by Angi Morgan
Chest-high bullet holes in her hallway were more than enough evidence that the creep bleeding inside her living room had been shooting to kill. The perp half-sat, half-leaned against her freshly painted—now blood-spattered—wall. Alert. Smug. Shot in the thigh.
“Dallas P.D. Show me your hands.” For someone unaccustomed to being shot at, her voice and grip were surprisingly steady. She covered her mystery man as he frisked the shooter. Dealer? Doper? Someone had followed the man who saved her life to her house.
Her DEA agent picked up the weapon several feet from the shooter and slipped it in the back of his jeans. Her agent? Definitely not a safe way to think. He had saved her life, but she couldn’t completely trust him yet.
The agent had a photo of Pike and the reverse side was a hand-drawn map to her house with doodles around the edges. Doodles to anyone else, but it was a code she and her brothers had used since childhood. The message told her to stick with this man until Michael contacted her. Sent before Michael was shot with Pike’s weapon. Sent before he was found comatose on police academy property. She had no reason to trust her brother and even less to trust the outsider carrying the message, but did she have a choice?
“Who wants her dead?” the agent demanded. He smashed the shooter’s hands on top of the wound. “You’ll want to keep pressure on that.”
The shooter sucked air through his teeth in a long hiss.
Blood seemed to be everywhere. But it wasn’t. Not this time.
Her hands were covered. No. Her hands were clean.
Swallowing hard did nothing to stop the tremors trying to overtake her body. She took several deep gulps of air, closing her eyes and ignoring the fact that her home was now a crime scene. But closing her eyes didn’t keep the image of Pike’s death from appearing.
Pike was lying in her arms. Bleeding. Nothing blocked the memory of your partner’s life fading away. The tortured look of pain as he struggled to tell her his last secrets would be with her forever.
His screams echoed through the parking lot. Wait, Pike hadn’t screamed. Her vision focused on the open mouth of her attacker. His painful roar bounced off the bare walls of her home.
What was the source of his agony? He hadn’t been in that much pain when they’d entered the room.
“Tell me.” The agent’s powerful voice sounded different, more guttural, more vicious. “I only have seconds to find my answers, man. But I can leave you in pain for a long time.”
The shooter screamed again when the agent’s fist pushed the shooter’s hand deeper into the bullet wound. Darby rushed forward. This couldn’t be happening. Cops were the good guys.
“Get back.” The agent flipped a badge toward her. “He’s a cop. A cop who just tried to kill you.”
“All right, all right,” the shooter yelled. “We’re cleaning up loose ends.” He hissed through the pain.
The agent didn’t stop.
“I swear,” the shooter cried. “I was supposed to make it look like a break-in, find the stuff Pike had given her and get rid of the girl.”
“We can sort through this train wreck with the correct authorities.” Darby should stop him. But she was unwilling to drag the agent from the only person in the room with answers. “There’s got to be a logical reason—”
The decision was made for her when the shooter passed out.
“He’s a cop. They’ll haul us to jail. We won’t find our answers while stuck in a holding cell until someone clears this mess up. They might finish what this guy started.” He stood and tossed the badge on top of the shooter’s chest. “You coming, O’Malley?”
The lights from the ambulance arriving outside flashed through the curtains. Her insides stopped shaking. “We have to call this in.”
“Lucky thing that ambulance is out front.” He gently turned her around by the shoulders and nudged her toward the kitchen. “We have to go. Now. I’ll drive.”
He slid past her and swiped her keys from the counter before she could object to anything.
“We can’t leave the scene of a shooting.”
“We don’t have time for a discussion. The EMTs are here.” He yanked on her right arm, keeping her from returning to the front of the house. “That dirtbag tried to kill us. He admitted they’re after Pike’s package.”
“I’ve got this man,” the first EMT shouted, coming through the doorway. “This is a badge. Call dispatch, officer down.”
It took a second to register the vise grip around her upper arm. And yet another second for her to accept how much trouble she’d be in once she left her house.
Oh yeah, she was leaving.
Following her brother’s instructions to stick with the agent might possibly clear Michael from suspicion and find Pike’s real murderer. She’d keep her word to her dead partner and save her brother.
“O’Malley, we have to go. Now.”
“Right after you hand over the shooter’s weapon.”
Secret Agent Man released her arm, pulled the .38 from the middle of his back and handed it to her. No argument, but he slammed through the door. She scooped up her gun belt, running close behind. He punched the opener button and ran to the driver’s side.
With their doors barely closed, he revved the engine and tore out of the alley. He zigzagged through the streets until he reached Central Expressway.
She squirmed enough in her seat to watch in case someone followed. She’d halfway expected to be in cuffs by this point, not in the clear. She stowed the shooter’s weapon in the compartment between the seats and holstered her gun, keeping it in her lap in case her companion did something crazy.
“North or south?”
“South.” Toward her office. Toward the familiar. Toward safety.
“South it is,” he said casually, driving like a law-abiding citizen, turning onto the highway as if nothing were wrong. “You should remove the battery from your phone.”
He was right again. She had a data phone with GPS capability that the police could track. The lights from Central Expressway illuminated the dismantling process that left her disconnected from anyone familiar.
