Chapter One
Judging by the expression on SAC Lloyd Stanger’s face as he sat across the desk from Thayne and his new partner, he was getting ready to tear them both new ones.
Thayne glanced over at Jarrett, who sat with his hands clasped in his lap, studiously staring down at them and avoiding Stanger’s blazing red cheeks as they heated.
Thayne had been working for the LA field office for nearly nine years and he’d never seen Stanger as red-faced and angry as he was now.
He supposed Jarrett had it coming.
It wasn’t every day that an ATF special agent did a Bruce Willis off a ten-story building in full view of a hundred spectators, law enforcement personnel, and several news crews.
Jarrett’s stunt had not only made the TV news but it was trending on YouTube and Twitter and several videos of it had been uploaded and viewed over fifteen thousand times in just the last three hours.
As far as Thayne was concerned, Jarrett deserved every bit of Stanger’s ire.
He was damned upset about it himself.
He’d only gotten Jarrett back from his Criminal Investigators Training Program and Special Agent Basic Training in Georgia last month.
Jarrett had begun his career with the ATF by crashing two vehicles and now this stunt.
As he covertly watched Jarrett pretend to look down ashamedly, Thayne knew Stanger was not going to accept one more screwup.
“Six months! Six months you were in training and this is how you come back to me, Evans? You know you could have pulled that suspect off the building resulting in your death as well as his! It’s bad enough that the news crews had a field day with that stupid stunt you pulled at the Staples Center.
I just got off the horn with the director.
He wants your ass and mine too.
After the way you looked out for Wolfe before his trial, we were happy to offer you a badge.
If it wasn’t for the fact that you have friends in Washington, I’d be asking you to hand it back to me right now.
And you, Wolfe… where were you when your partner was taking a leap off a ten-story roof?”
“I was coming up…”
Thayne began.
“Shut up! If I wanted your excuses, I’d ask for them!”
“But you did, SAC…”
Thayne stopped midsentence, slapping his mouth closed as SAC Stanger shot daggers at him.
Jarrett should be the one in trouble here but in the boss’s typical fashion, he was going to rail at them both until he felt better.
Somehow Thayne seemed to get blamed for Jarrett’s actions a lot.
As an agent who’d been on the job nearly nine years, he was expected to make sure his rookie partner didn’t do shit like this, but loosing Jarrett on the world with a badge and a gun hadn’t been Thayne’s idea.
How Stanger thought Thayne was supposed to put the genie back in the bottle was anyone’s guess.
“I-I probably shouldn’t have done that, SAC, but there was no way I could have known that Wolfe was about to come through that rooftop door, sir.
If I’d have stayed up there with nowhere to take cover from that MAC-10 the suspect had, I wouldn’t be sittin’ here.
Down was the only direction open to me and I just figured…”
“You just figured? You just figured you’d disobey a direct order.
Don’t sit there and tell me that the only reason you rappelled off that roof was because you couldn’t communicate with your team…”
Stanger held up a hand to stop Jarrett as he opened his mouth to argue.
“And if you tell me there was something wrong with that com unit, I’ll kick your ass, Evans.
We use military grade earwigs and communications systems.
They don’t have static!”
Thayne lifted a hand and put it over his mouth to hide the smile that threatened.
At the time, he’d wanted to kick Jarrett’s ass when he lost touch with him.
He knew, as did everyone on their team including Stanger, that Jarrett had taken the earwig out and disappeared it somewhere up on that roof.
He could have put the entire team in jeopardy, not just himself, and the breach in protocol was one that would have gotten him suspended under any other circumstances.
Stanger went on.
“If you ever lose contact with your team again, you’d better be unconscious.”
He glared at him as Jarrett opened his mouth to protest.
“Shut up.
Just shut up, Evans.
I’ll suspend your ass so fast your head will spin,”
he railed, “Secondly, if you had listened to me in the first place and let the LAPD aerial unit handle it like I told you to, all those suspects might have been taken alive or at least be able to walk!”
Jarrett peered up at him under dark lashes, looking guilty.
“Yes, sir.”
