“I don’t have time?—”
“It’s three hours out of your Saturday night. You’re the only other reporter with any lifestyle experience not currently scheduled to go on air Saturday. Please? You gotta eat anyway, and this is a five-hundred-dollar-a-plate dinner. Go and make sure Christy asks the right questions.”
Nelson slips back out the door before I can refuse, calling over his shoulder, “I sent the details to your inbox. You’re the best, Emi! I owe you one!”
Yes, he does. And if I have to cash in that chit to get the Fowler story on the air, I’ll do it.
Chapter Two
Jasper
I dump the empty beer bottle into the recycle bin and reach into the fridge for another. My fingers slip off the neck when someone bangs on my door. Tim’s early. He wasn’t supposed to be here for another hour.
The mold inspector gave his apartment the all clear earlier today, and the kid said he’d come by after his shift at the Stop-N-Go to sign the last of the paperwork.
“Next time you’re gonna be early, call—shit.” I grip the knob hard enough, my knuckles crack and stare my brother in the face. “What the hell are you doing here?”
“Good to see you too, Jas,” AJ mutters as he pushes past me. My right leg threatens to buckle, but I stifle my wince and keep hold of the door until I know I’m not going down. My twin’s gaze sweeps around the apartment, landing on the single recliner poised in front of the television. “You need some new furniture.”
“Why? Because I have so many visitors?” I can’t keep the bitter edge from my voice. In the eight months since he walked out of my hospital room, I’ve only seen AJ twice. Once at the funeral for the two Rangers who died in the explosion, and once at my retirement “party.”
“How the hell would I know how many visitors you have?” He ambles over to the living room window and stares out at the street below.
I shrug. “Pick up the phone once in a while. Maybe you’d find out.”
“Why?” That single word holds so much emotion, the air in the room swells with the weight of it.
“Jesus, AJ. Because I’m your brother? Because it ain’t good for you to be alone all the time? Because we used to be close until Grace went missin’—”
“Don’t, Jas,” he grits out. “Don’t fucking say her name…” His shoulders slump, and he runs a hand through his black hair. It’s several shades darker than mine, and one of the few differences between us. That and all of five minutes of life.
I grab his arm, forcing him to turn around to face me. “You won’t tell me a damn thing about the investigation, you never reach out—to anyone—and from what little I hear from McGrath and Elmore, you’re the grumpiest sombitch in the entire Ranger Division. Maybe you should try to say her goddamn name once in a while.”
AJ’s dark blue eyes turn frigid with rage. His fingers dig into my biceps as he shoves me up against the fridge. Beer bottles rattle inside. At least one falls over. “Shut. The. Fuck. Up.”
He’s shaking now, but he ain’t the only bull in this pasture. I can give as good as I get. “Eight months.”
“What?” He shakes his head, blinks at me, and his brow furrows.
“It’s been eight months since the explosion. Seven months and three days since I turned in my badge. That’s the last time I saw you. My own brother. My fucking twin. I lost my job, half the vision in my right eye, and my partner. And you don’t care. About any of it.”
He doesn’t move—or even breathe—for several seconds. “Fuck you, Jas. I care.”
With a snort, I sidestep him and limp awkwardly over to the recliner to lower myself down. “Coulda’ fooled me.” I rub my thigh, but it does little to ease the ache in my leg—or my chest. While I’ll be in pain for the rest of my life, AJ lost his wife two years ago, and he’ll never come back from that.
After a silence so long, the Ropers get three downs, AJ’s shoulders heave. “I should have been there that night,” he says quietly. “Hell, it should have been me who died. Not Schaffer and Urbanski.”
“Fucking hell, no.” I spin the La-Z-Boy around and sit up straighter. “We’d been tracking those cartel assholes for two months.”
“Yeah, and then Commander Ramsey suspended me for insubordination.” He leans against the breakfast bar, all the bravado gone from his voice.
“You were tryin’ to find your wife. That suspension was bullshit.” I rub the back of my neck, squeezing hard to try to relieve some of the tension before I lurch to my feet. “Sit the fuck down. You want a beer?”
“I can’t stay,” he mutters. “This was a mistake.”
“A mistake? For fuck’s sake. Why’d you really come knockin’, AJ? Because it sure as shit wasn’t to check up on me.” I should quit being so hard on him. I can’t imagine what he goes through every damn day. But he ain’t the only one hurting.
“The Boots and Bling charity dinner is tomorrow night,” he says, his voice flat.
