Half-Broke Heart (Combat Hearts #1.5)

by Tarina Deaton

  “We don’t.” Chris turned as his section chief, Richard Dickson, entered the conference room. “The kids are off limits.”

  Stephanie had the sense to backtrack. “I didn’t mean use them as bait or anything.”

  “We aren’t using them at all,” he said. He glared at Stephanie for a several more seconds before giving his attention to Chris. “Nolton, the Director’s looking over the brief you sent up. If she approves it, we’re going to send you in.”

  He stilled. “Undercover?”

  “Yes. Your cover will be you’re Dillon’s brother and looking for him since you haven’t heard from him. You’ve got the experience and look.”

  “Okay. When?”

  “She wants to give the team more time to make contact before we send in someone else.” He glanced around at the rest of the team. “You’ll go in alone this time.”

  “Understood.” He tried to keep the excitement out of his voice. Boots on the ground was one of the things he loved about his job and one of the things he missed most about being a Ranger.

  “And quit throwing that god damn football around in the office. I’m sick of replacing wall monitors.” He turned sharply and excited the conference room.

  “It’s foam, boss,” Chris called at his retreating back.

  “I don’t give a shit.”

  He grinned and caught the ball Darren tossed him.

  “Still cracks me up his name is Dick Dickson,” Stephanie said.

  “Don’t let him hear you call him Dick,” Phil said. “Last time someone called him that, he flipped a desk. Literally.”

  Chris’s cell pinged in his pocket and he threw the ball to Phil as he pulled the phone out.

  Denise: Busy?

  Kind of early for a booty call isn’t it?

  Haha. Need someone to go w/me to get a dog. Both my employees have class & Bree’s at work.

  “We good with where we are for now?” he asked everyone.

  “Another hot date?” Phil asked.

  “Don’t you have a dance recital to go to?” Chris taunted.

  Phil jerked in his chair. “Shit! What time is it?”

  “Three-thirty,” Darren said.

  “Damn it. Yeah, we’re good. I gotta go.” He gathered up the documents in front of him and rounded the table.

  Chris laughed. “I was kidding.”

  “May the evil gods of procreation bestow quadruplet girls upon you.” Phil rushed out the door.

  “Okay. Unless you two have anything else, I think we’re good.”

  They gathered up the files strewn across the table and left the conference room. Chris texted Denise when he reached his desk.

  I can help.

  Thanks. Can you meet me there? I’ll probably need to take the dog to the vet after.

  Sure.

  Thanks. Here’s the address.

  He pulled up the address on his directions app. Give me 30 mins.

  Okay

  Flipping the phone end over end on her leg, Denise watched the house across the street from where she’d parked. Glancing at her phone, she second-guessed texting Chris to help her. Sprocket stuck her nose in her ear and snuffled.

  Scratching her dog’s ear, she said, “I’m okay. Just nervous. Which is weird. He’s just a guy, right? It’s not like it’s a date. He’s helping me pick up a dog. Safety in numbers, right?”

  Sprocket licked her chops.

  “You’re not a lot of help, you know that? Screw it.” Shit, her emotions were all over the place, wanting to take a chance on maybe finding what Bree’d found and still wanting to stay safe in her own little world. There was nothing wrong with that. Safe was comfortable. Familiar.

  Safe was…safe.

  She turned the phone over to tell Chris never mind. Her thumb hovered over the screen before she tossed it in the cup holder.

  “Fuck.”

  Her side mirror showed a truck pulling up behind her. She watched in her review mirror as Chris opened his door and stepped out. Hmm, he did track pants good. The plain, long-sleeved t-shirt he wore hugged the planes of his chest and bulges of his arms. She pictured him without it, dark ink covering his chest.

  She was a glutton for fucking punishment.

