CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
When Marti arrived at the station, walked past the busy squad room and began heading for Grant’s office, she noticed that the door to RJ’s office, which was midway to Grant’s office, was slightly open. But when she saw that a woman was standing in front of his desk and Grant was standing behind his desk, she slowed her walk. And when she realized that the woman and Grant appeared to be in a heated conversation, she stopped walking altogether and waited. Did she continue to his office, or just wait there? She was supposed to report to him after all. But she quickly wondered what was she waiting for? This man had made love to her last night. He left her a note this morning where he called himself her boyfriend. Was this woman his girlfriend ?
Wait my ass , Marti thought as she detoured to RJ’s office. She felt she had every right to know what was going on. And she wasn’t going to speculate about it or leap to conclusions or let him explain it to her and put his own spin on it. She was going to find out for herself.
As she got closer, her heart began to pound and she didn’t feel as confident anymore. She could tell the woman was drop-dead gorgeous. Tall and statuesque and all the rest: she had it going on. And she was talking like a woman seriously scorned, but in an upper-class, controlled angry voice. But her voice was too light for Marti to make out what she was actually saying. But her heart began hammering when she heard Grant yell, “ And you bring this shit to my police department? Are you out of your mind? You knew what the arrangement was, and you knew it from the beginning !” He was talking as if they still had an arrangement. As if that woman was still in his stable of women. Did she get notes after he made love to her too???
Marti already felt that she had made a big mistake allowing her heart to even begin to get wrapped up in this man. He’d already told her he was a confirmed player just like all those other men she’d been with. What was she thinking???
She knocked lightly on the slightly opened door and then pushed it further open.
Grant was standing behind RJ’s desk and Celeste, the woman that stood in front of his desk, was blocking his view. When he leaned to his side to see who had knocked on RJ’s door and saw that it was Marti, his heart squeezed with an anxiety he’d never had before. He didn’t want her involved in his messiness! Not this early in their relationship. But he also knew Celeste was hellbent on airing their dirty laundry in public for all to see, and she was always the type that got what she wanted. He was pissed with her and wasn’t thinking about her ass in the way she wanted him to think about her, but he didn’t want Marti involved in this at all.
“Am I interrupting something?” Marti asked with that look of sincere curiosity on her face she couldn’t conceal.
But when she heard that it was a woman’s voice that had entered RJ’s office, Celeste quickly turned around, her blonde hair bouncing as she turned. She looked Marti up and down as if she knew Marti had what it took to be her number one rival even though she’d never even met her. And just seeing Marti seemed to anger her even more.
She quickly turned back to Grant. “Is she the reason? Is this bitch the reason?”
Marti wanted him to shout yes! Tell her I’m the reason , but Grant didn’t seem to want to give either one of them that satisfaction.
“Is she the reason, you bastard!” Celeste yelled again at him and then she picked up a file from RJ’s desk and threw it at him.
“Okay that’s it!” Grant angrily hurried from behind his captain’s desk, grabbed Celeste by her skinny arm, and all but flung her out of that office. Fighting against his pull all the way, Celeste reached out her long leg and attempted to kick Marti, as if Marti was the problem, but Marti backed away from her reach.
“He’s gonna do you the same way, sweetie,” Celeste spat out at her. “Don’t you think you’re immune from this shit because we all thought that. He’ll treat you just like he’s treating me now! See how he’s treating me? You bastard!” she cried out at Grant. “Leave me alone! You bastard!”
But Grant showed no compassion. She tried to hold onto the doorjamb, but he snatched her hands away and pushed her on out of RJ’s office and then slammed the door shut.
It was only then, when the door slammed shut, did Marti realized that RJ was actually seated in his own office, along with Pete Kerrigan and Sergeant Carter too. She had been so focused on that woman and Grant and their relationship that she didn’t even see them sitting there. And all three of them seemed bemused by what they’d just witnessed, as they glanced at each other, as if that woman’s pain and the whole display was nothing new to them. And Grant was their hero because of his antics with women. Those were the kind of cops they were. Her heart was at stake here, and she was terrified that she just might get it broken by their so-called hero, by this man she was falling so deeply in love with, but they were behaving as if it was all a humorous game.
Grant and Marti exchanged a look that revealed what they both were seeing in the other one. Grant saw pain and anguish and concern on Marti’s face. Marti saw embarrassment on Grant’s face. And she could tell he wanted no parts in explaining it or justifying his actions or any of it. He just wanted to move the hell on. “Have a seat,” he said to her and offered her a seat on the sofa.
Marti needed answers. She wanted answers. But not around RJ and gang. It was none of their damn business. As Grant went back and sat down behind the desk, Marti sat on the sofa.
Grant looked at the file that Celeste had scattered around RJ’s office, and it displeased him that she had behaved as if she was entitled to him. “Want me to get it up?” he asked RJ.
RJ had a smirk on his handsome face. “Yeah, Chief, I want you to get it up,” he said, and Pete and Carter laughed. “Please clean up your woman’s mess.”
When he said your woman , Marti glanced at Grant. But he didn’t glance at her. And his men kept the joke going. “You’re asking our chief to do manual labor?” asked Pete. “ Our chief? Don’t bet on it!”
