Expired Game (Last Chance County Book 5)

by Lisa Phillips

  “We’re not staying long.” Ellie was using her “teacher” frown as she knocked on the front door. That was never good.

  “I know. You’ve told me that several times since we left the police station.”

  Jess was supposed to be on medical leave, though it wasn’t that formal. Mia had given her the lecture about not coming back until she was fighting fit. Her lieutenant planned to get to work, employing everyone in the department to work the new leads they had.

  The whole thing was a mess. Then again, it had been this way since they first heard the name West. Since they learned the founders of Last Chance hadn’t exactly been the most upright. Even their grandfather hadn’t come through that completely unscathed, though folks seemed gracious to let a dead man rest.

  The door opened. Dean’s gaze softened when he saw Ellie. Jess, on the other hand, didn’t get a particularly warm reaction. Just, “He’s in the kitchen.”

  Jess left them to talk by the door and went to find Ted.

  He saw her coming and closed the cupboard under the sink where they—and basically everyone else in the world—kept their trash can. “Hey.” Ted strode to the hall in front of her, holding his laptop, and headed for his room.

  Jess stood at the door and watched him ease into his desk chair. She shifted the pile of clean laundry from his armchair and set it on the bed, then claimed the comfy spot. “How are you feeling?”

  He pulled over a couple of odd pieces of metal from a building set and used a rivet to secure them together in an arm. “Is that really what you came here to ask?”

  Jess sighed and looked at the high shelf above his full-size bed. It was littered with tiny robots, cranes, and all kinds of machines. Too many of them. She had no idea what they were or if they even had a purpose. Ted put them together while he was thinking. A way to occupy his hands with repeated movement, to free his mind to solve a problem.

  She preferred hiking. Usually with someone there to talk to.

  They were so different. Wasn’t that a good thing for a relationship? Or were they doomed because they had no common ground except work? Jess didn’t have enough past romances to glean from. She didn’t want to ask Ellie, and Savannah was off on her honeymoon for two weeks.

  A vacation sounded good.

  Ted opened the lid of his laptop and logged in. On the screen, his program was running.

  “Data from the phones?”

  He nodded without turning.

  “Anything yet?”

  “I’ll tell Conroy when it’s done. I’m sure you’ll be briefed.”

  “Why are you shutting me out?” Jess twisted so she could see him without turning her head, which was starting to hurt. “Like how you’re feeling over the fact it was your dad who killed Sally Peters.”

  His shoulders stiffened.

  “What are you guys doing?” She knew he was up to something. And he’d never pull it off without Dean finding out, which meant his brother knew. It was usually better to just include him up front rather than have to explain it all when he butted in anyway. “Please tell me.”

  “We’re working with the FBI to get him back in their custody. Other than that, it’s nothing to do with the Last Chance Police Department.”

  “So I’m nothing but a cop to you now, is that it?” After everything they’d been through together. All the affection they shared. Running for their lives. Movie nights, sitting close on the couch and sharing a bowl of caramel popcorn.

  She stood. “I guess there’s no reason for me to be here then.”

  If he didn’t care at all, why stick around? She was nothing to him but a colleague. At least right now. Because he had no intention of letting her into his personal life, he’d relegated her back to being “just a cop.”

  Jess got to the door before he said, “Hold up,” sounding wearier than she’d thought he was.

  She turned, trying not to make it look obvious that she’d wanted him to call her back. That all she wanted was for him to ask her to stay.

  Ugh. When had she turned into someone this needy? The truth was, she watched how Dean and Ellie complemented each other. How they both needed each other. But with her and Ted, he would never admit to needing her.

  She studied his face. He didn’t want to let her in. Had he been hurt before, letting someone in? Jess desperately wanted him to open up to her. But was that only because it would make her feel validated? She certainly would feel respected and appreciated if he talked to her about this. But that wasn’t a good enough reason for him to share. He should do it because he wanted to because she made it safe for him.

