“Don’t whine.” He grabbed his jeans from the chair he’d thrown them over.
“I’ll be here when you get back.”
Sitting on that same chair, he pulled on socks, then shoes. “It’s where you go in between that worries me.”
“I won’t leave.”
He stopped, hunched, a shoelace in mid-tie. “Don’t lie.”
“Where can I go? I don’t have a car.”
“You want me to disconnect all the phones, too, so you can’t call a taxi? Forget it, Max.” Done with his shoes, he stood and settled the jeans in place with a shake of his legs. “I know you. Where there’s a will, there’s a way. You’ve got one helluva will.”
“I thought that was one of things you loved about me.”
He stared, mouth flat. Okay, so it wasn’t the right time for a quip. She tried another tack. “Your mother said I’ll die if you make me leave with you.”
His fist cleaved the air. “That’s fucking paranormal bullshit. Horace told her that.”
The F word wasn’t good. “You said you believed.”
“I believe—” He stopped. “I don’t know what I fucking believe except that I’m not leaving my woman alone with a freak like Traynor out there.” His voice rose with every word until he shouted at her.
His woman. She liked it way too much. Bad timing for that emotion. “You forgot about Bootman.”
“Bootman?”
“The last one. The one who shot Cameron. The one who beat me and kicked me and raped me and left me for dead.” Harsh, unrelenting words, she used them to make her case, but guilt tightened the muscles of her throat. “He’s out there.”
He closed his eyes and put his head back, his Adam’s apple bobbing as he swallowed. “All the more reason not to leave you alone.”
“You said you loved me, Witt.”
He looked at her, not a muscle moving, his eyes unreadable. “I do. But you’re obsessed with Traynor. Don’t try to kid me it’s about Bootman.” He fairly spat the name at her.
She didn’t try to answer the accusation in his words, or lie. “You said you loved me.” She stopped, let the words sink in, letting him know by the tilt of her chin that she wasn’t finished. “But you never said you trusted me.”
His aura of emotions—rage, pain, and powerlessness—shimmered around him. “Don’t ask me to do this.”
“I will never ask you to stop being a cop.” She hoped he’d have his life back soon. “You’d wither without it.”
“It’s my job.”
“It’s who you are. I’ll never ask you to change for me. I’d never want you to. I love you the way you are.”
“So you’re saying if I truly love you, I have to let you go.”
“I’m asking you to let me fight my own battle, to not expect me to change now when the stakes have never been higher. Is that so much?”
His fists clenched, released, clenched. “You watched your husband die.” He shook his head slowly. “Don’t make me step back and do the same thing.”
“If you don’t, I’ll die anyway.”
“I’ll keep you safe.”
“Bud Traynor won’t let you.”
He groaned. His knees bent beneath the weight of what she asked. He hit the carpet. “Max, you’re killing me. Don’t ask me to let you go alone.”
She rose from the bed, went to him naked, without bothering to pull the sheet with her or grab a scrap of clothing. She went on her knees in front of him. With her hand to his cheek and her lips only inches from his, she whispered, “Trust me to do this.”
“I don’t know what this is.”
“Neither do I. I only know I have to do it.”
His hands skimmed her arms, then came to rest at her waist. Something moist sparkled in his eyes. “If you die, I’m gonna beat you nine ways to Sunday for it.”
She’d won but felt no elation. She didn’t tell him that dying might be part of what she had to do.
“Are you going to kill Traynor?” He knew after all.
She almost said no, but let the lie die on her lips. “If I can.”
Witt pulled away from her as if something had broken between them. “Remember when I asked if your husband had planned to kill Traynor?”
“Yes.”
He stared down at her for a long moment. “I wouldn’t have blamed him if he had. Sometimes a man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do.” Another Witticism.
“Or a woman?”
He closed his eyes, opened them two heartbeats later. “Or a woman.”
She wanted to put a hand to his cheek, but didn’t, afraid to touch him again until this thing with Bud was over. She stood with him.
He yanked open the top drawer of the tallboy against the far wall and pulled out a box. It looked like a damn piece of Tupperware. Tossing it on the bed, he marched to his nightstand. The drawer slid, stopped. Moonlight flashed on metal in his hand. A magazine, full of cartridges, she was sure. Returning to the end of the bed, he opened the box with a vacuum whoosh and pulled out a gun.
A Glock 9MM. Like Cameron’s.
He jammed in the magazine, only then looking at her. “I assume you know how to use it?”