More Than a Lawman

by Anna J. Stewart

  Eden sat, clutching Allie’s hand in the emergency room’s waiting area. She barely noticed Cole and Lieutenant Santos speaking with a scrubs-clad doctor. Ghostly murmurs and solemn nods robbed her of her words. It didn’t matter how many times she replayed things in her mind, the result was always the same.

  “You should let someone take a look at you,” Allie said.

  Eden shook her head. The main doors slid open and a flash of white darted toward them.

  “I keep telling myself I’m going to get used to getting these calls,” Simone said as she dropped down in front of Eden and rested her hands on her knees. “Are you okay?”

  Eden nodded. Blood covered her hands, still streaked her face. She hadn’t let anyone come near her, not when Agent Simmons should be their focus. She didn’t matter.

  “It’s my fault,” she whispered as if nobody else knew. “All I could think about was getting to Cole and I didn’t think—”

  “You sure didn’t.” Cole’s voice whipped through her.

  Eden flinched.

  “How’s Agent Simmons?” Allie asked as Simone rotated so she could look at Cole.

  “He’s alive. Barely. They asked about next of kin—”

  “His wife’s name is Suzanna,” Eden said after clearing her throat. “They’re separated but...” She pressed a fist against her heart. “He was hoping they’d get back together.”

  “Let’s hope he gets the opportunity,” Cole said. His tone shifted. “On the bright side, congratulations, Eden. You were one hundred percent right. Batsakis had turned his previous place of employ into some kind of medical facility, right down to the plastic strip curtains fit for a serial killer. Microscopes, blood bags, IVs, you name it. Given what we found, I’m guessing he’s been using it from the beginning.”

  “And Batsakis?” Eden tried to ignore the detachment in his voice. “Did you get him?”

  “The man at the warehouse wasn’t Hector Batsakis.”

  Eden’s head shot up. “Then who—”

  “Near as we can tell, he’s a vagrant Batsakis had hired to keep an eye on the place. Not that we can get a coherent statement out of him at the moment. He’s in shock.”

  “Eden’s fine, by the way,” Allie said. “In case you were wondering.”

  “No surprise. Eden always comes through unscathed, doesn’t she?”

  Simone got to her feet, but Eden quickly reached out, took hold of her hand and squeezed. “Leave it,” she whispered.

  “What were you thinking?” Cole blasted loud enough to catch the attention of the emergency room staff and waiting patients. “What part of wait in the car did you not understand?”

  “I—” She what? She’d barreled into a situation she had no business being a part of because she was scared for Cole? Because she realized she didn’t want anything to happen to him before she had the chance to tell him...before she could admit to herself...

  Eden took a shuddering breath. For the longest moment of her life, she thought she’d lost him, but here he was. Standing in front of her. Still alive. Furious, but still alive. “I wasn’t thinking.”

  “Well, bravo. You finally get it.” Cole’s voice didn’t dim. If anything, it got louder. “But how many people have had to get hurt or die before you figured out you’re not the only person in the world? What was it, Eden? Still chasing your headlines? Needed to get a firsthand look at the connection you’d uncovered? Afraid someone else might get credit for what you shouldn’t be doing in the first place? Whatever it takes to catch your killer, right? No matter who gets hit in the cross fire.”

  “That’s enough, Cole.” Now it was Allie rising to her defense, but again, all Eden could do was grip her friends’ hands tighter. “I know you’re angry, but that’s no reason—”

  “He’s right.” Eden blinked and sent tears scurrying down her cheeks through Simmons’s blood. “This is my fault.” Eden realized Allie couldn’t argue with her because she knew Eden was right.

  “Detective?” Lieutenant Santos called him over as Jack and Bowie entered through the same door Simone had.

  “What right does he have to attack you?” Simone dropped into the chair on the other side of Eden and wrapped her arm around Eden’s shoulders. “Doesn’t he see what you’re going—”

  “He has every right.” Suddenly, she understood what Simmons had been saying back in the car. Suddenly, she realized how little fight she had left in her. “I put them all at risk because—”

  “Because you thought Cole was about to get his head blown off,” Allie said. “I don’t blame you—”

  “So I, what? Ran into the line of fire? I ran toward the bullets, Allie. I didn’t even stop to think about any consequences.” What did that say about her? “Well? Is that guy talking yet? The one you did catch,” Eden asked Jack as he headed over to Cole and the lieutenant.

