Better When He's Brave

by Jay Crownover

Bax muttered something in his sleep and instinctively reached for her. She gingerly lay down next to him and put her hand on his chest that was concave and thinner than it had ever been. “We take care of each other. That’s what love in this place looks like. You have each other’s back.”

  She sighed softly as Bax turned his head and rubbed his nose in her wild hair. Neither one had ever looked so removed from the grime and grit of their everyday. They just looked like a couple united and in love. It twisted something deep and hard in my gut. Bax had gone through hell to get to this place. It was a victory hard won.

  “I’m gonna take off since you’re here with him. Call me if you need any help getting him home. He might be more of a handful once he isn’t tied to a hospital bed.”

  She giggled a little bit and waved me off in the dark. “I like it when he’s a handful. It’s my favorite when he makes me work for it.”

  “You guys are perfect for each other.”

  “No, we are so not, but we aren’t right for anyone else, so I guess that means we’re stuck with one another until the end of time.”

  Bax made a noise in his sleep and moved his broken wrist toward her. She whispered soothing sounds to him and continued to rub the pad of her finger over that black star. Like I said, that was what love in the Point looked like and I couldn’t be happier for either of them.

  I closed the door quietly behind me and pulled my phone out so I could text Reeve that I was headed back to the loft after all. She didn’t text me back, so I assumed she was already asleep since it was the middle of the night. I was pulling out of the hospital parking lot when my phone starting ringing. I thought it was Reeve calling me back to let me know she was awake and ready to play some after-dark games once I got home. My blood froze when the unnaturally calm voice of one of my fellow detectives came across the line.

  “Detective King, we just got called out to those high-rise condos on the docks. Shots fired and one reported fatality. One of the witnesses on the scene demanded that we call you. Said you’ve been staying there.”

  I had to concentrate on breathing after my lungs seized and my heart dropped into my shoes. “The fatality, is it a male or a female?”

  I heard the typical background noise that went along with a crime scene and practically put the gas pedal through the floorboard of the GTO as I raced across town.

  “Male suffering multiple gunshot wounds to the head and chest. Looks like a break-in and attempted sexual assault. The victim said she shot him in self-defense. She told the female officer on the scene that she’s your girlfriend and asked us to call you right away.” The other cop coughed. “Pretty girl. Looks like she took a nasty beating before she pulled the trigger. She won’t go with the paramedics until you get here.”

  A nasty beating? What exactly did that mean? My mind was racing with every worst-case scenario I could think of. I couldn’t believe Reeve had shot someone. Where had she even gotten a gun from and how had someone gotten past all the high-tech and extreme security measures Race had in place at the condo? None of it made any sense to me, but all that mattered right at the moment was that Reeve was okay and that whoever had tried to hurt her was the one not breathing anymore.

  When I pulled up in front of the condo, it looked like a scene out of a bad TV cop show. Flashing sirens, worn-down docks, bored bystanders waiting to see the bodies rolled out to the coroner’s van, patrol cops and tired-eyed detectives keeping the scene secure, and sure enough, a lovely victim dressed in practically nothing sitting in the back of an ambulance while a paramedic fussed around her. Reeve was wrapped up in a rough-looking blanket. Her dark hair was snarled and sticking up all over her head like someone had been using it to scrub floors or something. She was talking to another cop and the spinning red and blue lights cast harsh shadows on her pale face. She looked calm. She looked composed. She looked like a miracle and it wasn’t until she caught sight of me and turned to look in my direction that I saw the damage the other detective had described.

  She had white Steri-Strips over one of her dark eyebrows. She already had a black eye starting to form around one of those dark blue orbs. Her chin was split open and sporting spidery black stiches, and as she got up and started to move toward me I could see the scratches and bruises that decorated her soft skin. An angry and bright red slash decorated her throat, and it made me clench my fists. All she had on was a tank top that was being held up by one strap as the other one dangled torn and useless off her shoulder. She also had on those too-short shorts she liked to sleep in and I could see that her knees were torn open and raw like she had been dragged across the floor.

