Chapter 12 – Age 28
Jule walked out of the courtroom to find Detective Marcie Wyble waiting for him. “Well done,” she said.
His client froze beside him and looked warily at the police officer.
“Don’t worry. I’m not here for you,” she said.
Rolling his eyes at her, Jule turned toward his client. “I’m going to hang back and talk with Detective Wyble. You have a ride?”
He nodded. “Thanks again, Julian. I owe you.”
“You can pay me back by staying out of my office.” He reached for his client’s hand and shook it.
“I’ll do my best.” He winked and then hurried away.
“Need something, Marcie?”
“Don’t know how you got that guy off.”
“Your colleagues need to be more careful about contaminating crime scenes.”
“You’re an asshole,” she said, but there wasn’t heat behind it. The two of them got along remarkably well considering they were almost always on opposite sides.
“I hear that daily.” Jule pulled his phone out of his pocket. He had been in court all afternoon and he could only imagine the number of emails that had piled up during that time. “I know you’re not here to congratulate me. What’s up?”
“We got permission to walk the DeLeroy scene, but we need to go now.”
He jerked his gaze away from his phone. “Why now? I’ve had a long fucking day.”
“Because the shithead who owns the building says he doesn’t want us there during business hours disrupting his income stream.”
“If Franks didn’t want problems in his workplace, he shouldn’t have let his son have free use of the warehouse knowing he’s a piece of shit,” Jule said.
Marcie shrugged and they both walked toward the exit.
“Why are you here? Isn’t Ariel the lead on this case?”
“Not anymore. Commander Jeffries asked me to step in.”
“Why?” Jule frowned. He didn’t like Detective Ariel. The guy was a smarmy, arrogant dick, but it was unusual to take someone off an investigation that was so far along.
“Not sure, but it’s fine. I don’t mind,” Marcie said.
“Did you call Tommy?”
Tommy Breuger was his client and the star witness in a case against four of his friends who drugged and raped an eighteen-year-old during a party.
Jule didn’t think he was better than the rest of the assholes because he had also participated, but he was the only one willing to turn state’s evidence in exchange for immunity.
It was a case of the lesser of two evils.
“He’s your client.” Marcie smirked. “Isn’t that your job?”
He looked down at his phone again and scrolled through it to find Tommy’s number. “Battery’s almost dead.”
“Yours or your phone’s?” she joked.
“Both.” He pressed the call button and held the phone to his ear. “Do you have a charger?”
She shook her head.
“Fuck this whole fucking day.”
“You just won a dog of a case, stop whining.”
He flipped her off. His client answered and Jule explained the situation. “Detective Wyble and I will come get you now. What’s your address?”
“Are you sure it’s safe to give that to the cops?”
“Am I sure it’s safe for you to give a location to the detective who is going to drive to that location to pick you up? Well, I guess that depends. Are you somewhere you shouldn’t be?”
Marcie chuckled.
“I’m at home.”
“You have his home address, Marcie?” Jule asked.
She nodded.
“Never mind, Tommy. We’ve got it. Wait outside if you don’t want her to accidentally see anything when we get there. My phone’s about to die so I have to go.” He ended the call. “Are you sure you guys can’t make the case without this idiot?”
“Rape cases are difficult. You know that.”
He grunted. “Let’s get this over with. I really am beat.”
“Shouldn’t take too long.”
Everything took too long.
They were driving in rush hour traffic. They passed three accidents on the way to Tommy’s house, which slowed things down even more. When they finally got there, Tommy wasn’t waiting outside as planned.
“Want me to go into the house and get him?” Marcie asked, grinning. “Take the opportunity to have a look around?”
“I wish.” Jule unbuckled his seatbelt and opened the car door. “Be right back.”
He banged on Tommy’s door for a full minute before he opened it.
“Slow your roll, man.” Tommy tugged on his shoe and yanked it over his heel. “I was getting dressed.”
“You’ve had forty minutes to get dressed. We’re late. Let’s go.”
“A king is never late. Everyone else is just early.”
His fingers tightened into a fist and his knuckles cracked.
He wondered whether Marcie would arrest him if he punched his client in the face right where she could see.
Probably not but he didn’t want to do anything to make this day drag on any longer than it had to.
“That’s just fucking rude. Let’s go, Tommy. ”
The drive to the warehouse took even longer than the drive to Tommy’s house. By the time they pulled up outside, the sun had long since set.
