All In (The Naturals, #3)(59)

You’re better than they are. That’s the point.

“We knew the numbers written on the victims’ wrists were a message,” I said. “We knew they mattered. We knew it wasn’t just our attention he wanted.”

It’s theirs.

“That’s it.” Judd’s voice was rough. “You’re done.” He couldn’t order Agent Sterling off this case. That was outside of his purview. But the rest of us weren’t. He was the final word on our involvement in any investigation. “All of you,” he addressed those words to Dean, Sloane, and me. “It’s my decision. It’s my call. And I say we’re done.”

“Judd—” Sterling’s voice was calm, but I thought I could hear a note of desperation underneath.

“No, Ronnie.” Judd turned his back on her, staring at Sloane’s window, his entire body bow-string tight. “I want Nightshade. Always have. And if there’s a larger group involved in what happened to Scarlett, I damn well want them, too. But I won’t risk a single one of these kids.” The idea of walking away was killing Judd, but he refused to waver. “You’ve got what you need from them,” he told Sterling and Briggs. “You know where the UNSUB is going to strike. You know when. You know how. Hell, you even know why.”

I could make out a hint of Judd’s reflection in the window. Enough to see his Adam’s apple bob as he swallowed.

“It’s my call,” Judd said again. “And I say that if you’ve got anything else you need a consult on, you can damn well ship it to Quantico. We’re leaving. Today.”

Before anyone could respond, the door to the suite opened. Lia stood there, looking supremely satisfied with herself. Michael stood behind her, soaked from head to toe in mud.

“What—” Briggs started to say. Then he corrected himself. “I don’t want to know.”

Lia strolled into the foyer. “We never left the suite,” she announced, lying to their faces with disturbing conviction. “And I certainly didn’t beat the pants off a bunch of professionals playing recreational poker at the Desert Rose. In related news: I have no idea why Michael’s covered in mud.”

A glop of mud fell from Michael’s hair onto the tile floor.

“Get cleaned up,” Judd told Michael. “And all of you, get packed.” Judd didn’t wait for a reply before turning to retreat to his own room. “Wheels up in one hour.”





“I do hope you found your stay to your liking.” The concierge met us in the lobby. “Your departure is a bit abrupt.”

His tone made that sound like a question. It was closer to a complaint.

“It’s my leg,” Michael told him in a complete deadpan. “I walk with a limp. I’m sure you understand.”

As far as explanations went, that one held little to no explanatory power, but the concierge was flustered enough that he didn’t question it. “Yes, yes, of course,” he said hurriedly. “We just have a few things for you to sign, Mr. Townsend.”

While Michael dealt with the paperwork, I turned to look back at the lobby. At the front desk, dozens of people stood in line, waiting to check in. I tried not to think about the fact that in three days, any one of them—the elderly man, the guy wearing the Duke sweatshirt, the mother with three small children—could be dead.

The knife is next. I knew—personally, viscerally—how much damage could be done with a knife. We’re not finished, I thought vehemently. This isn’t done.

Leaving felt like running away. It felt like admitting failure. It felt the way I had at twelve, each time the police had asked me a question I couldn’t answer.

“Excuse me,” a voice said. “Sloane?”

I turned to see Tory Howard, dressed in her standard uniform of dark jeans and a tank. She seemed hesitant—something she’d never struck me as before. “We didn’t get a chance to meet the other night,” she told Sloane. “I’m Tory.”

The hesitation, the softness in her voice, the fact that she knew Sloane’s name, the fact that she’d lied to the FBI to keep her relationship with Aaron a secret—you love him, too, I realized. You can’t un-love him, no matter what you do.

“You’re leaving?” Tory asked Sloane.

“There is a ninety-eight-point-seven percent chance that statement is accurate.”

“I’m sorry you can’t stay.” Tory hesitated again, and she said, softly, “Aaron really did want to get to know you.”

“Aaron told you about me?” Sloane’s voice wavered slightly.

“I knew he had a half sister he’d never met,” Tory replied. “He wondered about you, you know. When you stepped in front of him that night at the show, and I saw your eyes…” She paused. “I did the math.”

“Strictly speaking, that wasn’t a mathematical calculation.”

“You matter to him,” Tory said. I knew, in the pit of my stomach, that it cost her to say the words, because there was a part of her that couldn’t be sure that she mattered to Aaron. “You mattered to him before he even knew who you were.”

Sloane absorbed that statement. She pressed her lips together and then blurted out, “I have gathered that there is an overwhelmingly large chance that your relationship with Aaron is intimate and/or sexual in nature.”