by C. B. Lewis
Well, that wasn’t what he’d expected to hear.
“You hacked a police computer and stole the files?”
“We wanted to help.” Kit looked imploringly at him. “There was so much we couldn’t tell you. So much we had to keep under wraps. It was the only way we could think of to get the information to you without everyone finding out about the TRI.”
“Shit.” Jacob sank back against the seat. He withdrew his arm from Kit’s shoulders and rubbed at his face with both hands. Just when things couldn’t get any more complicated….
Kit touched his knee, then drew his hand back at once. “I’m sorry. I had to tell you. Now everything’s in the open, you had to know.”
Jacob lowered his hands and looked at the younger man. “Is there anything else in the footage that might be useful?” He was keeping his voice calm with effort. “They have someone working on it, but if there’s anything we could use, you need to tell me now.”
Kit shook his head at once. “Just her and the man saying they’re going to Tom’s house and that they don’t think anyone’ll be around.”
“Good.” Jacob blew out a sigh of relief. “That’s something.” He studied Kit, and how pale and nervous he looked. “It wasn’t your idea, was it? Any of it? Nagy did it all.”
Kit chewed on his lower lip. “He thought we might be able to solve the case where the police couldn’t. Tom was one of the people who saved him. He wanted to find whoever….” His distress was audible in his voice. “He wanted to help.”
Jacob sighed and slipped his arm back around Kit’s shoulder, pulling Kit back against his side. “And that went well.” He rested his temple against Kit’s hair. “Your lot didn’t find the culprit. My lot were chasing an impossible killer. The only person who could have told us anything is probably going to snuff it so we’ll never find out.” He gazed blankly at the roof of the pod. “And it’s four in the sodding morning and I’m unemployed.”
Kit squeezed his thigh. “Could be worse. Could have crabs.”
Jacob tilted his head to look at him. “Anyone ever tell you you’re an odd one?”
Kit dropped a kiss on Jacob’s lips. “Once in a while.” He shifted on the chair to snuggle against Jacob’s side, his head on Jacob’s shoulder. “How long do I have before I have to get back to the station?”
“As long as we need to sleep,” Jacob replied. “Bugger them all. We’ve earned the break.”
Kit shivered and let out a soft sigh of relief. “Good,” he whispered.
Back at the hotel, they tumbled into the unmade bed. Kit managed to fall asleep almost at once, but Jacob couldn’t. Even with the warmth of Kit’s arms around him and the whisper of breath against his bare chest, his mind kept drifting back to the case. All the evidence they had wasn’t enough, and if they weren’t able to find some connection between Harper and the woman, Harper would walk with nothing more than a slap on the wrist.
He had no part to play anymore, and he knew it was going to drive him crazy. An unsolved case was like an itch in the middle of his back, just out of reach, and Christ, he wanted to be able to walk back in there and pick apart the evidence until he found what he needed to condemn Harper once and for all.
He stared at the ceiling.
Maybe he didn’t have access to the station. That didn’t mean he didn’t have access to the files.
In the darkness, he smiled.
Chapter 48
KIT WANTED to find somewhere to hide.
Going to the police station when Jacob was there was bad enough. Going into the station on his own and facing Jacob’s colleagues, when they probably all knew the part he’d played in Jacob’s resignation, was so much worse.
DI Temple was the one to meet him at the front desk. She was cordial, explaining that a desk had been assigned to him, and she would brief him shortly on his tasks. Kit could only nod gratefully when she led him to a desk in the corner of the room.
Other officers glanced at him occasionally. It gave him the impression of being put in the naughty chair.
One of them, a big blond man, came over ten minutes after Temple left him. “So you’re Rafferty? Work for the TRI?”
Kit flicked the screen of his quill away and nodded. “Kit.”
The man tilted his head, examining him. “I heard you’re one of the people who slowed down this investigation to cover for your boss.”
