Chapter 15 – Age 30 #2
A smile crept up Tor’s face. “I’m sure you would.” He cupped Jule’s elbow. “But it’s not necessary. I’m going to be done here soon and then I’ll come to your place.”
“Terrific. I’ll give you a ride.”
“Jule.”
“Not fucking leaving, asshole. Get it through your thick skull and finish up your work while I watch.”
A booming laugh sounded from behind him. “I understood what you saw in him years ago, Tor, but having front row seats to the show is even better.” Chief Montez had returned to his office after walking Jule’s mother and grandparents out.
“He knew about us?” Jule said, surprised.
“Yes.” Tor nodded. “Chuck’s known everything from the beginning. I had to explain it to him so he’d understand.”
“Understand what?” Jule’s legs started buckling now that the jolt of adrenaline from everything he’d heard was wearing off.
Unsurprisingly, Tor noticed. He slid his arm around Jule’s waist and anchored him as he walked him over to the table and pulled out a chair. “Sit.”
He did and the chief sat across from him. “Understand why I should believe a disheveled teenager’s crazy story about the murder of a prominent politician.”
“And why he needed my help to handle it.” Tor handed him a bottle of water.
Jule absorbed the information he had learned that afternoon and assimilated it with everything that had happened since the day his father was killed. “You’ve been doing this the entire time.”
“Almost.” Tor nodded. “Chuck wouldn’t let me badge in until I turned eighteen.”
“Which is three years earlier than policy,” the chief said. “I don’t believe you’ve ever thanked me for that.”
Tor flipped him off.
The chief cackled.
“So when you were locked up, it wasn’t real?” Jule asked.
“Oh, it was very real,” the chief said, all humor leaving his face. “I didn’t want him to do it the first time; he was so young.”
Tor rested his hand on the chief’s shoulder, and the older man patted it.
“But he insisted that it was the only way for us to truly understand how the Knights operated with the contingent that was on the inside and, like always, he was right.”
“The entire time.” Jule blinked up at him. “This is what you’ve been doing the entire time?”
Tor pulled a chair right next to him and sat.
He pushed his leg to the edge so their thighs connected and looked Jule in the eyes.
“I had to. If I didn’t, John Jones would have escalated.
He was on a tear back then. I was worried he’d go after my brothers, after you.
Letting him think I was standing with him was the only way I could have any control over him.
” He opened the water bottle and placed it in Jule’s hand.
“So you joined his cartel?”
“Worse.” Tor winked at the chief. “I joined the police department.”
“And you went to prison. How many times? I can think of at least three or four when I assumed…”
“Drink.” Once he did, Tor put his palm over his free hand. “It wasn’t that bad. I was able to get through my classes faster when I was locked up. Not as much to do in there.”
“What classes?”
“ASU online. Took me a while but I got my degree eventually.”
“You did?” Jule rasped.
“He needed that to get pinned as lieutenant,” the chief said.
“That’s not why I did it.” Tor scowled at him.
“Yes, you made that very clear. You did it so you wouldn’t disappoint your”—the chief flicked his gaze between them—“fiancé apparently. Congratulations on the engagement. Marriage seems like an even better reason to accept my offer. You’ll need job stability.”
“Fuck off, Chuck,” Tor said. “I told you not to do that.”
“What’d he do?” Jule asked.
“Introduced him to the in-laws.” The chief smirked. “Felt good to be the one disregarding your direct instructions for a change. I can see why you enjoy doing it to me so much.”
“What offer?” Jule asked.
“Chuck thinks he can strong-arm me into staying on the force even though I’ve been clear from the beginning that I’d be leaving as soon as we closed the case against John Jones.”
“I hope you’ll join my efforts to change his mind,” the chief said to Jule. “He’s an outstanding officer and I don’t want to lose him.”
“I was able to do this job well because I was working undercover. I fit in out there much more than I fit in here.” He waved his hand in the direction of the office door.
“But John Jones is no longer a threat, so I’m done with that now.
I need to be home.” He narrowed his eyes at the chief in a way that made most people flinch.
“And you need to leave Jule out of this.”
The chief was undeterred. This was clearly not his first experience being stared down by a displeased Tor Dunworthy.
“Nobody’s asking you to go back under, son.
You’ve done more than enough of that. You can take a regular post and live a regular life.
I see you running your own command one day, maybe even having my position. ”
“With as long as we’ve worked together, I’d expect you to know me better.”
The chief looked away from Tor and focused on Jule. “Julian, talk some sense into him. You’re the only person whose opinion he seems to value. Tell him not to resign from the department.”
Nearly everything he knew about critical aspects of his life had been upended and rewritten over the past hour.
But one constant remained and it was the same constant he’d known since he was six.
At his core, Tor Dunworthy was the same fearless, loyal, irreverent boy who had breezily disregarded Jule’s father in the interest of having fun in his own way.
“I’m afraid I can’t do that, Chief Montez.
Tor’s too much of an out-of-the-box thinker to be a cop. ”
The chief frowned. “I should have known you’d be a problem that day you told me off and said you wanted to work on the other side.”
Jule shrugged. “What can I say? The apple doesn’t fall from the tree, and despite what my family thinks, Tor and I grew up in the same orchard.”