  Jack hesitated, cringing slightly as he detoured for her. “Talking, yes. Making sense? Not really. From what we can gather and what we found of his in the warehouse, he’s a vagrant who’d been paid to hang around the building. He was also told the government was staking the place out and he should do whatever was necessary to get away should anyone ever try to enter.”

  “The mentally ill often make for convenient scapegoats,” Allie said, as she rubbed Eden’s arm.

  “True enough. We’re processing him now, but honestly, he’s not going to give us anything useful. He’s already muttering about his archangel and being on a secret mission from the stars.” Jack brushed a comforting hand over Eden’s shoulders. “Hang in there.”

  “Easy for him to say,” Simone said, dropping Eden’s hand. “You want coffee? I need coffee.” She searched the signage. “Where’s the coffee?”

  “Uh-huh, caffeine’s what you need,” Allie said. “Cafeteria is that way.” She motioned down the hallway. “Come on. We’ll all go.”

  “I want to clean up some,” Eden said, as she stood on wobbly knees and moved toward the bathroom. She wanted—she needed—to wash the blood off her hands. “But I’d appreciate a cup.”

  “You got it. Back in five.” Allie and Simone hurried off, but not before, Eden noticed, Simone shot Cole one of the nastiest looks she’d ever seen on her friend’s face.

  The creak of the bathroom door felt almost welcoming as she went directly to the sink. She turned on the water, braced her hands on the porcelain and dropped her chin. She couldn’t get the sound of Simmons struggling for breath out of her mind; couldn’t stop seeing, feeling, that spray of his blood as it spilled onto the ground.

  Eden pushed a handful of soap from the dispenser, scrubbing her hands so hard they hurt; blood-tinged water circling the drain. She grabbed paper towels and tried to clean her face, saw streaks of thick blood in her hair. Looked in the mirror and saw it spattered on her shirt. A sob caught in her throat.

  The door opened and shattered her solitude.

  Cole walked in, his face even more stony than before.

  Eden felt herself go cold. “Is he—”

  “Still in surgery.” Cole pushed the door closed and leaned against it. “I’m sending you home, Eden. There’s a patrol car waiting to take you back to the town house. They’ll park outside, until they’re relieved at midnight, at which time another team will take their place.”

  The town house? Not the boat? Not... “I thought maybe I’d go back to the station—”

  “You thought wrong.”

  “I know I screwed up.” The words erupted before she realized she’d said them. “I know this is all my fault.” He’d been about to leave, but he froze. She’d wanted to explain, to make him understand, but as he turned and looked at her, it took every ounce of courage she possessed to meet his hostile gaze.

  “Screwed up? There’s an agent fighting for his life because you couldn’t do the one thing I
asked. One thing, Eden! Now on top of trying to find the Iceman before he kills his latest victim, we’ve got the FBI demanding to know why a civilian got one of their agents severely injured, not to mention the start of an internal-affairs investigation once word gets out about the total fiasco at the warehouse. So yeah, you screwed up. And once again, someone else is paying for it.”

  “Sequestering me isn’t going to fix any of it.” She’d been wrong earlier. She did have some fight left. If she’d destroyed whatever feelings he’d had for her, fine, but she wasn’t going to let their relationship die in vain. “I didn’t do this on purpose. And I didn’t do it for the fame or for the blog or to even catch the Iceman in flagrante. I got scared for you. I made a mistake. And I didn’t for one second believe Agent Simmons was going to pay for it.” She didn’t think anyone would have to.

  “Yeah, well, he’s not the only one. We went out on a limb for you, Eden. Me, the lieutenant, Jack and half a dozen patrol officers. Now we’ll be lucky if they even let us keep the case.”