  He stood scanning the neighborhood and she could see the alertness in his body. The slight tensing of muscles. The assessing way he checked both ends of the street. They weren’t in the best area of Fayetteville. Actually, they were in one of the crappiest areas of Fayetteville, which was one of the reasons she needed someone to meet her. She wiped her hands on her dark green cargo pants and slid her low profile holster into the side of her waistband.

  “Stay,” she told Sprocket. She got out of the car and thumbed the lock button on her key fob.

  “Thanks for helping. I wasn’t sure if you’d be able to get off.”

  “Told them I had some errands to run.” He looked at the house behind them. “Where’s the dog?”

  “Across the street.” She pointed to the rundown, wood-sided duplex where 4x4 beams struggled to hold up the sagging porch roof. No one was outside and there were no cars in front of the house.

  His gaze tracked to the side of her hip where she’d tucked her compact SIG. She pulled the hem of her shirt over it. “Ready?”

  He nodded but didn’t say anything.

  Mentally shrugging, she walked across the street and skirted the side of the house.

  “You’re not going to knock?”

  “No,” she said, picking her way through the overgrown weeds. “The person who called said no one was home and I should get the dog today.”

  “Someone just called and said there’s a dog, come get it?”

  She could hear the doubt in his voice. “Happens all the time, unfortunately. A lot of rescues won’t pick up a dog. They want whoever is surrendering it to bring it to them. If someone takes it to the pound and the dog’s a bully breed, it’s automatically killed.”

  “How do you know this isn’t a set up?” His tone was accusatory.

  She stopped and stared at him, incredulous. “A set up for what?”

  He glared at her, but didn’t seem to have a ready answer so she kept walking. She spied the tan and white dog chained to a post on the other side of the yard as soon as she reached the short, chain-link fence. The dog lay on its side, not moving.

  “What’s that next to its butt?” Chris asked.

  “If I had to guess, I’d say it’s her uterus.” She lifted the latch on the gate and wrenched it open.

  “I’m not a vet, but isn’t that supposed to be on the inside of her body?” Disgust was evident in his voice.

  “Yup.”

  “What causes that?”

  “There are a few things that can cause it, but I’ve seen it mostly in dogs that are used as a breeding factory. It’s why the person who called said to come get her.”

  She rounded the dog so she could see her coming, rather than walking up behind her. The dog opened her eyes but barely spared Denise a glance.

  “Hey, pretty girl,” she said softly as she squatted in front of her. She held her hand in front of the dog’s nose, letting her sniff. Her pink tongue licked her hand once.

  “There’s a sweet girl.” She pulled a mesh muzzle from her cargo pocket. “I’m just going to slip this over your nose so neither of us gets hurt, okay?”

  The dog didn’t resist having the muzzle put on and Denise didn’t want to consider whether she was used to being muzzled or if she’d just given up. Neither option was a good one.

  “What’ch y’all doin’ to that dog?”

  Denise stood and faced the woman standing on the porch next door. “Taking her.” She moved her hand closer to her gun and felt Chris come to her other side.

  The neighbor leaned a hip against the rail and crossed her arms. “You the rescue chick?”

  “You the one who called?”

  “Yeah. That dog’s on death’s door and these folks don’t give two fucks to Sunday. My nephew said I shoul
d give you a call.”

  “Who’s your nephew?”

  “Mario Thompson.”

  The name was familiar, but she couldn’t put a face to it.

  “He got his dog Bravo from you last year.”

  She smiled. “Sorry, I’m better at remembering the dogs than the people.”

  “He said that too. Her litter’s under the porch.” She walked back into her house without another word.

  Denise looked at Chris. “Can you take her to the car while I check the pups?”

  He frowned. “Sure.”

  She helped him unchain and lift the dog in his arms, crooning to her the whole time. Placing her key fob in his hand, she said, “The lift gate button is under your thumb. Press it twice and put her in the cargo area for now.”

  He nodded and shot her another glare.

  What was that about? Shaking her head, she went to find the puppies.

