Chapter 10 #2
That was big for Ethan but not surprising.
Ethan’s dad, Lenox, was retired but he still owned Triple Canopy along with three of his Army buddies, Jasper Walker, Levi McCoy, and Nolan Clark.
TC had a compound on the outskirts of Hollow Point which included their offices along with a large training facility.
Officially, TC offered tactical training, something the Hollow Point PD and the county sheriff department took advantage of.
They also offered private security and investigations.
It was also known they had government contracts.
Seeing as those were confidential, I didn’t know how deep those ran.
What I did know was, it wasn’t unheard of for Ethan to call TC for help, but it was rare.
It could also fuck our case, if TC’s hacker Dylan Welsh handed us intel that was not on the up and up.
“Fruit from the poisonous tree and all that,” I reminded my partner.
In the years I’d known Ethan Lenox, I’d seen him angry, enraged even, but I’d never seen him vibrate with fury.
I’d also only ever known him as a choirboy when it came to policy and procedures.
Therefore, I was taken totally off guard when he stepped closer to the bed and in a harsh murmur, stated, “Fuck the tree.”
“Ethan—”
He cut me off to tell me, “All my life I knew I was gonna be a cop. I never regretted not joining the military or working for TC. I’m serving just like my dad and uncles.
Just doing it in a different uniform. But today is the closest I’ve felt to regret.
I want justice for the girl who was pulled out of a pond but right now, I want the man who put a bullet in my partner more, and if that means Dylan works his magic in a not-so-legal way, we’ll deal with it.
But I want a starting point, and I want that by tomorrow morning, not in two weeks after uniforms go door to door and hope someone gives us footage from their doorbell cameras without a warrant, or we wait with our thumbs up are asses while someone in tech gets us traffic cams.”
He wasn’t wrong. It could take weeks for us to get access to traffic cameras in the area. And if someone didn’t want to hand over recordings, they didn’t have to.
“It doesn’t need to be said, I have no issue with Dylan getting his intel however he comes by it. And if it was just me, I wouldn’t give a fuck. But we’ve got a dead Jane Doe—”
“And we’ll take care of her. Or I will because you’re on leave until those staples come out of your hard-ass head.”
Evidently my head wasn’t hard enough.
“I was hoping I hallucinated Captain Anderson coming in telling me I had ten days mandatory administrative leave.”
At the time of her arrival, I’d been pretty hopped up on pain meds. I could show up to work tomorrow and tell her I didn’t remember her stopping by.
“If you’re thinking about showing up to work tomorrow and telling her you have no recollection of talking to her, think again. She came in with Whittman who was in uniform and she asked him to turn on his body camera.”
Fuck.
“Seriously?”
“C’mon, Jase. Before she was promoted to captain she sat in the same bullpen as us.
She knows you. Besides, you were going on and on about how happy you were she got promoted and how much you love working with her and how great she was.
Then there was the part where you went into great detail about how you think we need more K9 units. ”
We did need more K9 units.
“You’re fuckin’ with me.”
At least I hoped he was.
“Nope.”
“And you didn’t stop that shit?”
Ethan’s face took on a hard edge. “Wasn’t here. I was out looking for the motherfucker who put a round through your shoulder.”
At this juncture I wasn’t sure who was more pissed I’d been shot—him or me.
What I was certain of was, Ethan Lenox was a good man, a good partner, and as loyal as the day was long.
“Now, we gonna talk about how Rainy tore out of here looking like you ripped her soul from her body?”
I clenched my jaw and shook my head.
“Nope.”
“Jase—”
“I fucked up. Nothing more to say.”
Even though I said that, Ethan didn’t agree.
“You gonna fix it?”
My throbbing head started to pound.
“I don’t know.”
“I’ll give you this to mull over while you’re thinking on it.
Valentine got word you’d been shot. He didn’t know the details, he called Sophie.
Sophie went straight to Rainy. By her account, Rainy was a mess after she told her what happened.
Though I wouldn’t call her a mess. When I saw her, she was wrecked.
While I was waiting for the captain to show up, I saw at least five different people offer to take her to the waiting room.
She wouldn’t budge from standing outside your door.
She was in such a state, the nurses let her be.
“After I left, got a call from Echo. Him, Jackie, Shilo, and Luke came by to check on you. They didn’t get in to see you because there was a woman by your bedside, holding your hand, crying.
They didn’t know who she was, but Echo didn’t want to interrupt.
Got another call a few hours later from Dalton.
He came by to see you, but the same thing happened.
He didn’t go into your room because there was a woman holding your hand, talking to you even though you were clearly asleep.
“For six hours she sat by your bed holding your hand. I don’t know what happened after you woke up.
I don’t know what was said. But the woman I saw in the hall waiting to see you was wrecked.
Even after she’d been told you were fine, awake, getting stitched up and would be released today.
She still waited. She still stood outside your door wanting to see with her own eyes you were okay.
So again, don’t know what was said. However, I do know you.
I know there is no way in fuck, you’re gonna let a woman like that leave the way she did without making that shit right. ”
When Ethan was done, the burn in my chest was so intense it felt like someone had taken a branding iron to my heart.
“I need to get the fuck out of here,” I growled.
“Let me go check on those release forms.”
Ethan was at the door when I called his name.
“Yeah?”
“Thanks, brother.”
With a jerk of his chin, he was out the door.
No further words were necessary. Ethan knew my gratitude had nothing to do with him finding out how long it would take to get my discharge papers ready, and everything to do with him taking the time to screw my head on straight.
I didn’t need to pull up the memory of Rainy fleeing my room.
The pain she’d leaked was still saturating the air, clogging my chest.
Good Christ, I was an asshole.