“Now, because you were a hot dog, I am pulling you and your partner to work a case down in San Diego,”
Stanger said.
“If I don’t see you for a few days, maybe my blood pressure will return to normal.”
He turned to look at Thayne.
“As for you, Wolfe, I have no choice but to send you down there with him.
Try not to let him kill anyone else.
It seems Evans needs babysitting and the last thing I need is to have him going off the rails… or roofs as it were.”
“Yes, SAC,”
Thayne said, ignoring Jarrett’s pointed glare.
“What kind of a case are we talking about?”
Thayne hadn’t been down to San Diego for nearly three years, since before going undercover with Mills Lang’s crew.
“There was a pyrotechnics show down there and several people were hurt.
The local law enforcement believes that some sabotage took place and we want you to find out why anyone would do that.”
“Sorry, sir,”
Jarrett said, sitting forward, “Are you talking about fireworks… like sparklers or something?”
Thayne bit his lip to keep from laughing.
You just have to push it, don’t you?
Stanger frowned and reached up to squeeze the bridge of his nose before glaring at Jarrett.
He took a deep breath, probably trying to calm himself.
“It’s a lot more than sparklers and I know you know we have jurisdictional authority over crimes using explosives to harm the public or destroy property, so don’t be a prickly ass.”
He pointed his finger at Evans.
“With summer nearly upon us and fireworks shows planned all over, if someone is sabotaging the displays, we’ll have a real problem on our hands.”
He paused and glared at Jarrett.
“Did you sleep through your classes down in Georgia or did the taxpayers foot the bill for your ATF training for shits and giggles?”
Thayne took Jarrett’s sleeve, starting to get up.
“I’m sure Evans is more than grateful for his training.
Let’s go, Jarrett.”
Stanger waved him back to his seat.
“I’m not done.”
Thayne sat back down.
“You two are due to report to Chief Willis at the San Diego PD’s northeastern division tomorrow morning.
Connor and Darcy will be giving you tech support if you need it from here.
They can help you run down any leads you come up with or do follow-ups if you need them while you are away from home base.”
“Thank you, sir,”
Thayne said.
Stanger nodded and turned to Jarrett.
“You should take special interest in this one, Evans, because the incident happened at Marine Corps Air Station Miramar.
You know how to speak Marine, don’t you?”
“Yes, sir,”
Jarrett said, sitting straight in the chair for the first time that afternoon.
“Good.
Well, ATF Investigator Ada Carrillo has been assigned the case and she will act as your liaison with the base and the local PD as well as fill you in on all the details of the case once you get down there,”
Stanger said.
Thayne looked over to see Jarrett frowning.
“Do they think military personnel are involved, sir? I mean usually the NCIS handles crimes that involve Marine bases.”
“As you both know, when explosives are involved, the ATF takes the lead on the investigation.
Since fireworks are involved, that makes the jurisdiction ours.
That doesn’t mean you won’t be dealing with the Marine Corps on this.
They host these fireworks shows on the base every year because there is a lot of asphalt as you might imagine with an air base… less chance of brush fires and the like that San Diego seems to be the victim of every fire season.
My guess is, they will be cooperative in every way since this is a huge event which funds Marine Corps charities every year along with the fact that their own families attend this event as well.
They were put in harm’s way and the Marines aren’t taking that well at all.
Twelve were injured, two seriously, most civilians.
This is bad, gentlemen.”
Stanger cleared his throat.
“Anyway, I expect you’ll feel comfortable talking with the Marine Corps bigwigs down there, Evans.”
SAC Stanger leaned forward and pointed a finger at him.
“Don’t mouth off, screw up, or do anything to embarrass the ATF.
I better hear glowing reports from everyone including the San Diego Police Department and the Marines.”
Jarrett blanked his expression and Thayne noted a look in his eyes that he’d seen only one other time… when they’d been about to rush out and face the armed and vicious killer, Roberto Virgil Romero, the man who’d been hired to kill Thayne months ago.
“I will be respectful when I’m on the base, sir.
It’s not my first rodeo,”
Jarrett drawled.
