“Yeah, well, today you’re on story duty, too.”
“An hour northwest of the station house, you said?” Ian asked, seeming to remember they were there.
“Not so fast.” Matt held up a hand. “Listen to me, okay? You can’t go running off with this feather and start calling in the barred eagle experts, okay? We need to take this slowly.”
“Huh? What’s wro— Oh.” Ian stared at them, his eyes clearing as he refocused, then darkening with understanding. “The feather is still evidence.”
Gigi added, “Not only that, but we were hoping it would help lead us to the place where she was attacked.” Instead it looked like they were going to have to find the place some other way, and in the process maybe lead Ian to the eagles.
“Can you give us any specifics on where we should be looking?” Matt asked. “High altitudes, you said. How high? And what kinds of ore? I don’t know of any copper mines or deposits up near Fourteen, but we could check for surveys.”
“Good point,” Gigi said. Maybe the evidence wasn’t quite played out yet, after all. “What do they eat?”
“I think… Let me see.” Ian spun his chair and rolled it to a stuffed-full bookcase along the wall. “Where is… Aha. There you are.” Gigi’s stomach took a long, slow roll as he pulled out a thin volume. “Ferrier’s Guide to the Flora and Fauna of the Colorado Mountains,” he announced. “It was the definitive guide back in the day. Comprehensive, though the organization is seriously wonky. It may take me a minute to find our eagle.”
“Look near the back,” she said softly. “About three-quarters of the way through.”
He shot her a curious look, but complied, then flipped a few more pages and stopped, eyebrows raised. “Well, hello. I guess you didn’t need me after all, did you?”
“I didn’t know the bird. I knew the book.” She met Matt’s eyes. “Let’s add a waterfall to our list of things to look for.” Because the sketch of Jerry Osage sitting in front of a waterfall had been stuck between the pages near the entry for the barred eagle.
Matt leaned in. “What else is listed near there?”
“This is the end of the birds.” Ian flipped a few pages. “Then we get into the ‘flora’ part. Which, for some reason, starts with trees. Specifically those weird pines that grow up near the Forgotten.”
Gigi frowned. That was the second time in as many days she’d heard the name. Alyssa had said something about it yesterday. “I assumed that was a ghost story or something. You mean it’s a real place?”
“It’s both,” Matt said. “It’s this grim chunk of wasteland that runs along the edge of the park’s northwest corner—except for a couple of rivers, it’s too dry to support anything but some real scrubby trees and a few coyotes, too far away to be a real tourist draw, and not challenging enough to interest the more extreme hikers. Question is: Would it be barred eagle country?”
Ian shook his head. “Unless they’ve done some major adapting over the past fifty or so years, the elevation is too high. And there wouldn’t be much in the way of food. The place is pretty deserted.”
“Is it part of the park?” Gigi asked, trying to figure out where the Forgotten belonged in the puzzle, if at all.
“It’s federal land,” Matt answered, “but the feds’ll never do anything with it, which makes it a perfect buffer for Sector Fourteen.”
“Actually, the city bought it from the feds,” Ian corrected. “Last I heard, the mayor had nearly managed to pawn it off on a private buyer to help offset budget problems, but there was some holdup over the paperwork. Something about impact statements, I think.”
“How long has this been going on?” Matt snapped.
“Six months maybe.” Ian sent him a look. “I assumed you knew. As it is, I think it’s pretty much a done deal at this point. Just needs the last few rubber stamps.”
“Son of a—” Matt broke off, gritting his teeth. “Proudfoot must’ve made sure word didn’t reach me. Probably a deal of some sort with the Park Service so they wouldn’t fuss. But Sector Fourteen needs those rivers. Hell, that whole damn side of the park does. If some private buyer starts mucking around up there and screws with the water, the west side will go as dry as the east and it’ll all burn.”
Gigi said, “If there are already problems with the impact statements, maybe there’s still time to make some noise.”