  Jess said, “I should go. You’re right, I don’t have to know about every single thing that’s happening. I just care about you, and I wanted to see if you’re all right.”

  “Sit down, Jess.” He brushed his free hand down his pant leg to his knee. Rubbing off the sweat of nerves? He did look like he was gearing up for something.

  Jess wanted to walk away and mope. Lick her wounds and whine to her journal about how people were so fickle. Everyone she worked with said they appreciated her. But then they didn’t act like it. She was sidelined and pigeonholed.

  She wanted to be a big part of Ted’s life, someone who made it better. Who complimented him and helped him out.

  She eased back onto the chair.

  “Are you okay?”

  She rolled her eyes. “Probably about as ‘okay’ as you. I’m not supposed to go back to work until I’m a hundred percent.”

  “So you’re working this case anyway, coming here to find out what I’m doing?”

  “That’s not it.” Not completely, at least. “I was just worried since you and Dean left so fast. Ellie was too.”

  Ted’s gaze was as unreadable as ever. “Thanks.”

  She shrugged one shoulder.

  “I’d rather ignore the fact my father even exists.” He brushed that fall of hair off his face.

  Was it her fault that every time he did that, her heart seemed to catch?

  He kept talking. “Instead, he’s right back in my life, at my place of work. Murdering.” His throat bobbed as he swallowed. “If I can bring him in and get him to tell us who West is—?”

  She nodded. The idea they could be done with both would surely be tempting. She could see why he’d done it. Though, she wished he’d have included her in the process.

  “But either way he tells the FBI about me.”

  Jess shook her head. “That you worked for him, years ago?”

  “He has enough he can discredit me. More uh…recently. Cases I’ve testified on could be subject to review. Who knows what the fallout will be?” His brow furrowed, but not out of confusion. It was something else. “So how do I hand him back over to the FBI, knowing he could cost us West? Criminals will go free—and I mean more than just West—and then I’ll probably lose my job.”

  His dad had leverage over him. That was what Ted had kept to himself all these years.

  “What about your growth mindset? What does that tell you to do?”

  He rolled his eyes and gave a slight shake of his head. “I have no idea what to do, but I know that if he’s dead at the end of this, I won’t shed a tear. And he won’t be able to tell anyone anything. The fallout will be minimal.”

  “So you want him to be killed.”

  “Because I’m a horrible son, I guess.” Ted glanced aside. “Too scared to own up to what I’ve done. I’d rather bury it all with him and move on.”

  “Ted—”

  He shook his head. “Don’t bother trying to make me feel better. It won’t work. Because I’ve been trying to think through scenarios where the FBI is forced to kill him. So I can be prepared, just in case.”

  “You’re not bloodthirsty.”

  “No? You think I haven’t considered getting a gun and using it on him myself?” He lifted his good hand, palm up, then let it fall back to his lap. “We’re supposed to fake his death for him. Convince everyone he’s gone. It could go wrong, and he�
��ll end up dead for real.”

  “That’s a risk he’s taking.” His father had to know that. He was trusting two men he’d destroyed, men he was supposed to have raised into good guys. Who’d managed somehow to be that themselves with no help from him.

  “And the risk I’m taking with him being alive is to lose everything.”

  “Against all odds.”

  Ted started. “What does that mean?”

  “I was thinking about the men you and Dean are.”

  “I’m nothing like Dean.”

  “You’re very different.” She’d concede that point. “That’s true enough. But it doesn’t mean you’re not both good men. Strong. Caring. Loyal. Hardworking.”

  Ted started to shake his head.

  “I know what you believe, and that’s what he’s put in your head. The good you’ve done for years now, the man I know you are, is what my grandfather saw in you. A good guy who works to help people. To bring justice.”

  “That’s a cover. It’s not the truth.”

