrased his question like Boone phrased an earlier one.
He ignored the guy and looked to Mueller, who was good cop.
Or acting like it.
“When was this woman killed?” he asked.
“We tend to be the ones who ask the questions,” Bogart replied.
Boone looked back to him. “I can pull up the Post online and find out so I’m not sure why you won’t just tell me,” Boone pointed out.
“Last night. ME’s preliminary puts time of death between nine and eleven,” Mueller answered.
“Where?” Boone kept at him.
“Her master bath,” Mueller shared.
“How?” Boone asked.
“Back of the skull. She was on her knees.”
“Execution,” Boone m
urmured.
Mueller gave a short nod.
“Husband out of the house?” Boone asked.
Bogart spoke up.
“They’re perverts,” he sneered. “He was somewhere probably getting fucked up the ass by a bitch in leather and a strap on.”
“Kev,” Mueller muttered, then to Boone. “The Mortons have an open marriage. He had a date. He shares that Mrs. Morton knew about it and approved.”
This was a lot of detail to convey to a civvy, which part had to do with Mueller covering for Bogart being a dickhead and part had to do with the fact he knew they were going to leave, and Boone was going to be on the phone with Hawk, Mitch or Brock before they were out of the front vestibule, so he’d find out anyway.
“So he’s alibied,” Boone noted.
“He found her and called it in,” Mueller shared. “This happened around one. He fucked the scene. Open marriage or not, he came unraveled. Tried to give a woman without half her head CPR.”
“Christ,” Boone bit.
Mueller’s chin suddenly jerked up, his gaze going beyond Boone, and Boone turned to see Ryn coming through the dining room.
She hit him, her front to his side, and shoved the fingers of one hand in the back of his jeans, her other hand she set to his stomach, and he curled an arm around her shoulders.
“Coffee’s on,” she told him.
“Right,” he replied.
She turned to the cops.
“This is very upsetting about Corinne,” she declared.
“We can imagine,” Mueller mumbled, then, distinctly, he said, “It’s our understanding two nights ago you went to Mrs. Morton’s house and there, you met a client of hers.”
“Brett,” she confirmed.
Boone held her closer.
She pressed her hand in at his stomach.
“Yes, Brett Rappaport,” Mueller said.
He felt her eyes and looked down at her to see her looking up at him.
“Is that his last name?” she asked.
“Yup,” he answered.
“You didn’t know his last name?” Bogart spoke up again.
Ryn turned to him, shaking her head. “He kidnapped me and my girlfriends in March.”
“Yes, this is on record,” Mueller stated.
“So we weren’t formally introduced,” Ryn went on.
Mueller cleared his throat like he was hiding a laugh.
Bogart narrowed his eyes on Ryn.
“Can you tell us why, when he’d kidnapped you last March, you met with him at Corinne Morton’s house two nights ago?” Mueller asked.
“Corinne told me she was throwing a party. She lied. She was setting me up to talk to Brett because Brett wanted to talk to me,” Ryn answered.
“You didn’t know he was there?” Mueller pressed.
Ryn shook her head. “No.” Again she looked at Boone. “And I now feel like a bitch because she kept texting she was sorry, and I blocked her.”
“The texts,” Mueller mumbled, and the way he said it, it was not for Ryn and Boone, it was aimed at Bogart.
Boone shifted his attention to the cop.
They had Morton’s phone. They saw her chain to Ryn.
Puzzle pieces were slotting together.
“What did Rappaport have to say to you that was worth him making his attorney set you up for this chat?” Bogart asked.
Fuck.
He did not want her to answer that, to these guys, fully.
But he had no way to stop her from doing that.
“He likes my friend,” Ryn stated.
Boone looked back down at her.
“It’s all kinds of weird, but I think he feels bad he kidnapped her, and all of us, and he wanted to see she’s okay and…now here’s the super weird part, get me to tell her he said hey.”
“That’s it?” Bogart asked dubiously.
“No,” Ryn answered.
Fuck.
“He wanted to ask me about Evie’s boyfriend, Mag. If I liked him for her. Honestly, he gave me the impression he wanted to know if he had a shot. He doesn’t and I shared that. And it wasn’t fun sharing it because, you know, he might not have liked my answers, and he’d kidnapped me before, and I was the one in the parking lot when there was gunplay. So I didn’t want to know how he’d react if he didn’t like my answers. But even though he seemed kinda sulky, he also seemed to take the news all right that he wasn’t gonna get in there with Evie.”
“I hope you can understand, considering the kind of man Brett Rappaport is, and the fact he’s wanted for the murder of a police officer, this story is hard to believe,” Mueller noted carefully.
“I can absolutely understand that,” Ryn replied. “Try being the person who was led into a room at gunpoint and then have some dude ask about your girlfriend and having to share he had no shot then being asked to tell her he said hey. Which I didn’t, by the way. Mag would go loco.”