Ian shook his head and said, “Proudfoot has it all tied up.” He glanced at Matt. “Too bad nobody legitimate stepped up and ran against him, even after the mess he made as acting mayor.” His voice was mild, but there was something very far from mild in his expression, and in the way tension suddenly snapped into the air between the two men.
Matt glared at him. “Leave it alone.”
“But you could have—”
“Leave. It. Alone.”
Gigi did a double take as the conversation veered from the Forgotten to something else entirely. “Wait. What did I just miss?”
“Nothing.” Matt tugged on her arm to bring her with him, and said in a suddenly formal, cop-to-civilian expert voice, “Thanks for the help with the feather. We’ll let you know if we see the eagle, and if not, when it’s safe for your people to come in and search.”
Ian rose and came around the desk to put himself between them and the door, eyes firing. “I’m just saying it would’ve been nice if there had been someone else to vote for. Someone who has a political science degree and used to say he was going to put in his twenty on the force and run for governor, because if an actor could do it, why not a cop?”
Matt’s fingers closed tighter on her arm, almost to the point of pain. His face, though, had gone hard and distant. “You should’ve taken the hint when I ducked all your calls. I’m not that guy anymore. I haven’t been in a long time.”
“You don’t need to be anybody but who you are right now, today,” Ian insisted. “The last mayor resigned in the middle of a sex scandal, and Proudfoot is well on his way to running the city into the ground. If someone like you could bring integrity back to the office, it would go a long way to healing—”
“Fine,” Matt snapped. “If that’s your plan then go and find someone like me. Because I’m not interested, and I’m not available.” He dropped Gigi’s arm and headed for the door, leaving her standing there, brain spinning.
This wasn’t the ranger’s detachment or the cop’s intensity she was seeing—this was anger overlain with a deep, restless frustration that was as powerful as it was unfocused.
Ian followed them to the door. “Okay, you’re not interested or available. So what are you? Because you sure as hell don’t look happy.”
Matt stopped and spun back, expression dark. “I’m in the middle of the case from hell. It’s not murder yet, but it’s only a matter of time before they get brave enough, desperate enough. I’ve got a ranger in the hospital, another one sleeping on my couch, and I’m wearing a damn badge. So forgive me if I’m not in a very happy place at the moment.”
“I’m not talking about right this second and you damn well know it,” Ian pressed. “Are you doing what you really want, or is it just easier this way? Tell me you’re happy, Blackie, and I’ll leave you alone.”
Gigi wanted to slip out and let them argue in private, but she couldn’t move. Her pulse thudded in her ears. “I was happy, damn it. Forty-eight hours ago, I was just fine. I had air, sunshine, privacy and three good rangers in charge of keeping the hikers from killing themselves. And I’ll get back to that peace and quiet when this case is over and life goes back to normal. A week, thirteen days on the outside, and, yeah, I’ll be happy again.” His voice went harsh. “I just want to be left alone. Is that so damn much to ask?”
“Not if that’s what you really want.”
“I just said it was, didn’t I? Ian, let it go already. And don’t call us, we’ll call you.” Cutting a black look in Gigi’s direction, Matt snapped, “Come on. We’re leaving.” He yanked open the door and stormed out, boots thudding angry beats on
the waxed marble, the sound cutting off as the glass door eased shut in his wake.
She didn’t follow, just stood staring after him for a moment, stomach roiling in such tight knots that she didn’t know whether she wanted to scream, cry or shoot something. Or all of the above.
A gentle touch on her elbow startled her so badly that she jolted and spun, fists raised.
Ian jerked back, hands up, evidence bag dangling from one. “Whoa. It’s just me. And despite what you probably think right now, I come in peace. It’s just that peace doesn’t always start out that way with him. Never did.”
She uncoiled, swallowing past the aching tightness in her throat. “Sorry.”
