Chapter Twenty-Six
RHYS
“SIT DOWN, Abbot,” AD Dunn says as he points at the chair across from his desk.
His tone pisses me off from the start. I’ve never been fond of Dunn, never pretended to be friends with him or tried to kiss his ass. As long as I do my job, and do it well, it shouldn’t matter how much I like him or if he likes me.
But the tone as he tells me to sit down has my spine straightening, and I clench my jaw. The anger with Sanders is still fresh on my mind, so I take a deep breath and sit down, determined not to let one occurrence influence the other.
Leaning forward on his desk, he links his fingers like he always does. His blue eyes are angry as he takes a deep breath. “A complaint has been lodged against you. It accuses you of ethical misconduct with a witness.”
Standing from the chair I just put my ass in, my body reacts as if he just landed a cheap shot to my jaw, every muscle tight, and I clench my fists as I tower over his old desk. “On what fucking grounds?”
He leans back in his squeaky chair, his eyes narrowed. “Sit down.” Each word is sharp and punches through the tension.
Looking over his head at the wall, I take a deep breath as I lower myself back down in the chair. I need to calm down, or I’ll end up without a job.
Keeping his reclined position in his chair, he slides a folder across his desk, an anonymous complaint. “I need to know if there is any truth to it, and what I need to tell the Inspector General.”
“Of course there’s no fucking truth to it! The woman is difficult as hell, and I’m just trying to keep her safe.”
It’s true, she is difficult, and I am trying to keep her safe. They don’t have to know that I’ll put a bullet into the head of anyone who tries to hurt her, whether it’s attached to this case or not.
I reach for the folder, and open it to the first page.
Everything is typed, Kinley’s name is listed as the witness. Every instance that Sanders has been witness to is listed. The fucking coward couldn’t even make a complaint without hiding behind the black redacted bars stamped across the page where the accuser’s name is.
My phone buzzes in my pocket, and I slip my finger in to push the button to silence it.
Flipping the first page, there are witness statements from the police department from when we interrogated that stupid fuck, Finney.
“Everyone in the conference room witnessed your behavior during the meeting when a derogatory comment was made about the witness, Abbot. I asked you then if there was anything I should know.”
Lifting my eyes from the file, I have to loosen the muscles in my jaw to answer him. “Because there’s nothing to know. Because I want to keep her safe doesn’t mean I want to take advantage of her!”
For the first time in my life, I’m going to lie through my teeth. For my job and for Kinley’s dignity. I won’t drag her through a humiliating investigation through the Inspector General if I can help it. This is my fault, all I had to do was control myself.
Something about her makes me lose all of my common sense, no woman has ever had that kind of power over me.
But I don’t regret it, I don’t regret anything with her. I’ll carry the weight of all this, she doesn’t need to feel any of it.
Looking back down, I flip another page. “I’m going to appeal.
” Without looking up at Dunn, I continue.
“This is Sanders’ way of getting back at me for embarrassing him in front of the guys, and telling him he needs to stop sniffing around the witness.
He’s had a hard-on for her since we first brought her into custody. ”
“Are you suggesting that Sanders has stepped outside the lines?”
Looking up at him, I lift my eyebrows and nod. “Abso-fucking-lutely.”
My phone buzzes again, and I slip my hand in my pocket to silence it again.
“So, you’re telling me there is no basis to this complaint?” His chair squeaks as he turns sideways and links his fingers in front of him, his elbows on the chair arms.
“No, there’s not! I don’t know for sure why Sanders has taken it to this level. I thought he was just pushing boundaries and engaging me in a pissing match. But this is baseless, a misuse of company resources, and a waste of everyone’s time.”
He stares at me as he tips his head. “You know we’ll have to assign the witness to another agent.”
My heart clenches, and everything in me wants to refuse and tell him to go fuck himself. She’s mine to protect and take care of.
“She won’t go with another agent, she’ll go back to her ranch. I had to practically beg her to leave her family to stay with me after the incident at her cabin.”
“We still have to try. She has every right to refuse protection, but if the Inspector General gets involved, they will insist.”
“Then don’t send this to the Inspector General.”
He lifts his hands in surrender. “It’s out of my hands. Sanders copied the executive assistant director in Oklahoma City. He’ll be reaching out to me.”
Fuck!
My phone buzzes in my pocket again, but I decide to check it this time just in case. On the screen are multiple notifications from my security system.
“What the fuck?” I whisper as I stand up and tap through the security clip icons on my screen. The hair on my neck stands up, and my gut twists.
“What?” Dunn asks as I watch Kinley waving up into the camera lense in her bra and boxers with my shirt tied around her foot.
Then I watch her climb the fence, her arms shaky and her face as red as a beet. She keeps looking toward the front of the house, and just as she gets over the fence, her head jerks and she hurries out of the range of the camera.