  “Sounds like you’re more worried about that than the case.” Eden scrubbed a wet paper towel over her shirt. “Guess we’re both pretty messed up, then.”

  “For once in your life, do as I say and go home. It’s for your own safety.”

  “Just because we slept together doesn’t mean you get to control me, Cole. As you said, I’m a private citizen. I can go and do whatever I want.” And what she wanted right now, more than anything, was to put this case to bed and the Iceman behind her.

  Cole stalked over to her. His look of fury she’d never seen before. “Do you have any idea what it felt like for me to hear Allie scream your name at that warehouse after I heard those shots? To realize you’d put yourself in the middle of everything yet again? You’re reckless, Eden. You’re dangerous, and after today, I’m convinced you’re out of control. You don’t care about anyone other than yourself, what you want. What Eden needs. You want to do something to help? Then listen to this. You are done with this investigation. You will go home. You will lock your doors. You will bury yourself in that mausoleum of a basement of yours and not poke your head out until I’m convinced it’s safe for you to do so. Do you understand me?” He gripped her shoulders hard for a second before he pushed away and walked out of the bathroom.

  Eden looked at herself in the mirror, his words ringing in her ears. Yes, she’d heard him. And yes, she understood.

  But she wasn’t done. Not with this case. Not with the Iceman. And she wasn’t about to sit around waiting to hear someone else she did care about—another friend—had died. This wasn’t about ego. There was no pride involved. She’d made a promise when hanging in that freezer—to herself and to the victims and their families.

  She was going to do whatever it took to find Hector Batsakis and stop the Iceman once and for all.

  * * *

  “McTavish here is heading to the station in a few moments,” Lieutenant Santos told Cole when he rejoined them in the hospital waiting room. Cole was wound so tight, one wrong look—from anyone—and he was going to spring apart. “He’s getting statements ready about the warehouse incident. He’ll hand them over to Internal Affairs. And you should go home.”

  “I’m staying here.” Cole wasn’t about to leave until he knew one way or the other. “Simmons took on Eden because I asked him to.”

  “We all took on Eden,” Jack said. “No one could have predicted what happened out there, Cole.”

  “I could have. I should have.” In fact, he never should have agreed to let her on the case, but at the time, he’d needed to keep an eye on her. To stay close to her. Because he’d been terrified of losing her.

  Instead an FBI agent could lose his life and the Iceman might claim another victim.

  “No wonder you and Eden get on so well. You both suffer the same martyr complex,” Jack said.

  Allie and Simone rounded the corner carrying trays with cups of coffee.

  “Take your pick—it’s all bad.” Simone started handing out the coffee to the officers keeping vigil. She looked around. “Where’s Eden?”

  “I sent her home.” He frowned when Allie snatched his cup away.

  “How very gallant of you,” Simone said, in a tone that had him wanting to protect his man parts. “Make it a habit of kicking a girl when she’s down, do you?”

  “Maybe if she stayed put we’d have fewer problems like this.” Simone with her claws out. Great. The day just kept getting better.

  “Right. I’m going to leave before this turns nasty.” Jack gave them all a salute with his coffee and headed out. “See ya back at the station.”

  “Do you think Eden doesn’t know what she’s responsible for, Cole?” Allie asked him. “Or were you not paying attention? She’s devastated by what happened.”

  “I can’t care about that right now.” He had to focus on what he could control. His job. The case. His team. Then he’d worry about Eden’s hurt feelings.

  “Well, you should.” Allie poked a finger hard into his chest. “You should have seen her face when those shots rang out from inside the warehouse. She thought you were hurt, Cole. You were all she cared about.”

  Cole froze. “What shots from the warehouse?”

  “Yes, what shots?” Lieutenant Santos moved in, as did Simone. “You said none of you fired your weapons.”

  “We didn’t. Bowie? Nelson?” Cole waved the two uniforms over. “Did any officers fire their weapons inside the warehouse?”

  “No, sir.” Nelson, ginger hair shining under the hospital lights, held his cap in his hands. “Near as we could tell, they came from outside.”

  “That’s where we headed when we heard them,” Bowie confirmed. “Simmons got there first.”

