“Yeah?”
“Bad news and kind of good news,” Sean said and when Layne did nothing but stare impatiently, Sean went on. “Rutledge didn’t lead us to the location but he did lead us straight to four of her army. The cop on his tail called backup. They came in quick but cool and were there when Rutledge either pushed too hard or got impatient. Whatever reason, shots were fired, the boys moved in.”
“Rutledge?” Layne asked.
“He went down, he’s still alive, it’s bad though and he’s on his way to hospital,” Sean answered.
“Fuck, Sean, that is not good news,” Layne clipped.
“No, the kind of good news is that Rutledge took down one of her army, the cops got the other three, they were all armed and, man, it is highly likely we’ll get ballistic matches on the slugs they pulled outta you,” Sean returned.
Sean was right, that was kind of good news.
“Any of her crew know where the party is located?” Layne asked.
“They’re workin’ them now,” Sean answered.
Layne nodded and moved, Cal moving with him. They separated in the parking lot, both going to their trucks, Cal following close as Layne headed to The Brendel.
Ryker’s bike was parked at the foot of the stairs leading up to Towers’ apartment. Layne didn’t bother finding a spot and neither did Cal, they parked at the curb. They both got out and started to jog up the stairs where Ryker was waiting.
“Bust it,” Layne ordered, his head tipped back to look at Ryker and Ryker didn’t delay, he took a step back, lifted his big motorcycle boot and the apartment door crashed in.
The alarm immediately went off, Ryker and Layne ignored it, both of them moving into the space. Cal went to the alarm panel, ripped the face off, twisted some wires together and the alarm stopped.
“Shit, child’s play,” he muttered, his eyes slicing to Layne. “Rocky lives here, to do list, man.”
Layne didn’t have to think about Roc’s security. Rocky was, that night, officially no longer living at The Fucking Brendel.
“What are we lookin’ for?” Ryker asked.
“Anything,” Layne answered. “Just look.”
“Devin sifted through this place, bro, and I get the sense he’s good at what he does,” Ryker noted, pulling cushions off the couch.
Layne picked up a cushion Ryker pulled off, yanked his army knife out of his jeans and his eyes locked on Ryker.
“He had to go easy,” Layne said softly. “We don’t.”
Then he ripped the cushion open with his knife.
Ryker smiled his ugly smile, it was without humor but filled with something else which made it uglier and a fuckuva lot scarier.
Then he ripped a cushion clean in two with his bare hands.
*
Towers’s apartment was clean so they moved to Rutledge’s.
By the sounds of it, Cal and Ryker were tearing up the downstairs. Or, at least Ryker was.
Layne was working the bedroom when he flipped the mattress on the bed, his eyes glancing across the bottom of the mattress to go to the box springs then his eyes shot back.
Stitches.
Shit.
He walked on the mattress, crouched down to the stitches and carefully slid his knife in. Ripping the material away, he reached in and felt it, he found the edge, pulled out the manila envelope and also pulled in breath.
He knew he didn’t want to see what was inside. Still, he opened the envelope carefully, shook out the eight by tens on the mattress and used his knife to move them around as his stomach churned.
Rutledge. Rutledge and Towers. Towers with girls with Rutledge in shot, watching; Rutledge with girls Layne had never seen; and Rutledge also with Tara Murdoch.
He stood, tearing his eyes away, looking at the wall, taking a moment to pull his shit together.
Then he pulled out his phone and called Merry.
“Hope this is good, big man, ‘cause I’m –”
“I’ve just located evidence that Harrison Rutledge is a pedophile,” Layne told him.
Silence then, “Where are you?”
“Rutledge’s apartment.”
“Man, we’re still holding on the search warrant,” Merry bit out.
“Good, then we’ve assisted the Department in a time-saving measure,” Layne shot back. “We’ll finish up, leave visible what you need to see and move out. No one needs to know that you boys didn’t make this mess.”
“Fuck, Tanner,” Merry hissed.
“Merry, suck it up and work with it,” Layne advised.
“This is not your burden, brother, you didn’t let those girls down,” Merry said low.
“No, brother, we all did,” Layne returned, flipped his phone shut and kept looking.
*
“This is bullshit!” Ryker barked. “Time is wastin’.”
Cal’s eyes cut to Layne, his phone to his ear, he moved out of Layne’s office and into the reception area, closing the door. Cal was working through every number on Rutledge’s cell phone bill, he had half the pile, Dave was sitting at the receptionist’s desk with the other half. They’d taken pictures at the apartment of a number of hopefully useful documents and gone to Layne’s office to print them out.
Ryker and Layne were going through credit card statements.
“Focus, Ryker,” Layne advised.
“Every second we waste –” Ryker growled.
“You wanna hold hands and meditate and hope her location pops in one of our heads?” Layne growled back. “Or do you wanna investigate this fuckwad and hope he tripped up and leads us to your girl?”
Ryker glared at him. Layne held his glare then looked back to the statements.
His eyes shifted through the one in his hand, down and then back up.