RJ laughed. “I won’t.” And they laughed again.
But Marti could see that Grant was super-serious. He wasn’t able to be playful like them. He was very playful around her, but never in public she noticed. Especially after such a very private display had been heaped upon a very private man.
He got down to business. “What were we talking about?” he asked them.
“You mean before we were so rudely interrupted?” asked Pete as he and RJ glanced at Marti as if she was the interruption.
“We were talking about the video from the shooting at Karney’s,” said Carter. “We were talking about that woman in that green pantsuit.”
“Did you see what I meant?” asked Grant.
They all nodded. “That shooter was definitely eyeing her,” said RJ. “I was amazed I didn’t see it the first time.”
“Thank our consultant for her eagle eye,” said Grant. “She’s the one that pointed it out to me. I missed it too.”
Marti could tell none of Grant’s men wanted to give her credit for anything, and that was fine by her. She wasn’t thinking about them anyway. She was thinking about that woman and how Grant was going to handle her and the rest of his stable going forward. Or if he was going to handle them at all. What if he planned to keep them exactly as they were in his life? Something Marti was never going to allow herself to be a part of.
“What we need to do is get more intel on that lady in green,” said RJ, “and what connection did she have to those two shooters at Karney’s.”
“Get a couple of guys on it,” said Grant to RJ. “But not just her connection to the Karney shooters, but if she had a connection to the Wafer House shooter as well.”
“I’ll handle it,” RJ said and as he was saying it the desk phone buzzed and Grant answered it.
“He’s just taking over your desk, Cap,” Carter said to RJ with a grin.
“Tell me about it,” RJ said.
“What is it?” Grant said into the intercom.
“They said you were in Cap’s office, sir,” the clerk on the intercom said. “I had to tell him where you were.”
Grant frowned. “Tell who?”
“Mayor Rickter is in the building and he’s heading your way, sir.”
“Shit!” said Grant and ended the conversation. He did not want to be bothered with Dooney’s antics today.
“Why would he come all the way down here again?” asked Pete.
“Probably about yesterday,” said RJ. “The public’s very angry with the police department for not doing everything in our power to keep that shooter alive. They’re convinced the two shootings are related and he could have reassured them that there’s no network of mass shooters out there looking to do it again. He was mega-pissed that we turned his public relations triumph into a nightmare yesterday. He’s still pissed.”
“He keeps talking about how Governor Devere’s holds grudges against him,” said Carter. “Looks like he holds grudges against everybody else.”
Marti sat upright. She knew the mayor didn’t like her and she didn’t like him. But she was going to keep her composure as the door to the office flew open and Mayor Dooney Rickter walked in. “Why aren’t you in your office?” he said to Grant without looking at anybody else.
Grant remained cool behind the desk. “I didn’t know that was a requirement.”
“Fuck you, McGraw! Always got something smart to say. And fuck the BOBs for saddling me with you!”
“What do you want, Dooney?” Grant asked with irritation in his voice. “Or is yelling at me the goal?”
“That gal you wanted to kick my ass because you said I was disrespecting her,” Dooney said, “ just disrespected all of us.”
Grant wanted to look at Marti, because he could see her from his side vision staring at the mayor as she had to be wondering what on earth he was yapping about, but he kept it together. “What are you talking about?” he asked the mayor.
“That chick sent a report to Tallahassee that excoriated every one of us.”
“ Whaat ?” said a shocked RJ.
“If I didn’t have connections in the AG’s office I wouldn’t have even found out what was going on. And it’s bad. She didn’t hold back. They’re already talking about shutting us down after just that one report! And that was before that debacle yesterday. That black bitch trying to bring us down!”
“Knock it off,” Grant warned the mayor as RJ quickly cleared his throat. And it wasn’t because he was black, too, but because he wanted to alert the mayor that the bitch he was referencing was in the office with them. When the mayor looked his way, he slyly pointed across the room.
When a still-angry Dooney looked across the room and saw Marti sitting there, he frowned. “What are you doing in here? Get out of here! Don’t you see me having a meeting with my men? You’d better get your--”
Grant stood up. “That’s enough, Dooney!” he warned again. But he understood his anger. He looked at Marti. “Wait in my office,” he ordered her.
Marti wanted to rise up at that mayor and tell him about his butt, but she knew she’d be out of line. And besides, she could see that Grant was just as angry with her as the mayor. But he knew how to camouflage it better. “Yes, sir,” she said and left the office.
But she felt sick to her stomach as she went into Grant’s office and took a seat on the sofa. She leaned her head back and fought back tears. It had been that kind of morning. First one of his ladies was giving him grief, probably for not returning her phone calls or whatever, and now that racist mayor was letting him know that her very first report wasn’t flattering in the least about his department. And she had to own that shit because it was the truth.
But it was a day that was going nothing like she had expected it to go. It started out so promising. He wrote the word love in his note. He referred to himself as her boyfriend. It meant a lot to her. But to go from that to this shitshow? It seemed as if their affair was doomed to crash before it got off the ground. And she had been so hopeful!