Kit felt a cold knot in his gut, but he looked back at the man, setting his jaw. “Unless I’m mistaken, I was the one who gave you the break in the case with the data from the eye.” He lifted his chin defiantly, meeting the man’s eyes. “The only thing I didn’t tell anyone about was the time travel.”
The man continued to gaze at him, his arms folded over his chest.
Kit fidgeted.
“Anton.” Temple’s voice made him look away from the man. The woman was coming back toward the desk. She gave the blond man a warning look. “Don’t you have work to do?”
Anton touched his fingertip to his forehead. “On it, boss.” He shot Kit a last look, then walked away.
“Ignore him,” Temple said. “First off, I need you to give me a description of the man who was skulking outside Jacob’s place, then we’ll need you to get into Sanders’s drive. The upper levels and your boss need to know what he was working on.”
Kit nodded. “I want to help however I can.”
Temple’s stern expression softened slightly. “I know. Jacob spoke well of you.”
“It just feels strange being here, knowing I’m the reason he had to leave.”
Temple patted him on the shoulder. “We all know Jacob made the call. He always did what he had to, to break a case. You help us tidy up this one and let him go out with a cherry on top, yeah? I think he’d appreciate it.”
“I might not be able to get into it,” he warned.
“Just do what you can.”
She left an officer with him to get the description, then brought him a slate and the evidence bag with the drive in it. Their equipment was good quality, and faster than some of the TRI tech, but even so, he knew Tom and Tom’s keys. It was going to be a long day.
He didn’t know how long he had been trying to break through the encryptions, but he was distracted by a gentle buzz in his pocket. He frowned, pulling out his quill and drawing out the screen.
There was a message from Jacob.
What do they have you working on?
He glanced around, then replied. Sanders’s drives. They want to know what he was doing.
Tell Temple you need to work on the eye.
Kit’s frown deepened. The eye? Why?
Tell her you think there might be more data on it. Trust me.
DS Temple was talking to the blond man, over at his desk. Kit hesitated, then got up and went over to her. She held up a hand, motioning for him to wait, and finished what she was saying before turning.
“Rafferty?”
“Could I have another look at that eye, when you have a minute?” he asked, hoping Jacob knew what he was doing. “I was thinking there might be more data apart from the video.”
Temple’s dark eyebrows arched. “Like what?”
Kit shrugged. “It could be information about where the eye came from. Or about the man and where he was coming from. I don’t know exactly,” he said, and then suddenly, he did. He remembered the video. Maps. They had maps. He stared at her, his heart racing. “It might even have information about where they were meant to take the stuff they stole.”
Temple spun to look down at the man beside her. “Anton, get to the evidence bay. Get me that eye. We need to get all the data from it, if we possibly can. It could give us our link to Harper.”
The man’s craggy face broke into a smile, and he shoved his chair back. “Yes, boss.”
Temple looked back at Kit. “You think it’s possible?”
“Even if there isn’t anything new, we have to try,” he replied. “What do you want me to do with the memory drive?”
Kit nodded and retreated back to the desk. He opened out his quill. How did you know there was more stuff on the eye?
You can take the man out of the CID, but you can’t take the CID out of the man. Janos sends his regards.
Kit stared at the message.
“Rafferty?”
He snapped the screen shut and turned, startled. “Yes!”
Temple was standing right behind him. There was a knowing smile playing around her lips. “I wondered how long it would take for him to try and stick his nose in.”
“I—” Kit wrapped his hand around his quill. “It’s not—”
“Don’t worry about it,” Temple said, her voice low and conspiratorial. “This was Jacob’s case. I knew it would bother him. If he wants to drop us hints, we’ll keep it between us. He was the one who told you to look into the eye, wasn’t he?”
Kit nodded with a sheepish smile. “Is he always like this?”
“Stubborn to the bitter end?” Temple laughed. “Yeah. He never knows when to stop.” She nodded to Sanders’s drives. “Any luck there?”
He shook his head. “I’ve run it through the TRI decryption program, but he’s used his key as well. It’ll take me a while.”
Temple ran her finger along her lip thoughtfully. “Right now, I think the eye has to be the priority. How much time will you need?”