Thayne noted how his entire body seemed to straighten even more.
It was almost as if, when reminded who he was, Jarrett became that Marine, even in posture.
Stanger nodded.
“Good.
See that you do, son.
Make me proud.”
Jarrett frowned and nodded, standing up.
Thayne stood too and the two walked out of Stanger’s office.
Thayne glanced at his partner.
“You good, man?”
Jarrett threw him an exasperated look.
“Yeah.
I don’t know what I was thinkin’ jumping off that building the way I did and now this assignment?”
“It’s not a bad assignment, Jarrett.
You know your way around a base and Stanger obviously still trusts you enough that he’s sending us.
You have a chance to prove yourself, but you can’t screw up again.
He’s not going to put up with it.”
Thayne reached out and gave his partner a squeeze on the arm, stopping them before they walked out into the bullpen.
Jarrett turned to look at Thayne.
His eyes were still hooded and his expression closed off.
“Look, I know I’ve been hard on you since you scared me half to death by taking a swan dive off a ten-story building, but this assignment is really not going to be as bad as you imagine.
I’m sure you can still find a way to get into trouble.
Just do it quietly.”
Jarrett shot him a sideways glance.
“Thanks, Wolfe.”
Thayne noticed the way Jarrett’s lips fought not to smile.
Thayne dropped his hand and they turned to continue on into the office to face their coworkers.
When they walked out into the main office bullpen, several sets of eyes looked up from the paperwork they were doing at their desks.
Sarah Connor sat beside her partner, Tim Darcy, a huge man with shoulders as wide as the side of a barn.
Jose Galvez, the man who’d replaced Victor Lowell, Thayne’s deceased partner, sat beside his new partner, Craig Baldwin.
Baldwin and Jarrett were the two rookies in the office and like Jarrett, Baldwin was also a veteran.
He was recently returned from an overseas post in Livorno, Italy, well-known for American Beach, a popular liberty spot for American military stationed overseas and Thayne knew he had gone through the ATF training with Jarrett.
They’d become friends and Thayne had a hard time not feeling territorial around Jarrett when Baldwin was around.
The kid was friendly with everyone and handsome in a fresh-faced wholesome way.
The team’s wide eyes greeted them as they walked out of Stanger’s office and up to Sarah’s desk.
“What’s the verdict, Evans?”
Darcy asked, the only one apparently not afraid to hear the worst.
“He’s sendin’ us down to the border to play with sparklers,”
Jarrett drawled, sounding disgusted.
“You and Connor are gonna play tech support from here.”
“Firework duty, huh?”
Jose snickered.
“Well, the fourth is coming up,”
Sarah said, “Every year we seem to spend most of June and July investigating accidents caused by careless handling of them.
But usually the investigators only bring us in when they’re ready to make an arrest,”
Sarah said.
“Something must be special about this scene.”
“Whatever happened to the good old days of fireworks on the neighborhood streets?”
Darcy interjected.
“Every year, all the dads on the block used to get together and try to outdo each other to see who had the best ones.
Remember those fountains of sparks? The dads would set them off in front of our driveways.”
“I envy you, man… growing up in suburbia.
In the barrio, all the tios would bring M-80s up from Mexico and take bets on which kids would blow their hands off first,”
Jose said.
The group laughed.
“Wait.
That didn’t really happen, right?”
Sarah asked.
She looked horrified.
Thayne grinned at her as Jose and the others laughed harder.
They pointedly ignored her question.
“That’s cold, man,”
Craig said, slapping his partner on the back.
“They think I’m kidding.”
Jose just snickered harder.
“So, what’s down in San Diego?”
Tim Darcy asked Thayne.
Thayne shrugged, deciding he should probably be vague to save all the questions.
His coworkers knew Evans was a Marine and he didn’t want anyone to think that they’d been assigned for that reason.
The fact that the explosion happened on a Marine base might have just been coincidence.
It could have happened anywhere.
“The SAC wants us to meet up with the local PD down there about an explosion at an annual fireworks show.
I guess they think it’s possible sabotage.”