  “I want everyone who was on that call to turn their weapons in for testing,” Santos said. “I want this by the book for when IA comes to investigate.”

  “Wait a minute.” Simone held up her free hand. “You’re saying that someone outside the warehouse fired shots to make it sound like they were from inside? Who would do that? And why?”

  “It doesn’t make any sense. I was there, and if you’d asked, I’d have agreed with Eden. Those shots came from inside. I can’t even remember seeing anyone around. But now...” Allie trailed off.

  Every word Cole spewed at Eden slammed back on him with a vengeance. “This wasn’t an accident. And it wasn’t a mistake. Somebody wanted Eden in the line of fire. They wanted her there when we drove Batsakis’s watchman outside. Someone who knows Eden. Knows how she’d react.”

  “This wasn’t Eden’s fault,” Allie said. “Not all her fault.”

  Simone pointed a finger at him. “We all know what Eden does when someone she cares about is in trouble. She leaps first and worries about the fall later. So I ask again...where’s Eden?”

  * * *

  “Ma’am, our orders from Detective Delaney were clear. We’re to drive you directly to your house and stay until we’re relieved.”

  “Officer Pearson, isn’t it?” Eden scooted forward in the back of the patrol car. She should feel honored. Most officers didn’t have partners, but somehow she’d managed to warrant two escorts. “And, Castillo?”

  “Yes, ma’am.” The young woman in the passenger seat gave her partner an uneasy look from beneath the visor of her cap. Her nose had a light dusting of freckles that added to her youthful appearance.

  “Tell you what’s going to happen if you do as Cole told you,” Eden said. “You’ll drive me home and I’ll go in the front door. Wait a few minutes and after which, I’ll go out the back door, get into my car and drive to the station myself. At some point, someone in the department is going to notify Detective Delaney that you didn’t do what you were supposed to. So.” She rapped her knuckle on the metal divider. “We can either do this together or me on my own. Your choice.”<
br />
  “Nothing at the academy prepared us for this,” Castillo muttered. “I say get her to the station and let the detectives in Major Crimes deal with her.”

  Pearson gave a curt nod.

  “Smart.” Eden sat back and pulled out her phone as it buzzed for the fifth time in as many minutes. Allie again. No, Simone. She flicked through her missed calls. Nope. Not going to happen.

  She wasn’t putting anyone else at risk.

  Eden turned off her phone and rode the rest of the way in silence.

  * * *

  “What do you mean she’s not answering her phone?” Cole demanded, as Allie hung up again.

  “Gee, I can’t imagine why she might want some alone time,” Allie mused. “It’s not as if the one person she trusts more than anybody embarrassed her in public and then dismissed her.”

  Cole shook his head. When was this nightmare going to end? He glanced over to where the lieutenant was on his phone. “She doesn’t—”

  “Why do you think she flew out of that car? I swear, Cole, for someone who’s as bright as you are, sometimes you have the brain of a gnat. Because she thought you were hurt. Because she was afraid she wouldn’t get the chance to tell you how she feels about you before you go and die on her. Which is what she thinks everyone she loves is going to do, by the way. And who can blame her, with everyone she’s lost?”

  “Hallelujah. You actually got her to talk about it,” Simone said. “That’s going to entail a couple of bottles of the good stuff. So where would she have gone?”

  “I had two patrol officers drive her to the town house.”

  “Terrific. We’ll head there. You go—” Allie waved her hand in the air “—wherever you think is best.”

  “Passive-aggressive,” Simone said. “I’m impressed.”

  “I’m not.” Cole frowned. “Look, even Eden isn’t crazy enough to...” Now it was his turn to trail off as her two best friends turned disbelieving expressions on him. “Yeah, never mind.”

  “Detective Delaney? Lieutenant Santos?” Dr. Inari, whom they’d spoken with earlier, approached and waved them over. “Agent Simmons has been stabilized for now. He’ll need more surgery, but given the amount of blood he’s lost, we want to wait until he’s stronger before we proceed. We’ve put him into a medically induced coma.”