Chapter 5
Chapter Five
Gardner looked sour at the interruption.
It might be that he didn’t appreciate the Feds stepping on local toes. Or Javi might have cut in on whatever Gardner was trying to build for Professional Standards.
Cloister couldn’t tell, and it made his skin itch.
This was why he didn’t do politics. Dogs were simpler.
“Your scene, SA Merlo,” Gardner said.
He pointedly clicked his pen, traded a look that said “these fuckers” with Cloister, and stepped aside to finish photographing and recording the evidence in the kitchen.
His background presence made Cloister weigh his words, acutely conscious that anything he said could end up in a report.
He didn’t have anything to hide or be ashamed of, but…
he didn’t want anything non-case-related memorialized.
Not when there was a good chance it would end up crossing Kincaid’s desk at some point.
Because, sure, Cloister knew how to capitalize on people thinking he was dumb and willing to fight. It was useful. But the idea of Kincaid smirking over something Cloister said or did, as if it somehow confirmed that Javi’s ex was the better man, did not feel good.
“Depute Witte?” Javi prodded. “I asked about your read on the scene?”
He had.
“It’s up to forensics,” Cloister put everyone’s favorite qualifier around his statement, “but I don’t see any signs that SSA Joel was under any sort of immediate duress when she left. There’s no sign of forced entry…”
He glanced at the back door. The glass he’d broken to gain entry glittered on the tiles, the sound of deputies' voices outside filtering through the gap.
“None until I got here,” he amended dryly. “And while we have blood on the scene, it looks like she just cut herself making a sandwich. Peanut butter and banana.”
“Forensics pending,” Javi said dryly.
In the background, Gardner forgot himself enough to snort. “Your name is going to be mud, Agent Merlo, if it turns out she just panicked at the sight of blood and is in an ER somewhere waiting to be patched up.”
The ghost of a smile twitched at the corner of Javi’s mouth as Gardner gave him the excuse he needed.
“You,” he said. “Out.”
Gardner turned around. He gawped at Javi for a second and then mustered a spluttered protest.
“Hey, I’m just saying—”
“That you think a seasoned FBI agent, who’s killed in the line of duty, was so overcome by the sight of her own blood that she forgot how to do her job?
” Javi finished for him. “If that’s the level of your contribution, I’d prefer someone capable of basic reasoning to log the scene. So, again, out.”
Gardner’s jaw clenched, the muscles in his cheeks visible under a scruff of stubble.
“You know what,” he said, “people are right about you.”
He left. The glass on the floor crunched under his boots as he went out the back door. He didn’t quite slam it, but the sharp snap of the door against the frame made it clear he wanted to.
“What’s he mean by that?” Javi grumbled.
Cloister gave Javi an amused look. “Oh, come on,” he said, “you know the answer to that.”
That earned him an amused glance and a clipped, starched response. “If we had time, I’d make you explain that, Deputy,” Javi said. “Since we’re up against the clock, how about we stick to the scene?”
Fair enough.
Without Gardner in the background, Cloister felt his shoulders come down from around his ears. He breathed out and relaxed into the familiar rhythm of working a case with Javi. It still caught Cloister by surprise how easy that felt.
He wasn’t complaining, but the “boyfriend” thing turned out to be a daily minefield. The only saving grace was that it wasn’t just Cloister’s issues that caused problems. They both contributed equally to the “what the fuck was that” moments.
At work, though, everything just…worked. Not always smoothly, and sometimes they only went in the right direction from spite, but it got results.
“There’s no direct duress on SSA Joel,” Cloister said. “But there was urgency.”
Javi nodded at Cloister to go on as he moved around the kitchen. He checked in cupboards and tapped the toe of his boot on the pedal of the swing bin to look inside.
“It would be a 50/50 chance whether this would hold up in court,” Cloister admitted. “The trail is compromised just because it’s everywhere, but based on Bon’s nose, Joel went from here to the sink, to the bin—”
Javi stooped down and fished out a bloody wad of paper towels, holding it up between gloved thumb and forefinger. Cloister nodded.
“Then she went through the utility room and into the garage,” Cloister said. “She didn’t leave a note, she didn’t stick her head in to check the kid was really asleep—”
Javi wobbled his hand in the air to indicate that part might not be as compelling as he’d expect.
“I don’t think they got on very well,” he said.
There spoke someone who had a good relationship with their parents. Cloister put his hands in the pockets of his jeans and leaned back against a clean stretch of counter.