Kit winced. “As much as you can give me. It’s not exactly easy work.”
She nodded. “You do what I tell you to. Leave the rest of it to me.”
“I don’t want to get you in trouble as well.”
Temple smiled. “Believe me, if I get in trouble on this case, it’s not going to be your fault.” She nodded to the drive again. “Keep working on that until we get the eye. We’ll set you up somewhere quieter, make sure you’re not disturbed. That way no one’ll see what you’re focusing on.”
Kit tried to laugh. “No pressure, then.”
Temple patted him on the shoulder. “You’ll do fine.”
Chapter 49
JACOB JOLTED awake when the taxi-pod chimed.
He rubbed at his eyes and tried to get his bearings. It took him a moment to recognize the shithole of a hotel he was currently staying in, but then consciousness and recollection came crashing in on him. He slid out of the taxi-pod and headed for the door, withdrawing his key card from his pocket.
It had been a long day.
As soon as Kit had headed for the station, he’d done some digging, spoken to people at the TRI, and shuttled himself out in the direction of the Schmidt-Nagy house.
While Nagy was wary about admitting his crime, as soon as he realized Jacob was ready to conspire with him to find the man responsible, he had his slate out and was flinging up projections all over the smooth white walls of the living room.
A lot of it, Jacob already knew, but the video footage was what he wanted to see. He had watched it over in silence four times, his smile growing wider by the moment. Less than ten minutes later, he knew his colleagues would be on the right track.
It hadn’t stopped him going over every single file with Nagy, looking for anything he might have missed. Almost every file he had on his slate was there, as well as the extra information Nagy and Kit had unearthed.
It had been a long, focused day, only broken by a brief call from Luke to check on him, and a heated argument in Hungarian between Nagy and his lover. Judging by the raised voices and angry gesticulating, Schmidt hadn’t been aware of Nagy’s hacking, but the fond impatience in his expression suggested he wasn’t really angry, only concerned.
Jacob hadn’t bothered calling Kit. Even if he had, he knew he probably wouldn’t have got any reply. When Kit was in coding mode, he didn’t even seem to notice there was anything else going on. If a fire alarm had gone off, he probably would have sat through it until the flames were licking his feet.
It came as a surprise, then, when he opened the door and the lights were already on.
“Kit?”
“Mm?”
Jacob shucked off his jacket, hanging it in the wardrobe behind the door, then went farther into the room.
Kit was sprawled on his belly on the bed, naked as the day he was born, his chin propped on his folded wrists. He must have showered recently, his hair still in damp disarray. His quill was in front of him, the small screen projecting less than a foot from the end of his nose. From the look of him, he wasn’t even watching whatever was displayed on it, his eyes half-closed.
Jacob crouched down at the end of the bed and tapped the quill to switch off the screen. It winked out, and Kit opened his eyes a little wider, peering up at him. A drowsy smile crossed his lips.
“Y’r back?”
“Looks that way.” Jacob propped his arms on the end of the bed. “Busy day?”
Kit nodded, rubbing his cheek against his forearm and yawning. “Eye. Drives. Stuff. Lots of stuff.” He managed to unfold his arms enough to reach out and run a finger along Jacob’s sleeve. “Smart boyfriend. Big brain.”
Jacob’s heart skipped a beat. “You found something?”
Kit nodded, smoothing Jacob’s sleeve. “Maps.” He shook his head, as if it would wake him up, and forced his eyes open. “Eye had maps. The meeting point.” He smothered another yawn, blinking hard. “They came to the wrong place.”
“The wrong place?” Jacob echoed. “They weren’t meant to go to Harper?”
Kit rubbed at his forehead with the heel of his hand. “Wrong,” he said, shaking his head. “Time. Wrong time. Maps weren’t right. Maps were from ten years ago.”
Jacob stared at him. “Ten years ago, when Sanders first developed the technology? They were trying to steal it before Sanders even started using it?”
