Ryan didn’t say anything. He just watched me trying desperately not to crumple in front of everyone.
I cleared my throat, and leaned against the nearest desk for support. “Well,” I said, my voice hoarse with emotion. “It looks like I have nothing to do for a few days. Why don’t I take him while you work.”
Lydia blew out her breath loudly. What the hell was up her ass?
“Why would you do that for me?” Ryan quietly asked, standing up slowly. “Don’t you hate me?”
“No,” I said, my eyes blurring with tears. “I don’t hate you at all.”
His eyebrow quirked up, and his features softened. “So, you like me?”
I shook my head and pinched my lips together trying not to scream or laugh or show any of the crazy emotions that were spinning through my head at the moment.
I was saved from utter humiliation when Cameron jumped out of his chair and shoved a picture against my face. He leaned on me, unaware of any personal space, and mumbled words I couldn’t make out. He shook the paper in his hand until I took it from him.
The picture left me breathless.
It was a pencil sketch of me and Ryan, looking at each other—there was passion in our eyes, fire and feelings. In just a handful of shapes and lines, Cameron had captured every emotion I had.
My fingers trembled when I handed the picture to Ryan, who tightened his lips and spoke through gritted teeth. “Looks liked he nailed us.”
He looked at me over the top of the paper, brows knitted closely together, probably wondering what the hell was going on in my head.
“Let me see what Mr. Picasso drew,” Lydia squealed, cutting between us.
“Here, look at the one of you,” Ryan said, pulling the picture of us away from her before she could catch a glimpse. He threw the sketch of her into her hands and folded the one of us together and stuffed it in his back pocket.
He lifted his head back toward me and asked, “You’d really hang out with him today?”
“Of course, I would,” I whispered.
His shoulders slumped in relief, and he nodded, breathing in deeply. “That would be a life saver. I’ll bring back dinner.”
“Okay,” I said, cheeks burning.
He looked down and laughed, “Okay, then.”
Ryan stayed unusually quiet as I packed Cameron’s belongings up. Every once in a while, I would look back toward him and see him watching me from the corner of his eye. I wanted him to look at me. I liked his attention, and I acknowledged that to myself. I liked his smile when it was pointed in my direction. I liked the way his gaze roamed my body. I liked the way he flirted with me. I just plain liked him. The problem was I didn’t want to. Because I seemed to have this stupid, stupid thing where a man smiling at me felt like a future, and I fell so easily and blindly into love—when all the guy was doing was simply smiling.
Cameron was quiet on the ride home. He sat in the passenger seat, belted in, rocking back and forth. He only became vocal when I drove past a fast food restaurant, and repeated over and over the word fries. Smiling at him, I slowly said, “I want fries.”
“I want fries,” he yelled.
So, that’s what I got him.
By the time we got back to my apartment, he had eaten three servings of fries and two cheeseburgers. He still had some chicken tenders left, and he clutched them in his hands, tightly, as I walked him to my front door.
But, something was wrong.
I stopped him mid-step, before he could climb up the front porch steps. “Cameron, sit on that chair,” I whispered, pushing him up the steps and down onto the chair. Without him seeing, I drew my gun.
My front door had been kicked open.
Wood splinters were scattered all around the porch. Slowly, I pushed the door wide open, spilling light into the front foyer. Stepping through as quietly as possible, I took one last glance at Cameron, who was happily munching on the remainder of his food, and walked inside like I was trained to do in a hostile environment: Eyes, muzzle, threat.
There was a small antique table Dean and I inherited from our grandmother we kept in that front room, now it lay on its side with its drawer dangling from one corner. The coat rack was toppled over it, and our extra jackets and hoodies lay like bodiless beings all across the floor.
Up the stairs my brother’s apartment door was untouched, yet my door, the one on the lower floor was hanging off it’s hinges. A cold wind blew in with me and tingled at the base of my neck.
