“Alejandro—wait?—”
“No.”
I couldn’t stay. I couldn’t let him say anything back. I couldn’t survive it. He reached for me. I moved. And then I was out of the door, out of his apartment, stumbling into the cold hallway with my heart in pieces.
Real feelings.Real danger.
THIRTEEN
Levi
I was halfwaythrough a stale precinct coffee when Tess Calloway found me. The bullpen was crowded with layers of noise, and the flickering shitty lights did nothing for the headache pressing behind my eyes. I needed to keep writing the reports that were required, and of course, that was when my brain dragged me right back to him—Doc’s mouth on my throat, whispering that he already knew every weakness I had. Not now. I shoved the memory down hard, the unwelcome heat of it cutting sharply through the cold precinct air. It was a flash of last night I didn’t want—Doc’s voice low in my ear.
“You wreck me, detective.”
It twisted something in my gut, complicating everything, burning under my ribs where fear and want mixed too easily.
Frank was somewhere chasing down warrant language, so it was just me down at the lower end of the office when Tess stepped up to my desk with a face like thunder.
“What did he do now?”
She glanced over her shoulder. “Stanton? Nothing, he’s a perpetual asshole.” She huffed. “I can’t wait until he retires. Ibet you’re happy he’ll be going with all his snide shit about your dad.”
I shrugged. “I get where he’s coming from. He trusted my dad. And when the shit hit the fan, a lot of that kicked back on him. Without what happened, he’d probably be the one in the cozy office giving orders now.”
She paused a moment, seemed hesitant. “You know they’re talking about putting us together after him and Frank retire?”
“I know.”
“Stanton said it was career suicide being attached to the name Rosen.”
“You think it is?”
“Nope. You’re a good detective, Rosen, and with my brains and your beauty, we’ll make a kick ass team.”
I grinned up at her. “Agreed.”
She visibly relaxed, tension dropping from her shoulders, and I changed the subject before we got all mushy and shit. “How did the cyber tip work out?” The Cave had left a trail for the cyber team here to find the tip on a location for the older Dr. Dryden-Wells, the one who’d signed a patient out AMA, with said patient vanishing. He’d retired five years ago, but then he, too, had dropped off the radar until Caleb found him.
“We visited him in a care home out in Glendale. Registered under the name Michael McCluskey. Early onset dementia.” Tess scratched the back of her neck, uncomfortable. “He didn’t give us much, and boy did that piss Stanton off.” She threw me a wry smile—yeah, we shared the same opinion of Stanton and his bigoted views on race, sexuality, gender, and everything in between, and dealing with the elderly was probably on that list too. I’d lucked out being partnered with Frank, although my partner did explain way back that it wasneverintended for me to be partnered with Stanton. The asshole didn’t want the queerson of a fucking bad cop who’d fucked everyone over, anywhere near him.
His words, apparently.
She sighed heavily. “Poor patient was rambling about birds pecking out livers or something.”
“You mean like Prometheus?”
“I have no idea, but hell, I’m surprised you know that story.”
I gestured at myself. “Notjusta pretty face,” I deadpanned.
“Anyway, he wasn’t coherent. Honestly? I hate that we even bothered him. But an anonymous tip is an anonymous tip.”
I felt a twinge of guilt that it was the Cave who’d pushed the cops that way, but something about both of the Dryden-Wells surgeons got my back up.
“I just—look, I don’t think this lead’s going anywhere.” She hesitated, then added, “Wish we could’ve left the old guy alone. He looked… lost. As if he were halfway in a different reality.”
I nodded, jaw tight. I hated that part of the job sometimes. The parts where, as cops, we stirred up pain only to watch it fall flat.
