Total pages in book: 80
Estimated words: 78364 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 392(@200wpm)___ 313(@250wpm)___ 261(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 78364 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 392(@200wpm)___ 313(@250wpm)___ 261(@300wpm)
“Okay. It’s Sunday night, and I don’t want to see you in the office until Thursday morning when you and your partner report to Jones.”
I nodded.
“Yes?”
“Yessir.”
“Okay,” he said, and I could tell from the catch in his voice that he was very relieved that everything was over. “Let’s move,” he barked at the others.
As he walked out, Becker walked in with Cho and Lopez.
“Where’s your computer?” Becker asked.
“In my bedroom.”
“Good. Some guys leave them at work when they go on vacation, and that annoys the shit out of me. We all know you’re gonna need it.”
“Truer words,” I agreed. “We had to write reports on the situation we encountered in Washington with Luke Stoker.”
“I heard about that,” Becker said softly. “Little girl all right?”
“She is. Yes.”
He took a breath. “Good.”
“The two of us will get our reports written later tonight.”
“That’ll work. Did you fire the gun?”
“I did not.”
“Then please secure it.”
“Yessir.”
“I’ll be here with the team.”
“Thank you.”
“Miro was going to come in the morning to get the dog. Does that work for you?”
I nodded, easing Bodhi back, and he just stood there, not moving, no longer shaking but looking like a zombie.
Going to my kitchen, I first got my phone out of the refrigerator—it was cold but working—turned on the volume, then got my gun off the counter. I walked back to Bodhi, took hold of his bicep, and led him to the bedroom, with Chickie right behind.
I could hear Becker barking orders to the tech team, telling them they had better collect only what they needed and not make a mess. He also said he had a cleaning crew showing up five minutes after them, so they better be thorough.
In the bedroom, I sat Bodhi down on my bed and then slid my left thumb over the slide-mounted safety, engaging it before putting the Glock in my nightstand. Taking a seat next to Bodhi, I put my arm around his shoulders as Chickie put his head in my lap.
“I’m okay,” I told him, petting the dog because he was such a good boy.
He just sat there like he was in a trance.
“Please talk to me.”
Silence.
“Okay,” I said with a sigh. “I’m gonna go get you some water, all right?”
The moment I started to move my arm, he grabbed my hand with both of his.
“Bode?”
He coughed softly, tried to speak, made a noise that was not a word, and then tried again with no better results.
But I knew him, so I could help. “You were scared.”
Shuddering breath. “We were outside, in the SWAT vehicle—not the transport one, the other one with all the monitors inside.”
I nodded.
“We could see you and Brodie on infrared, and then suddenly there’s audio and I can hear that he’s out of it and you’re being so good with him, so calm, like you always are in those situations with hostages, but he’s got a gun, and I can’t get past the thought that you’re all alone with him, and I know what he did to Ian, and if he comes at you, because you’re not at full strength, he could really hurt you… I tried to tell them you’re hurt, but nobody was listening to me.”
“You got here first.”
“Of course I did.”
I would have been there first as well. It was Bodhi. When he called, whenever he called, I would be the one to show up before anyone else. Not that we should have ever been apart. “I wish I wasn’t hurt. I hated you going without me.”
“I know but that couldn’t be helped. What kills me is that I was sure you’d be safe, just like Kage did. You were armed and I set the alarm when I left and Chickie was here.”
“It’s okay,” I soothed him.
“It’s not,” he choked out. There was so much pain and regret, it was suffocating him.
Moving abruptly so he had to let me go, I stood up and went around the side of the bed. “Come get this off me,” I instructed. “Brodie put it on too tight.” He hadn’t, it was fine, but Bodhi needed to do something for me right then. It was necessary.
He was beside me in seconds, gently removing it, careful not to jostle me. “He helped you with the T-shirt too, didn’t he?”
“Yeah.”
“The thought of him touching you, touching your skin… I want to kill him and throw up at the same time.”
So many different emotions running through him at the moment, and it was up to me to fix it, to make him better. “He didn’t hurt me. You can see he didn’t.”
He just watched me with hollow eyes, and with the sling off, I lay down on the bed, on my side, and patted the bed so he’d know where I wanted him.
Following my lead, he stretched out so we were facing each other. He had nowhere to look but into my eyes. “I don’t remember ever being that scared,” he confessed.