18. Char
CHAR
I stared at the clock, watching as the secondhand ticked around.
And around. And around. How long was the sheriff gone?
I didn’t have a clue, honestly. I kept that folder clutched tightly against my stomach.
My eyelids grew heavy as the cold air in the unforgiving room tugged my body under.
All I needed was a hot meal to fill my belly, a warm blanket, and the arms of my men wrapped around me.
How I would’ve given anything for an update on my boys.
“I said now, Sheriff.”
“Just give me a second. I ran out to get us coffee. You can see her in?—”
“I said, now. Now, where is she?”
I leapt to my feet. I never moved so quickly in all my life.
My ears second-guessed what I heard, but my heart knew.
My soul knew. It came alive, the whole of me, as his lumbering footfalls fell closer to the room.
People pummeled him with questions as the smell of coffee wafted beneath my nose, and I tore through that room like a bat out of hell before I yanked the interrogation room door open.
“Deacon!?” I called out.
But the deputy guarding the room moved to stand in front of me. “Just wait. They’re almost here.”
“Get out of my way,” I said through gritted teeth.
“Just take some breaths,” I heard the sheriff say. “We’ve covered a hell of a lot of ground tonight. She’s a bit?—”
“Char!”
“Deacon!”
I tried to move around the deputy, but he kept stepping with me. Inching around with me, as if he was commanded to keep me in that room. The smile slipped from my face. My grip on that folder loosened. I got into his face, staring him down as a bead of sweat trickled down to his temple.
“Get out. Of my fucking. Way,” I glowered.
“Move, or you’re dead,” Deac commanded.
His grizzly voice filled me with strength as the deputy practically scrambled to get away from the door.
His musky cologne wafted beneath my nostrils, drowning out the smell of half-assed coffee at eight in the evening.
And when he came into view, his gigantic form looming over the heads of every deputy that rushed to his aid, his gaze locked with me.
I took off running down the hallway.
“Deacon!” I exclaimed.
He smiled—genuinely smiled—as I leapt into his arms. I clung to that folder for dear life as I jumped into the air, soaring toward him with my arms and legs outstretched.
I’m sure I looked like a goddamn cartoon as I wrapped myself around him.
As his arms draped over me and his face found the crook of my neck.
“Are you all right, little one?” he murmured into my skin.
Tears sprang to my eyes at the feel of his hot breath against my neck. “They’ve taken good care of me.”
“Promise?”
“You have my word.”
He pulled his head up. “Then why does it sound like you’re still in distress?”
I wiggled the crumpled folder filled with papers into his field of vision. “We have a lot to talk about.”
He furrowed his brow. “Really did a number on that, huh?”
I blushed as a giggle fell from my lips. “God, I missed you. I know it was only for a few hours, but?—”
He tucked a strand of hair behind my ear. “—but it felt like days?”
My forehead pressed to his. “Yeah.”
He kissed it softly. “Yeah, I know.”
I felt his grip on my chin before I registered what was happening, and with all eyes on us, he tilted my head up and crashed our lips together.
His fingertips trailed down my neck, tracing my ever-beating pulse point as our tongues melded together.
He tasted so sweet, like honey straight from the hive.
I molded to him as I devoured him without a care in the world as to who was watching.
Let them watch. Let them gawk. Let them salivate.
I wanted the world to know that he was mine.
“Oh, Deac,” I whispered down the back of his throat.
He pulled away with a soft growl for me. One meant only for my ears.
It shook me to my core.
“We need a secure room, Sheriff,” he said as he turned his gruffness back on.
“We’ve been talking in here,” Nielson said as he brushed past us, “let’s go.”
The tone of the room immediately changed the second the three of us were behind that door. The deputy closed it before the sheriff placed the to-go carton of coffee down on top of the metal table before producing a stack of Styrofoam cups.
“Best I could do under the circumstances. Courtesy of the ol’ lady,” he said.
Deac picked up a cup. “You tell that wife of yours her coffee is always welcome.”
“Yes, please. From me, okay?” Char asked.
DEACON
Goddamn it, I missed that sweet little voice of hers. Being in her presence immediately calmed me, like a good smoke, or a hot sandwich settling into my gut after an arduous day.
I wanted to get her home and fuck her until the whole world knew she was mine.
Nielson chuckled softly before he sat back down in his seat. “So what brings you racing across town at a time like this?”
“This,” I said as I handed him the email Plug printed out.
“Here, you need this, too,” Char said as she held the folder out to me.
