Tate could still see the grotesque mask of terror that even in her hopeless situation, she’d tried to soften with her one last scream of, “I love you, Tate!” Her last words. His eternal damnation. Love, it turned out, didn’t mean jack in the high, craggy peaks of the Alaskan wilds.
“You could’ve saved her,” he breathed, his throat ragged with the regret and the futility of having saved so many others when he couldn’t save the women he’d loved. Either of them. “Do you have to take everyone?” he asked the Lord.
A heavy mitt landed on his shoulder. “Tate,” was all Tucker had to say to open the floodgates.
Damn. Tate didn’t have the strength to shove his boss’s hand away. He’d been ambushed again, but he couldn’t let his boss see him, not like this. He kept his head bowed and breathed through his mouth, blinking before one tear fell, needing oxygen and a way out of this nightmare called his life.
The busy world of law enforcement and first responders swirled around him in the far right traffic lane, but eventually, the fire engines rolled on to other calls where other people could be saved. Shortly after they left, the EMTs packed up and followed their lead. There was nothing left for any of them to do here.
Three of the six police cruisers on scene turned off their flashing red and blues, and rolled eastward. One lane reopened with two officers directing the heavy traffic. Then another lane opened. Engines revved. Horns honked. People resumed their busy lives while Tate’s stood still.
He’d only known Winslow less than twenty-fours hours. How’d he get so deep into her when he’d been celibate by choice most of his adult life? Why her? Why now? Why this one young woman when so many others had passed by without him giving them a second glance? When he thought he’d never be whole enough to take another risk?
The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away. How well he knew.
It’d be good to hear what news the divers relayed to the police and the Coast Guard. What they’d seen. Who they’d found, if anyone. Not that it mattered. The car was fathoms below the choppy surface, maybe sitting on the bottom by now. You couldn’t see the roof from the bridge. The Coast Guard’s life-saving drill had changed to body recovery.
No one submerged in the chilly Potomac could survive this long, especially if their health was already compromised. It wasn’t humanly possible. Tate knew the odds. Chevy Sparks turned too quickly into Chevy Anchors. They had no capacity to maintain a large enough air bubble like you saw in those murder mysteries on television. That crap wasn’t real. But death was. Death and guilt and drowning, and that hollowed out cavern where his heart used to be—those things were real.
Tucker didn’t have the brains he was born with, just stuck to Tate like glue, his hand firm and solid on Tate’s shoulder. It almost felt—warm. But Tate was no dummy. Tucker only stayed on his six because he was afraid Tate might jump next. Funny. Part of him wanted to, but his grief-sickened mind kept thinking of that fierce little survivor back at the Mortimer ranch, the one still waiting for Winslow to come for him. Yeah. Pepe. The dragon.
In a way that damned dog was saving his life. He didn’t have anyone now, and Tate couldn’t bear the thought of that homeless, throwaway dog in anyone’s arms but his. If this was the end, Pepe was all that was left of Winslow. They needed each other.
“You ought to head back to Maple,” Tucker mumbled. “You know. See what else Ky and Isaiah found in the house. Maybe—”
“No.” Tate forced a swallow. He didn’t need busywork, and nothing on Maple would bring Winslow back to life. Fighting the crush of despair, he locked onto the icy depths of the river and refused to give Joyce the upper hand, even in death.
He wouldn’t leave until he saw Winslow’s limp lifeless body. Yeah, he knew he was stupid to stand there and wait. Any minute now, Tucker would pull rank on him and send him home, but Tate had nothing left, and no reason to want to live in a world without Winslow.
Like that kid all alone on that mountain in Alaska, he did the only thing he could. He hoped against hope.
Chapter Eighteen
Tucker proved to be a stalwart companion. Hadn’t offered one patronizing piece of advice the entire afternoon. Just showed up at the railing and stood there like a brother instead of a boss. But at the end of the day, it didn’t matter. No car. No Winslow. No sense standing around once the fog rolled in and the Coast Guard divers called it quits.
The CG commander doused the spotlights, then gathered his men out of the river and turned his ship toward home. He’d left a marker buoy to resume the search early Sunday morning, weather permitting, but for tonight, his work was done.