  I let out a soft little “oomph” as she hit my chest and tucked her head under my chin. She started crying as soon as my arms closed around her. She cried and cried. Her body shook so hard I thought she was going to fall apart. I stroked my hand over her messy hair and muttered soothing words to her as the other detective meandered over to where we were standing. He looked at me and then at Reeve and lifted his eyebrow.

  “I still have a few more questions to ask.”

  I narrowed my eyes at him as Reeve shook even harder against me. I wasn’t used to being on the opposite end of this conversation and I couldn’t say I cared for it at all.

  “Give us a minute.”

  “All right, but I’d like to get back to bed before the sun comes up, so a minute is all you get.”

  I wanted to punch the guy in the face but Reeve needed my attention more, so I bent my head and put my lips to her ear.

  “Roark?” I had to know if the mouse had finally turned the table on the cat. She shook her head in the negative and her wet cheek touched my lips, so I pressed light kisses on it.

  “Who?”

  “Zero. I’d just gotten out of the shower. I was getting ready for bed and he was just there all of a sudden. I recognized him from when he showed up at the safe house looking for Conner. He had a knife.”

  She pulled back and looked at me with wide, fear-filled eyes. “He was going to kill me.”

  I shushed her softly and pressed my mouth to hers. “But he didn’t. Where did the gun come from?”

  She looked away and started shaking again in earnest. It made me scowl and squeeze her a little harder on her arms where I was holding her. “Reeve . . . the gun?”

  “That’s my question too, Ms. Black. That’s an unregistered firearm with no traceable serial number. Where did it come from?”

  She looked at me then quickly looked away. She pulled away from me and wrapped her arms around herself. She wouldn’t pull her gaze up from the ground as she whispered, “He brought it in with him.” It was a lie. I knew it right away and it made my skin feel suddenly too tight.

  I opened my mouth to call her out on it but then looked at the other detective. He was watching her and watching me and I knew that saying anything would lead to more questions that couldn’t be answered.

  “Finish up with her while I go wake Race up and ask him how in the hell someone bypassed his security. I’ll be right back.” I knew I sounded angry and far less sympathetic than I should be but I couldn’t help it. She was lying and still making choices that put both of us in a tight spot legally. She was still walking in the gray and I hated it. It made me want to shake her when she looked like all she needed was a hug.

  Turned out I didn’t need to wake Race up. Brysen answered the door with wide eyes and told me that he was with his tech guy in the security center of the building trying to figure out how Zero had gotten inside the fortress. She gave me directions to the basement and I went to find Race and his so-called security expert. The door was open when I got there and I was immediately confronted with an entire wall of live camera feeds. There was the front of the building, the garage, the hallways on each floor, the elevators, the roof, all of them showing the activity currently happening.

  “What in the hell happened tonight?” I barked the question and neither Race nor the other guy jumped. The other guy looked at me over his sho
ulder behind the frames of his black Buddy Holly–style glasses and frowned. He should look like a computer geek the way he was pounding on the keyboard and tinkering with knobs and dials that made up the surveillance system but he didn’t. The guy was as tall as me and almost as ripped. He had tattoos over every visible inch of skin and a hard glint in his eyes that let me know he wasn’t scared of my size or my fury that was filling the room.

  “What happened is someone turned everything off and then opened the front door for that fucker. He waltzed right in.”

  “What?”

  Race turned to look at me. He appeared as angry as I was and I realized his girls were just a few floors down from Reeve, so a stranger in the compound was as much of a violation to him as it was to me.

  “Stark has this system set up so that no one can mess with it. It’s constantly recording and feeding into servers so we have a visual on everything at all times. Someone literally pulled the plug on it tonight, and once that was done they let the guy in. There is no footage of him going up the elevator to the loft, nothing. He kicked the door in and attacked Reeve, but since Booker is normally the only other person on that floor, no one heard her screaming. Someone called the cops when they heard gunshots and then all of a sudden the feed comes back to life like it got plugged back in.”