  Chapter 6

  Chris laid the dog down on the folded up moving pad in the back of Denise’s SUV and ran his hand over her side. Rib bones protruded under her short fur. He wasn’t sure what he was more pissed about—the condition of the dog or the risk Denise took coming to this part of town. He knew for a fact a major gang called this area theirs and they wouldn’t take it well to have a white chick coming in and stealing a dog. Shit, the dog now lying in the back of her car was probably part of a dog fighting ring.

  Denise rounded the side of the car, carrying a beat-up cardboard box in her arms. “Take the pups and put them close to her belly.”

  He looked in the box and found four, small squirming puppies. And one not squirming. “How old are they?” Picking up two, he put them near the mother and watched as they immediately latched on to start feeding. The dog finally lifted her head and looked at the puppies.

  “Six weeks. Maybe. They shouldn’t have been separated from her yet.” Sprocket whined from the backseat. “It’s okay, girl. We’ll get them to Doc Abbie soon.”

  “Who’s Doc Abbie?” He put the other two puppies next to the first two.

  “The vet that takes care of the dogs at the rescue.” She set the box down and slid it all the way to the back.

  “What about the other puppy?”

  She shook her head, pressing her lips into a tight line. They stepped back and she closed the door. “Thank you for coming out.”

  “About that.”

  “About what?”

  A dark gray sedan pulled around the corner and rolled by, the driver slowing to a crawl and staring at them as he passed. Now wasn’t the time to ream her for putting herself at risk.

  “When will you be home?”

  Her eyebrows pinched together. “In about an hour or so. Why?”

  “I’ll meet you there.” He went to his truck, unlocking the doors.

  “What for?”

  Was she serious? “We’ll talk about it at your place. Right now we need to get out of this neighborhood before someone stops to ask us what we’re doing.” He got in his truck and started it, waiting for her to do the same. She rolled her eyes and he gripped the steering wheel to keep from getting out and yelling at her right there.

  He’d never understood the whole wanting to spank a woman before, but holy fuckballs, he got it now. Her cavalier attitude to putting herself in a dangerous situation was pissing him the fuck off. She had no fucking clue what could happen to her in this kind of neighborhood.

  His anger continued to roil as she pulled away from the curb. He followed her as far as the All American Expressway, then headed to his gym, needing to burn off some of his anger.

  Those had better be her fucking headlights. He’d been waiting for over an hour for Denise to get home. Having expected her to already be there after he finished at the gym and showered, his anger had come back in full force when she hadn’t been waiting and hadn’t answered his calls or texts.

  He stood from the bottom steps when he heard her footsteps crunching on the crushed gravel. “What the hell took you so long?”

  Sprocket sniffed his shoes and climbed the stairs, but Denise stopped on the peripheral of the pool of light cast by the floodlight, partially hidden by the shadows behind her. “Hi, Denise. I thought you’d be back earlier.” She’d lowered her voice to make it sound deeper.

  She took a half step to her left. “Sorry it took longer than I thought it would, Chris.”

  She stepped back to the right. “Is everything okay? You look like warmed over shit.”

  Step to the left. “Why no, Chris. The dog needed emergency surgery which is going to cost a shit load of money and she may not make it anyway. Then I got a call that my cousin was taken to the ER and I had to sit with her kids until my parents got to her house.”

  Back to the right. “I’m sorry to hear that. Let me be an asshole some other time then.” She pushed passed him and climbed the stairs, her footsteps landing heavily on the wooden steps.

  Fuck. He scrubbed a hand over his face and followed her up the stairs, catching the door before it shut behind her.

  “Chris, it’s late and I’m really not in the mood to deal with whatever crawled up your ass.”

  “Not in the— Do you have any idea the kind of danger you put yourself in today?”

  She yanked open the fridge and pulled out a bottle of wine. “What are you talking about?”

  “That was one of the worst areas in Fayetteville. Cops don’t even go in that area unless they’re called in for something major.”