Across the river, National Harbor was lit up in all its early Christmas shopping glory, but Tate’s heart was locked up tight. He forced his fingers to let loose of the metal guardrail that held him up, but getting his boots to step away from the scene below was something else again. His eyes held fast to the bobbing whitecaps. Expecting. Still hoping. Still praying. Any minute now, Winslow might bob to the surface. She might gasp for help and he meant to dive in and be that breath of life for her.
“Where are you going?” Tucker asked as if Tate had waved goodbye or something when he’d done no such thing.
“Nowhere,” he bit out. He didn’t mean to come across like an ass, but he was that close to falling apart, and if he stepped away from the rail—for even a second—it meant he admitted Winslow was gone. That she’d drowned. That Joyce won. The thought of Winslow’s lifeless tiny body in the icy water stole Tate’s breath.
“You need something to eat, Tate. Come on. I’ll walk back to your car with you. We’ll go somewhere for a cup of coffee.” Tucker made the mistake of cupping Tate’s elbow.
Tate jerked free of the compassion offered. He didn’t need it or the sympathetic undertone in his boss’s voice. “I’m staying.”
Tucker was right. Tate knew it, but how did a man give up and walk away from the woman he had no business loving? Like the drizzly rain now falling, his tears blurred his view of the river. The whole damned world turned fucking tragic.
His phone rang. He swallowed a gutful of despair and choked out, “Higgins,” instead of ‘What the hell do you want?’
“Tate? That you?” The tone in Harley’s three words sounded suspiciously compassionate, like Tucker’s.
“Yeah. What?” He didn’t need sympathy. He needed to be left alone.
“Were you going to stop by and visit this dog tonight? Pepe?”
Tate brushed the back of his hand over his eyes. “Yeah,” he croaked. Soon. Really soon.
“When?”
Why did when matter? Once he stepped away from Winslow’s watery grave, he’d just admit he’d lost her. That he’d given up hope. What mattered the time of day?
He coughed hard and loud, his lungs close to shutting down. He needed to breathe, didn’t he? Why? Explain the need for pulmonary function to a man who’d just lost the woman he loved. Yes, loved. I shouldn’t have told her it was too soon. I should’ve said thank you. I should’ve told her I love her too.
“Because I’ve got a dog on my hands that won’t settle down no matter what I try, and trust me, I know dogs. I’ve tried everything.”
Tate nodded more to himself than in answer. Why was Harley calling a man who’d never owned a dog in his life? He had no advice to offer. Like Winslow, he didn’t really know Pepe, either. Right then, he didn’t know anything.
“Is he hungry?” he asked the obvious. Then feed him.
“Hey man, are you okay?” Harley sounded genuinely concerned. Maybe he didn’t know where Tate was or that he was standing on the Woodrow Wilson Bridge, feeling like his world was ending. Maybe Tucker hadn’t leaked the news.
“Yeah. I’m good,” Tate lied. I’m fuckin’ wonderful.
“If you say so...” Suspicion filled the interlude. “Anyway, this little guy hasn’t stopped barking since we got home. He won’t let my boys play with him, and he bolts the door every chance he gets. He wants out, but I don’t d
are let him in case he runs off. I’m thinking he’s looking for his owner. Was her name Winslow?”
“Yeah. Winslow,” Tate ground out, that sweet name harder to speak now that he knew he’d be leaving her behind in the next few seconds. Maybe minutes. “I’ll be right there.”
“You got my address?”
“Yeah. On my way.” Didn’t it figure? When it rained, it poured.
Tate stuffed his phone back in his pants pocket and turned his head to the left where Tucker couldn’t see. The traffic was steady and noisy at his six. A good blanket of fog had rolled in, covering everything in the river but that pulsing yellow beacon on the Coast Guard buoy. The sky let loose with a steady rain. Damn, this was hard.
He swallowed his angst and blinked against the wind, life’s bitter lesson learned once more. Don’t fall in love. It isn’t worth the pain.
Only he knew better. Loving someone was worth everything. Even standing here with his heart in his throat, he’d do it all again for those few hours he’d been privileged to spend with Winslow. He was dumb like that.
