“Did you?” Jack asked.
Vic pulled his gloves off with his teeth, one at a time, and let them drop to the canvas. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, and when he looked up there was nothing left of the grinning showman who’d challenged the sheriff to a sparring match five minutes ago. In his place was a tired old fighter who’d taken one too many shots and knew the round was over.
“I didn’t kill that boy,” he said. “I loved that kid like he was my own.” His voice cracked on the last word, and for a fraction of a second I believed him. Then the shutters came down—that hard, flat look settling over his features like armor being bolted into place. “And if you’ve got any more questions, you can direct them to my attorney.”
He ducked through the ropes without another word and walked toward the gray door that led to the back hallway. Didn’t look at the fighters who parted to let him pass. Didn’t stop to explain or deflect or spin. Just walked, shoulders hunched, one hand still pressed against his ribs, and disappeared through the door.
The lock clicked behind him.
Jack lowered his gloves and turned to me, and despite everything—despite the dead fighter and the underground bouts and the wall of silence we’d just hit—there was a light in his eyes. It was something his body remembered even when his badge said he wasn’t supposed to.
“Gloves,” he said, holding up his hands.
T-Bone climbed into the ring and helped Jack take off the gloves, and then Jack was jumping down on ground level again. I exhaled a breath I didn’t know I’d been holding.
“You enjoyed that,” I said quietly, watching as he put his shirt back on.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Your pupils are dilated and you’re trying not to smile.”
“That’s adrenaline.”
“Uh-huh.” He buckled the duty belt at his waist. And clipped on his badge. “He’s going to lawyer up,” I said. “We rattled him, but he’s not going to flip. Not yet. Whoever’s above him scares him more than we do.”
“For now.” Jack sat on the ring apron and pulled his socks and boots back on, lacing them with the efficiency of a man who’d dressed for battle a thousand times. “But we’ve got the notebook and we’ve got names. Vic can hide behind his attorney all he wants. The walls are closing in.”
We ducked through the ropes and dropped to the gym floor. The fighters who’d been watching had drifted back to their stations—or pretended to. Heavy bags swung. Speed bags chattered. Ropes slapped concrete. But the conversations between the men had shifted—quieter now, more urgent, heads leaned close together and voices dropped low.
Something had changed in Iron House today.
And everybody in that gym knew it.
CHAPTER NINE
The sun was low and orange through the trees when we crossed the bridge onto Heresy Road, the Tahoe’s tires humming against asphalt still warm from the day. Jack had one hand on the wheel and the other on my thigh, and I was trying to organize the chaos in my head into something resembling a coherent case.
“I’m calling the team in tonight,” Jack said, reading my thoughts like he always did. “We need to get everything on the board before Vic’s attorney starts making our lives difficult.”
“Your office or the station?”
“Home. I don’t want this anywhere near the station yet.” His thumb traced an absent pattern on my thigh. “There’s too much money in this operation. Until I know how far the tentacles reach, the fewer people who know what we have, the better.”
He didn’t need to spell it out. Underground fighting with high-stakes betting meant organized crime. Organized crime meant corruption. And corruption had a way of showing up in the last place you expected—including police departments and city offices.
“Who?”
“Cole, Daniels, Derby. And Doug’s going to need Margot for this.”
I made a sound in my throat that conveyed exactly how I felt about that.
“Be nice.”
“I’m always nice. She’s the one who keeps trying to seduce my husband.”
Jack’s mouth twitched, and he said, “If it makes you feel better I’m hardly tempted at all.”
“Always a comedian,” I said.
