“Why you gotta go and make this sound like some black-market shit?”
“Please, you eat that shit up,” Lance returned. He paused as he opened the file information for the video itself. “Do me a sub favor and verify it plays before I delete this?”
“Can’t keep the original, huh?” A subtle clicking assured Dietz was in motion. Not that the man’s fingers often held still.
“Nope.”
Dietz hummed. “Well, that’s not what I was expecting. But yeah, looks like I got the whole thing. Your guy’s a piece of shit.”
“Not my guy, Deets,” Lance shot back as he watched the final loading bar wipe away the evidence from the tablet. “Mygirl.” He pretended not to notice Amy’s eyes go big as saucers. To her credit, she stayed silent.
Dietz, predictably, blew out a whistle. “Shit. Well now it makes sense. I’ll be in touch, brother.” He disconnected and a heartbeat later the tablet screen refreshed, no sign of the video file in sight.
For good measure, Lance triggered a restart on the device, then held it out to the still wide-eyed nurse. He offered her the nicest smile he could manage. “It’s booting back up, but I wiped the video completely.” He indicated his phone. “Dietz has a copy, and he’ll keep it locked down until it’s needed. He’s never not come through for me before.”
Amy nodded the way people did when they weren’t fully listening. She looked down at the device now back in her hands, hovered a finger over the screen, and finally asked, “What about the email trail?”
Lance pushed out a scoff. “Everything’s gone,” he said. “The video never existed. Not as far as the hospital’s concerned. If Bishop goes through the tablets trying to find it, he’ll conclude Lynn was bluffing. It’ll piss him off, but I don’t fucking care.” He paused. “Pardon my language.”
She pulled in a breath and seemed to come back to herself, finding a smile that reached her eyes again. “Oh, you’re fine. We hear worse every day.” She tucked the tablet into the crook of her arm. “Thank you so much, Mr. Blackburn. I’m sorry I just sort of dumped this on you….”
He shook his head. “No apology necessary. I’d handle it more directly if I weren’t still a one-legged man. Anytime you hear about something that’s a danger to Lynnette, I’d like to know.” Not that he planned to stay in the hospital forever. The surgeon he now severely wanted to punch in the face, and the kidneys, and a few other choice places, had dropped the word ‘release’ while Lance was getting back into bed. Release would be fabulous, except for the possibility of it leaving Lynn in danger.
But as Amy darted from his room, Lance decided the notion of release was the last thing he needed to be worrying about. The first thing he needed to know was whether or not Lynn was okay—whether or not it was even fucking safe for her to be coming into work. Then he’d see about breaking every bone in GavinBishop’s pathetic body and taking a trip to Oregon’s famous coastline so he could toss the broken mass over a cliff. Maybe he’d bring Jon with him for that part, just to make sure the body was properly washed out to sea.
The words Bishop had said to Lynn in that short video replayed in Lance’s mind and sparks snapped off his fingers with the rise of his agitation. He needed to cool it before he caused too many problems.
Lance closed his eyes and reflected on the vision of Lynn in his hospital room while they shared lunch. Not his ideal first date, but as it had been her idea, he was over the fucking moon for it. And that had been before she’d come back, with the food, yeah, but also in her damn tempting civilian clothes and visibly settled from her earlier upset. She’d pulled the chair up closer to him, within reach, and talked. Told him real shit. Listened to his real shit. That vision of her, more relaxed than he’d ever seen her and a different warmth in her smile, lingered in his mind.
Fuck, she was beautiful.
And he would fucking slaughter any bastard who hurt her.
Chapter eight
Fight, No Flight
Lynnette had driven outto meet up with Jenna at the Leeland County Sheriff’s Department as requested, layers of frustration probably weighing her foot more heavily than necessary on the gas pedal. Being alone to think inevitably let her mind wander back to Bishop and that bullshit stunt he’d pulled. She hadn’t had a moment to check her email, let alone the opportunity to move the video to a safe location. Which she probably wouldn’t get to do until she was home and had access to her laptop, anyway.
Then her mind wandered to Lance and their admittedly questionably professional lunch … thing. It felt like it had been a thing.
It should definitelynothave been a thing.
Her heart still beat faster, just reflecting on the way he looked at her. He wasn’t the only one to ever shorten her name—Jenna tended to, in fact. But the way he said it made it sound like a sweet, tender endearment.
She snorted at herself.What would I even know about those?She’d always had terrible taste in men. It was one of the reasons she’d just sworn them off altogether. What did a woman need with a man when there were so many toys on the market?
Thatwas a dangerous series of thoughts, because then her mind started blending memories of lonely nights with a vibrator and visions of the way Lance Blackburn’s eyes burned into her. The way he grinned at her. The warmth and strength of his fingers curling around hers when she’d impulsively taken his hand before she’d left his room.
She’d hoped catching up with Jenna and focusing on Jenna’s crisis would be a good distraction. The joke was on her.
In a karmic twist of fate that had Lynnette feeling more than a little stupid, Jenna revealed that her high school sweetheart everyone had long believed died in a heroic tragedy while on deployment with theMarineswas in fact not dead. That was a rumor that would be leading to some intense family drama Lynnette was glad to stay out of. But Jenna’s Jon was, obviously, also Lance’s local buddy and Lynnette could have kicked herself.
Which had her thinking about Lance again.
Until the Sheriff’s Department pissed her off.
Jenna had gone in seeking to file a missing person’s report for a young employee of hers, and inquire about her bakery, which the department still had on lockdown. They’d been summarily thrown out with the threat of a harassment charge and arrest if they should ever “bother” the department again. For anything.
