“What happens tonight?”
“Undercover bust with Hazard Creek PD.”
“You’re going?”
He nodded. “The chief needs a strong team. We’ll be dealing with some skilled criminals. We don’t want any gunplay.”
She sank back against the pillows and took a swig of coffee. “Hazard Creek, hmm. Did I step into something the day I showed up to cover that DEA bust?”
“Yes and no. I’m sorry to be cryptic, but I don’t have all the answers. Let’s just say it wasn’t all about the bust.”
“So it wasn’t the pharmaceutical story I was working on?”
“No. Doesn’t look like a story you were working on at all.”
She was silent for a moment, staring down into her coffee mug, looking thoughtful. Then she said, “What about me? If you’re working tonight, does that mean no one’s after me?”
He forced himself to meet her gaze, felt her hope deep down in his gut. He wanted to sit next to her, take her in his arms and reassure her. He gripped the edge of the dresser to keep himself from going to her. “I’ve made arrangements for you to catch up with Joe and Rosie in the city.”
“You told them what’s going on?”
He shook his head. “They already knew. Alex told Caroline after we left last night—”
“Got it.” She held up a hand to stop his explanation.
“I gave Joe a call this morning to fill him in. Sal and Janet are going to pick you up at noon and drive you into the city. You’ll catch up with everyone and stay there until we get the situation under control. How does that sound?”
“Sal and Janet are staying, too?”
He nodded, watching the understanding dawn on her beautiful face. “The chief sent a disaster recovery company to your house this morning to assess the damage. They met up with Brian when he came over to feed the horses. Your insurance will handle it. You’ll get a new kitchen and a clean house out of the deal. The bomb was meant more as a diversion than anything else.”
“Good to know that no one wanted me dead.”
Scott didn’t point out that if they had, they’d have had ample opportunity to kill her yesterday. Not when the thought made him grip the dresser even harder.
“Please tell him thanks for me when you next talk to him.”
“I will.”
“And Janet and Sal are coming for me at noon?”
He nodded. “Are you hungry? I can fix you something to eat while you get ready.”
“No thanks.” She set the mug aside and glanced around. “Is this your place?”
He nodded again.
“Mike told me about it. It’s beautiful.” She gave a shrug. “What I saw of it in the dark, anyway.”
“Not big. Grand tour will take all of five minutes. Feel free to look around.” He glanced at her mug. “Want more coffee?”
A tiny frown creased her brow. “Scott, we made love last night. We slept together in this bed. Are you really going to stand there and act like it never happened?”
He met her gaze then, surprised by both her candor and his own stupidity. His head flooded with a thousand things he wanted to say, but not one he could actually admit aloud.
“Why won’t you talk with me about this?” she said. “Please tell me. I want to understand. You shut me down yesterday, too.”
“Riley, I—” He what? He loved her, but couldn’t bring himself to tell her when it meant revealing that he wasn’t the man she thought she knew, but a man who’d come from a dark past.
She swung her legs around and stood up, dragging the comforter with her. It revealed more than it concealed, but she didn’t seem to notice. He did. A gut-deep ache started inside, and he had to fight the urge to cover the distance between them, to admit he’d loved her forever, that he wanted nothing more than to continue loving her forever.
“Are you intentionally trying to make this weird?” she asked in a clipped tone he’d never heard before. “You care about me. You wanted me last night as much as I wanted you. I’m not imagining any of that.”
“No,” he admitted, forcing the words out. “You’re not.”
“Then what’s the problem, Scott? Just talk to me.”
He stared at her. At the confusion and anger on her beautiful face. What could he say? She was a strong woman. A woman who believed in people. She wanted to believe the best in him, too. And knowing that made him feel more powerless, more toxic than he’d ever felt before.
“Riley, I’m not who you think I am.”
She shook her head, trying to shake off her confusion, as if she wasn’t sure she’d heard him right. “I don’t understand.”
“No. You don’t,” he agreed. “You’ve been through so much. There’s no happy ending with me. I’m no good for you.”
Scott didn’t give her a chance to reply. He left the room. He could protect Riley from the men who’d killed Mike, but he didn’t know how to protect her from himself. A man who didn’t know the first thing about healthy, loving relationships.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
JASON STOOD UNNOTICED in a side room, peering through the ajar door, for once out of the glare of the spotlight of news crews that had been assembled for this press conference.
“Last night’s operation dismantled an organization that has abused its power and connections for the past several years by importing powder cocaine from Mexico, converting this material into street drugs and distributing it throughout our city and surrounding communities,” Chief Levering told the reporters. “The D.A. will bring charges against the individuals involved. The success of tonight’s operation is thanks to the cooperation of the FBI, Poughkeepsie and Hazard Creek Police Departments. Federal and state authorities will continue working together to attack public corruption and the sale of illegal drugs.”
Jason waited through the ensuing question-and-answer period, didn’t come out until the room had cleared of the media and Chief Levering was gathering items into his briefcase, looking as if he was about to head out himself.
“Chief,” Jason said. “You treated me better than I deserved tonight. I wanted to say thanks.”