“Seriously? Talk about cold,”
Sarah said.
She was frowning.
“There’s always tons of kids at those things.
I take it there were injuries?”
“Looks like it,”
Thayne answered, “We won’t know the extent of it until we meet with the ATF investigator and SDPD.”
Jarrett nudged Thayne’s arm and he glanced over at his partner who stood next to him. “What?”
“We got reports to write and then I gotta get packed.
How ‘bout you?”
Jarrett asked.
Thayne noted a spark of something in Jarrett’s expression.
Whatever that look was, he definitely wanted to explore it some more.
He smiled and then nodded.
“Yeah.
I got reports too.
Not as many as you, though.”
That earned him an eye roll from Jarrett.
“Don’t remind me,”
he grumbled.
****
They spent the rest of the afternoon writing reports and by seven, Thayne was rubbing his eyes.
He glanced over at Jarrett.
“You about done there?”
Jarrett looked up, glancing at him with a glazed far off look.
“I’ll be done here in like ten minutes.”
He rubbed at his eyes as well.
“After that, I need food.”
Jarrett patted his belly and Thayne watched the motion with interest, feeling like he could remember every scar and the curve of every muscle below the dress shirt he wore.
Jarrett had been gone for six months and though Thayne had flown out once to visit him, it only now felt like they might finally get the opportunity to renew their connection.
He missed the touch of his lover, the smell of his skin.
Their time together had been wonderfully intimate before his training and then, the one time Thayne had gone to see him about two months after he’d flown off to Georgia, they’d been crazy for each other, spending an entire weekend in bed together.
Since Jarrett had returned though, that part of their relationship had been absent and Thayne was worried they wouldn’t be able to get back to that point.
He’d never had a long-distance relationship before and he’d done a shitty job of it when Jarrett had been away.
Falling back into bed with Jarrett since he’d returned just hadn’t happened.
Nothing seemed normal with them anymore—at least what had passed as normal before Jarrett had left for training.
Thayne had missed Jarrett.
He’d refused to move in with Thayne before leaving for Georgia, and now Thayne realized that decision had probably been for the best.
When Jarrett had come home a month ago, he’d moved his things out of storage and into a short-stay residence hotel.
Maybe he was uncomfortable staying with Thayne since it had been so long.
But it felt almost as though they were strangers, when it had once been so much more.
Thayne hadn’t pushed Jarrett to stay the night with him but the fact was, Jarrett hadn’t seemed to want to either.
That just hurt.
When they’d lived those three turbulent months together and then through the trial afterward, it had seemed like they’d shared something which had serious potential.
In hindsight, Thayne knew Jarrett probably had made the right decision.
There were times when he felt Jarrett watching him at work—felt the longing Thayne knew he was feeling—but so much time had passed, he wondered whether the old feelings would ever come back.
Are we truly strangers after everything that passed between us?
“I’m starving too and we have a long drive tomorrow morning,”
Thayne said, forcing himself to snap out of the headspace where he’d gone.
He watched Jarrett nod, not meeting his eyes.
Fuck this.
He knew Jarrett wasn’t going to make the first move so it was going to be up to him.
“I was thinking maybe you could go pack a bag and come over for pizza and beer.
Maybe you can stay over so we can leave early.
What do you think?”
Jarrett glanced over at him and he smirked, the deep dimples making an appearance.
“A man after my own heart.”
Thayne’s heart sped up.
“Who can resist pizza and beer?”
Thayne smiled. “Okay.”
He stood and picked up his jacket from the back of his chair, draping it over his arm as he watched Jarrett scribble on the page in front of him.
“I’ll get out of here and then order pizza.
Meet me at my place in an hour?”
Jarrett grinned.
“Okay, Wolfe.
You got it.
See you then.”
Thayne turned to walk away and then turned back, having forgotten the note Stanger gave him with the SDPD contact.
When he spun around, he caught Jarrett staring at his ass.
He cocked his head and smiled.
“Interested?”
Jarrett let his gaze slide over Thayne’s body before smiling wider. “Maybe.”
He focused on Thayne’s eyes.
