Chapter 38
THIRTY-EIGHT
BOSTON
Rolland shakes his head as we walk away from the small coffee stand. He asked me to meet him here to discuss a case. It isn’t unusual for us to meet outside the precinct since we hate talking about some cases in the office because you never know who’s listening.
He looks like shit. His face is unshaven, and there are dark circles under his eyes.
“They have a lead, but for some reason, they’re being quiet about it.” Rolland stirs his coffee, and I glance at him. He’s been avoiding eye contact with me.
“On which case?”
“Marcus’s,” he says. “Why they’re keeping us out of the loop, I don’t know.”
Rolland and I are the lead investigators on most of the cases that come through the precinct.
I’ve earned that responsibility through my years of dedication on the force and the cases I’ve solved.
Sure, some of our prime suspects may go missing a few times a year, but aside from that, I would say at least seventy-five percent of my cases have been solved.
So there are only a few reasons the department would withhold information from us.
We start walking the several blocks back toward the precinct.
Rolland tells me about his day, and how he got called into work unexpectedly, and how it’s ruined his sleep pattern.
Rolland and I have been partners for a long time, so I’m used to him complaining about the stupidest of things.
But the sleep story is new. He goes on to tell me about the chick he was fucking last week, and I nod as I pull out my phone and pull up the cameras to check on my wife.
When I see her getting out of bed and rummaging through boxes with her phone to her ear, I’m confused.
She steps in and out of the camera’s line of sight before I see her walk into her shoe room and slip on a red pair, which usually means only one thing—she’s going to kill someone.
When I left her not that long ago, she was tired and almost asleep.
So I’m not sure why she’s up and dressed all of a sudden.
Is she hiding something from me?
“Who’s the chick with the blue hair?” he asks.
“My wife,” I tell him. His eyes go wide, and we stop near the edge of the park. It’s dark, and hardly anyone is around.
“Shit, man, you got married and didn’t tell me?
” He starts laughing. He looks down at my left hand, where my wedding ring resides.
Rolland is laughing so hard that he ends up hitting the phone out of my hand, and as he goes to pick it up, he steps on it, breaking the screen.
“Fuck, man, sorry. Let me get that fixed. I know a guy who knows a guy.” I glance at it and swear under my breath.
Tonight is not the fucking night for my phone to not be working.
I want to know where the fuck my wife is going, and why.
Is she okay?
“So, who is this woman?” he asks, taking another sip of his coffee. “Did you get forced into marriage? I heard that’s a thing.” I tense, wondering why he would draw that conclusion. When I glance up at him, he’s looking at me intently. “Shit, did I give it away that easily?”
“Give what away?”
“Don’t play coy with me, Boston. We both know you’re smarter than that.”
“What are you talking about?”
He sighs, then drops the coffee to the ground and kicks the cup. “I take it my men didn’t succeed.”
His words have barely registered before I have my gun unholstered and pointed straight at his head. He doesn’t seem bothered by the fact that my gun is aimed at his skull. In fact, he takes a step closer so the barrel of the gun presses against his forehead.
“Do you really think I’d have this conversation while you have a loaded gun?” I don’t believe him, so I pull the trigger. It makes a clicking sound but fires no bullets. How the fuck did he gain access to my gun?
I lower the weapon, and he steps back. “He wouldn’t accept me, and I had a feeling it was because you’re of so much use to him.
I figured I could take you out and replace you, but somewhere along the way, your pretty little wife started killing all my men.
” When he mentions Maven, everything in me goes cold, and fear strikes me at the thought of him doing something to her.
But he doesn’t notice, and continues, “And then I thought maybe you did have a clue about what I’m doing. Did you send her after my men?”
“Your men?”
“Edgar, Marcus, and Bailey,” he says. “All members of your little society.”
“The society you clearly want to be a part of,” I say. “How did you even know about it?”
“Marcus talked a lot of shit when he drank,” he tells me, then lifts his gun just as the rev of a bike comes from behind me. “I’ll kill her too. Maybe then I’ll be accepted because I found the killer of the Forsaken members.”
I can’t help but turn to see Maven get off her motorcycle with her helmet in her hand, and we lock eyes.
“She sure is pretty. What do you think will happen when the blood stains her hair? What color does red and blue make?” he muses, training the gun on her. “Say goodbye, Boston.”
When she starts running toward me, I turn to face my partner, putting myself between her and harm’s way. If he’s going to shoot me, then he can look me in the eye. Her heels click louder with every step.
The last thing I remember is a searing burn right before I fall to the ground.
And a mess of beautiful blue hair.