The bust had gone down with the help of the FBI, and they’d rounded up a total of thirty-two drug dealers and six DEA agents under the command of Barry Mannis. The drug dealers were with a well-known cartel out of Juarez, Mexico, and Chief Levering had directed Scott to book Jason privately. The chief had already worked out an arrangement with the D.A. and a judge to release Jason on his own recognizance until Internal Affairs began their investigation and decided whether or not to bring charges against him.
It had been much, much better than Jason deserved.
Chief Levering leveled a no-nonsense stare from beneath grizzled brows. “I know you’re facing a tough road ahead, but I also know you did the right thing tonight. We shut down an operation that has been pumping drugs into our neighborhoods and the prisons for too long. And you’ve helped us to get the person responsible for Mike’s murder. I appreciate that personally. I know you made some poor choices recently, but it looks like you’ve got company.”
“Are you talking about the parole officer?”
“And a prosecutor with the D.A.’s office and correctional officers at Downstate and Green Haven. That’s so far.”
“Jesus,” he blurted. “That many?”
Chief Levering nodded. “Seems Agent Mannis has been running quite the tight operation, which might explain why he tried to eat his gun when his drug deal went south.”
“I missed that.”
“Thought you might have. You and your men looked pretty busy with the feds on that plane.”
No argument there.
“You came clean. That wasn’t easy. It was right. Remember that when you’re looking in the mirror.” Chief Levering extended his hand. “Good luck, Chief.”
Jason shook his hand, surprised that he didn’t feel like a hypocrite for the first time in a long, long time.
The sun was coming up by the
time he left the police station by the back exit. He walked out the door into a day that looked like it might turn out to be one of those rare Indian summer days. He wasn’t exactly a free man, but he was outside and not locked in a cell.
It was a start.
“Damn it,” he swore as he reached into his pocket. The booking sergeant had returned his keys, but his cruiser was still at the airfield. Scott had driven him into Poughkeepsie to be booked.
Jason could have gone back inside to ask someone for a ride, but he pulled out his cell instead. He’d used up a lot more than his fair share of luck with the PPD and didn’t want to push it any further.
He was about to call directory assistance for the number to a cab company, but to his surprise, he caught sight of a familiar figure at the edge of the fenced parking lot. A casually dressed black man who leaned against a motorcycle with his tattooed arms folded across his chest. Jason was surprised by the strength of the emotion he felt and headed straight toward this unexpected visitor.
“It’s Sunday morning, Tyrese. Shouldn’t you be at church or something?”
“Services don’t start until ten. But I heard how things went down last night and thought you might need a ride.”
Jason didn’t ask how Tyrese had heard. The media had only just gotten hold of the story, and they wouldn’t be implicating the Hazard Creek police chief, anyway. He could only assume Tyrese still had street connections. “You have a divine vision or something?”
Tyrese flashed a toothy grin and his grill gleamed. “I know how it works around here. Just glad you’re walking out the door without cuffs.”
“Me, too, man. Me, too.”
“Then hop on, boss.” Tyrese motioned to the helmet on the bike’s back rail. “You’re in for the ride of your life.”
That was the damned truth. Jason wished he had one-tenth of Tyrese’s faith that everything would turn out okay. But the sick feeling he had in the pit in his stomach promised that facing Internal Affairs and the FBI wasn’t going to be pretty. And even worse would be facing his family, especially Callie. He was going to break her heart. He might find himself alone for the first time since he’d met his oh-so-competent wife.
Well, not entirely alone thanks to Chief Levering and Tyrese, he reminded himself while climbing onto the bike. And Callie did love him. He didn’t doubt that. If his luck held a little while longer, he might convince her to give him a chance to earn her forgiveness, too.
“I DON’T UNDERSTAND,” Riley told Chief Levering when he called to tell her and her entourage, which included her kids, in-laws and two police escorts, that the coast was clear and they could come home. “I haven’t been able to reach Scott by phone ever since I left his house Saturday.”
“I told you, Riley,” the chief said. “He’s fine. There’s nothing to worry about. The sting went down better than we had a right to hope. I didn’t want you coming back to town until the FBI rounded up everyone. Just a precaution.”
“You’re not answering my question.”
“You haven’t answered mine, either. Did Jake tell you where he found that CD?”
“Yes,” she said, chagrined. “Behind the desk in Mike’s office.”
“Behind the desk?”
“Mike kept his laptop bag on the floor beside the desk. If he put the CD in an outer pocket, it could have fallen out. Unless he had it on the desk and accidentally knocked it off himself. I don’t know. Except that my inquisitive son found it.”
“Which turned out to be a good thing.”
“Yes, mostly,” she admitted. Finding out that a corrupt DEA agent had been responsible for taking her husband’s life still didn’t bring him back. And considering the break-ins and the abduction and the explosion in the middle of her kitchen… “Now back to Scott. If he wasn’t hurt in the sting, then why aren’t you telling me where he is?”
“He got a phone call about some personal business he had to deal with out of town.”
She glared at the phone, plastered a smile on her face while crossing the living room, where Rosie, Lily Susan and the kids sat poring over old photo albums. She pulled open the door and slipped onto the patio.
