“Yes, sir,” Collins said. He gave Javi an embarrassed look and muttered another “Sorry, sir” as he hurried off down the corridor.
Frome pushed the chair out of the way and rapped his knuckles on the doorframe, although he didn’t wait to push the door open.
“Witte, the special agent here wanted a—” He stopped when he took in the room. “What the hell are you doing, Deputy?”
CHAPTER FOUR
CLOISTER SATon the edge of the bed in a pair of well-worn, unbuttoned jeans and a rucked-up hospital gown. He’d managed to get one boot on, but the left was giving him trouble, mostly because of the heavy pristine-white cast on his left hand. He didn’t look up as he grunted to answer Frome.
The hard knot of tension that had been in Javi’s stomach since Tancredi closed the door to his office finally relaxed. He’d imagined a lot worse than a clean hospital room that was probably nicer than Cloister’s trailer—at least it had a TV—and a single cast.
Blood on the floor and the sheets and the machines that someone had finally turned off. Handfuls of bloody gauze and stained lengths of tubing shoved into the corners. The smell of it—blood and meat. Bits.
Javi swallowed the old bile in his throat and impatiently swept the thoughts away. It obviously wasn’t that bad, he decided with a prickly mixture of relief and anger. The idiot had probably tripped over his dog and fallen into the road in front of someone’s car.
“I’m going to get dressed, get Bourneville, and go home,” Cloister said as he finally wrenched the boot up over his heel. “I’m fine.”
Frome scoffed. “The doctors say differently, Witte,” he said. “Since they’ve got a medical license, and you have a GED, I’m going to take their side. Get back in the bed.”
Cloister straightened up. “I’m fine.”
Once Javi caught sight of Cloister’s face, it was obvious that was a lie. A stitched gash ran from the corner of his eyebrow up into his hair, outlined in puffy blue-and-red bruising, and a raw graze skimmed over his cheekbone. He was going to have a black eye soon too. The puffiness had already settled under his eye. It just needed to color in.
The roughly broken nose predated tonight. It had been a feature as long as Javi had known Cloister, but it still contributed to the overall “just lost a fight” look.
For some reason, that just put Javi’s back up more.
“You don’t look it. You look like shit,” Javi said dryly. He crossed his arms and raised his eyebrows. “What happened? You forget that this isn’t Sheep’s Head, Iowa, and didn’t look both ways before you crossed the road?”
Frome winced at the question and shot Javi a hard look. “That’s enou—”
“Sheep’s Horn, Montana,” Cloister interrupted with an amused correction. “And trust me, I’d rather get hit by a city truck. At least it’s not covered in cow crap. Nothing better to do tonight, Special Agent Merlo?”
“They can wait,” Javi said. “I wanted to check that this wasn’t anything to do with the cartels.”
Cloister braced his long legs against the floor and gave Frome a hard look. He had the sort of harsh and raw-boned face that lent itself to grim even without the bruises.
“I’ve already told the lieutenant my theory,” he said. There was a hint of challenge in his voice.
Frome shook his head. “You’re not on the case, Witte,” he said. “Youarethe case. We’ll investigate. If there’s any evidence, we’ll find it. Now stay here and talk to Agent Merlo while I go and find your doctor.”
He gave Javi a slight nod as he turned and ducked back out the door. The go-ahead to ask Cloister some questions, Javi assumed. Frome gave himself too much credit if he thought Javi needed his permission.
“So what was your theory?” Javi asked.
Cloister shrugged and clumsily dragged off the thin paper robe. Under it his torso was mottled with bruises from his shoulder down to where they disappeared under the loose waistband of his jeans. They cut through the old tangle of scars and ink on his ribs, lost under the old damage.
“You’re not on the case either,” Cloister pointed out as he got up off the bed. The way his muscles moved under bare skin, faded from his usual whiskey-dark tan down to amber gold, made Javi distractingly aware of how long it had been since he’d touched that skin and tasted the sweat and salt of him.
Cloister grabbed the department-issue T-shirt—or it was once, before years of salt air and laundromat wash cycles bleached it down too far to pass muster—off the base of the bed and shook it one-handed. He dragged it clumsily over his head, and his voice was muffled under the faded cotton as he fought with the sleeves. “It’s not a federal matter, and Frome isn’t going to ask for your help on this one.”
“And I thought you weren’t good with authority.”
Cloister snorted. He finally got his cast through the sleeve and dragged the T-shirt down over his head. His dark-blond hair stuck up in unruly clumps, as though he’d just gotten out of bed, and he combed his fingers through it absently as he looked around the room.
“Yeah, well, it’s like you said,” he drawled. Javi waited. He already knew that whatever Cloister said was going to piss him off. It was never nice to get your own words thrown back in your face, especially when it reminded you what an asshole you’d been. Cloister hitched his jeans up with one hand and grabbed his wallet and keys out of the bedside table. “My life’s not your business.”
Javi was right. That wasn’t what he wanted to hear. The fact that Cloister was right only made it worse. Those were the terms of engagement, but Cloister was supposed to be the one kept at arm’s length.