“No. I’m the one who’s sorry.” He shot a telling look at the door. “I thought from seeing the way he was when he came in, and the way he was with you, that he was…well. I thought he was in a different place, that’s all.”
“It’s not like that.” But the heavy weight pressing on her heart said that deep down inside, part of her had hoped.
Not if all he wanted was to be left alone, though. Not if he wanted to be the ranger, the loner, the closed off man who didn’t need anything except space and didn’t offer anything in return.
He had said he would have his peace and quiet back in thirteen days, and he hadn’t picked the number at random. In thirteen days, the academy assignments were being announced and personnel shifted around. Which meant Tucker had used the information to talk Matt into teaming up with her…and he was looking forward to her departure.
Well, screw him. She could take care of that part right now.
She pulled out her phone, bypassed the first McDermott number and speed-dialed the second. “McDermott, Homicide.”
“It’s Gigi. I want to trade in my cop. He’s broken.”
MATT MADE IT HALFWAY down the hall before he spun and slammed his shoulder into the wall. Pain flared at the point of impact and lower down in his gut, but he deserved all of it and more.
Sagging, he leaned back against the wall, which felt far steadier than he did just now.
One second he and Ian had been doing okay, and then the next…damn it. They’d been back at it like they’d seen each other four days ago, not four years.
And Gigi had been right in the line of fire.
He had caught a glimpse of her face as he stormed out, and the dark-eyed mixture of sharp hurt and dull resignation was singed into his brain. He deserved that, too, because he had insisted that he was the best one to watch her back when really he was about the worst possible choice to protect her.
Which he had just proven in spades.
His emotional control was gone, incinerated the moment their lips touched. Or maybe it had happened before then, somewhere between the first sizzle of seeing her in the hallway outside Tucker’s office and the second his brain had kicked back into gear and warned him that she was trouble. That she was the first person he’d met in a very long time who had the potential to mess with his head.
Only she wasn’t trying to mess with anything—she was just trying to do her job. He was the mess—what had just happened back there had nothing to do with her and everything to do with old scars, even older dreams, and a friend who knew how to push his buttons.
Damn Ian for going there. Damn Proudfoot for whoring out part of Bear Claw Canyon because he couldn’t handle his finances.
And damn him for not being the man he should have been.
Behind him, a door opened and Ian’s voice became audible, saying, “…any time, day or night, seriously.”
“I may just take you up on that.” She sounded as if she really meant it, too, which put a nasty twist in Matt’s gut, even though he knew he didn’t have the right to feel anything even remotely approaching jealousy right now.
In college, Matt had been the charming jock, Ian the poet, and they’d both had their share of conquests. Later, though, their lives had diverged. Ian had gone to grad school, flourished, and emerged both poet and charmer, while Matt had worked long hours in uniform, trying to make everything okay when it couldn’t possibly be. And now Ian was still charming, while Matt was…hell, he didn’t know what he was, but it wasn’t good.
Ian and Gigi exchanged a few more pleasantries that had him grinding his teeth, then she headed in his direction, her silver-toed boots clicking like a ticked-off metronome.
She wore a studded black blazer, beige pants that clung to every dip and curve, and a purple shirt that did more than hint at her cleavage. But where yesterday he would have looked at her and seen a city slicker, now he just saw her.
He pushed away from the wall as she neared him, stuck his hands in his pockets when they wanted to reach for her. “I know it’s not nearly good enough, but I’m sorry. Ian and I…well, he’s always been able to get into me like that, just keeps going until I snap.”
“He’s worried about you.”
So am I. It had never been like this for him before, all rage and mood swings, with him feeling like he was barely hanging on. “Give it five minutes and he’ll be back to worrying about tracking down those supposed barred eagles. Which is what we should be doing.” Not wasting time arguing politics and impossibilities.
She stared at him for a long moment, her hair falling in angles across her face like war paint, making her look in that moment both wholly feminine and terrifyingly capable. “Okay,” she said softly. “Let’s hit the road.”