“Out of town is a big place, Chief. Anywhere in particular?”
“I understand you’re annoyed, but I can’t tell you what you want to know.”
To say she was annoyed was a dramatic understatement. She simply didn’t believe the man had made love to her then disappeared off the planet without a word.
“Chief, my house and minivan were broken into. My equipment was stolen. I’m so scared for my children’s safety that I have to send them away and get around-the-clock police protection, which didn’t do the trick, I might add. My kitchen blew up. I’m abducted in an ambulance that winds up in a ditch. You find the people responsible for my husband’s murder and bring down a drug organization that involves public corruption on local, state and federal levels.” Her voice rose in a crescendo despite her best efforts at remaining rational. “After all I’ve been through, you won’t tell me where Scott is?”
“Riley, please, I can’t tell you.” The chief sounded as helpless as she felt, and guilt pricked her conscience.
It passed quickly. She wasn’t going to accept this. She wanted answers. Scott wasn’t giving them to her, so the chief was her next best option.
Before he got a chance to make another excuse or hang up, Riley launched into her plea. Not the gory intimate details, of course, but the broad strokes.
“I know Scott cares about me,” she told him. “but he has totally shut down. He refuses to discuss what’s going on between us, and I don’t know if he’s flipping out because of Mike. I didn’t expect this any more than he did, but we can’t pretend it isn’t happening. He said he wasn’t good for me, and now he’s AWOL. Do you understand why I’m worried? You know him better than anyone. Can’t you give me something to work with here?”
To her surprise Chief Levering chuckled. “Having cops is more trouble than having kids.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means you’ve convinced me to betray his confidence.”
“I did?” She frowned, afraid to believe winning him over had been that easy.
“You did. How much do you know about Scott’s upbringing?”
Sinking onto the edge of a planter, Riley stared out at the street with its traffic rushing in all directions. “I know he comes from New Jersey. Caroline told me his mother died when he was young and his grandmother raised him for a while. Mike only said his past had been somehow…difficult.”
“Difficult doesn’t describe it, Riley, but that’s Scott’s story. Right now all you need to know is where he is.”
“Why are you telling me now?”
“Because I know Scott. I don’t want him to let a good thing pass by because he’s a stubborn pain in the ass.”
“And…” She couldn’t get out another word around the lump in her throat.
“And I hate that he’s alone right now. His father died, Riley. He got the call a few hours after the sting.”
“Oh, no.”
The chief snorted. “Don’t get me wrong. He hated the son of a bitch. If he’d had any choice, he wouldn’t be dealing with this at all. But he’s next of kin. And given the circumstances, there wasn’t anyone else.”
“What circumstances?”
The chief’s sigh made Riley brace herself. “His father was a lifer. Tri-State Correctional Facility in Jersey. Murder one. That’s all I’m going to say. You want to know more, then talk to Scott. He went to sign papers and make arrangements. I offered to go with him, but he wouldn’t let me. He knows this place is a zoo with the Feds here.”
Still clutching the phone, Riley stared into the street, consumed by the idea of Scott alone. Thoughtful, kind Scott, the man who made nests and babysat sick little girls, who helped teens fix cars and get their lives on track. The man who’d always been there for her, who’d held her, who’d listened to her rant, who’d rescued her f
rom an ambulance in a ditch. The man who’d reawakened her ability to feel and brought her back to life with his kindness and kisses.
Had Mike been alive, he’d have been with Scott right now. There wasn’t a doubt in Riley’s mind.
“I’m on my way, Chief.”
“Good girl.” He gave a laugh. “Just give me a call when you get close. I’ll find out exactly where he is. If he’s still at the correctional facility, I’ll make some calls to get you in.”
“Got it.”
“Good luck, Riley.”
She laughed. “Sounds like I’m going to need it.”
After disconnecting the call, she remained outside, taking time to collect her thoughts and whisper a silent plea to Mike for some idea of how best to be there for Scott.
And Riley knew as surely as if he’d spoken to her directly from heaven what Mike would have done—he would have offered unconditional support and love just as he always had.
That was one of the things she’d always loved and admired about her husband.
But Riley wasn’t the only one who loved Scott, and as far as she was concerned things always worked out for a reason. At the moment, she had a whole living room filled with people who considered Scott one of the family.
With an utter certainty she hadn’t enjoyed in a long time, Riley headed back inside the apartment and called her kids. “Hey, guys, want to help me make somebody feel better?”
“Who?” Camille asked.
“Uncle Scott. His dad died, so I’m thinking we should try to make him feel better. What do you think?”
Those two sweet little faces reflected so much concern that Riley could only marvel at how mature they were becoming. They understood what it meant to lose a dad.
“I still feel sad,” Jake admitted. “Hugs make me feel better.”
“And pizza,” Camille suggested. “We can bring Uncle Scott pizza. That will make him feel better.”
Riley could not have possibly been more proud. Laughing, she met Joe’s gaze above the kids’ heads. “Those are great ideas. Now go make sure you’ve got everything in your duffel bags, okay? We don’t want to leave Aunt Lily Susan’s house trashed or she won’t invite us back.”
Her Husband’s Partner Page 20
