"They didn't find me here," he shrugs. "Obviously, I can't say where they did. But it looks like they dropped me here for dead after attacking me somewhere else."
"It's looking more and more likely that they caught you off guard either coming or going from Mingle," Skyler comments. "I can go through the cameras from the week you vanished, but I don't have the exact date when it would have happened. I didn't know you'd been picked up and put in the hospital until it had already been over a month since I saw you."
In my peripherals, I see Cormac slowly nod, taking another sip of the warm, fragrant drink, "What are the chances Steele is somehow involved in all of this?"
Skyler opens my laptop, scrolling through something, all the silly stickers on the back of my computer staring at me as he does. "Considering he's been up my ass about the guy he wants info on for weeks, I'm gonna say low. But I wouldn’t rule anything out.”
"Who is Steele?" I ask quietly.
Cormac groans, "He's just an annoying little gnat that won't go away."
That's not helpful. That could mean anything.
"He's a dirty cop," Skyler fills in the blanks. "But a real one. He uses Mr. Killer here and I to give him an advantage in case’s he's working so he can get there before anyone else and take credit for the busts."
"He's a douche bag, is what he is," Cormac mumbles.
"Wait," I hold up a palm. "Not Ben Steele."
Both of them freeze, looking at me as if I've grown a second head.
Cormac turns my chair to make me face him, "How doyouknow him?"
I try to sift through the memories. "I didn't know him well, but he was involved in a couple cases I sat in on my final year of school."
"What kind of cases?" Skyler pries.
"Ummm," I think back to the handful of times I saw him on the stand. "I'm not sure. Corruption charges for one of his superiors, I think. And a murder trial.”
"Was he on trial?" Skyler asks, clicking away on my laptop.
Shaking my head, I tell him what little I know, "He was just a witness in both.”
They share a silent look, one that says there's more they aren't telling me and aren't going to be.
Fine by me.
The less I'm involved, the better.
I keep telling myself that at some point, there will come a time when I can extract myself from Cormac and the life he leads.
If I can just continue to fool myself into believing it, I can keep putting one foot in front of the other.
"Is there anything else you can tell us that you know about him?" Cormac asks gently.
I shrug, "Not really. I only saw him testify a few times, but I always thought he seemed like a smug asshole."
"Agreed," Skyler says, checking his watch. "Speak of the devil. He's freaking out and thinks we sabotaged his thing last weekend."
Cormac chuckles, "Well, did we?"
With a shake of his head, Skyler closes my computer. "No. I wanted them gone as much as anybody. Especially now that Wolfy's boyfriend is so involved."
"You still think we can protect Julian from it?" Cormac looks down at his hand, nervously drumming his fingers on his leg. "If they're behind bars?
Skyler sighs, "I hope so. They're getting dangerously close to the type of shit you used to put people down for."
"What do you mean?" I ask.What kind of people did he... do that to?