  “All this fancy equipment and a single plug undid it all?” I knew I sounded incredulous but I couldn’t help it.

  “It’s a computer. Computers need power to work.” The tattooed guy, Stark, snapped the reply and went back to messing around with the laptop. “There is a fail-safe that keeps everything recording to an external server after the power gets pulled, but that takes a little while to fire up. Plenty of time for someone to use the blackout to their advantage.”

  “So who knows it’s here in the first place? Who would know where the plug was to pull? Not Roark, and not his minion.”

  Race shoved his hands through his shaggy hair and shared a hard look with the computer guy.

  “We’re playing earlier footage to find that out. Only a handful of people know where this place is located in the building and even fewer have the code to get in the door.”

  Something flashed in his eyes like he already had the answer and was just waiting for confirmation. I lowered my voice and asked him, “How did Reeve get her hands on a gun?”

  His green eyes went dark. “You’re a detective, Titus. Detect.”

  I blew an angry breath out through my nose like a bull as a familiar face suddenly decorated the monitor at the entrance to the building. “Booker.”

  “Exactly.” I realized Race was answering my question about the firearm and not seeing what I was seeing on the screen.

  “No, Booker is at the front doors and fuck him if he’s the one that got her the gun. He’s out on bond; I’ll throw his ass back in jail.”

  Race turned around and I saw his entire body go stiff. Booker walked through the front doors of the complex, looking right at the security cameras the entire time. He got on the elevator and I saw Race visibly flinch when he hit the button to the basement level.

  “Shit.”

  “I thought he was your boy.” This from Stark as Booker hit the lower level of the building and the cameras followed him right to the door of the room we were in right now. He paused and looked at the camera one more time before punching in the code. The door opened and then everything went black.

  Race swore and Stark rocked back in the chair, blowing a whistle out between his teeth.

  “You got a rat, boss.”

  Race clenched his hands and looked back and forth between me and the computer guy. “He likes Reeve. Why would he set her up like that?”

  “It was weird. The way he kept his eyes on the cameras. He knew you were going to see him doing it.”

  Race shook his head. “I don’t get it.”

  I grunted. “I don’t have to get it. I see him and he’s getting locked up. She was almost raped and killed tonight.”

  Race lifted one of his gold eyebrows at me and asked, “Then I guess it’s a good thing someone gave her a weapon to protect herself with, isn’t it? This story could have a much sadder ending, couldn’t it, Titus?”

  We glared at each other, neither willing to give an inch. The tension was broken by Stark clearing his throat.

  “Guys, same team, remember? Maybe you should turn all that posturing and anger toward the dude that let the bad guys in the door.”

  I was the first to look away. I shifted my eyes to the monitor, where it felt like Booker was looking right at me through the glass.

  “If I find him first he’s going back behind bars.”

  Race’s mouth pulled tight. “If I find him there won’t be anything left of him to put behind bars. This is the one safe place in this entire city and he took it away from me, away from my family. There is no explanation on earth that will make up for that.”

  I used to tell him not to say stuff like that to me because I was and always would be a cop. That made his actions premeditated. Now I just told him, “Don’t get caught,” and turned around and went back to Reeve.

  She was sitting in the passenger seat of the GTO. Someone had gotten her a sweatshirt, but even before I got behind the wheel of the car, I could see that she was still shaking like a leaf. I asked the detective in charge of the scene if she was clear to go. He just grunted at me and told me she was one lucky lady.

  When I got in the car I noticed she was still crying big, fat silent tears.

  “Are you okay?” I was still mad at her for lying to the cop, for being dishonest with me, but it was obvious she need a kinder touch than I wanted to give.

  “Fine. Where are we going? We can’t get back into the loft until they clear the scene.”