  “Maybe it’s you who has that backward. Maybe it’s the truth, and what’s underneath—the bad you think is the real you—is what your father put there. It’s not the real you, the man you’d have been if he hadn’t dragged you all over the place doing his work.”

  “That’s not… I don’t.”

  “I get it, you know?” She could admit this to him, at least. “There’s a part of me people don’t see because they see what they want to.”

  “So it’s all on them? Like your grandfather, deciding I was worth trusting when there wasn’t anything farther from the truth.”

  She shook her head. “It’s what I show people, but it’s also what they decide. It’s a little bit of both.”

  “You can’t control what people think of you.”

  “Not always. But sometimes you can write the narrative.” Part of how people treated her was how she’d taught them to treat her—which was based on how she saw herself. The whole thing was complicated. “What I’m running into is trying to get people to change their perception about me. Because I don’t like what I’ve written.”

  “I want to keep mine.”

  “Because you’re scared of what they’ll do or say if they see the truth?”

  He pressed his lips together.

  “Do you want me to tell you it wasn’t your fault? That he dragged you into situations you should never have been in. That he forced you to do things you never should’ve done or would have chosen to do if you’d been given the choice.”

  “I did choose. Some of it. And I wasn’t always unhappy.”

  “Life is life. We all have different experiences. What matters is what you do with the future, not what happened in the past that you can no longer change.”

  Jess wanted to make detective, not be assigned undercover cases her entire career. No matter how Bill’s words had made her feel, that was what she saw in her future. The thing, currently out of reach, that she wanted.

  So what was she going to do about that?

  “You should start a podcast. Like a life coach type of thing.”

  Jess grinned. “Everyone has one these days.” She shrugged. “Who has time? We’re trying to bring down West.”

  “You can try all you want. I’m going to do it.”

  Her grin turned into a laugh. She was about to say, “Yes,” when a knock sounded at the door.

  Dean opened it and stuck his head in. “The FBI is here.”

  Twenty-two

  In the front seat of the big black SUV that Special Agent Eric Cullings had arrived in and was now driving, Dean spoke on Ted’s phone.

  Sitting beside Ted in the middle row, another agent leaned into him, watching every keystroke Ted made on the laptop perched on his knees. He’d made a hotspot with his phone to connect his computer to the internet and was running a trace. Trying to find the source of Dean’s caller.

  “I know that, Dad.” The way his brother said Dad made Ted want to wince.

  The agent beside Ted used a low voice to say, “Keep him talking.”

  As though they all didn’t know that. It was the whole point of what they were doing out here. Even though Ted had already explained to them that their father was far too smart to allow himself to be strung along so that his GPS might be tracked to the place he was standing right now.

  Dean spoke into the phone. “It’s a good plan. It’ll work.”

  It had taken them years to find him. And that had been thanks to Stuart, Kaylee’s brother Brad, and an operation that involved law enforcement from both Last Chance and Zander’s team. Even then, he’d escaped federal custody.

  And they thought he’d hang on long enough to be caught?

  Ted shook his head, even as he zeroed in on the location. He gave Eric the closest cross streets, figuring he knew the town well enough. The guy had married local PI Tate Hudson’s sister and was here often, what with having an undercover guy in town.

  Dean chuckled, but it sounded like no laughter Ted had ever heard from him. “You just don’t like the idea of me fake-shooting you.” He paused, then chuckled louder. “You would. Just tell me when, and I’ll be there.”

  The GPS narrowed to an apartment complex on the west side of town. Ted whispered the name to Eric, who nodded and hit his turn signal.

  The idea they might actually come across his father didn’t fill him with excitement. Despite being along for the ride, he’d rather be back at the house with Jess who was protecting Ellie. Ted wasn’t super happy, but they needed his skills.

  Problem was, he might end up having to look his father in the eye.

  He would see everything he’d ever done and hated about himself reflected in the old man’s eyes. And then more of what his father had done. Like trying to drag poor Kaylee into a reconditioning program so she could be “trained” to become his wife. Or talking his way into the CIA Director job.

