Darker Than Any Shadow

Chapter Twelve

I entered Trey’s apartment to the sound of the shower. When I opened the bathroom door and stuck my head inside, the steam billowed around me in a thick tumble. Trey liked lava-hot water combined with lots of soap. The result was a heady overdose of sensation, like an ancient bathhouse, rich with the smell of unguents and oils.

I hopped up on the black marble vanity as the water stopped. “Hey boyfriend, I’ve got a problem.”

Trey’s voice echoed in the stall. “What kind of problem?”

“Rico’s hiding something, something big, and I don’t know what to do about it.”

“What makes you think he’s hiding something?”

“Fifteen years of being his best friend. Plus blood stains on his shoes, which are in an APD evidence locker, which I will tell you about on the way.”

Trey pulled the shower curtain back and stepped out, a thick white towel wrapped low at his hips. He always looked so young without the suit and tie and perfect hair, practically virginal.

“On the way where?”

“Lupa.”

I pulled off my tobacco-scented shirt and tossed it in the hamper. He’d laid out a neatly folded stack of clothes—black sweatpants, white tee-shirt. Clothes for staying in.

He put his hands on his hips. “Why are we going there?”

“We’re helping clean up. Cricket said the bathroom’s still off limits, but the office is no longer part of the crime scene. Which makes it and the hall and the parking lot fair game.”

“Fair game for what?”

I ignored the question. “You used to work crime scenes, right?”

“No. I was SWAT.”

“I mean before that, when you were in patrol. You obviously know how to secure a scene, you did it last night.”

“Securing a scene and working a scene are not the same thing.”

“Nonetheless. I still need you.”

“Why?”

“Ah, my sweet, you’re doing that thing you do.”

“Which thing?”

I stuffed my jeans into the hamper and slammed the lid. “I want to know the truth about what’s really going on with those people—Cricket, Jackson, Frankie, Padre, Rico—oh yes, let’s not forget Rico.”

Trey started to say something else, and I cut him off. “I know, I know. Everybody lies. I want to know what they’re lying about.”

Trey looked at me for a long time, dripping wet. “You are aware, of course, that I’m not infallible, especially with people under emotional stress. And all those people—”

“—fit that category, I know. But you’re still the best thing I have to a lie detector.”

“Which is also unreliable in certain circumstances.”

“I’m making do.” I knew I had clean jeans in my drawer and a couple of tee-shirts in my section of the closet. I hoped I’d replenished the underwear. Trey still looked grumpy. I tried to sound reasonable and sweet.

“Come on, I never ask you to do this.”

He shot me a look.

“Okay, hardly ever.” I moved to stand right in front of him, so close I could feel the wet heat rising from his body. “Only when it’s important. And this is important.”

Trey narrowed his eyes and not in that analytical way. In that way that made the blue sharpen and melt at the same time, in that quickening way that was as tactile as a caress.

I put my hands on my hips. “Don’t give me that look. You had your chance last night.”

He cocked his head. “You told me to make flow charts. Then you told me to go to sleep.”

The steam beaded my face, kinking my hair into frizzy corkscrews. I put my arms around his neck, his skin moist and supple beneath my hands.

I looked up at him. “You always do what you’re told?”

“Most of the time. You know that.”

I reached down and grabbed a thick handful of towel.