Tied Up in Knots

by Mary Calmes

  “Jesus,” Callahan said a while later, staring at me. “You’re actually going to finish that.”

  “You should see what my partner and I normally do for breakfast,” I told him.

  “No, I don’t think I should,” he teased.

  Once they both relaxed, the company was as good as the meal. I got to hear about their last case, and there was much debate over who hit the windshield of the car that made the driver swerve. The conversation made me homesick for Ian, but when I went quiet, neither man noticed.

  When we got back to the hotel, Callahan and Redeker checked in with their boss, Supervisory Deputy Braxton Ward, who was by all accounts a man who yelled often and hated the DEA as much as I did.

  “Yeah, you could transfer out here,” Callahan assured me. “You’d get along with Ward just fine.”

  As I worked on my laptop, pinging Ian just in case, I watched Callahan moon over his partner and wondered how Redeker was missing it when it was so transparent.

  When Callahan had him look at something on his laptop, Redeker leaned in close, and even if I hadn’t seen Callahan inhale, I would have heard it. He was pining… hard… and I was guessing from Redeker’s lazy smile and “lighten up, kid” attitude that he had no clue he was inspiring such hunger. I wondered if I was ever so dense, or if Ian had been quite so oblivious.

  I was probably reading way too much into their partnership.

  “We need to go over the plan, Jones,” Redeker said as he crossed the room and sat down beside me on the bed.

  It was really very simple. We’d go to the lounge, dive bar, whatever it was, in the early evening and catch Hess between sets. If he was ready to go, we’d call for backup, follow him home, and get him into custody. If he wasn’t, he’d have uniformed police officers watching him who would put a serious crimp in his freedom.

  Callahan and Redeker left me about two o’clock so I could catch a nap and we could all shower and clean up. Before I crashed out for maybe a couple of hours, I called the office and Kohn and Kowalski were on desk duty, answering phones and running background checks.

  “Check the news,” Kohn told me after we exchanged greetings. “The interim chief apologized to Becker today.”

  “No shit.”

  He grunted.

  “Did Becker go to the press conference?”

  “Fuck no. You know that ain’t him. Plus, a marshal that has his picture splashed all over the place is not a smart man.”

  “True.”

  “Becker did issue a statement saying that the practice of pulling people over when their only crime is driving while black must stop.”

  “I’m betting it was worded differently.”

  “It was pretty close to that.”

  “And how did that go over with the brass?”

  “As well as can be expected.”

  “I’m thinking the marshals’ office is not all that popular down at police headquarters at the moment.”

  “I’m thinking you’re right.”

  I sighed deeply. “I’ll watch the apology. I want to hear what it sounded like.”

  “It sounded like politics, but at least they did it. You have to keep chipping away at this shit, or it’s never gonna change.”

  That was very true. “Vegas is boring,” I told him.

  “There’s the whole goddamn Strip, Jones, how the hell is it boring?”

  “I’m not much for gambling.”

  “Just the lights and the atmosphere are awesome.”

  I grunted.

  “You’re such a whiner, Jones.”

  I told him to go to hell.

  He told me to make sure I got some sleep.

  I hung up without saying good-bye.

  ACES AND Eights, it turned out, was a lounge close to the intersection of Naples and Paradise Road east of the Strip. We all changed so we looked better; they dressed up and I dressed down. I went all in black: dress pants, dress shirt, and the Alexander McQueen black monk strap boots I had with me. The holster on my calf was black too, not that anyone would see it, hopefully, and my star was on my belt under the untucked shirt. I’d slicked my hair back and thought about wearing sunglasses, but I was going for scary, not douchey.

  Callahan cleaned up nice in dark jeans and a white linen shirt, but really, of the three of us, it was Redeker who was going to turn heads. Between the worn cowboy boots, dark-brown khakis, and short-sleeve white cotton button-down that strained around his biceps and accentuated the heavily veined forearms, I was thinking he could get laid just standing there breathing. Callahan was having trouble moving air through his lungs, from what I could tell. I hadn’t noticed him staring when we walked over together, him more or less at my back. But now, inside, under the dim lights, I could tell he was concentrating hard on the whole breathe in, breathe out thing.

  When Redeker went to get us drinks, me a bottle of water and his partner a Coke, I rounded on Callahan.

  “What?”

  “Is Redeker gay?”

  He almost swallowed his tongue. If Ian had been there, he wouldn’t have let me open my big fat mouth, because it was none of my business. But me there alone, without a keeper, everyone around me was fair game.

  “The fuck did you—I—Jones, do you—what?”

  I snorted out a laugh. Jesus. “You should tell him you want him to fuck your brains out, and if he doesn’t, find someone who will.”

  He looked like I’d just kneed him in the balls.

  “I can see it, the pining, clear as day,” I sympathized. “It’s gotta be exhausting for you.”

  “No, you’ve got it all wrong.”

  He didn’t trust me, but that was okay. He didn’t know me. “I’m gay,” I said levelly, meeting his gaze. “And everyone I work with knows and doesn’t give a shit. If they care here and that’s why you’re not telling your partner, you should think about transferring. My boss is looking to bring on four more guys.”