I was instantly on a call. Burglary, possibly still in progress. I didn’t stop to look at my ruined belongings or what was taken. I looked to clear the house and make it safe. I’d deal with the rest later. The break-in itself would have been simple, unremarkable if it weren’t for the messages left behind, and the chemical scent of fresh paint that filled the air. I doubted anything was taken at all.
This was someone sending a message. A direct message to me, now.
Once I knew the house was safe and empty, I lead Cameron into the foyer and let him sit on one of the steps leading to Dean’s part of the house. I didn’t want him to see what was in my apartment. My front door was spray-painted with the word, “Whore.” All the walls in my apartment were too. My television was smashed in, glittery shards of glass sparkled and glistened over my rug. All of my furniture was tossed over, paintings and pictures ripped off the walls. My vibrator hung from the ceiling fan. Pages of books were shredded into confetti. My refrigerator opened, all its contents spilled out onto the floor. None of that bothered me—not even being called a “whore”—not yet anyway.
What bothered me were the hundreds of pictures scattered over every surface of floor or table in my home. Pictures of me in the sexy lingerie I had worn when Harris and I spent a night away on Fire Island. The pictures of me dancing for him, posing for him, having sex with him—I looked like a porn star—like some dirty, filthy woman just screwing some anonymous dick.
The thing was, it looked purposeful; you couldn’t recognize him in any of the pictures.
Only me.
And to anyone who didn’t know I had been falling in love with him, I definitely would have looked like a goddamn whore.
I stumbled back, heart slamming hard in my chest, all those filthy pictures—everywhere. Why would someone do this to me?
Chapter 8
Ryan
On the dashboard of the car, my phone rang. “Callie, grab that for me,” I said, as I drove. We were driving back from gathering all the video surveillance on the streets right outside the dentist’s office. From what Callie and I could see, it was the same masked figure, dressed all in black that was caught leaving the buildings where the cadets were executed in. These cases were somehow tied together.
“Who is ‘Future Baby Mama’?” Callie asked, laughing. She held the phone up in one hand. “Do you have names like this for all your special friends? What am I? I better be ‘Badass Bitch’, or something.”
Shit. It was Brooke. It was about an hour or so since she left the office. She’d probably had enough of Cameron and couldn’t handle him. I knew she couldn’t be as perfect as I thought she was.
I grabbed the phone out of Callie’s hand, and winked at her. “You’re ‘Hot Pop Tart’.”
“What the hell? Why?” she sneered in my direction.
“Because you eat a hot Pop Tart every morning,” I said, laughing and holding up a finger at her. “Hold on and let me take this call.”
I hit the answer button and brought the phone to my ear. “Everything okay?” I asked, without any hellos.
“No,” Brooke’s voice cracked on the other end.
“Brooke? Babe, what happened?” I said, yanking the steering wheel to the right and turning the car in the direction of Brooke’s house.
“Someone broke into my house,” she choked out.
“Are you okay? Is Cameron okay?” I asked, stepping on the gas and hitting the car’s lights and sirens. “I’m on my way.” Is the perp still there? Was someone t
rying to scare her? Hurt her?
“Cage,” she whispered into the phone. “They wrote the word whore all over my house. It’s on everything.”
“Is the house clear?” I asked, slamming my foot all the way down on the gas pedal.
“Cage, I’m a cop. The first thing I did was make sure your brother was safe and checked the house,” she snapped.
“Okay. Okay. I’m on my way. Do you need me to stay on the phone?”
“No,” she said, and ended the phone call. I threw the phone back on the dash, angrily.
“Wanna tell me what’s going on?” Callie said, next to me.
“Brooke’s house was broken into.”
Callie’s head slowly turned toward me, and she leaned back against the car door, crossing her arms over her chest. “Brooke Fury?”
“Yes,” I growled, swerving across a lane of traffic to get through a light.
“Brooke Fury is your ‘Future Baby Mama’ and I’m a freaking ‘Hot Pop Tart’?”