  “I’m aware of that, which is why I was armed.”

  “That’s another thing. Do you have a permit to carry concealed? Do you even know how to shoot the damn thing?” Her look told him immediately he’d crossed some kind of line.

  She set the stemless wine glass down with a thud. Her stare was even, devoid of emotion. She didn’t break eye contact as she pulled her gun from her holster, dropped the magazine and racked the slide back, ejecting the cartridge. Snatching the bullet out of the air, she disassembled the slide from the grip without looking at it and slammed the two pieces on the counter next to her wine glass.

  “You know absolutely fuck all about me. Just because we made out and had dinner once does not mean you get to storm into my apartment and mansplain shit to me like I’m a fucking idiot.”

  Fuck. He’d totally fucked up. “Denise—”

  “Get out.” She poured wine into her glass, refusing to look at him now.

  An urgency to fix what he knew he’d just fucked up threatened to overtake him. He took a step toward her, but stopped when Sprocket put herself in his path and growled low in her throat.

  Denise stepped back from the counter and looked down at Sprocket, surprise on her face. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, letting it out slowly. When she spoke again, her voice was softer. Calmer. But no less adamant. “You need to leave. Now.”

  “Denise—”

  She put her hand on Sprocket’s neck. “I needed someone with me because it was an unsafe neighborhood and it’s better to not be by myself. But make no mistake, I can take care of myself and have been doing so for a very long time. The very last thing I need tonight is to assure you I’m not some helpless little lady that doesn’t know what the fuck she’s doing. So you need to go.”

  Dread settled low in his stomach like a knot that he knew, no matter how hard he worked at it, wouldn’t untie easily. He knew this wasn’t some feminine wiles thing to create drama. For one thing, that wasn’t her style. For another, something in the way she stood and in the tone of her voice said she was done with him.

  Nothing he said at that point would break through the wall he could see her shoring up around herself. A wall he hadn’t even realized he’d been chipping away at until that moment. Inherently, he understood time was what he needed to give her, but everything in the center of his being wanted to fight and push against the barriers she was erecting.

  He walked backward to the door, not breaking eye contact until he had to. Jogging down the stairs, he stormed to his
truck and slammed the door.

  “Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!” He slammed his hand against the steering wheel. Christ, he needed to get a grip. Why was this tearing him up so bad? He’d known her all of a week. Not even that. So why the fuck did he feel like he’d just lost something important?

  Chapter 7

  Denise walked around the small two-man tent, stretching out the corners and setting the pegs into the ground and trying not to watch Chris talking to Bree. She’d been aware of him from the moment she’d pulled into the campsite. His presence was impossible to ignore, even yards away. Especially when what she wanted to do was drink him in after not seeing or hearing from him in three weeks. Even having told him to go, watching him walk away had left an ache in her chest that was still there.

  Jase squatted down next to her as she set the last peg. “I’m worried about her.”

  She looked over just as Bree laughed and laid her hand on Chris’s arm. A flash of jealousy burned through her. Fuck, she had issues. “She’s good.” She stood and brushed her hands on her jeans.

  Jase rose from his squat. “Why’d you guys leave the dogs at the rescue?”

  “There’s too much going on out here for them.” She crossed her arms over her chest and turned so she wasn’t facing Chris directly.

  “What if she needs Polly while she’s out here?”

  Denise cocked her head and assessed Jase. She was still angry with him for the stunt he’d pulled with Bree and part of her didn’t want to help him at all. But Bree was genuinely happy. Happier than Denise could remember. So she did the adult thing.

  “There’s too much going on out here for them.” She crossed her arms over her chest and turned so she wasn’t facing Chris directly. “We’ve brought them hiking before. But with so many people, and since we’re staying out here a couple of nights, it was better to leave them at the kennel.”

  “What if she needs Polly while she’s out here?”

  “Polly helps Bree because she senses her moods. She touches her to provide her comfort. To bring her back to the moment.”