“Did you report this to the police?” Bogart asked.
She shook her head but explained, “Right, see, I told Mag, who I knew would tell Hawk, and Hawk has cop buddies. But honestly, Brett let me go, and I was glad it was just him having the hots for a girlfriend and I made it out alive…again. But bottom line, this guy could get to me. He’d demonstrated that, now twice, so I wasn’t all set to rile him up. The guys knew what happened and that meant I was protected.”
“You told someone called Mag, not your boyfriend, who also works for Delgado,” Bogart noted.
“My boyfriend?” she asked.
“That’d be me,” Boone grunted.
She started and looked up at him.
He smiled down at her.
“Oh,” she whispered.
He smiled down at her more.
She looked to Bogart and continued to demonstrate her apparently keen ability to read people by telling her truths, which were not lies, but they didn’t share the full picture. Though, and this was the genius part, they shared enough of it, with detail, to be believable as the full picture.
“We were in a fight. Boone can be annoying. And bossy. Though I won’t do that again. When Mag called and told him Brett got to me, he lost his mind, at me, primarily because I didn’t call him the minute Cisco let me go to tell him Cisco had me at all.”
Boone burst out laughing.
She was pressing close and grinning up at him when he stopped so he bent and touched his mouth to hers.
“How was Rappaport with Morton?” Mueller asked, breaking into their moment.
Both Boone and Ryn looked to him.
“I never saw them interact,” Ryn answered. “Though, the minute I walked in, she apologized even before I knew there was something to apologize for. She just said he was a client you didn’t say no to. I didn’t know what she was talking about. Until I did.”
“Mr. Morton reported to us that you’re a member of their sex club,” Bogart stated baldly.
Ryn pressed even closer, and in a quiet voice, confirmed, “I am.”
Bogart looked to Boone. “You down with that?”
“And again, you’re asking questions that are not pertinent to your investigation,” Boone said low.
“Your woman involved in kinky sex shit you’re not involved in, and a woman also involved in it gets dead, and all Delgado’s boys are known to have a variety of skills, I’d say that’s pertinent,” Bogart shot back.
Boone’s body grew stiff.
“Boone and I were on the couch all night watching true crime shows on ID,” Ryn snapped, all easy, cooperative, let’s-get-this-done, open sharing gone.
Bogart ignored her and kept his attention on Boone.
“You know, just to say, now that I know who you are, there are a lot of us in the department who aren’t down with Nightingale and his men, Delgado and his boys, Chaos and their thugs, and Sebring and his crew thinkin’ they can do whatever the fuck they want in Denver. A lot of us. No one says dick around Lawson or Lucas, or Eddie and Hank, Malcolm or Tom. But there’s gonna come a time w
hen you fucks are gonna mess up, and there’s gonna be a lotta brothers with badges who are gonna be all over that.”
“Kevin,” Mueller spat.
Ryn pulled from Boone. “As there’s not any more I have to share with you, I think it’s time for you gentlemen to be on your way. I’m sure you have a number of visits to make this morning. So we won’t delay you any further.”
“Yes,” Mueller stated quickly. “We appreciate your time, Kathryn.”
“Not at all,” she said. “And if I remember anything else, do you have a card?”
Mueller pulled out a card.
He started to hand it to Ryn, but Boone reached out and took it.
Mueller’s eyes tracked through him but didn’t catch.
Boone felt Bogart seething.
Ryn moved as if she was going to show them to the door, but he pulled her behind him, and he did it himself.
Bogart didn’t even look at him as he exited.
Mueller stopped and opened his mouth.
Boone spoke first.
“Don’t. You know.”
Mueller did know that was all kinds of fucked up, considering their purpose for being there, and their need for reliable and willing witnesses. Or at this early stage in the investigation, any information they could find. And he knew how Bogart behaved would not foster that.
He also knew Boone wasn’t a fan of Bogart’s attitude, and because of Bogart, that was all they were going to get out of Ryn if Boone had anything to say about it.
So Mueller shut his mouth, it went tight, then he walked out.
Boone closed and locked the door then prowled down the hall to get his phone, which was on Ryn’s nightstand.
He didn’t get his first call off before Ryn was in the doorway.
“Malcolm or Tom?” she asked after names she didn’t know.
“Malcolm is Lee and Hank Nightingale’s dad, a cop. And Tom’s Lee’s wife, Indy Nightingale’s dad, also a cop.”
She knew Eddie and Hank. They were cops but they were in what was considered the Nightingale crew.
Jet, Lottie’s sister, one of the Rock Chicks, was married to Eddie Chavez.
Lottie’s posse…
Being Ryn’s posse.
Hawk’s crew…
Being Boone’s crew.
In other words all of this…
Their crew.
“Sebring?” she went on.
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