Pivot

by Kat Martin

  There was the sound of pounding footsteps as Manny rushed to join him.

  “What’s wrong?” he demanded, his head swiveling from side to side. “Where is she?”

  “Gone,” Hammer rasped between clenched teeth.

  “Gone where?”

  “If I knew that do you think I’d be standing here like a dumbass?”

  Manny scowled. “She can’t have gone far. Not on foot.”

  “Don’t be stupid,” Hammer snapped. “All she had to do was crawl out the window and head into town. She could have called a friend to pick her up and we would never know. She’s probably been gone for hours while we twiddled our thumbs in the parking lot.”

  Manny paled. “It’s not our fault.”

  “Do you think that’s going to matter to Dobbs? She’s going to have us castrated.” Spinning on his heel, Hammer stomped out of the motel room. “You make the call,” he told his brother, heading toward the street.

  “Where are you going?” Manny demanded.

  “To find a bar.”

  * * *

  Gwen hissed in fury as she tossed her phone on her desk. A second later Leo entered her office and closed the door.

  “Well?” he asked.

  “She’s not there,” Gwen told him, her fingers tapping an impatient tattoo on the arm of her battered chair.

  There was nothing she hated more than incompetence.

  “Damn,” Leo muttered. “How did she get away without them noticing?”

  “She slipped out a bathroom window.” Gwen shook her head in disgust. “If it was her at all.”

  Leo looked at her as if she was speaking a foreign language. “Who else would it be?”

  “If she has any brains, she would know her place is being watched,” Gwen told him. “She probably had a friend lead those idiots on a wild-goose chase before disappearing.”

  Leo fidgeted from one foot to another. Gwen could sense he was battling against the urge to run out of the police station and keep running.

  “What about the trace we put on her phone?”

  “Still nothing.”

  “So now what?” he demanded.

  Gwen considered the question. She’d personally checked Donny’s house, as well as the hospital where his grandmother was being treated. There was no sign of the boy. Melanie Cassidy was her only hope of finding him.

  “We need to find out where the bitch went after she grabbed the boy out of Hammer’s vehicle,” she abruptly announced. “There has to be surveillance footage of her somewhere.”

  Leo frowned. “Even if there is, it could take days to get the warrants necessary to get our hands on them.”

  She sent him a scathing glare. Did he think she was stupid? Of course, she wasn’t going to let anyone in the department realize she had an interest in Melanie Cassidy. Not when it was quite likely they were going to have to dispose of her. It’d been dangerous enough to trace her phone.

  “I’m not going through official channels,” she informed him. “I have a source who can tap into CCTV without the hassle of a warrant.”

  “What friend? A cop?” he demanded, his pudgy hands clenching and unclenching. It was obvious his nerve was about to snap. Gwen silently considered whether it was time to dispose of her partner.

  It was possible that Detective Leo Blake’s used-by date had passed.

  A worry for later.

  “Dooby Brown is a . . .” Gwen drummed her fingers, trying to find the words to describe the weaselly little man. She’d busted the tech genius a few years ago for credit fraud. “A free spirit,” she at last said.

  “Can he be trusted?”

  Gwen snorted. “About as much as I trust you.”

  Leo jutted out his jaw, his expression peevish. “I don’t like including another player. It increases our risk of exposure. We should just kill Kowalski like I wanted to do in the first place.”

  Gwen shoved herself to her feet, reaching out to poke Leo in the center of the chest.

  “Kowalski dies and internal affairs will never, ever stop digging for evidence of corruption in the police force,” she snapped. “Eventually they’re bound to find some mistake we’ve made and we’ll both be looking at a retirement that includes an eight-by-eight cell. Is that what you want?”

  Leo managed to look even more peevish. “No.”

  “If we can pressure Kowalski to tell the judge that he lied about dirty cops working with the cartel, then all this heat goes away.” She gave him another poke, wishing it was a bullet going through his cowardly heart. “Got it?”

