Chapter 20 Shawn #2
I check my watch. “It’s nearly eleven; will he still be up?”
“If he’s not, he won’t answer,” she replies as she taps his contact and puts it on speaker phone.
“Hey there, Beckett,” Tucker greets after two rings.
“Hey, Tucker. So, listen, I’m in a bit of a situation and could use some—”
“Where are you and what do you need?” All amusement fades from his tone, and he slips into straight business. It honestly warms me to know that Beckett has people who have her back no matter what.
And while I don’t know a whole lot about the Hunts, my impression of them grows.
As she fills him in on everything, from receiving the photograph to Lucian Creed and discovering Lauren’s existence, I get up and walk to the back windows to stare outside. The solar lights I placed around the vicinity of my back fence glow softly, and I let my gaze travel around the yard.
Dirty cops.
What if I’m right?
What if Seymore had something to do with it?
Will they come for both of us now?
My hands tighten into fists at my sides, and I take a deep breath. Lord, please help me. I’m floundering here.
“Man, Beckett. You should have called me the second you got that picture,” Tucker says when she finishes filling him in.
“I know, but I didn’t want to interrupt your lives.”
“Next time, interrupt away.”
My frustration comes back. Will she regret coming to me now that I’ve failed?
“What do you need me to do?” he asks.
I turn. “The two officers who were lead on that investigation died suddenly in accidents two months apart, shortly after that case wrapped up.”
“That’s fishy,” Tucker replies.
“My thoughts exactly.”
“Think you could look into their—”
“Doing it now. I pulled up the case files while Beckett was talking.”
I stare at the phone, part impressed, part shocked and disturbed that he was able to access confidential police files that easily.
“Got it. Looks like Detective Oliver Wilson was in a single-car accident. Report says that the roads were wet from recent rainfall, and his tires were low.”
Someone let the air out.
“As for the other guy, Detective Bradley Caraway, he was out fishing and slipped off the boat. Looks like he hit his head and drowned.”
Someone attacked him and staged it to look like an accident.
“Those are some red-flag deaths if ever I’ve seen them,” Tucker comments. “No further investigations took place. They labeled them as accidents and filed the reports.”
“They were killed to cover up the truth. Loose ends that needed tying,” I comment as I shake my head.
“My thoughts exactly. If you give me a bit, I can dig into their financial records and see if anything pops around the time Paul’s plane went down.”
“That would be great, Tucker. Thank you so much.”
“Anytime, Beckett. You know that. Detective Sampson?”
“Yeah,” I reply, my brain spiraling as I consider all of the possibilities.
“Beckett Wallace is like another sister to us. Keep her alive, please.”
“Even if it costs me my own life,” I reply without hesitation, my gaze locked on hers.
“Good. I like to hear that. Talk soon, Beckett. I should have information for you in the next couple of hours.”
“Great, thanks so much. Talk soon.”
The call ends, and Beckett sets her phone aside. I can’t settle, can’t bring myself to sit back down. Two cops killed within two months of each other—less than a year after they closed a case with so many red flags it looks like a party banner.
That screams cover-up.
And if they weren’t at the helm, who was?
“Breathe. If there’s anything to find, Tucker will find it.”
“I failed you.” I shake my head and turn to face her. As I do, she gets up from the couch and crosses over toward me. “You should have gone to the Hunts from the start. You probably wouldn’t have been attacked in the hotel room, and you’d likely already have the answers you need.”
“I didn’t want to go to them because I knew I could come to you.”
“Look what good that did you.”
“Actually, I think it’s turned out quite nicely,” she replies.
“How so? We have nothing, and you had to go to Tucker anyway.”
“We have a lot more than you’re giving us credit for,” she replies. “We know that he was working for Lucian Creed. I now know that he has a daughter, and we have our suspicions that there were police officers involved in the cover-up. That’s a lot to go off of.”
I pinch the bridge of my nose. “We still don’t know who killed him.”
“No,” she admits. “But we know who didn’t.”
“You believe Lucian?”
She crosses her arms. “He had no reason to lie, right?”
“No,” I agree. “If he’d killed Paul, he would have told you, delighted in your pain, then killed us both, and been done with it.”
She takes a deep breath, and I see some of the sorrow she’s been burying surface. “I just—I still don’t understand how Paul could have let himself get wrapped up in something like this. Working for a man like Lucian? Police cover-ups? What was going on and how could he do something like that?”