  “My place.” It wasn’t as secure as the condo, but look at how well that had worked out.

  “Okay.” She sounded so defeated, so broken, I couldn’t resist the urge to reach out and put my hand on her knee. It made my teeth clench when she jolted and jerked away at the contact. She cut a look at me and more tears fell. “Sorry.”

  I swore softly. “Don’t apologize. It was a rough night. We can talk about it later. All of it.”

  “What if I don’t want to talk about all of it?” Some of the iron that fortified who she was threaded back in her tone, and pride at her fight licked up my spine. My girl had the tools to take care of herself, the fight to keep herself safe, and that made the way I risked her every day feel less like a dick move.

  “You don’t have a choice. That’s what more is, Reeve. You and me and all of it. But that can wait until tomorrow.”

  She looked away from me and leaned her forehead on the passenger window. “Tomorrow is another day, but I’ll still be the same girl, Titus. You aren’t going to like what I have to tell you.”

  “The story has a man hurting you and me nowhere around to stop it. It has you alone and scared while fighting for your life. Damn straight I’m not going to like what you have to tell me, Reeve. The rest of it I’m going to listen to and we’re going to work through because you have to trust me enough not to lie to me anymore.”

  “I have always trusted you. It’s you trusting me that I’m adjusting to.”

  “Then we’ll adjust together.”

  I hoped they weren’t just empty words I was handing to her because she needed reassurance. I wanted to believe that we could indeed figure out something other than the strict black and white that ruled my life and the hazy gray that filled hers. This time when I put my hand on her knee she didn’t flinch or move away; instead she covered it with her own and squeezed.

  Chapter 17

  Reeve

  TITUS’S HOUSE WAS A little bit like him. It was a tidy little Craftsman on the outside, with a perfectly mowed yard, but on the inside things were kind of messy and all over the place. It was easy to see from his decor that he was a bachelor and that he lived alone. There wasn’t a lady’s touch anywhere and the little furniture he did have w
as heavy and dark, covered in discarded items of clothing and dotted with empty beer bottles and empty takeout containers. Titus was sloppy in his own space, and I would have never believed it if I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes.

  I was tired and I hurt all over, so instead of jumping into the showdown I knew was waiting for me, I asked him if I could use the bathroom to clean up a little bit. He told me to wait a second and I heard him banging around as he was rushing to clean up a little bit before I saw even deeper into who the man behind the badge really was. It took him twenty minutes or so, but when he was done he came and got me, led me to a bathtub filled with steaming water, and waited while I crawled inside. He watched me as I sank my sore body into the heat and told me he would get me something else to wear since the stuff I had on was either trashed or borrowed. I nodded and watched as he walked stiffly out the door.

  He was mad and trying to hide the fact while he struggled to be gentle for me. He was mad at me for lying and mad at himself for not being there when I needed him, and wasn’t sure which of those things had him more fired up. I also wasn’t sure that he was going to be able to look me in the eye after I told him why I had the gun and what my initial plan had been to do with it. He said we would work through it but I was going to let him down again, and I wasn’t sure his innate sense of morality was going to be able to handle me admitting I was fully intending to be part of another person’s death. It was a lot for anyone, especially a man with such a strict code of right and wrong, to have to muddle his way through.

  I wasn’t supposed to get the stitches in my chin wet, so I submerged myself up to the top of my shoulders and did my best to scrub the raw wounds on my arms and legs. My hair floated out like a dark cloud around me and I had to concentrate really hard on my breathing so that I didn’t start shaking and crying all over again.

  Not much scared me. I had seen a lot, lost a lot, suffered a lot, but being blindsided by Zero in a place that had felt so safe was enough to make me feel like I would never be secure again. He was just there, in my face and everywhere, without a sound and I knew he was there to kill me on Conner’s orders, but the look in his eye told me he would make it hurt and make me suffer for his own pleasure.