“Doesn’t matter,” Cloister told him. “That would just mean she’d be more vigilant about making sure there’s nothing concrete the kid can point out to use against her. Abandoned in the middle of the night is pretty concrete.”
Javi nodded and circled back to the board where Joel’s half-assembled sandwich had been left. He leaned the heels of his hands on the edge of the counter as he looked over the space.
“So something came up that made her leave under her own steam, but she didn’t take her car or her phone, so it wouldn’t be on record…
” he trailed off and shook his head. “It doesn’t make any sense.
Joel’s a workhorse. She isn't impulsive, and she doesn’t take chances.
When I worked with her in Phoenix, I don’t remember her even having a hunch, never mind following up on one.
She’s the last person I’d expect to go off-book. ”
“People change,” Cloister said. He reached out to touch Javi’s wrist in a discreet caress, his fingers tracing the knob of bone. “You did.”
Javi glanced down to watch Cloister’s finger trail down the back of his hand. The corner of his mouth quirked in a wry smile.
“Maybe,” he acknowledged. “But I didn’t have a choice. Joel had nothing to gain from changing, so why bother?”
Cloister didn’t have an answer to that one. The only thing he’d ever changed was his address, and it turned out that didn’t help. It turned out that wherever he went, there he was.
The lack of a comeback made Javi nod in satisfaction at being proven right.
“Exactly,” Javi said as he pushed himself off the counter, casually moving his hand away at the same time.
Cloister’s hand hung in the air for a beat, until he recovered and took it back. He shoved it out of the way in his pocket, as if that was the only way to keep it out of trouble, and fiddled with the handful of dog treats already in there as he tried to work out how he felt about that.
The answer was not obvious.
They might have been dating officially for a while—since they’d signed all the disclosure forms after the Morrow case—but Cloister had spent most of that time on medical leave. This was the first time they’d had to try and navigate how they’d behave in the field.
For now, he didn’t know if Javi pulling away was professional distance, emotional distance, or if the sun had been in Javi’s eyes where he’d been standing. Cloister didn’t know if it was something he needed to file away to chew over later with Bourneville or not.
Javi was no help. He’d already moved on.
“I’m going to chase up the husband, see if he can tell us anything.” He paused as he went to check his watch and frowned at his bare, tanned arm. “Get a shirt on.”
“I kinda like the polo,” Cloister remarked.
He did. It was partially how annoyed he knew Javi was with it, and partly the glimpse of sharp, angled collarbones that he usually only got to appreciate at home.
His. Or Javi’s. Whichever they were at.
“Then you can wear it,” Javi said coolly. It backfired, though. Cloister saw his dark brown eyes warm with interest, the pupils expanding, as the remark sank in. Heat burnished Javi’s cheekbones as he swallowed and cleared his throat. His voice roughened slightly as he added a low, “Later.”
The murk of paranoia receded as Cloister grinned.
“Just don’t think wearing the FBI logo means you get to tell me what to do,” he said.
Javi raised one eyebrow a twitch as he looked Cloister over.
“That’s not why you do what I tell you,” he said confidently.
He was right, and that sent heat snaking down Cloister’s spine from the nape of his neck to the crack of his ass.
It was his turn to flush, and he knew it looked a lot more raw on him than it did on Javi.
Before he could recover enough to scrabble together a retort, Javi shifted his tone back to brisk and businesslike.
He raised the other eyebrow to match the first. “But speaking of who’s in charge, you technically aren’t on duty right now. So if you had anything else to do…”
“Like what?” Cloister asked. He quirked the corner of his mouth in a wry smile. “Sleep? I’ll take Bon and see if there’s a secondary trail from the garage. Joel had to leave the house somehow, even if she didn’t take her car.”
Javi gave him a grateful nod.
“I appreciate that,” he said. “If you find anything, let me know. Once I talk to the husband, I’ll need to loop Kincaid in. He’ll want the full picture.”
The mention of Kincaid’s name put Cloister’s hackles up. He’d never been a jealous man, so he wasn't sure why. Maybe he could work it out later.
“I’ll do that,” he said. “Bourneville?”
She made a muffled “oof” through the T-chew and scrambled up off the tiles, briefly awkward and lanky as she righted herself and sorted out four legs and a tail.
The sodden chew toy came with her as she padded over to Cloister’s side.