  He hunched his shoulders, his face pale. “Yeah. I got it.”

  Chapter Seven

  Gray strolled back to the library, taking a second to appreciate the sight of Mel seated at the desk. It didn’t matter that she was in a pair of cheap sweats, or that her hair was tousled from standing in the breeze before it was completely dry.

  Just being able to walk into a room and see her there was enough to ease a hunger he hadn’t realized was gnawing at him. A knowledge that would have unnerved him two years ago. Now . . .

  Now it only deepened his determination to earn his way back into this woman’s heart.

  He cleared his throat. “Time for breakfast.”

  Mel jerked her head up in surprise. Obviously, she hadn’t realized she was no longer alone.

  “I’m not done,” she protested.

  “They’ll be here after you eat,” he assured her. “Plus, I have a fresh pot of coffee brewing.”

  Her eyes brightened at the mention of coffee. “I could use a break,” she admitted, rising to her feet. “The faces are starting to blur together.”

  Gray waited for her to join him before he led her out of the office and toward the breakfast bar. She climbed onto a high stool, her eyes widening at the sight of the fluffy pancakes, eggs, bacon, and bowl of fresh fruit.

  “You made this?” she demanded, not bothering to hide her shock.

  “Yep.” He poured coffee into a large ceramic mug and slid it in front of her. “I’m a handy guy to have around.”

  She filled her plate, dousing her pancakes with the maple syrup he’d warmed in a pan, and hungrily dug in. He’d always loved the fact that she had a healthy appetite. With Mel there was never any pretense. She was who she was. Period.

  “I don’t remember you cooking before,” she said between bites.

  He piled his own plate and started to eat. “I didn’t. But after I moved to Spokane, I got tired of eating out,” he told her. He’d also needed a way to distract himself from his regrets over his hasty flight from Seattle. “Surprisingly, I discovered I enjoyed spending time in the kitchen. It helps me de-stress.”

  “It’s delicious,” she assured him, finishing her meal and then sipping her coffee. “Did you call Ian?”

  “I did. Donny is fine and currently being bullied into playing hide-and-seek with Lily. I could hear him laughing in the background.” A smile curved his lips at the memory. There’d been something in the echoing laughter of the children that had tugged at his heart. “Plus, two of Ian’s cousins flew in this morning to provide extra protection.”

  Relief darkened her eyes. “Thanks.”

  He held her gaze. “You’re not in this alone, Mel.”

  “It feels strange. I’ve been taking care of myself for a long time.”

  “Yeah, me too. I called it independence, but if I was being honest with myself, it felt like loneliness.”

  She shoved away her empty plate, her expression impossible to read. “Independence isn’t a terrible thing.”

  “No, not terrible, but nothing replaces a family,” he said, thinking again of the happy laughter of children. “Even if it is messy and painful and occasionally infuriating.”

  She frowned, but before she could respond, there was a buzzing from the burner phone that he’d left on the counter.

  Sliding off the stool, Gray crossed to grab the phone and pressed it to his ear.

  “What’s happened?” he d
emanded, knowing it had to be Ian. No one else had the number.

  “I have a license for you to run,” his friend said.

  Gray rummaged in the drawers until he found a small pad and pen. “Go,” he commanded.

  Ian rattled off the combination of letters and numbers and Gray jotted them down.

  “Who does it belong to?” Gray asked.

  “Two men in a dented SUV who trailed one of my employees, Jillian Harmon, from Mel’s apartment to a motel south of town.”

  “The kidnappers,” he growled. It had to be them.

  “Jillian waited for a few hours to see if anyone else would make an appearance, or if the men would lead her back to Seattle and the cops that you suspect are involved with the drug cartel,” Ian continued.

  “Anything?”

  “She’s still waiting.” Ian squashed Gray’s brief flare of hope. “Right now, the two men are in a local bar drowning their sorrows at realizing Mel managed to slip away. She’s going to hang around and keep an eye on them.”