“Is Martin Franks meeting us here?” Jule asked, squinting into the dark night.
“He’s supposed to be.” Marcie picked up her phone and looked at the screen. “Ariel sent a text.” She scrunched her eyebrows together. “He said the door’s unlocked and we’re supposed to go in.” She glanced at Jule. “Maybe Franks got tired of waiting on us?”
“How would he know that?”
“Franks called him, I guess?”
“He doesn’t know Ariel’s off the case?”
She shrugged.
“Can we get this over with?” Tommy asked from the back seat. “This place gives me the creeps.”
“Gee, I wonder why.” Jule twisted and glared at him over his shoulder. “Remembering all the girls you and your buddies hurt here? Guilt setting in?”
Tommy flicked his gaze to Marcie and hunched down. “It was just the one time.”
“Uh-huh.” Jule took a deep breath and tried to regulate his heart rate. He couldn’t stand his client, but Tommy’s cooperation meant four men who were at least as bad if not worse would face consequences for their actions. He turned back around. “We good to go, Marcie?”
“Yeah.”
They got out of the car and walked toward the warehouse.
“Weird that they don’t have security lights out here.”
“They usually do,” Tommy said.
If Jule hadn’t been so tired, he may have thought to ask more questions or suggest that Marcie call her commander, but he hadn’t seen Tor in three months, which always wore him down and made his sleep restless.
Add that to having been in trial all week and now being forced to play nice with a man he wanted to kick the shit out of, and he was bone-deep exhausted.
Within moments of the warehouse door slamming shut behind them, Jule recognized his mistake. Marcie was scanning her flashlight across the wall so Jule could locate the light switch when he heard a popping sound.
“Get down!” Marcie shouted. She reached for her gun and flipped around.
Confused, Jule crouched to the floor. More shots bounced off the wall behind them, and he realized they had walked into an ambush.
Jule flicked his gaze around the room, trying to figure out where the shots were coming from and if there was anywhere to hide, but the darkness made it difficult to see anything.
After that, everything happened at light speed. Tommy ran toward the door, more shots were fired, and he grunted and fell to the floor.
“Fuck.” Jule stared at Tommy’s unmoving body, his heart slamming against his chest. “Is he dead?”
“Very likely. He took two to the torso and I’m pretty sure one to the head.” Marcie was crouched beside him, holding her gun over her flashlight. “We need to take cover. Can you see anything?”
“No.”
“Stay behind me.”
Jule wanted to argue but he was unarmed and there wasn’t time so when Marcie scootched across the floor toward a shadowy mass that looked like it could provide some protection, Jule followed.
She shot into the dark, presumably trying to create some sort of shield, and it almost work.
Almost because they had just reached what he could now see was a tall rack filled with boxes when Marcie cried out and her gun and flashlight went flying.
“Marcie!” He grabbed her legs and pulled, trying to get her away from the open area and behind the rack.
“Take cover,” she gasped out, voice weak. “Go.”
As if he’d leave her out there vulnerable.
He got her mostly tucked underneath him and stayed low to the ground as he tried to reach their best chance at safety.
He realized the situation had gone from already horrible to catastrophic when she stopped fighting him off and went limp in his arms. “Hang in there, Marcie.” Bullets hit the concrete close enough to make his ears ring and cover him in dust.
And then suddenly, everything went silent.
Jule looked behind him and saw a figure.
Two figures actually. One behind the other.
They looked to be grappling and then the one in front slithered to the ground and lay still.
The one still standing walked toward him.
It was nearly pitch-black and his body was flooded with panic and adrenaline, but Jule would know the shape of that body anywhere.
“Tori?” he croaked.
“Stay down.”
Tor strode over and put a gloved hand on Jule’s cheek. “Are you hit?”
He shook his head. “What are you doing here?”
“Thank fuck.” His voice was shaky, his touch tender. “She breathing?” He inclined his head toward Marcie.
“I think so.”
Tor turned his head from left to right, scanning the room. “That’s her weapon?” He tipped his chin toward Marcie’s gun, which lay in a beam from her flashlight.
“Yes.”
“Stay there.”
He marched toward the gun, picked it up along with the flashlight, and then swept the light over the floor. “This is where she was standing when she was hit?” He carefully made his way over to the spot. “There’s pooled blood.”