  His face went from thinly veiled terror to discomfort, and I immediately understood.

  “No, man, I live with someone already and he’s way prettier than you.”

  Instant glare before he flipped me off.

  I scoffed, and the smile I got in return was worth the time it took to finally see the full blazing glory of it directed at me. He was a very handsome man. If scruffy Malibu Ken dolls did it for me, I’d have been all over him.

  “The hell?” Redeker was there, his hazel gaze darting between us. “You girls flirting over here?”

  “Yep,” Callahan assured him. “You can bring whoever you want back to the room tonight. I’ll be in with Jones.”

  The look on Redeker’s face, uncertainty mixed with something colder, deadlier, told me Callahan had much more of Redeker’s interest than he thought. “Wait—” I began.

  “No,” Callahan snapped before he walked toward the bar.

  Redeker rounded on me. “What the hell was that about?”

  I weighed what to say and decided I didn’t care because I didn’t need to. Being careful wasn’t necessary here. “I think that your partner is tired of waiting.”

  “What?”

  “Could we not do that whole thing,” I said grumpily. “I know what I’m looking at.”

  “And what is that?” I ignored him and he shook his head. “You’re way off base there, Jones. You have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  “Do something or don’t, it doesn’t affect me one bit,” I clarified. “I’m outta here tomorrow either way.”

  Redeker studied me intently. “I could ruin his whole life, do you understand?”

  I understood that he thought he could.

  “Career, what he wants family-wise, all of it could just be gone in a moment if I forget what my responsibility is here.”

  With the drawl, the way his voice dropped low, husky, how rough looking he was, a little scary but with dimples at the same time, I could understand the man’s allure. Everybody wanted a cowboy to call their own. “I think it’s awfully
shortsighted of you to think you know what he wants his whole life to be.”

  He shook his head like I had no idea.

  “You never know until you jump.”

  His glare was dark. “Not all of us have the safety net you apparently enjoy up there in Chicago, with the way you’re comin’ at me. Everyone’s all nice and out in the open, huh?”

  “No, but my boss, the guys I work with—none of them give a shit about who I sleep with. They only care about how I do my job.”

  After a moment he nodded.

  “I like having my safety net, and maybe if you don’t have one here, you should think about going someplace where you will,” I quipped, smiling in that way I did that pissed people off. “You guys could both put in transfer requests tomorrow, but you won’t because you’re scared of what that would mean for the two of you.”

  “You don’t know anything about me or him.”

  “Nope,” I agreed. “All I know is that your partner looks at you like you walk on water, and you like that just fine.”

  “Listen—”

  I rode roughshod over him. “You have all the power. And he has shit because you haven’t come clean and told him that the idea of taking him home with you gets you hard.”

  I expected him to hit me, and I was prepared if he tried. What I was not expecting was the look of absolute surprise on his face.

  “Oh, come on,” I said, remembering how I hid my heart from Ian and how much longer we would have been together if I had just come clean with him from the start about my feelings. “You’d have to be blind to miss what you mean to him. It’s you who’s playing his cards pretty damn close to his chest.”

  “I—”

  “It was the same for me, so I get it. I swear to God, I wouldn’t even be giving you shit if I hadn’t been right there where you are.”

  “How do you know?”

  I shrugged. “You were jealous when you walked up on us, and earlier today—you stand really close to him, right up in his space. I’m now familiar with that maneuver.”

  “Oh?”

  “I live with my partner.”

  It took him a second. “And you’re not roommates.”

  “No.”

  “Where is he now?”

  “Deployed.”

  “Sorry.”

  “It’s his calling.”

  He nodded and was quiet for a moment. “Callahan’s really young.”

  “And you don’t wanna fuck him up. I know. You told me.”

  “I need to keep things how they are, just friends.”

  I took a breath, let it go, resolved to stay out of it going forward. “Okay.”

  “That’s it? You give me the third degree and finish with okay?”

  “No, man, you’re a lot stronger than I was, and if you can stand it the other way, more power to you.”

  “What other way?”

  “Watching him fuck other people.”

  “The fucking don’t bother me none.” It was patronizing how he said it, like he was above it all.

  “The falling in love with will,” I volleyed.

  After a long moment, he said, “I suspect you’re right.”

  “But there’s nothing to be done, right?”

  He declined to answer.

  The “Hey, hi, hello.” came out of nowhere.

  I turned, and there in front of me was five foot seven inches of Josue Hess, looking even more fragile and beautiful than he did in his pictures online. I’d noticed his eyes first because it was something I did from my days as a foster kid. Always check first to see if people had kind eyes. Hess’s were dark, glittering obsidian. That and his gorgeous burnt sienna skin with undertones of ochre, a blush of antique gold under silken brown that his Jamaican-born father had gifted him with, made him traffic-stopping beautiful. But that wasn’t all. From his German and Dutch mother, he received sharp elfin features: a short upturned nose, a wide expressive mouth, and long curling lashes. “Pretty” was the only word to use with such devastating genetics at work right there in front of me.

  “Josue,” I greeted. “May I call you Josue?”