  Gray’s first instinct was to race to the bar where the men were drinking so he could beat the truth out of them. Every man had his breaking point, no matter how tough he might be. But he quickly reined in the impulse. Not only would he destroy any hope of getting the men convicted of attempted kidnapping, but the cops would only fade deeper into the shadows.

  Nope, his only hope was exposing them once and for all.

  “Thanks, Ian,” he murmured.

  “I’ll keep you updated,” Ian promised.

  Gray tucked the phone in his pocket and turned to meet Mel’s worried gaze.

  “Well?” she prompted.

  “We might have a lead,” he told her, heading into the office. Mel quickly followed behind him.

  Gray settled at the desk and used the private account the chief had set up for him to run a trace on the plate.

  A minute later he had a name.

  “Manny Hamil,” he murmured, then pulled up the mug shots and typed in the name. “Does he look familiar?” he asked as the photo appeared on the screen.

  Mel leaned over his shoulder. “He might have been the driver. It’s hard to say.”

  Gray leaned forward to read the note at the bottom of the mug shot.

  “He was arrested with his brother, Kevin the Hammer.” He typed in the name.

  “Kevin the Hammer?” Mel repeated. “That’s his name?”

  “Thugs aren’t hired for their clever wit,” he said dryly.

  The mug shot of Hammer filled the computer screen and Mel sucked in a sharp breath.

  “That’s him.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “Absolutely.”

  Gray felt a surge of grim resolve. They had the names and faces of the bad guys. It was the break they needed.

  “I’m going to print off their rap sheets,” he said.

  “What are you looking for?”

  “The top priorities are unearthing the officers who’ve arrested them, any history of being a paid informant, and any contact with the local drug cartel.”

  He tapped on the keyboard and there was a humming sound from the printer on a nearby shelf. Then a small window popped up on the computer screen that showed there were over a hundred pages waiting to print.

  “That’s just the rap sheets?”

  “Yeah, this is going to take a while,” he told her. He could have chosen the criminal record, which would have been shorter, but he wanted the notes from any prosecutions.

  “Let’s go,” he said, rising to his feet and heading toward the French doors that led to the back of the cabin.

  “Go where?”

  He slid open the door. “It’s too beautiful a day to be inside.”

  “I thought we were hiding,” she protested, even as she followed him out of the house and down the short flight of stairs.

  “We can hide in the trees,” he assured her, crossing the paved patio to the narrow pathway.

  Mel hesitated, glancing back at the house. Then, with a tiny shrug, she moved to join him as he strolled into the trees. They moved through the dappled shadows, angling down the side of the mountain.

  For several minutes there was silence broken only by the shuffle of pine needles beneath their feet and the chatter of squirrels scrambling from one tree to another.

  Then Mel sucked in a deep breath and released it on a soft sigh. “I love the smell of cedar.”

  Gray tilted back his head to admire the towering trees around them, savoring the warmth of the dappled sunlight that managed to sneak through the branches.

  “I used to think nothing was better than the salty tang of an ocean spray on my face. But after spending a few weekends in the mountains, I discovered an appreciation for the scent of the trees and the song of the birds.” He returned his attention to the woman walking at his side. “My dad would have hated it here.”

  Mel shot him a curious glance. “Your parents didn’t seem to have much in common. How did they get together?”

  It was a question that more than a few people had asked. Not just because his father had been a fisherman and his mother a high-powered lawyer. It was the fact that his father loved being out in the fresh air rather than fancy parties and was obviously uncomfortable when he was being hauled to the opera or the latest art exhibit.

  “My mother was in law school and after her finals she went bar hopping with some fellow students,” he told Mel. “She was leaving a cheap joint near the wharf when some guy tried to drag her into his car.”

  Understanding sparked in the beauty of her green eyes. “Ah. Your father rescued her.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Very romantic.”