She shoved it into his hand, sodden and distressingly warm, for safekeeping.
“Be careful,” Cloister said.
Javi’s gaze flicked over Cloister’s shoulder to the garden outside where Gardner bantered with Boyd and a handful of other deputies. The thumb-wide span of skin between Javi’s eyebrows tensed in a not-quite-a-frown.
“I can handle Kincaid,” he said. “I’m worried that you’re the one who doesn’t know what he’s dealing with.”
“Don’t underestimate me,” Cloister said. It was meant to be banter, but his voice came out tighter than he’d planned.
Javi gave him a sharp look.
“I don’t,” he said and headed out of the kitchen.
Cloister watched him go and then looked down as he scrubbed his hand through his hair.
That didn’t feel like a vote of confidence.
The funny thing about people who didn’t act on impulse is that when they did, they were good at it.
SSA Joel was in the wind.
The trail ended in the garage, at a greasy spot of (probably) transmission fluid on the smooth gray concrete floor.
The frustration of the dead end still had Bourneville on edge an hour later.
With nothing else for them to contribute for now, Cloister had left Javi and the rest of the department to do the footwork while he headed back to the trailer park.
He did feel guilty about that. It wasn’t like he’d not just had a month off. That sort of downtime should have filled his boots until his next vacation in the grave.
Still, at least he wasn’t enjoying himself.
Cloister staggered to a stop, sand rucked up around his beat-to-shit trainers, and doubled over with his hands braced on his thighs.
Bon’s lead, loosely looped around his neck, swung forward and cast a long, noosed shadow on the white sand.
The froth of the turning tide eddied around his soles as he listened to his heartbeat in his skull and waited for his body to unclench and come back online.
One day it wouldn’t…not today though.
His lungs did an emergency restart first, forcing a breath in even though they still felt stiff as leather behind his ribs. The rest of him reluctantly followed suit. He spat the taste of bile off his tongue, stiffened his knees, and pushed himself back upright.
Ahead of him, Bourneville had stopped and turned around to look at him. Her ears were tipped forward, and she might have been panting. A little. As he tried to get his lungs to loosen up to the idea of breathing again, she did a play bow in the sand and then came racing back to him.
Wet sand splattered up his bare legs as she did a tight circle around him and then shoved her head between his knees.
“The day I outrun you,” Cloister told her as he fished a treat out of his pocket for her. “That’s when we retire.”
She didn’t look worried about the time frame as she grabbed the treat.
Cloister staggered, his knees not quite up to balance yet, as she shoved the rest of the way between his legs and took off again.
He blew a drop of sweat off his nose and squinted against the light as he watched her bounce around after sand flies.
It seemed like she’d gotten over her frustration with the truncated search.
Cloister wished he found it so easy.
He craned his neck from one side to the other and started back the way he’d come. As he trudged along the track of his own footprints, he realized his left foot was wet. It looked like one of his trainers had finally given up the ghost.
His foot squelched all the way down the beach and up the long flight of well-worn steps back up to the trailer park. By the time he got to the top, his already tired muscles felt like Jello ready to slip off his bones, and he felt every step with a twinge in his wrist.
Bourneville let him get three-quarters of the way to the top and then sprinted up past him, taking the stairs two at a time. She stopped at the top of the hill, and her tail dropped as she stared at something.
It was a neutral stance. Cloister still gave a sharp whistle. She shifted her weight, but didn’t move.
“Hier,” he vocalized the command, ignoring the ache in his chest at redirecting that much air.
Bon gave whatever was there a hard stare, then turned and loped back down to him.
Cloister grabbed her collar with one hand, the leather damp and rough with sand, and held her as he pulled the lead from around his neck. He looped it over her head, pulling her ears flat, and snugged it tight around her throat.
She stayed on alert the whole time, eyes fixed on the top of the stairs and body strung tight.
“Heel,” Cloister told her as they headed up the last five steps to the top.
He already knew from Bourneville’s reaction that it wasn’t Javi, but he had no idea who else to expect. Cloister wasn’t a very social person. The only person he knew who’d visited him out here had been Galloway. That had been a one-off, though.
Still, Cloister did have a tentative list of possibilities as he got to the top of the stairs.
None of them were there.
In fact, as Cloister stared at the slight sandy-haired man, wiry and nondescript in chinos and a blue collared shirt, enjoying a coffee on the step of Cloister’s trailer, he still had no idea who he was.