It hit him then. They shared the same monster. This was probably why he felt so connected to her, why he couldn’t stop himself from caring or from being so damn pissed off by the thought of her allowing some man to abuse her.
And because she’s so damn sexy. But deep down he’d known it was more than the attraction he felt. Hell, he’d dealt with dozen of cases involving beautiful women before and managed to treat it like a job and not a personal agenda.
“Do you see anything that’s missing?” he asked, wanting to get her out of here.
She looked around and then met his eyes. “My mom.” She bit down on her lip, slipped off the bed, and followed the black footprints he’d left on her mom’s carpet last night.
He stood in the room, listening to the soft thud of her footsteps moving away from him. The hospital smells seemed to evaporate, replaced by the smell of cigarettes. He looked around. Had Cali’s mom smoked while using oxygen? Shaking his head, he went to find Cali. She waited on the sofa, eyes still dry, sitting with her hands clutched in her lap. One look at her and he knew she was lost in her private world of grief. Damn if he didn’t know how she felt.
He had the urge to pull her up and into his arms. To hold her like he did earlier. She’d felt good against him, soft in all the right places. But it hadn’t just been her being female or soft that made it feel good. It had felt…right somehow.
But it wasn’t. As tempting as it was to give in, to make this more than just a case, he couldn’t. He couldn’t for a dozen or more reasons. And whether he wanted to admit it or not, he wasn’t a hundred percent sure he believed Cali wasn’t just a tad like his dear ol’ mom. Too nice. Too willing to be some man’s doormat.
“Ready?” he asked.
She shot up, walked out, locked the door after he exited and then climbed in his SUV without saying a word.
He didn’t know if she was back to being mad at him, or just mad at the world. Either way he could understand. Grief did that to you.
He drove back to the school where he’d left her car but he needed to ask her more questions about Stan. He wasn’t looking forward to it, but it was his job.
His stomach grumbled and felt as if it was gnawing on his backbone for nourishment. He pulled into a coffee shop. “I need to ask you some questions about Stan. And I’m starving.”
“Haven’t we already tried to do this once?” she asked.
“Yeah.” He shrugged and felt the guilt sitting on his shoulders. “Just a few questions. And I’ll stop being a dickhead. Scouts’ honor.”
She looked suspicious. “You never were a boy scout, were you?”
He grinned. “Touché. But you have my word.”
She inhaled and then nodded. A wave of relief washed over him and he again found himself wanting to stop fighting the attraction, to see where it took them. But damn, where was his willpower? Probably off in some corner of his empty gut dying from hunger and lack of sleep. After some food and rest, surely he’d be back on top of his game.
He went to remove his keys from the ignition when his cell phone rang. Pulling it out of his pocket, he saw it was Quarles. He looked at her. “Sorry. I have to take this.” He answered it. “What you need?”
“Hey,” Quarles said. “Where are you?”
“Right outside the beltway. Why?”
“You need to come in.” Bad news shadowed Quarles’ tone.
The feeling rumbling in Brit’s empty gut reminded him of how he’d felt when Adams had called him about Keith. He prayed he was wrong. “Why?” He gripped the phone harder.
Chapter Thirteen
“There’s been another shooting,” Quarles said. “Another officer. The same MO as Keith’s.”
Brit’s hold on the phone clenched. His lungs held on to the oxygen of his last breath as he put out the one—word question. “Who?”
Quarles cleared his throat before speaking. “Mike Anderson. The kid who worked that domestic violence case with us. He’s dead.”
“No, it can’t be him. He’s in Galveston with his girlfriend.” Brit got a vision of Mike standing at his office door, holding a bag of cat food, and beaming about his plan to have sex on the beach. Brit’s mind refused to believe the kid with such a zest for life and a soft spot for strays could be gone. Gone like Keith. “He’s with his girlfriend,” Brit repeated.
“He never picked her up,” Quarles said. “When he didn’t show up, she assumed he was mad. But when he didn’t call, she finally went over to his place. She found him in his garage. Two shots to the head.”
The truth kicked Brit in the gut. He didn’t want to believe. But refusing to believe something wasn’t going to change a God damn thing. He’d proved that the hour he stared at Keith’s body in the morgue, swearing it wasn’t him.
“Christ.” Brit slammed his hand on the dashboard. “I’ll be right there.” He dropped the phone in his lap.
Cali stared at him with questions in her eyes. “Something wrong?” Her voice radiated concern, tenderness.
“Yeah.”
“With my case?”
“No.” He didn’t say anything else. He couldn’t. He put the car in drive and started back to the school.