I wish I had an answer for her, but I’ve got nothing. There’s no situation where I could see myself working for someone like Lucian. I’d rather lose everything than trade a piece of myself like that. And from the look on her face, Beckett feels the same.
“I thought I knew him, you know?” A tear slips down her cheek, but she quickly wipes it away. “And it makes me wonder what else he was lying to me about.”
I reach forward and rest my hand on her shoulder. “We’re going to figure it out, okay?”
“I know we will, because—” Glass shatters.
I throw her to the ground and cover her with my body. “Stay down!” I yell as more glass breaks. Bullets. Someone is shooting at us. Staying as low as I can, I crawl over toward my TV, where I have a handgun stashed.
“What’s going—”
“Get down!” I bellow as Lauren opens her door. She immediately drops to the floor.
As soon as the firearm is in my hands, I peer over the couch and through my front windows in time to see a car speed off into the night.
“Stay out of sight!” I yell again as I jump to my feet and rip open the front door. I race outside, hoping to get a plate number or vehicle description, but they’re gone before I can. Reaching into my pocket, I withdraw my cell phone and tap my partner’s contact number.
“Hey there, Sampson.”
“Get uniforms and get to my house. Someone just tried to kill us.”
“On my way.” The call ends, and I head back into the house, beyond angry. Seymore. His name is a flashing neon sign in my mind. Does he have something to do with this? Or did he mention it to someone in his precinct who decided it was time to take us out?
“It’s all clear,” I say as I enter the house, though I keep my weapon in hand in case they decide to come back.
“What was that?” Lauren asks as she stands and brushes the front of her sweater.
“Someone clearly thinks we’re getting too close.” I round the couch. “Becke—” The blood drains from my face when I see her on the floor, a puddle of blood beneath her.
“I think I got hit,” she chokes out.
Falling to my knees beside her, I search for the bullet entry. I turn her over onto her side gently and see an entrance wound in her left shoulder. “Hang on, okay? You’re going to be fine.” But the amount of blood? I’m not so sure. The ground is slick with it as it pours from her injury.
I do what I can to block out the fear so I can focus on saving her life.
“Call an ambulance!” I yell at Lauren.
“On it!”
“Beckett, hang in there, okay?”
God, please let her be fine.
With nothing else within reaching distance, I rip my t-shirt off and press the fabric to her injury. She hisses in pain. “I know it hurts. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,” I repeat. I made yet another mistake, and she paid the price.
I taunted them, and Beckett took the bullet.
How could I have been so stupid?
“Did you see who it was?” she asks, her body trembling, voice wavering.
“No.”
“Help is coming,” Lauren says as she rushes over. Her eyes are wide, her face pale. “What can I do?”
“More towels,” I tell her.
“Okay.” She darts away.
“Shawn?” my partner yells through the open door.
“Back here. Beckett is hit.”
With a grim expression, he rounds the couch.
“I’m sorry,” she says. “Your house is all sh-shot up because of me.” She’s going into shock.
“Don’t apologize. I need you to stay with me, okay?” Keeping pressure on her wound, I prop her up against my chest, then rub my free hand up and down her arm. “Can you stay with me?”
“Here,” Lauren rushes in and offers me a towel. I throw my blood-soaked shirt to the side and use the towel.
“Who are you?” Anderson asks.
“M-m-y—”
“Her friend,” Lauren says, pointing to Beckett. “Lauren,” she adds with a look at me. I nod in response.
Better to keep her out of it.
“Nice to meet you,” Anderson says as he crouches down in front of us. “Beckett, you’re going to be okay, all right?”
Sirens scream in the distance, and with every passing moment, my own adrenaline begins to wane, and all I can feel is panic.
Pure, blinding fear.
What if the bullet hit something vital? What if she doesn’t make it?
God, please don’t take her. Not yet. I need her here.
“Shawn,” she whispers.
“Stay with me, Beckett.”
“I’m tired.” Her head lolls to the side.
The towel is already saturated with her blood. The floor is slick with it. Both of which mean she’s dangerously close to bleeding out. “How far out is that ambulance?” I snap at Anderson. Panic claws at my chest, and tears sting my eyes.
She can’t die.
I won’t let her.
He straightens as reds and blues flash outside my windows. “Looks like they’re here.” Turning, he sprints through my house, and I hear him directing them inside.
“Beckett, please don’t leave me,” I whisper as I press a kiss to the top of her head. “Please stay with me.”
But she doesn’t answer.