“Shitty day,” Tucker said simply when Tate turned his back on the guardrail and headed west. Once he made up his mind, he set a brisk pace to his Jeep, needing the solitude it would offer.
Tucker hadn’t parked much farther from the Jeep. He went one way without so much as a good-bye. Tate went the other, headed to the Mortimer dog kennels, needing to be left alone.
The road to Harley’s was bleak and busy. By the time Tate rolled up to the cedar log home Harley had built for Judy, the rain had stopped, but he was bone-tired. He hadn’t eaten all day and his gut—no, make that his heart—hurt.
Harley had two boys, twins nicknamed Little Alex and Georgie, the one after Alex Stewart, the other after some guy Tate couldn’t remember, maybe Harley’s old man. One of them came scrambling out the front door, and wouldn’t you know, Pepe raced behind him, yapping his head off.
Tate shoved his Jeep door open, intending to jump out and intercept the four-legged mutt before he got away, but damned if that hound dog didn’t head straight for him. With one mad dash, Pepe was inside the Jeep and on the floorboards by Tate’s boot. Another leap put him on Tate’s lap where the crazy dog set to licking and kissing Tate’s chin. God, that little dog felt good, warm and wiggling and full of everything Winslow had lost.
Tate lost it, right then and there. Every last piece of self-restraint. He buried his face in Pepe’s neck, fighting the tsunami of grief lifting up in his heart. This bundle of joy had no idea he was kissing the man who’d let his mistress down. This dog was dumb and blind and—precisely what Tate needed.
He heard Harley at his open door, but he wasn’t man enough to look his friend in the eye. “I heard,” Harley said as he reached a hand to Tate’s back. “I’m sorry.”
“Yeah,” was all Tate could manage. Damn, it had been a long time since he’d felt so shattered. He hated losing control like this. Hated. It.
“The offer’s still good, buddy. Judy will be happy to treat that bullet hole in your arm, no questions asked.”
Tate nodded, his chin bumping Pepe’s hard, excited head. A golden ray of light spilled out the wide front doors of the Mortimer home like sunshine. Another little guy the same size as the one with Harley, stood at the doorway with Judy, and damn. Didn’t the sight of a happy family gnaw at Tate’s heart like a dog with a bone.
He had no one to go home to. His loft in Occoquan, North Virginia, was just another apartment. This time of day it’d be dark and empty, cold because he kept the thermostat set on low the days he worked late. He just didn’t want to be there. Not like this.
He choked back the lump in his throat. “Nah. I’m good.”
“No, you’re not, Tate,” Harley said firmly, his fingers digging into Tate’s shoulder. “Times like this are when you need to be with someone. Come on in. You need a beer.”
A big red danger light broke through the muck in Tate’s head. Harley was a recovering alcoholic. If he was offering beer it had to be… “Root beer?”
Harley’s brows knitted together in sheer kindness, a hard gift to accept on a day like this. “Of course. Judy would kick my ass if I fell off the wagon and left her to tend these two hellions.”
“Aw, Daddy. You swored,” Mini-Harley mumbled.
“Yeah, well, don’t you go telling your mom on me now.” Harley placed a wide palm over the kid’s head and ruffled every last hair. “It’s guy talk, son. That’s all. See if you can lure Pepe away from Tate and let’s go inside, Georgie. Come on, Tate. It’ll do you good. If we’re lucky, Judy will feed us.”
“I heard that,” the lady in question piped up from the porch. “I’m waiting, Tate, and yes. We’re having homemade pizza tonight. Please stay and eat with us.”
Pizza and root beer. Almost sounded tempting. But no. Tate couldn’t choke down anything. “Another time. It’s been a long day and I’ve got to buy dog food and... stuff.”
“Damn. Almost forgot.” Harley turned on his heel and headed back inside, leaving one of the twins with Tate. Georgie was it?
Maybe around five-years-old, the little guy climbed into the Jeep and onto Tate’s lap with Pepe. He made himself at home, playing with the steering wheel and the shifter like he was driving. Being a kid. Damned if the little guy didn’t smell like he’d just had a bath. Judy was a good mom, just like... her.
