Case Wrap Up #2
I jumped up but Ori was already across the table and Alec was on the phone calling for a medic. I knew I could help and went around the table to see pink-tinged foam coming out of his mouth.
“Get back!” Ori’s eyes were panicked as I came into his line of sight.
“I can hel—”
Ori jumped up from the floor and grabbed me before walking me back out the door. I was battling to get back inside because we didn’t have everything that we needed and the suspect was drugged.
“Ori!”
Ori set me on my feet and held my head still, forcing me to look him in the eyes. “He’s gone, Asha. You didn’t smell it but I did. He took cyanide.”
I stopped fighting my body almost going limp. “He what?”
Ori paused before standing straight up and reinforcing what he’d said with a nod. “It wouldn’t have mattered and if you had gotten too close to him and tried to resuscitate him you could’ve been poisoned too.” That explanation forced him to inhale sharply unable to catch his breath.
“What the hell happened?” Anderson had come out of the observation room demanding an explanation just as Alec walked out of the room and shook his head at us. The suspect was dead.
Ori swung so fast I didn’t even notice that he’d made a move to do anything. His fist connected with Agent Anderson’s jaw and the man’s head snapped at an angle that had to be unnatural.
“Ori!” Agent Cochran was walking down the hall in no hurry to stop Ori’s second hit. Anderson seemed to want the violence so he could play victim. Ori didn’t care about the way any of this looked and stood tall as he straightened his jacket.
“You had one fucking job and that was to keep her out of that fucking room. One! And you failed. I don’t give a fuck what sanctions I face or write-up I get, he deserves more than that.
You know how these muthafuckers can get fixated on people.
That’s a risk we take every time we do something but it’s not what she signed up for.
It’s why we made sure her involvement was kept off the record.
But your wanting to buck the system has now put her in the middle of this shit.
And another thing, if I catch your eyes on any part of her body that ain’t her fucking face you’ll wish that a cracked jaw was the extent of your injuries.
I might not say shit but I see it all, don’t get your career cut short over a woman that wouldn’t piss on you if you were on fire. ”
He put a hand on my arm and it was everything I could do not to snatch away from him in front of everyone.
I was furious with him and couldn’t explain the emotions running through me.
Your pussy would like to have a word.
Ignoring my inner thoughts I frowned at him openly displaying my displeasure, since he had truly crossed a line by trying to assert his dominance over me.
Cochran looked to Alec who was waiting in the door to see if he needed to jump in between the men.
“Because he couldn’t keep a consultant in the room she witnessed a man violently end his life. We would’ve been held responsible for anything that happened to her in there. You’re so eager to look good that you don’t care who gets hurt and that’s why this shit ain’t in you.”
“Dr. Avery, are you okay?”
“Yes, Agent Cochran.”
“Are you up to being debriefed? The room is wired but we just want to hear any insights on what you might have seen before he expired.”
“That’s not a problem.” My nod was curt, as I was happy to lend a hand. The massive hand on my arm tightened slightly before it tugged me slightly down the hall away from where everyone was standing.
“What is it?”
“Are you sure you’re up for this?”
“Yes. And while we’re at it, why in the world would you think he was attracted to me?
That man feels that all of us are inferior to him, which is how I got in the room.
He didn’t think I could be of any service and he assumed I would fall on my face.
I’m sure he was more shocked that I could contribute than anything else. ”
He stalked closer to me, his height towering over me in a way that would intimidate most but only aroused me.
“I understand that you hate all men and see most of us as useless. That’s something that I can agree with.”
I motioned between us confused at the lecture. “Then what’s all this then?”
“The fact that you’re so blinded by your own intelligence that you miss the primal drive that most of these fuckers still allow to rule them.”
“Speak plainly.”
“He wants to fuck you. He has since he first laid eyes on you. You think that his thinking that you’re beneath him somehow makes you less attractive to him?
Our people were treated like livestock but overseers, slave owners and random white people were all too eager to stick their dicks into our women or buck break our men.
You act as though zoophilia is something that is beyond the scope of reason with their bloodline. ”
“Agent—” I was reaching for professionalism and distance but he refused to cooperate.