He had the feeling he had just failed a test he hadn’t even known he was taking.
As they rolled away from the U.C. Bear Claw campus, she called the lab, gave a brief report on the eagles, and had Alyssa send a bunch of altitude maps and ore surveys to her phone. When he tapped the brakes at the main road, she broke off her conversation to say, “Head for Station Fourteen. Jack’s waiting for me up at your place.”
Matt winced at the continued invasion of his private space, but he headed north out of the city without comment. She called someone else, got a different map sent and studied the information on her phone’s tiny display, frowning.
He glanced over. “I know you’re mad at me—and with good reason—but that’s my territory. Talk to me. I can help narrow down the search.”
“I’m not mad at you. I’m thinking.”
And the thing was, she didn’t really look mad. She looked sad and resigned, and the two together tugged at something inside him. “What did Jack find?”
She glanced at him, brows furrowed. “Nothing that I’m aware of. Why?”
“I thought you were going to go over some new— Oh.” The detective wasn’t waiting to show her evidence. He was picking her up and taking her away.
“You said you wanted your peace and quiet back.” She was focused on her maps, or at least staring at them. “You saved my life. Giving you yours back seemed like the least I could do.”
“I didn’t…” He trailed off as a heavy weight settled on his chest at the realization that she was right that they should split up. Williams had his head on straight. He would do a better job of protecting her, because there wouldn’t be any emotion in the mix beyond friendship and respect.
“This is what you want, right?”
For a second the air between them went tight with anticipation; he had a feeling she was waiting for him to argue. When he didn’t, she gave a soft sigh and looked out the window.
He told himself to leave it alone, that it was better this way. Instead, after a moment he said, “Have you ever slept wrong on your gun hand, and woke up with it totally numb and useless?”
“I shoot okay lefty.” But the corner of her mouth softened a little, and she nodded, still staring out the window as they headed up into the foothills. “Yeah. I know the feeling. And I know how much it hurts when everything starts waking up again, how you just want to stand there and scream, or maybe hit something, because of the pain. But at the same time, you know you have to get through it or you won’t be able to shoot properly.”
How was it that she could see so clear
ly something he was just starting to get to himself?
“I thought I put myself back together the best I could. Now, though, I think maybe I’ve been sleepwalking for the past six years, and this case, meeting you…I’m starting to wake up.”
She looked at him then, expression unreadable. “And that back there was what, emotional pins and needles?”
“Whatever it was, it wasn’t me. Or not the guy I want to be. Especially not around you.”
A flush touched her cheeks, but she looked down and fiddled with her phone. “I’m just passing through. Another thirteen days and I’m out of here, either to the academy or to fill in for someone who’s gotten the call.”
“Caught that, did you? Yeah, Tucker got word this morning. I wasn’t supposed to say anything until he knew one way or the other. Sorry.”
“Don’t be. It’s a reality. Just like it’s a reality that I don’t have time for a new complication right now, even a short-term one.”
He turned on to the winding route that led alongside brittle, dry Sector Nine to the western half of the backcountry. They were alone on the familiar road, so he put the pedal down.
He didn’t know whether she had meant to make him think about short-term, no-harm-no-foul sex between them, but he was suddenly filled with her flavor as if he had just kissed her, was warmed by her skin as if he had just touched her. Although his body was on board for short-term anything, logic said she would be far better off riding with Williams. He might be waking back up, but he was far from leveled off.
“Okay,” he said quietly. “Yeah. Okay.” He glanced up in the rearview mirror to see if he could catch her expression, some glimpse of what she was feeling.
Instead, he saw a truck that hadn’t been behind them a minute ago.
It was big and black, with tinted windows. And it was catching up fast.
Chapter Nine
Matt’s pulse accelerated and his knuckles went white on the steering wheel. “Hang on,” he ordered grimly, “we’ve got company.”
Bear Claw Conspiracy Page 9