“See you soon, Wolfe.”
He nodded and turned away, walking toward the elevators with a little smile.
He felt a wash of pure hunger pass over him as he rode down to the parking garage… hunger that had absolutely nothing to do with pizza.
****
Jarrett watched Thayne walk out of the office.
He realized that he hadn’t been fair to him when he’d come back.
Thayne was probably the most open and trusting person he’d met in his life and he was aware that his rejection of Thayne’s offer to move into his place both before he left for training and after he’d come back, had hurt Thayne.
If he had to be honest with himself, and he had been many times while in Georgia, he blamed himself for so much of what had happened to Thayne.
He knew that he should have protected Thayne and that he’d failed.
When Thayne ended up lying on the asphalt with a hole in his chest, it had almost killed Jarrett.
Jarrett wasn’t a good man.
He felt bad every time Thayne looked at him with unquestioning trust.
During their time together, Jarrett had let things get out of hand.
He’d taken the heart of a trusting man and hurt him, possibly even more than Virgil had done when he’d shot him in the chest.
What’s more, Jarrett sensed Thayne was falling for him and he’d stayed away for exactly that reason.
Jarrett wasn’t the kind of man who could love like that.
He wanted Thayne to have a man who was worthy of him and Jarrett was so different from that man, Thayne would never understand.
How was he ever going to be able to tell Thayne that he wasn’t worthy of his love or trust? It was so much easier just to let him forget their connection and everything they’d been to each other.
Being put in the position of protecting Thayne’s life had made Jarrett begin to put the past behind him, but once he’d failed and let Virgil nearly kill him, the truth of who Jarrett actually was had come down on him like a ton of bricks.
He finished up the reports he was writing, pushing everything back into proper folders, and putting them away.
He locked his drawers and picked up his jacket, staring at the hole in the sleeve from catching on something while he was running up the stairs that morning.
He smiled, remembering the craziness of it all and then slung his jacket over his arm as he walked out of the office, turning out lights and loosening his tie as he went.
Wearing suits was driving him nuts and he hated it.
Besides that, it was becoming super expensive replacing them.
He went down to the garage and stowed his suit coat in the saddlebag of the Harley, slung a leg over, and took his helmet off the handlebars.
Within a minute he was headed toward the Valley.
Jarrett stopped at his own place, picked up his shaving kit, and changed into an olive green muscle shirt, cargo pants, and an old leather jacket.
He picked up a fresh suit and then tromped on down to the parking lot where he climbed into his Jeep Wrangler and headed over to Thayne’s place.
Chances were they’d end up trying to reconnect, and Jarrett could feel his stomach lurch at the very thought of it.
He’d avoided being alone with Thayne to this point but Jarrett wasn’t stupid.
As soon as they were in that apartment together, they’d probably be all over each other.
The sex had always been amazing, but the feelings Jarrett had when they were together were even more of a threat than anything he’d ever experienced out in the field.
Thayne Wolfe was dangerous to Jarrett.
A half hour later Thayne buzzed him into the lobby and he took the elevator up to his apartment.
When Thayne answered the door, Jarrett could smell the scent of pizza coming from inside.
The second he met Thayne’s blue gaze, he felt his stomach flip-flop.
“Hey.”
Thayne met his eyes and stood back, beckoning him into the apartment with a wave of his hand.
Jarrett smiled. “Hey.”
He walked into the front room, lay the garment bag over a kitchen chair, and dropped his small duffel on the table.
A pizza box was on the raised bar between the living room and kitchen in the small apartment.
He’d only been there once before, when they’d hurriedly packed up Thayne’s gear to move into the safe house where they’d lived for nearly two months.
Thayne moved past him into the kitchen.
He opened the fridge and pulled out two Coronas, holding one up. “Beer?”
Jarrett walked over and took the bottle from his hand.
“Thanks.
I need to wash away the scent of paper,”
he drawled.
He screwed off the top and took a long drink before glancing back at Thayne who stood watching.
“Paperwork sucks, huh? And here you thought the ATF badge came with lots of dynamite and car chases.”
Jarrett smirked.