  He nodded quickly, and I noticed he was looking me over like he was examining me for flaws. It was slightly disconcerting, but the scrutiny wasn’t interest, more like he was making a decision on my worth as a human being.

  “How are you?” I asked.

  He moved in closer and stared up into my face, studying me further.

  “Josue?”

  “Okay,” he said after a few moments of silence, nodding. “This makes more sense. Mind, body, and soul in alignment with what I expected.”

  “I’m sorry?”

  “You actually look like I thought you would, is all.”

  “Pardon me?”

  “You three, you’re marshals,” he announced, waving the pointer finger of his right hand at me and Redeker and Callahan, who’d just joined us. “But I didn’t see them in my reading, only you, so clearly you’re the one I’m supposed to go with.”

  Had he seen my badge?

  “Sorry, I’m freaking you out. I apologize. I read my cards this morning, and the Knight of Swords was crossing me, and I read that as protective,” he explained before grimacing and nodding to Callahan and Redeker. “These two—not so much with the inspiring faith and loyalty, but you… I get.”

  Cards? “I’m still not following.”

  He cleared his throat. “The reason I know that things are happening and that I would be okay up until this point is that I’m a medium.”

  Oh no. I looked over his head at Callahan and Redeker. “No one briefed me on the fact that he’s psychic.”

  He tapped my chest, bringing my attention back to him. “I’m not crazy. My father had the gift, so I have the gift.”

  Had. Shit. Orphan trumped whatever my feelings were on psychic ability. “You’re all alone, huh, kid?”

  He nodded.

  I could see the pain of his past written in those dark, too serious eyes, and I personally knew how it felt. My reserve melted, and I sighed as I realized what was going to happen—what I couldn’t help but do. I decided right then and there. I was taking him back to Chicago whether he wanted to go or not. I was putting his life before mine; I was ready to take a bullet for him.

  “Let’s go pack your shit.”

  “Okay,” he sighed, smiling at me.

  “I thought I’d have to spend a lot of time convincing you.”

  “No. Like I said, the cards said you were coming, and I had the Tower card a few days ago, so I told the band I was done, to get ready since, yanno, my life is about to change, and fighting it is just futile.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “That’s why we let everyone know that this was our last gig. My cards are never wrong.”

  “Absolutely,” I agreed.

  He rolled his eyes. “Believe what you want, marshal, but I trust you because all the signs say I should, and the path you’re leading me on promises happiness and love.”

  “Love, huh?”

  He nodded.

  “I’m taking you to your love? Is she pretty?”

  “He,” I was corrected, “and yes, he is very beautiful.”

  Lord. “Show me where you live, kid.”

  Callahan and Redeker were looking at me like I had horns growing out of my head. The whole plan of going into the lounge and scoping it out and finding an opportunity to get Hess alone was moot in ten minutes flat. Hess was ready to go, and it couldn’t have been easier. No arm twisting necessary.

  Since nothing was ever that simple, it made sense that as soon as we got outside and the bullets started flying—centering on Josue—that things changed quite a bit.

  I heard the squeal of tires before I heard the pop-pop-pop of gunfire and a bullet hit the doorframe beside me. I shoved Josue up against the wall, bent over to pull my gun, shielded him with my body, and shouted for everyone to get down, wishing Ian was there with me. Not because I wanted bullets whizzing by his head too, b
ut because he was good in life-and-death situations and always kept me grounded. Like now, I didn’t return fire; I couldn’t. Ian wouldn’t have either. The street was too crowded, so I was hoping that between me yelling and the obvious threat, everyone would use their brains and hit the ground.

  As was usual, the opposite happened, and chickens without heads would have been smarter. People never ceased to amaze me with their lack of self-preservation. They ran into the intersection instead of away from it, so I had no choice but to dart out—after warning Hess not to move—into the line of fire and direct the chaos.

  “Stay there!” I roared at a woman who thought a better option than remaining crouched down behind a parked car with her daughter was to make a mad dash for a nearby restaurant.

  Jesus.

  When I pointed at my star, she nodded that she understood and would remain still. A young couple was going to do the same thing—dart out into the open—but I threatened to put them in jail if they moved. They looked horrified.

  “He’s trying to save your lives!” Josue yelled.

  And of course they listened to the gorgeous aspiring rock star, lifting their hands to let him know they understood. Forget about the badge I’d tucked my shirt behind so it was visible; being law enforcement carried no weight in the face of his cult status.

  “Jones!” Callahan yelled as he joined me.

  “Cover him!” I ordered, waving at Josue and then bolted into the street with Redeker right on my heels. “Keep them off me!”

  “Done!” Redeker thundered back.

  The guys in the car shot at us, but we were flying and the distance was sprint short, not what I did in San Francisco just days ago. So the fact that I was able to get to the car and dive inside, on top of the guy sitting there, was not that big of a deal. Redeker being right there with me, launching himself through the driver’s side window and wrestling for the steering wheel, was.

  I felt the car lurch forward, and then we all whiplashed as it came to a bouncing stop, the sound of fists and breathing loud in the cramped space. Redeker was trying to knock the driver out and get to the ignition at the same time.