“Shut up,” I laughed, “You want to be my future baby mama? I’m sure we could—”
“I can’t have kids,” Callie said, turning her head away from me and looking out the window.
“Wait what? You’re like twenty-eight or something, what do you mean you can’t have kids? You’ll meet a nice guy and it’ll happen.”
“No, it won’t, asshat. Stop talking about what you know nothing about. For starters, I’m thirty-two,” she snapped, poking her finger into my forearm. “And, I can’t have children. I had a complete hysterectomy when I was younger. I’ll never have a family. Ever.”
“Shit, Callie, I’m sorry. I didn’t—”
“Just shut up,” she said, quietly. “There’s nothing for you to be sorry about. Just drive, okay?”
I nodded, focusing on the world outside the windshield, and stomping down the anger I felt for Brooke. She was somehow involved in the middle of one hell of a clusterfuck and she wasn’t telling me things. I had to find out why. And Callie? Callie and I were definitely going to talk about what was going on with her. She was hurting, and there was no way I was going to let her do that shit alone.
I jumped the car over the curb of Brooke’s driveway and yanked the gearshift into park. Callie and I rushed out of the car to find Cameron rocking quietly on a chair in the house, and Brooke in tears on her hands and knees, grabbing what looked at first glance like black and white photographs up off the floor. She had a pile of them clutched to her chest.
Callie tapped me with the back of her hand, “You get FBM, and I’ll go through the house.”
“FBM?” I asked, confused.
“Future Baby—”
I waved my hands for her to shut up, “I got it. Right. Just go.”
Kneeling down next to Brooke, I stilled her grabbing hands, and tilted her face up to mine. Her eyes were rimmed red, and tears fought to tumble over her lashes, but she tried her best to hold them back. “Brooke, it’s okay. It’s—”
The words died lifelessly on my lips when I noticed what she was holding. Pictures—hundreds of them, maybe more—all of Brooke, all in some kind of provocative or pornographic situation. “Brooke?” My own voice sounded foreign to me. I struggled for a clear breath as a burning sensation exploded deep inside my chest. A sharp pain in my jaw stabbed down my neck until I realized how hard I was clenching my teeth looking at the pictures of her with someone that wasn’t me.
She stumbled up, a sob wrenching from her chest, and raced into the bathroom. I scrambled after her, catching her just in time to help hold back her hair as she emptied everything she’d eaten that day into the toilet.
Collapsing back against the wall of the bathroom, she grabbed the towel that hung over a small circular ring, and wiped her mouth. When she moved the towel away her face was pale and her eyes wide, staring up at the mirror that had “Whore” written across it in red.
This was a personal attack on her—so was the break-in at the dentist. I didn’t know how it tied in with the murders, but Brooke was in the middle of it. Was it a jealous boyfriend?
“Come here,” I said, pulling her into me. She was trembling, her entire body convulsing with small, violent, uncontrollable shivers. All I could do was hold her.
Outside the bathroom door, I heard other officers entering the front rooms. Dean’s voice was loudest. Callie must have called everyone else.
I ran a hand over her hair, trying to calm her. In the other hand, I held some of the pictures. The pictures were erotic. It was hard not to look at them that way. Hard to see them with an objective eye or as evidence. They were so alluring. Her smile. The curves. The way she looked on another man. Anger tore through me, and I gulped back a roar. Everyone outside, crunching over the broken glass and all her belongings, were seeing the rest of the pictures, and I could physically feel her humiliation suffocating her.
“Everyone is going to see them,” she whispered, and sniffed. “And the only thing I did wrong was love him.”
“Brooke, babe. You have to tell me who he is.”
She shook her head against my chest. “I can’t.”
Why did she feel like she couldn’t? What would make her not be able to? “Shit. Brooke,” I held her at arms length, searching her eyes. “It’s someone we all know, isn’t it?”
Tears poured out of her eyes.
“Someone in the office?”
She looked away. The noises and voices outside got louder and louder.