In another clip, Sanders walks up to my front door. He was just here twenty minutes ago. He went right to my house! Motherfucker!
“Fuck!” I look up at Dunn. “Something’s wrong at my house, the witness is injured, and it looks like Sanders is there.”
Where the fuck is Swan?
As I turn to leave, I toss the folder on his desk, and he says, “Take Corbett and Gomez with you.”
“Corbett!” I yell in his general direction as I’m jogging across the room to my desk.
He looks up from what he’s doing and lifts his eyebrows. “Yeah, boss.”
“Get units and an ambulance to my house now. I’m on my way there. I need you and Gomez to meet me there.”
As I grab my keys from my desk and run toward the stairs, I hear Dunn yelling something at me from his office door, but I ignore him and take the stairs two at a time with Corbett on my heels barking off orders on his phone.
We run through the slow, fucking sliding doors at the front entrance of the building to our SUVs.
I didn’t realize it was possible for my heart to freeze and still beat at the same time. Getting a full breath as I break every traffic law in the book is not possible, and my imagination is running wild with scenarios of why she would be outside my house in her bra.
If he fucking touched her, I’m going to put a bullet between his eyes myself.
It only takes me ten minutes to get to my house with the lights on my car, but there are already two police cruisers in the street, and as I jump out of my SUV, I see them standing around something in my front doorway. Panic is squeezing my spine, and I take the front four steps two at a time.
Swan is lying on the floor, with a lot of blood around him, and one of the officers is holding his hand. Another officer turns to stop me. “This is my house.” I bark.
He looks down at my gun and badge and steps back.
The sound of sirens is getting closer, and I kneel next to Swan and lay my hand on his shoulder. He’s pale but conscious and able to focus on me. “Who did this to you, Swan?”
He takes a breath to speak but coughs. He and I both know that he has to give me this info now if he can. I lean closer to him so my ear is next to his mouth. It takes a moment, but he whispers, “Sanders.”
The ambulance pulls up in the driveway, and I squeeze his shoulder. “You’re going to be fine, the paramedics are here.” I look into his eyes, and he nods before I say, “I have to find Kinley.”
He tries to grab my wrist as I lean away from him, but he’s too weak for his fingers to grip. I look in his eyes again, and he mouths his wife’s name.
Nodding, I look over my shoulder at the paramedics lifting a gurney onto my porch. “Don’t worry, I’ll call Stef and take care of it. I’ve got to get out of the way so they can take care of you.”
He nods and relaxes as I stand up and rush down the hall to my bedroom. “Kinley!”
My bedroom door is hanging half off the hinges, he obviously broke through, and the window is open. What the fuck happened here?
I saw her in the backyard on the security feed, so I run to the back door and rip it open to go outside. Sweat immediately forms on my forehead and back from the heat. “Kinley!”
Squinting against the bright sun reflecting off the water, I walk around the pool and glance across the yard before I see two small bloody spots by the pool house on the hot as fuck concrete. She doesn’t have shoes here. When I grab the door to pull it open, it’s locked. I never lock this door.
“Kinley!” I slap my palm against the glass as I yell, and then cup my hands around my face to look into the room.
As I’m considering breaking the glass, the door to the bathroom opens, and she slowly walks out, soaking with sweat, in my boxers and her bra. Her hair is wet and sticking to her red face, and my t-shirt is around her foot, soaked in blood and leaving a footprint on the floor with each step.
Fuck!
Relief washes over me, and I’m able to get a full breath. But I still can’t get the fucking door open.
“Unlock the door, baby.” I yell.
The closer she gets, out of the shadows, I can see her skin is flushed red all over her body from sitting in the heat, waiting for me. My heart breaks as I watch her, she seems to move slower with each step, her beautiful eyes locked on mine.
Her hair is stuck to her skin around her face, and I can see beads of sweat rolling down her chest and stomach. As soon as her finger slides the lock down, I shove the door open. All of her strength seems to have left her, and she falls into my arms.
The panic that was pulling me tighter with each passing minute eases as soon as I touch her. Her body is like a rag doll from weakness and slippery with sweat, and I have to hold her tight against me to stop her from sliding through my grip.
“I got ya, baby.” I grab her around her back and slide my arm behind her knees to scoop her up. Her skin is burning up, so I walk right to the pool and down the steps to squat down and immerse her in the water. The blood in the t-shirt around her foot creates a cloud of red hanging in the water.
She sucks in a breath from the cold and lets her head rest on my shoulder. “What took you so long?” Her voice is weak, but next to my ear.
“I came as soon as I saw you on the camera, babydoll. Are you hurt anywhere besides your foot?”
She shakes her head against my shoulder and wraps her arm around my neck. “You need to work on your response time, Special Agent. I’m okay now you’re here.”
I suck in a deep breath and hug her close to me.
This was too fucking close.