Some Kind of Hero (Troubleshooters #17)

They weren’t kissing but they were definitely glued tightly together—and the emotion in their body language was off the charts. In fact the SEAL’s face—Schlossman’s face—was twisted, as if he was trying not to cry.

Peter saw the same whatever-it-was that she was seeing, and he made a sound, low in his throat, that was close to a growl. “I’m gonna fucking kill him.”

“He’s really one of your SEALs?” she asked. That made him likely even older than Dingo, since these days most SEALs were college graduates.

“No, he’s a candidate,” Pete said tightly. “He’s not a SEAL yet, and now he’s never gonna be. Motherfucker.”

“So he’s one of your students,” she clarified. “Do you think that’s how he and Maddie met?”

“I have no idea how they met,” he said. “No idea. Maddie’s never even come to the base with me, so…Jesus, he must’ve gone after her—targeted her. Son of a bitch.”

“That’s pretty creepy,” Shay said. “Do you really think he’s capable of—”

“He went through phase one of BUD/S under me—Hell Week—and I was hard on him.” Peter paused. “No, I was brutal. I didn’t think he’d make it, but he surprised me, and…he did. But now he hates me. He’s made that pretty clear.”

Shayla used her fingers to expand the photo on her phone’s screen, enlarging Schlossman’s face. His expression was one of anguish. “Whatever this is, whatever’s going on, he’s not happy about it.”

“Is that supposed to make me feel better?”

She looked up and into Peter’s eyes. His anger was mixed with frustration and his own darkly private pain.

“How can I help?” she asked him in response. “What do we do next? Okay, here’s an idea. How about if I go and talk to this young man?”

He laughed as he jammed his truck into drive, and pulled out of the parking spot and then out of the lot. “Nah, I’m gonna take you home.”

She made a high-pitched hmm sound. Where was Harry when she needed alpha-male-wrangling backup? But he didn’t appear, so she went with, “That’s not a very good idea.”

Peter pretended his reasons were logistical. “Yeah, actually, he’s probably on the base, so it’ll be faster and easier just to drop you home, instead of checking you in as a guest.”

Shayla took a deep breath and refused to cosign his bullshit. “I’m calling you on that, Lieutenant,” she said flatly. “Will you please think with your brain for a second—instead of cavemanning this? I mean, I have kids, so I get it. I do. But there’s a reason good cop, bad cop is a thing. If you want to get info from this man, it simply makes more sense to bring me along. Of course, if your real goal is to just beat the hell out of him…or have him beat the hell out of you—” She pointedly looked at the photo again. “This young man is big, and maybe deep down you think that his kicking your ass would be well-deserved—”

She’d purposely stomped on his alpha-male button and he responded as expected with a flash of frost in his blue eyes. “Yeah, no way can that idiot kick my ass. Just let him try.”

“So you do want to start a fight,” Shay said as he braked to a stop at a traffic light. She sighed, maybe a tad too dramatically. “Well, that’s disappointing. I thought you wanted to find your missing daughter.”

Peter’s hands were so tight around his steering wheel, his knuckles were white. As she gazed pointedly at him, he closed his eyes and inhaled a long, slow, deep breath. “I do want to find her,” he said on his exhale, opening his eyes to look at her. “But I also really want to punch Schlossman in the face. If he used Maddie to get back at me…” He shook his head.

“The key word there, Lieutenant, is if,” Shayla pointed out. “And if he used Maddie that way, well, he’s going to have bigger problems, don’t you think? Why muddy it by giving him a reason to play the victim card?” She pretended to be a blubbering Schlossman. “Yeah, I know she’s only fifteen, Detective, but Lieutenant Greene punched me in the face!”

He actually laughed at that—good that he could still laugh—but then his phone rang. It was connected to the Bluetooth in his truck, and it was up so loud they both jumped. The name Zanella appeared on the dash’s screen, and Peter said, “I’m gonna take this,” even as Shayla told him, “You should answer that.”

“Zanella, you’re on speaker. I’m in the truck with Shayla,” Peter curtly said as a greeting.

“Ah, you’re still with Shayla-the-neighbor.” Izzy Zanella’s voice was loaded with That’s interesting innuendo.

“Not still.” Peter didn’t try to hide his annoyance. “Again.”

“We made a plan to go over to the high school early this morning,” Shay explained.

“Any luck?” Izzy asked.

“Not much,” Peter said. “A few leads—best is from Shayla’s son. We’re kind of in the middle of it. What’s up?”

“Drove the fam to the airport and on the way home, it occurred to me that I have this spacious rental van for another fifteen hours,” Izzy’s voice cheerfully said. “I thought I could bop on over to the storage space in Palm Springs, bring all that stuff back and stash it in your garage for you, save you the road trip. I just need the key or the combo to the padlock—oh yeah, and the storage unit number would be helpful, too, so I don’t have to wander the place, weeping as I try to open every lock.”

“Wow, that would be great,” Peter said. “Thanks, man, but…you really wanna do that drive all by yourself?”

“Noooo,” Izzy said. “No, no, no. I tried Lopez, but he’s busy—” somehow he managed to make air quotes with only his voice “—but then I remembered da boyz in Boat Squad John have today off, and I figured, hey, they were prolly looking for something to do, am I right? And since those young’uns owe me a giant-ass favor in the vague shape of humping boxes into a van—”

Peter cut him off. “Boat Squad John is going to Palm Springs with you? Today?”

“Well, not all of ’em,” Izzy said. “Five more guys in the van would take up a lot of space and kinda defeat the purpose. But Seagull volunteered, bless him. The rest of the idiots drew straws and Hans won.” He paused. “Or maybe he lost. Nah, I’m gonna go with won.”

“Hans Schlossman?” Shayla asked and Peter looked at her sharply, shaking his head in a very clear Say nothing more.

“That’s right,” Izzy confirmed. “What? Wait, let me guess—Grunge has been regaling you with the timeless tale of the mighty, mighty Boat Squad John. Oh. And no wonder. Those tadpoles did us proud during Phase One, but the biggest surprise of all prolly had to be when Hans—”

Peter cut him off. “Where are they meeting you—or are they already there? Where the fuck are you?”

“Well, you’re sure interested in the minute details, G. I’m the fuck at the Grill—I just had breakfast. Timebomb Jackson’s gonna drop off Seagull and Hans in about ten, but we’ll need to get that unit number and key from you before we hit the road. Breakfast was delicious: blueberry pancakes with sides of scrambled eggs and—”

Peter did a U-turn right in the middle of the street even as he cut Izzy off again. “I’m five minutes from you, I’m bringing the key, don’t go anywhere.” He punched the end-call button and looked again at Shayla. “Good cop, bad cop it is.”