Sliding over the glass and debris in the hallway was Dean, Captain Anderson right behind him. She flinched in my arms the minute their faces appeared. “Brooke? Brooke? Is she hurt?” Anderson yelled. “Get your hands off her, Cage!”
She burrowed deeper into my chest.
Dean held Anderson back. “Is she okay, Cage?”
“Yeah, now that I’m here,” I growled, glaring at Anderson. It was him? That’s why she couldn’t say anything. She was too scared. What the fuck was he doing? Using his rank to scare her? She loved him? They had a relationship? That’s impossible? It couldn’t be him. He was at least twenty years her senior.
Dean pulled Anderson out of the doorway. “Get her out and get her talking,” he snarled at me.
Anderson shouted back with his own demands as I closed the door on them.
I pulled her face up. “It’s Anderson?” I whispered.
She didn’t deny it—just looked at me with those big doe eyes and cried.
Anger ripped through my chest. What the hell was she thinking? “And you were okay being his mistress? You were okay fucking a married guy?” I asked, losing every ounce of respect I ever had for her. “I would have never thought you had that in you.”
“What?” she cried, and promptly vomited again, all over me.
Chapter 9
Brooke
Thickness lodged in my throat. A tingling swept up the back of my neck and across my face. My skin was too tight, too sweaty, too cold, and too impossibly hot all at the same time.
This couldn’t be happening to me.
My back was up against a wall, huddling in the corner of the kitchen. Sobs were trapped in my throat as my thoughts shattered. My body was on display in images for everyone I worked with to see. I felt violated in a way that sunk deep into my skin, got right into the marrow of my bones, and darkened my insides. I curled up on the floor, wanting all of it to end. I just wanted everyone to go away. Or me, maybe. Maybe, I could just vanish into thin air and never see any of these people again.
They talked in hushed tones over my head like I wasn’t there. Collecting evidence. Tiptoeing around pictures of me completely naked. Unknowing. Gullible. Stupid. Dirty. Whore. How would I ever be able to show my face at work again? How would I ever trust another man? I never wanted to do this again. I tugged my sweater on. I didn’t have enough layers of clothes to cover my shame.
Ryan was in my living room. Through the doorway, I could see him pacing back and forth, hands clasped around the back of his neck, face twisted and grim. He
stole a quick glimpse of me each time he treaded past the opening of the kitchen, a dark look filled with confusion and rage.
Dean sat at the kitchen table, leaning his elbows on his knees, trying desperately to talk to me. I stared blankly ahead, watching each time Ryan stormed past the door.
“You have to give me something, Brooke,” Dean rumbled.
I stayed frozen, unable to meet his eyes.
“Is Ryan Cage the guy you’ve been seeing?” Dean asked in a low whisper.
My chest tightened sharply, and I flinched, gulping back the rest of the vomit that was trying to explode from my throat.
“I don’t know what’s going on, but this looks like a jealous boyfriend.” My brother is a good detective. I knew he was trying to figure it all out, put the pieces all together, but I just couldn’t speak. Right next to my foot was a black and white photograph of me, taken through a window. I was obviously putting on a solo performance for someone, and I looked almost possessed. I sob broke out of my chest as his eyes glanced quickly down at it.
“Shit,” he said, snapping up the picture and slapping it face down on the table. “Okay, Brooke. Come on, focus.” Dean was desperate. This wasn’t how he ever spoke to victims.
“Dean, let me handle her,” Harris’s voice said low, as he patted Dean on the back. My brother looked up and hesitated. “Get up, and let me give it a try.”
Dean rose off the chair slowly, keeping his eyes on Harris’. He was a really good detective; the picture was getting clearer and clearer to him that he could trust no one. Just like me. He gradually made his way into the living room and met a stiff, tense presence of Ryan.
Then, Harris blocked my view as he stepped in front of me to sit.
But he never got the chance, because I thrust my foot out and kicked the chair clear across the room. “Don’t come near me.”
“I didn’t do this. Any of this,” he whispered.
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