  The crimes his father had committed were unbelievable. Ted figured the FBI didn’t know the half of it.

  And yet, he’d come back here.

  On the run from the law and faced with no men and no resources, his father had returned to where he had people on his side. Or, at least someone willing to give him what he wanted in return for killing Sally Peters.

  Ted wanted to amputate him from his life, like a diseased limb. Slowly spreading the bacteria that would kill the rest of the body. His dad needed to be cut off.

  The Special Agent next to him tapped Ted’s arm. He looked over and the man mouthed, You okay? Ted shrugged. What did it matter? They were doing this anyway.

  The FBI agent was cut from the same cloth as Eric. Tall, fit. Clean cut. Like a businessman, but with an air of lethality. The badge and gun said he meant business. Ted had been around cops for years, but these guys wore it differently.

  If they could hold on to his father this time, they’d have a shot to bring Pierce Cartwright to justice—while Ted lost his job, his support system, and probably his freedom in the process.

  Would he lose Jess too?

  Somehow, from their conversation in his bedroom, he wondered if she would walk away. Write him off. It seemed almost like she wouldn’t hold his actions against him—even as she refused to let him skate out from responsibility for his choices. He didn’t understand it. Kind of like how he didn’t understand why God would choose not to hold his mistakes against him. Paying for what he’d done made much more sense.

  Ted didn’t want to go to jail. But getting away scot-free? That would be worse.

  The computer zeroed in on the building. It turned out to be a townhouse. Much better than multiple floors of apartments where they’d have to wait for him to come out. Or guess which floor he was on. Ted pulled up the listing and found the name on the lease.

  He showed everything to the agent beside him. The townhouse was being leased to Leonard Orlando, who Ted knew was a firefighter with the Last Chance Fire Department. After several men had pretended to be firefighters lately, this could mean the
whole department was being dragged into this. Implicated.

  He sent it all to Conroy’s email address while Eric pulled up outside the house, a couple of doors down.

  Dean said, “See you then,” and hung up the phone.

  “We should move quickly.” Eric got out, then leaned down to ask, “You want in, Dean?”

  “Yep.” Ted’s brother shoved his door open. “Stay here.”

  The two FBI agents donned protective vests, gave one to Dean, and the three of them raced to the front door carrying weapons.

  Ted closed the lid of his laptop and grabbed the keys from the ignition. He locked up the car and followed to the front door.

  Before he got to it, the Special Agent appeared. His brows rose seeing Ted there.

  “Jenkins, right?”

  The Special Agent responded by saying, “Let’s go. You’ll want to see what we found.”

  Ted followed him up the steps and through the door where he abruptly stopped in his tracks. What they’d found? He should’ve said, “Who.”

  Ted gaped at the man on his front on the carpet, hands cuffed behind his back. “Basuto?”

  What on earth was going on? They’d tracked his father and landed Basuto. Did that mean he was working with Pierce Cartwright? Or…West?

  Ted just stared.

  Basuto wiggled on the floor, struggling against the cuffs like any belligerent criminal. Not like a police sergeant. “What are you guys doing in my house? And let me up.”

  Dean hauled the sergeant to his feet and stepped back. Eric still had his weapon out. Ted stood with Jenkins at the entryway while Eric said, “Care to explain your connection to Pierce Cartwright, Sergeant Basuto?”

  He blinked. “My…what?” He spun to Dean. “I don’t know your father.” Then back to Eric. “Uncuff me. I’m a police sergeant in this town. Call Conroy.”

  “Because you believe that, as a cop, you’re above suspicion?”

  He stared down Special Agent Cullings, apparently not impressed by Eric’s line of questioning. “If I’d done something illegal, I’d expect nothing less than exactly what I’d do to any other suspect. But I haven’t. Why are you asking me about Pierce Cartwright?” He looked at each of them in turn. “Ted?”