Lover Unleashed (Black Dagger Brotherhood #9)(110)

José went back to his paper-clip sketching. “Internal Affairs is going to give you a warning.”

“Really?”

“I told them your head was where it needed to be,” José said after a moment.

Veck cleared his throat. “Thanks, man.”

José kept moving the clip around, the little scratching noise so very loud. “The pressure in this job is a killer.” At this, he looked Veck right in the eye. “It is not going to get easier.”

There was a pause. Then his partner murmured, “You don’t believe what you told them, do you.”

José shrugged. “Time will tell.”

“Why the hell did you save my job, then?”

“I guess I feel that you should have a chance to right your wrongs—even if they’re not really yours.”

What José kept to himself was that it wasn’t the first time he’d taken on a partner who had things to work out on the job, so to speak.

Yeah, and look at how Butch O’Neal had turned out: Missing. Presumed dead. In spite of whatever José had thought he’d heard on that 911 tape.

“I am not my father, Detective. I swear to you. Just because I was being professional when I hit the guy—”

José leaned forward, his eyes boring into the kid’s. “How did you know that was what bothered me about the attack. How did you know the calm was the thing.”

As Veck blanched, José eased back again. After a bit, he shook his head. “It doesn’t mean you’re a killer, son. And just because you fear something doesn’t mean it’s true. But I think you and I need to be real clear with each other. Like I said, I don’t think it’s fair for you to be held to a different standard because of your pops—but if you have another outburst like that over anything—and I mean parking tickets”—he nodded toward the Starbucks mug—“bad coffee, too much starch in your shirt . . . the goddamn photocopier . . . it’s game over. Do we understand each other? I’m not going to let someone dangerous wear a badge—or a gun.”

Abruptly, Veck went back to staring at his monitor. On it was the face of a pretty blond nineteen-year-old who had disappeared about two weeks prior. No body yet, but José was willing to bet she was dead by now.

After nodding, Veck picked up the coffee and sat back into his chair. “Deal.”

José exhaled and put the paper clip where it belonged, in the little clear box with the magnetic rim. “Good. Because we’ve got to find this guy before he takes anyone else.”





THIRTY-NINE


Traveling south on “the Northway,” as Manuel called it, Payne’s eyes were starved for the world around her. Everything was a source of fascination, from the streaming lines of traffic on either side of the road, to the vast black heavens above, to the bracing night chill that rushed into the car’s cockpit every time she opened her window.

Which was about every five minutes. She just loved the change in temperature—warm to cool, warm to cool. . . . It was so totally unlike the Sanctuary, where everything was monoclimatic. Plus there was the great blast of air that blew into her face and tangled her hair and made her laugh.

And then, of course, every time she did it, she looked over at Manuel and found that he was smiling.

“You haven’t asked where we’re going,” he said, after her most recent shutting.

In truth, it did not matter. She was with him and they were free and alone and that was more than enough—

You scrub him. At the end of the night, you scrub him and come back here. Alone.

Payne kept her wince to herself: Wrath, son of Wrath, had the kind of voice that went with the likes of thrones and crowns and black daggers hung about the chest. And the royal tone ’twas not window dressing. He expected to be obeyed, and Payne was under no misapprehension that just because she was the Scribe Virgin’s daughter, somehow she was not subject to his rule. As long as she was down here, this was his world and she was in it.

Whilst the king had uttered those awful words, she had squeezed her eyes shut, and upon the silence that had reigned thereafter, promptly realized that she and Manuel would be going nowhere unless she avowed.

And so . . . she had.

“Would you like to know? Hello? Payne?”

With a start, she forced a smile to her face. “I would prefer to be surprised.”

Now he grinned deeply. “Even more fun—well, as I said, I want to introduce you to someone.” His smile faded a little. “I think you might like her.”

Her? As in a female?

Like?

Verily, that would happen only if the “she” in question had a horse face and a big butt, Payne thought.

“How lovely,” she said.

“Here’s our exit.” There was a soft click-click-click and then Manuel turned the wheel and drew them off the larger road onto a declining ramp.

As they stopped in a line of other vehicles, she saw off on the far, far horizon a huge city, the likes of which her eyes struggled to comprehend: Great buildings marked with an incalculable number of pinhole lights rose up from a ground cover of smaller structures, and it was not a static place. Red and white lights snaked in and around its edges . . . no doubt hundreds of cars on roads similar to the one they had just traveled upon.