I mindlessly took it from her as I watched the sheriff’s face. But he didn’t seem as shocked as I figured he might be.
“What is it?” I asked.
His tongue clicked around in his mouth as he set the email down. “You should really look in that folder first.”
I looked down at the folder Char handed to me and I didn’t waste a second.
I flipped it open as I leaned against the wall behind me, and one by one, pieces dropped into place.
Nielson was there with answers before I even asked them, and Char even hopped in every once in a while to answer questions I hadn’t even spat out of my face.
She really was a force to be reckoned with.
Her father didn’t stand a fucking chance.
“Jesus fucking Christ,” was all I managed to say after looking through the folder’s contents.
“Yeah,” Char said with a snicker.
“Before you ask anything else,” the sheriff said as he stretched his legs beneath the table, “I’ve got a deputy looking something up for me that we need. So just give him a few minutes.”
“What is it?” Char asked.
He held up his hand. “Trust me, just take a deep breath and give him a few more minutes.”
We didn’t need a few minutes, though. The sheriff barely got his words out before a knock came at the door.
“Come in,” Nielson said.
That spindly little deputy who tried keeping Char from me poked his head in, and my face immediately sank.
I stared him down as he came into the room.
I ground my teeth together as he dropped yet another folder in front of Nielson.
And as I watched that motherfucker like a hawk as he scurried out of the room, Char went to stand over the sheriff’s shoulder.
Where they both gasped in unison.
“What?” I asked. “What is it?”
Nielson stood. “Get over here.”
Char flickered a worried gaze toward me. “Now, please.”
I didn’t hesitate to get over there, and as I looked down at what they were looking at, it was as if the entire world finally snapped into place.
“Well,” I said flatly, “now that we know who everyone in play is, let’s hash this out so we have a clear picture.”
Char pointed to Doc’s picture. “That man right there is Captain Ryan Murphy, one of ATF’s own. He’s a dirty cop.”
“High up on the ATF chain, too,” Nielson said as he slid his hands into his pockets.
My head spun with the full force of the scene we had found ourselves caught up in, but I forced myself to keep up as I looked at the papers sprawled out in front of us.
Papers that painted the clearest of pictures when there was once nothing but darkness.
Char took the reins again. “If I’m reading all of this correctly, it seems like ATF tried to make it an internal investigation, but that didn’t work. No one could catch the man in anything they were trying to accuse him of.”
“So they send their best guard dog,” I said.
Char sighed. “Who we now know thanks to Nielson and his fine deputy out there?—”
“Fine is pushing it,” I murmured.
I felt Char’s gaze on the profile of my face as she continued. “—works as an Internal Affairs officer.”
“That’s why she was hunting Doc in the first place. Federal agent gone dirty. It’s textbook,” Nielson said.
I rolled my tongue over my teeth. “So she’s tasked with figuring out just how dirty Captain Murphy is. That’s why we kept finding those little black cameras everywhere we went. She wasn’t tracking us.”
“She was tracking Doc,” Nielson said.
“And it was only a matter of time before I wandered into her net,” Char said.
I pointed to the email. “That still doesn’t explain this, though.”
Char furrowed her brow. “Why doesn’t it?”
I paused and looked over at Nielson before I cleared my throat. “When everyone was at the clubhouse and you were being absolutely brilliant?—”
Char beamed with pride. “Thank you. I appreciate the acknowledgement.”
I chuckled. “I’m sure you do. But while all of that was going on, Plug managed to place a tracker on that van you gave back to her. Which I’m sure you had a good enough reason for doing?”
Nielson nodded. “I did, but we won’t get into it now. It may not be important, it was just a shot in the dark.”
“What kind of shot?” Char asked.
The sheriff rolled his shoulders back. “I figured giving her the van back might make her feel safer after being exposed like that.”
“I just figured you shoved her out of your car because she beat your dashboard to bits,” I said with a grin.
Nielson’s face fell. “Bitch.”
Char roared with laughter, which pulled a chuckle from my own throat.
“She really fucking is,” she said.
Sheriff Nielson hooked his thumbs into his pants belt loops. “That’s great that you got a tracker on the van, though. Where did it lead you guys?”
I puffed out my cheeks with a heavy sigh. “We tracked her to a gas station, a pharmacy, a grocery store, a motel room, and eventually? An abandoned warehouse near the fault line.”
“You’re kidding,” Char said, “are they still there?”
I nodded. “As far as I know.”
“As far as you know?” she asked. “The fuck does that mean?”
“Char,” I said.