Kit nodded. “Their gate doesn’t work right. They missed the time they wanted to hit.” He stretched out like a cat, kneading at the blanket beneath him. “Wrong times. S’pose they wanted Tom’s plans before the TRI happened. ’Magine being first people to get it. Could make a fortune.”
Jacob nodded, covering Kit’s hands with his. “Do we know who they were taking it to? Or where they were taking it to?” he asked. If they knew that, then they might be able to make sense of it all, and maybe even figure out who had sent them.
Kit’s face split in a sleepy grin. “Yep.”
“Well?”
Kit curled his fingers over the end of the bed and pulled himself closer, until they were nose to nose. “A shipping company,” he confided. “Just getting successful ten years back.” His eyes were shining. “They moved, four years ago, to bigger offices. Fancier offices. Some daft DI just quit so they could arrest the boss.”
Jacob stared at him, holding his breath. “We have the link to Harper?”
Kit beamed at him. “Mm-hm.”
Jacob sank his hand into Kit’s hair and kissed him hard. “You,” he said, between kisses, “are a bloody marvel.”
Kit smiled into the kisses. “Yep.”
He caught the front of Jacob’s shirt and pulled at him, and Jacob was happy to take the hint, crawling up onto the bed with him. He kicked off his shoes, and both of them made quick—if clumsy—work of his shirt’s buttons.
“You’re not too tired for this?” Jacob asked, burying one hand back in Kit’s hair.
Kit reached down and squeezed him through his trousers. “You can do the work.” He laughed. “Gets you off, doesn’t it? Fighting crime?”
Jacob grinned crookedly. “Only a little.” Kit squeezed him again, reminding him just how up for it he was. “Okay, a lot.” He caught Kit round the middle, pulling him closer. “You got johnnies?”
Kit caught the front of Jacob’s shirt, pulling himself up onto his knees. “Who d’you think you’re talking to?” He jerked his head toward the bedside cabinet. “Good Boy Scout, me.”
Jacob wrapped one arm around his lover’s waist, then leaned over and groped in the bedside cabin
et. He came up with a handful, and gave Kit a look. “An optimistic Boy Scout.”
Kit shrugged with a pleased, lazy smile, slowly tugging at the front of Jacob’s shirt. It was gaping open to the waist, but he wasn’t making any moves to take it off.
“I’m feeling overdressed,” Jacob observed.
Kit’s smile turned wicked. “I like it. Feels naughty. All naked and you all dressed.”
He couldn’t help laughing. “Yeah?”
“Mm.” Kit leaned down and nuzzled at his throat. “Should have kept the handcuffs.”
Jacob’s eyes went a little wider at that image, and his trousers were feeling uncomfortably tight. He reached down between them, undoing his belt. Kit’s hand joined his, fumbling with the button and fly, and all at once, a warm, skinny hand was wrapped around his prick.
“Lemme,” Kit said, snatching one of the condoms.
Jacob ran his hand down the length of Kit’s back, watching those pale clever hands wrapping around him, stroking him, then smoothing the condom neatly on. “You’re more awake, then?”
Kit raised those drowsy eyes to him. “Nah. Can do it in m’sleep if I have to.” He straddled Jacob’s thighs, his own thighs pressing to Jacob’s ribs. Their bodies were flush against each other, and he wriggled, rubbing their cocks together. “C’mon. Lube me.”
Jacob snorted, squirting some lube into his hand. “Such sexy talk,” he said, then hissed through his teeth when Kit’s tongue teased his ear. His teeth caught Jacob’s lobe and slowly tugged.
“Could talk dirty,” he murmured as Jacob squeezed his arse, stroking his fingers against Kit’s opening. “Could tell you how much I liked your arse. Noises you made first time. Could have done that for hours.” He moaned against Jacob’s throat when a finger pushed into him, hips shifting, cock rubbing against Jacob’s bare belly. Jacob had to close his eyes, breathing hard. The air rushed from him in a gasp when Kit bit his throat. “M’ready already,” Kit breathed, hot and wet on his skin. “Fuck me, yeah?”