“Why did that man follow you to my house and try to kill you?” she asked five minutes down the road.
“Didn’t he say he was after you, Officer O’Malley?”
“Let’s cut the cutesy crap, shall we? Pull over at an all-night gas station. I need a minute to process what happened.” Maybe she should wave her gun to emphasize she was in charge. “And it’s Detective.”
Or it used to be before she’d been transferred to the academy.
“So we’ll need gas?” he asked, avoiding yet another question and darting his eyes to the rearview mirror.
“Look. I still don’t know who you are and Pike wasn’t all that clear about who the package was for. He didn’t mention anyone by name.”
“And you didn’t open it?” He smiled a toothy grin in her direction. “You strike me as the curious type.”
He was confident and arrogant about his decisions. He’d done this before. Run. Evade the police. Shoot suspects or worse. Some of his experience was beginning to piss her off. Most she was beginning to admire.
“Don’t pretend to know me. We’re only twenty minutes from where I report for duty. So cool it.”
He lifted his fingers off the steering wheel in mock surrender. The next exit approached and he crossed three lanes of traffic to come to a screeching halt on the shoulder.
“What the heck are you doing?” she yelled.
“Keep your eyes open, O’Malley. Good surveillance requires more than one person. I’m looking for a second car.”
Automatically turning in her seat, she watched as four cars sped past.
“You don’t seriously believe that man was a cop?”
“Don’t you? His badge looked authentic to me.” He swiveled in his seat to face her instead of the mirror he’d been staring at. “Pike sent for me. In my book, that means he couldn’t trust anyone near him. Bad guys. Bad cops.” H
e shrugged. “Doesn’t make any difference to me. Somebody killed Pike and I’ll return the favor.”
“Pike meant a lot to me, too.” But so did Michael. She wouldn’t let this mystery agent find anything without her. Not when the most obvious path to Pike’s killer might lead him to her brother. She needed to be certain he avoided that particular road. “What could be so important that Pike would be killed before anyone even knows what it is? Why would cops want to make this mysterious thing disappear along with anyone who knows about it?”
“I promised to deliver it to the DEA. I’ll let them sort out all the whys. Don’t worry about my end. Just take me to it.”
“I prefer to drive.” She removed the keys and shot out the door, walking around the tail of the car while he circled the hood.
What was she doing? Was this DEA bad boy truly Pike’s friend or someone wanting the package to destroy it? She’d find whatever Pike had hidden and the truth. Cops trying to kill her didn’t make sense, but neither did this agent. Quick on the draw, saving her life—she understood that was part of the job. But even her own father had never held her hair while she’d thrown up.
Was she totally out of her mind? Shoot, she already knew the answer. She’d fled the scene of a crime. A man—a cop—had been shot with her duty weapon. And her job was history. Her only ray of hope was if this guy was legitimate. They could explain what happened to his supervisor, retrace Pike’s steps and find the missing pieces. It was her best, perhaps her only, chance of helping her brother, getting justice for her old mentor and hanging on to whatever shred of what might be her career.
If the agent could connect the dots to prove Michael’s innocence, she’d lend him the pencil.
“Let’s start with something simple…your name.” She shoved her weapon into the door pocket, unsnapping the security strap of the holster. Easy access if something went wrong.
“Now that we’ll be working together I guess you should know. Erren Rhodes to your rescue.”
“I’m not working with you.”
“Isn’t it a little too late for that decision?” He turned in the seat, leaning back toward the door window. “Look. All we need to do is retrieve Pike’s package and you’re done. Back to whatever boring job you do.”
Boring was correct. She wanted out in the field. More specifically, she wanted to be undercover. She’d spent years analyzing other officers’ work, verifying accounts of operations and preparing case information. She’d longed to be in the field. Instead she’d been transferred to the academy.
Whoever this man was, he was her clue to unraveling this mystery and she would stick with him to find her answers. It had to be the cop in her telling her she could handle this guy. After all, she had the gun, right?
Right. That’s why a voice in her head kept screaming she must be completely and utterly nuts. It would be easier if it were the Sergeant Major’s voice droning in her ear about making the wrong decision. Truth was, she hadn’t heard her father’s voice in a long time. Nope, it was her voice asking questions.
“This’ll take some getting used to,” he said. “I’ve never worked with anyone before. You’re in, O’Malley. Admit it.”
“So how do we avoid every cop in the city who will be searching for us?” Every instinct told her that trusting this man would help clear her brother’s name.
“You mean they’ll be searching for you,” he stated, very certain of himself. “They don’t know who I am yet.”
“Someone knows you’re in Dallas. Didn’t you say they ambushed you?”
“You’re probably right.” His nod was a silhouette against the passing cars. “Start by taking me to the package. We’ll open it up and find out what we’re dealing with.”
“This is ridiculous, Agent Rhodes.”
“Cut the agent bit. It’s too easy to slip up in front of the wrong person. Call me Erren or honey or babe.”
She watched him fix that gorgeous smile back on his face. Yes, it was totally for her benefit. And it was halfway doing its job.