“I think so.”
Tor squatted low to the ground, Marcie’s gun in his hand. “Look away.”
“What?”
“Turn your head or close your eyes, Jule. Now.”
Instinctively, he did as Tor said and squeezed his eyes shut. Two shots rang through the dark and then it was quiet again.
“What’d you do?” He stared at Tor.
“What I had to do.” He set the gun and flashlight down and walked back to him. “Can you carry her into the car?”
Jule nodded, his mind unable to process everything that was happening.
“Do that and then drive away and call this in. In that order. Tell them the detective returned fire after she was shot and then she passed out. That’s all you remember.”
“Tor, I don’t—”
“She needs a hospital but it’s not safe for her to stay here and wait for an ambulance. Good Sam’s the closest. Did you hear what I said? Call it in. She was shot, returned fire, then passed out. Got it?”
“Yes.” Jule stood and lifted Marcie into his arms. “You coming?”
“I need to walk through this place to make sure nobody else is here.”
“Why? Come with me.”
“Can’t. Jule, go. I’ll be fine.”
“Tori.”
“She’s going to bleed out. Go.”
Everything in him rebelled at walking away from Tor, but he was right about Marcie, so Jule stopped arguing, shuddered as he passed Tommy’s lifeless body, and ran to the car.
“Hey.”
Tor’s whispering voice and tender touch woke him up. He was stretched beside Jule, his palm stroking Jule’s cheek.
“What time is it?” He blinked his dry eyes open.
“Little after three. Sorry to wake you up. I can’t stay. Just came to check on you.”
“’S okay. I’m glad you came.” It had been after midnight by the time he had finished talking to the police about the absolute clusterfuck that had happened at the warehouse.
Between the drive home, shower, and anxiety that had been twisting his gut, he couldn’t have been asleep for more than half an hour.
He raised his arm, wrapped it around Tor, and cupped the side of his neck. “I was scared tonight.”
“I know.” Tor kissed his forehead. “Sorry I wasn’t there sooner.”
“Not about me, about you.” He nuzzled Tor’s neck.
“I wasn’t the one being shot at.” Tor pressed his face to Jule’s neck and hugged him tightly.
He combed his fingers through Tor’s hair.
When he hadn’t been talking to detectives, Jule had been thinking about what Tor could possibly have been doing in a warehouse that had been one crime scene months earlier and become another that night.
The only definitive answer he could come up with was nothing good.
He didn’t have a solution for what they could do about the danger Tor’s father posed, but maybe if Tor were willing to talk to him about it, they could come up with a plan together.
Nobody was smarter than Tor or more determined and yet he had been running for over a decade.
It was both unsustainable and out of character.
And in addition to all of that, Jule had seen very clearly that the life Tor was living was likely just as unsafe as the one he was avoiding.
“Why are you doing this, Tor? You don’t have to. You can stop. I can help you stop.”
“I can’t.”
“Fuck that. I’m so sick of this shit. Aren’t you sick of it?”
“Leave it alone, Jule.” Tor propped his forehead against Jule’s and wove his fingers through Jule’s hair.
He always had. Every time Tor had shut down, he had relented.
They were twenty-eight years old. People around him were getting married, having children.
But they were stuck in a purgatory that Tor seemed unwilling to fight his way out of.
For years, Jule had relented, but in that moment, exhausted and scared and frustrated, Jule pushed back.
Not with his fists or with his rage, but with his words.
“No. Tori, I don’t understand. Talk to me. You never fucking talk to me.”
Something shifted in Tori’s expression, a crack, and for a moment, he thought he’d gotten through to him. But then the blinds came down, his expression shuttered, and he sat up.
“Tor?” he said, panicked. “What are you doing?” He didn’t need to hear the answer because Tor was showing him by reaching for his shoes. “Please don’t go.” He kicked himself for pushing too hard. “Tor, come on.” He gripped his hip.
“I talk to you, Jule,” Tor said as he wedged his foot into his shoe. “You’re the only person I really talk to. But some things can’t be said.” He bent back down and kissed him. “I have to go. I’ll come back as soon as I can.” He kissed him again. “I’m so glad you’re okay.”
“Tori, please. I need to understand.”
He gazed at him for a long time, his blue eyes so shattered that Jule’s chest ached in reaction. “Penance,” Tor finally said, and then he stood and walked out the door.