Tate closed his eyes, his battered heart so damned raw that his chest hurt when he breathed. He needed to leave before he turned into a blubbering mess, but just then, a soft little-boy hand patted his cheek. Once. Twice. Then it settled against his neck as Georgie twisted his little boy body around to look at the man behind him. “Daddy says puppies are like guardian angels only they don’t got wings,” he whispered.
Tate nodded, not needing any more of the milk of human kindness.
“He said they wake us up and keep us safe from the boogey man and other monsters.”
“They do, huh.” Tate had to say something.
The kid nodded. “Yeah, they do, and we should never be ‘fraid of the dark, ’cuz if we got a dog in the house, we’re safe and protected all the time,” he said, bobbing his head at those last three words.
The kid made sense. Harley’s dogs were German Shepherd or Malinois, not the Chihuahua type. In their world, Pepe was nothing but a snack-sized hors d’oeuvre. A cupid angel maybe. Nothing as fierce as those flaming archangel types Harley trained.
“You have bad dreams?” Tate asked to keep the conversation off him.
The boy nodded. “Ah-huh, and I keep a nightlight on ’cuz it gets dark at night, but sometimes Awex bees mean to me and he turns it off.”
Awex, meaning Little Alex, Georgie’s twin.
“But Daddy lets Rooster sleep with me now, and I ain’t ascared of nuthin’.”
“Who’s Rooster?”
“My very own puppy, and I have to brush him and feed him and pick up his poop in the yard every single day before Daddy gets home ’cuz I’m a good dog owner. I’m wesponsible.” He said that with his chin stuck forward.
“You mean responsible.”
Georgie’s head bobbed. “Ah-huh! I one of the good guys ’cuz I is wesponsible.”
Cute kid. “Do you think Pepe’s big enough to keep a guy like me safe tonight?” Tate doubted it. Not with the kind of nightmare he had coming at him.
But the little guy nodded even as he patted said guardian angel on his head, making Pepe blink with every pat. “Ah-huh, and he might steal your covers too, but it’s okay. Dogs is man’s best friends, you know.”
Tate swallowed hard. He knew that about dogs, just hadn’t taken advantage of it the way Harley had. The man raised several dozen security dogs every year, making some available for local law enforcement. Others, trained as service dogs for veterans with PTSD, went to deserving men and women returning from the wars. Word was Harley donated those dogs out of the goodness of his heart. He’d suffered with PTSD once. He knew the difference a good servic
e dog made in a ragged man’s life.
And there sat Tate with the tiniest service dog ever, shivering up against his chest and doing what dogs did best. Just being there when the whole world fell apart. Maybe Georgie was onto something.
In a minute, Harley came back with a five-pound bag of dog food and Tate was good to go. He eased the kid to the ground. “Thanks, Georgie. How about Pepe and me come back for a visit someday? Would you and Rooster like that?”
The kid’s smile looked just like his dad’s, a little crooked, but just as wide. “And we’ll play fetch and hide-and-seek and Legos?”
“You bet.” What else could Tate say?
Harley put a hand to Tate’s shoulder. “You need anything, you call me. Judy and the boys would love to have you and Pepe stay with us. We’ve got the room.”
Tate put the Jeep in reverse. “Tell Judy thanks, but no. Another time.”
He might take Harley up on his offer, but then again…
He might not.
Chapter Nineteen
It took less than an hour to get home from Harley and Judy’s. By then, Tate was spent, his heart broken and the pieces of it crushed to dust. Most guys would resort to alcohol or violence at this point. Not Tate. He scooped Pepe into his arms and headed up the side steps to his loft. Drinking hadn’t brought anyone in his life back. Why start now?
The rustic complex was small. It had been built around an old grain mill and housed maybe ten residents at the most. He rented the entire top level, more of an attic with a wide open set of brick-walled rooms, high wooden beams, an east facing set of floor-to-ceiling windows, and a view that couldn’t be beat. Except tonight.
At the top step, Tate keyed in his access code and opened his door. The day outside had turned gloomy and dark, matching his mood. He shut the door and locked it out. Moving through the place, he kept hold of Pepe. “Take it easy, boy. You’re with me now.”
Joker Joker (The Deuces Wild Series Book 2) Page 14