His hand went to my cheeks and he lifted my face so that I was staring him in the eye.
“Don’t fucking agent me. You think I have the desire to watch while some piece of shit I could murder in cold blood and sleep well at night watches my fucking fiancée like he’s plotting on how he can get his hands on her?
You believe that I am going to let him live after the way he disrespected you? ”
“He didn’t touch—”
Ori’s eyes cut back toward the direction Anderson was standing now receiving medical attention. I could hear the commotion from inside the interview room as it was being taped off.
“He thought about it.”
“You can’t murder a man for thinking about wanting to sleep with someone. Every man in this world would be on your hit list.”
“I know the type of sick shit he’s into. I have dirt on everyone in this fucking building in case it becomes useful for me and those who are my family. You think I’m going to let some muthafucker I’m forced to be around live after he’s thought about doing that shit to my fucking wife?”
“So is this a man thing or is this an ego thing? Of course, those are truly synonymous aren’t they?
You aren’t worried about protecting me, your pride is injured.
You want him to respect you and the fact that he’s crossed a line he wasn’t even aware of is what has you so bloody heated, isn’t it?
” I was hissing the words through my teeth my fury unbridled.
“It’s an I like you thing. I value you beyond this deal and whatever else bullshit you keep saying to yourself. I get I don’t emote the way regular muthafuckas do but I’m still a man. I can care about you and look out for you. I promised you, remember?”
And just like that, I was pliant. Softening to the almost passionate way he’d spoken to me.
“I remember.”
His face stayed the same but I could see how his eyes grew brighter and less rigid. “Good. Now are you able to go through this or do we need to wait—“
“I’m a professional, Ori. I appreciate you wanting to give me time to breathe but I’m good. If I need to fall part I can do it later. But now we have a case to close.”
ORI
“Mira!”
I knew she hated when I started hollering through the house but I enjoyed pissing her off. She was just playing like she was annoyed anyway because I knew part of her secretly liked it.
She’d left hours ago. And I knew by the time she was done recounting what had occurred she was mentally drained.
Asha had looked like she needed me but I couldn’t leave.
Besides being debriefed on what I saw with Christopher Clancy, I had to answer for that shit with Anderson. Which further put him on my shit list.
His ass better be glad I’m retiring and I don’t give a fuck about this anymore.
I waited to hear her yelling at me but when silence answered my call, my hackles went up. Immediately, I pulled out my gun and started looking around the house to see what, if anything, was out of place.
I made quick work of walking the halls until I made it to our suite.
I could hear the water running in the shower and breathed slightly easier, realizing she hadn’t heard me because of the shower.
With the way our security was set up, I knew she couldn’t have been in trouble but that didn’t stop me from thinking the worst.
I knew she’d affected me more than I cared to admit but I wasn’t trying to think about that now.
With everyone popping up in my life, I wanted to take a break from my mind.
It wasn’t possible but I wish I could dive into the ocean and swim down as far as my lungs would allow just so I could take myself out of reality for a while.
My African and Hawaiian ancestors must all have been seafarers because the water had always soothed me.
According to Faith, it had always been that way.
I set my gun on the bedside table before walking into the bathroom.
The immediate feeling of grief almost choked me more than the steam built up from her shower.
This is what I felt was wrong. This was the urgency to get home.
I thought it was a simple desire to see my…
see her but it was clear she was going through something and she needed me.
Asha’s outline could be seen through the fog of the shower and I was most alarmed when I saw that she was still fully clothed as she stood beneath the sprays of every jet in her shower.
I walked closer to the door and knocked on the glass, hoping not to scare her. She looked near catatonic and since she had an affinity of stabbing people; I didn’t want to shock her and become her next victim.
“Mira!”
I called out to her loudly enough for her to hear me over the rushing of the water and she slowly blinked like she was coming back from wherever she’d traveled.
I opened the glass not giving a fuck about my suit, as I was immediately drenched in water. I maneuvered around her, which blocked some of the water from hitting her, forcing her to blink again before she focused on me.