  He smiled with wry amusement. “It was certainly better than asking a woman to have coffee when she’s clearly distracted by her job.”

  Mel hurriedly returned the conversation to his parents. “Was your father already a fisherman?”

  Gray nodded. “He’d just bought his own boat and was working twenty hours a day to stay afloat. Literally. I think my mom admired his grit and ambition.”

  “So do I,” Mel said without hesitation. “I have great admiration for anyone capable of creating their own business.”

  Her words warmed his heart. All his life, people had fawned over his mother. Understandable, because she’d created the sort of power and wealth that most people envied. Still, it annoyed him that they ignored his father’s accomplishments.

  “I think they genuinely loved each other,” he said, recalling the way his father would hold his mother’s hand when they left the house together, or how his mother would brighten when his father walked into the room. “It wasn’t until my mother had reached the top of the corporate ladder that she started nagging at him to sell his boat and get an office job.” A sadness tugged at his heart. Those arguments had been the only blight on his childhood until the death of his father. “I didn’t understand at the time why they were always arguing. Looking back, I assume that my mother decided having a husband who was a common fisherman tarnished her image.”

  Mel considered his words, her brow furrowed as if she was sorting through them to find some hidden meaning.

  “Maybe,” she said at last.

  “Maybe?”

  She came to a halt as they reached a pretty glade filled with wildflowers. Turning to face him, she tilted her head to the side.

  “There’s another possibility.”

  He was confused. “Is there?”

  She took a second. As if gathering her thoughts. “When I was young and my mother relapsed, she would tell me that she didn’t have the money to take care of a kid, or even that she was too busy with her new boyfriend, and that’s why I had to go back to foster care,” she said, her voice so soft that Gray had to strain to hear the words. “She didn’t want to admit that she was using again.”

  Gray struggled to disguise his fierce reaction. He’d learned that Mel refused to condemn her mother despite the fact she’d utterly failed her daughter.


  “How would having a new boyfriend be a better excuse to put you in foster care?” he demanded, his voice edged with disgust despite his best efforts.

  Her expression was wistful. “Because she didn’t want me to know that she was too weak to stay sober. It made her feel like a failure,” she told him. “She wanted her daughter to see her as a smart, capable woman, not a junkie who would do anything for her next hit.”

  Gray took a step forward. He had been awed by this woman from the moment they’d met. He’d never encountered another person with such a kind heart combined with such unflappable competence no matter what turmoil was spinning around her. She not only cared about her students, but she would move heaven and earth to make their lives better.

  “How did you ever turn out to be so amazing?” he breathed.

  She blushed, as always uncomfortable when he pointed out just how wonderful she was.

  “I have my issues,” she insisted. “And it’s taken time to accept that my mother did the best she could.”

  He bit back his opinion of her mother. Instead, he returned his thoughts to his own parents.

  “I’m not sure what this has to do with my mother’s insistence that my father sell his boat,” he said.

  “Fishing is a very dangerous occupation,” she pointed out. “Maybe your mother was worried your father would get hurt.” She studied him, a hint of regret in her voice. “Or worse.”

  Gray stiffened. “If that was the reason, then why wouldn’t she just . . .” His words trailed away. He’d been so young when he’d overheard those squabbles that he hadn’t considered inner motives. He’d listened to their words and accepted them at face value. Now he tried to look back with the wisdom of an adult. “Oh,” he muttered, feeling as if the earth was moving beneath his feet. “She didn’t want to admit that she was scared.”

  Mel shrugged. “It’s just a thought.”

  “A very good one,” he admitted. “My mother prides herself on being invincible, which to her means being in complete control of her emotions. It would be hard for her to admit that she was afraid.”

  “It would also explain why she was so opposed to your becoming a cop,” Mel suggested, her tone gentle. As if she understood that the bitterness he’d nurtured for years was being ripped out and replaced with regret. “That’s a job that would give most mothers nightmares.”