“It doesn’t matter. I won’t be approved to work with you.”
“Who are we asking?”
Erren stared as O’Malley didn’t crack a smile.
“You aren’t sanctioned for this operation?” She continued to nervously drum her fingers on the console between the seats. “There’s no chance your supervisor can help clear this incident? No safe contact?”
“Let’s say the DEA will be ecstatic when I’m not causing any more problems. Pike was my safe contact. Always has been.”
“Good grief, you can’t mean to find Pike’s killer completely on your own. Especially with no plan or backup or resources.”
“I’ve got you, babe.”
“Why do you need me?”
Erren had no specific answer, but wasn’t it obvious? She wasn’t his partner, only an unanswered question in his investigation.
“Somehow Pike’s death has connected us, O’Malley.”
“Do you have a theory about that?”
“I don’t know who left the map leading me to your house.” Had she opened her eyes the slightest bit wider? “Maybe you do. Can we discuss this while you drive?”
Glowering, his reluctant detective turned the key, shoved her Camry in gear and merged back into traffic. The photo had come from Butthead. His working theory? Beavis and Butthead would pick him up, follow the map and kill them both in her living room, leaving the picture. He didn’t know why yet…it was only a theory.
But something more than Pike’s picture had convinced her to come with him. He didn’t care why as long as she delivered Pike’s stuff and he could finish the job. He would find the murderer, give him what he deserved and disappear. Simple. Yeah, he definitely had a plan.
“Tell me exactly what’s going on.”
“I was ambushed. My cover’s blown. And my Dallas handler disappeared when shots were fired.”
“If they decided to take you out, no offense, but it wouldn’t require an ambush or shooting their own men. And that doesn’t explain the Dallas P.D.’s involvement.”
That x-ray vision of hers was starting to unnerve him. She looked as if she could see through the persona he cloaked himself with on the street. The same personality that had kept him alive for six years. He couldn’t afford to exchange innuendos or smiles with her, just the facts.
“It was a setup. Whoever was at the end of the alley wasn’t with Beavis and Butthead. Those two guys were as surprised to see the cops as I was.”
“Or impersonators,” she said loyally. She wasn’t naïve, just staunch. Even after a dirty cop tried to kill her.
“I tried to surrender, but they kept firing.”
“And missed.” There she went shaking her head again. “So what were they really after? Your credibility? What’s your usual procedure when something like this happens?”
“Never happened.”
Why did he suddenly sound as if he was lying? He was an excellent liar. But he was telling the truth. So why did her questioning make him feel like a liar? He must have hit his head harder than he remembered. “I have to be close to something, because they want me out of the picture. But why not dead?”
“Dead doesn’t go away.” Her voice was emotionless and unsettling. “It gets cops crawling out of the woodwork, which is something they probably don’t need.”
Right answer. And logical. Pike had said O’Malley was one of the best. Yeah, she might have that rare quality he could admire. And admiration wasn’t something he spared for too many people—especially cops. Strangely, it was there the first time he’d looked into the detective’s emerald-green eyes. And he still didn’t know her first name.
“If I help you—”
“If?” Better for her to know there wasn’t a choice.
She shot him a look like… Just what was that look? Cute, yes. That one curious eyebrow thing suggested he was the crazy one and she was totally in control.
“If I decide to help you, we’re partner
s,” she stated.
“Now wait a minute.”
“Equal in all decisions.”
“I don’t care how much undercover experience you think you have.”
“Equals.” Looking straight ahead, she was confident again and his insides were jumping.
“Nope.” He didn’t really have a choice and he could see the control slipping from his fingers. What was it about this woman that got under his skin? “No way.”
Lie.
All he had to do was lie. Agree with her until he got the package. Other than “south,” she’d given no other directions. He still didn’t have a clue where they were headed. He could lead her to believe they were collaborating. Nothing new about that. So why did he feel compelled to be honest?
“This is for real, O’Malley. Don’t think for a second they won’t kill us.” Even in the dark, he was certain her knuckles turned white from her death grip on the wheel. “We can pretend to be equals, but it’ll be my experience that’s going to keep us alive. Got it?”
Truth had spewed from his mouth. She must have agreed since she didn’t disagree. He leaned back in the seat, very aware of the condition of his clothes. Everything hurt. His side wasn’t exactly on fire, but it wasn’t nice and comfy either. He clamped his hand over the wet gauze. As long as he stayed immobile he was fine, but he needed a couple of stitches or some Krazy Glue.
“I guess you should issue your orders using my name. It’s Darby.”
The unusual name fit. Darby O’Malley. Nice. A complete Irish bundle with dazzling red hair.
“Can you make out that alert sign?” she asked.
They were on a major thoroughfare cutting through Dallas, and the flashing alert ahead of them had nothing to do with road construction.
“Abducted. White female. Suspect armed. Silver Camry TX SGT MJR3.” It was worse than he’d originally thought, but he couldn’t let O’Malley know that. “You have personalized plates?”
“How can they think I was abducted? He said he was a cop.”
“The cop lied. You’re a smart woman. Don’t you know how the real world works?”
“What could he accomplish? He shot up my house and nearly killed us.”
