Cam shook his head then dug his fingers into his hair. He could feel the beginnings of a headache plaguing him.
“Start over. I’m confused. Someone broke in. Cops show up and think it’s the guy who attacked Reggie the other night, and she went home to get her gun?”
Hutch nodded. “In a nutshell.”
Sawyer gave Hutch a look of understanding. “She held out on us, didn’t she?”
“Yeah. She did.”
“You going to fill us in then?” Cam asked.
“Jeremy said they think it’s personal, that Reggie was the intended target, not the woman the attacker killed. Apparently he called her Reggie, which is something no one but us calls her. While he had his hands wrapped around her neck intending to strangle her, he told her that it was ‘time to make him pay.’”
“Son of a bitch,” Sawyer growled.
“Do they know anything else?” Cam asked.
“All Jeremy said was that they think it’s possible it could have something to do with her father. Politicians attract nutjobs with agendas. Maybe he doesn’t agree with Peter Fallon’s politics. Who the fuck knows. But they think he was the one who broke in today. No fingerprints. Just shoe prints outside that match the ones at the murder scene from the other night.”
“And we left her here with only Birdie for protection,” Cam said in disgust.
“Where is Birdie now?” Sawyer demanded.
Hutch turned to look at Sawyer. “She’s at home. Reggie’s department and the county guys are alternating patrols by her house. She lives just a block from the chief, so he’ll be looking in on her too. I wanted her to come out here, but she insisted on going home.”
“I’ll call her in a little while to check in on her,” Sawyer said. “And I’ll run by there tomorrow morning to make sure her security system is working properly.”
Cam nodded. “That’s a good idea. We need to think about beefing things up around here. Obviously we can’t leave Reggie alone again. Not if this asshole is stalking her.”
He glanced down at Reggie again then frowned when he noticed the brace around her wrist was gone. Hutch followed the line of his gaze.
“She irritated it wielding that bat,” Hutch explained. “It swelled, and the brace was bothering her. I took it off and iced it down for a while and made her take a pain pill.”
Frustration beat at Cam. He wanted Reggie where she belonged. With them. But not like this. He wanted her to choose to be with them, not forced to remain because they insisted on protecting her.
He rubbed the back of his neck and stared up at the ceiling.
“What’s got you worried, Cam?” Sawyer asked. “You seem to be stressing a lot lately, when you were the most confident going in.”
Cam looked at Sawyer and then at Hutch and found the same worry reflected in Hutch’s eyes. Yeah, he supposed to them he had appeared confident. He was always the one telling them it would work out. He was a goddamn fraud. The truth was, he was scared shitless.
“I’m worried that we won’t be able to make her happy. And now I’m worried that we can’t keep her safe. I’m worried that I’ll lose her,” he said truthfully.
“I think we all have those same concerns,” Hutch said. “But at some point we have to stop worrying about the what-ifs and focus on only the things we can control.”
“And what would those things be?” Sawyer asked dryly.
Hutch turned to Sawyer with a dark stare. “We can’t control how Reggie feels about us. We can’t control her fears. All we can control is how we react to the situation. And we can damn well make sure we present a united front. This will never work if Reggie senses we’re divided in any way.”
“He’s right,” Cam said quietly. “We can’t convince her this will work if we can’t even convince ourselves.”
Sawyer’s hand skimmed over his bald head in agitation. Damn good thing he kept it shaved or he’d probably yank his hair out anyway.
“We’ve been over this.” Frustration leaked from Sawyer’s voice. “Why do we have tokeepgoing over it? I understand that we have to work together, but I won’t spend every goddamn minute of my time with her in a group setting.”
Reggie stirred beneath Hutch’s hand. Cam shot Sawyer a warning stare and held a finger up to his lips. Then his gaze dropped back to Reggie as her eyes fluttered open.
“Cam?” she whispered.
