Skin Deep (Station Seventeen #1)(83)
Her pulse clattered in yet another round of you can’t be serious. “What? No.”
“A clear and present threat was made against you,” Sinclair said, gesturing to the mirror where her dress and the ominous message still stood like a taunt. “What else would you suggest we do?”
“Let me back on the case?” she asked with a little bit of sarcasm and a whole lot of honest suggestion. “This is beyond personal now, Sam. You can’t really expect me to sit in protective custody while you guys track this bastard down.”
Aha. The look on Sinclair’s face said her words had found their mark. Still, he asked, “Are you refusing protective custody?”
Isabella answered with care. “I’m not an idiot. I know how to watch my back and I’ll check in at regular intervals. But as far as staying in some safe house in the hinterlands of the city, yeah. I’m refusing protective custody.”
Sinclair frowned, but he also didn’t argue. Thank God. “You’re going to have to stay somewhere else, at least for tonight while CSU goes over this place and we look into leads. If one of them points at DuPree, we’ll let you know.”
A protest formed, hot and quick on her tongue, but Kellan jumped in before she could say a word, his arms knotting across his chest. “Wait. You’re really not putting her back on the case?”
Now it was Sinclair’s turn to cross his arms and go for the stare-down. “Walker, you’re here right now as a courtesy to Isabella. Don’t make me regret being nice.”
“No, I’m here because I was with her when she came home and found her apartment trashed. I’m part of this, just like she is. And if booting her from this case after this sonofabitch DuPree just threatened her is your definition of nice, I’d hate to see you act like a dick.”
In an instant, the air seemed to vanish from the room, and Sinclair’s stare turned razor-wire sharp as he pinned Kellan with a glare strong enough to be weaponized. “That’s unfortunate, because you’re about to make me cross that line.”
“Be my guest,” Kellan shot back. “You could use a little riling up as far as this case is concerned.”
Even in the face of Sinclair’s badge and Beretta, he didn’t take one toe off the proverbial line, and sweet Jesus, things were really mission critical if she had to be the voice of reason.
“Okay, you two,” Isabella said, wrestling her voice into calmness despite the game of high-velocity tag her heart was playing with every last one of her ribs. “I get that things are a little tense, but we’re all on the same side here.”
Sinclair broke the standoff first. “You’re right, we are. But I can’t put you back on this case until you start following the chain of command and learn how to trust your team. Especially now that you’re a potential target.”
Kellan snorted. “What do you think she just did?”
Stunned, Isabella turned to stare at him, Sinclair mirroring her surprise as his chin snapped around to do the same.
But Kellan either didn’t notice their shock or didn’t care that they were both gaping like fish on dry land. “As soon as I told Isabella we’d found Angel in that fire, she called you,” he said. “She knew her ass was on the line, but that didn’t stop her, even for a second. She knew she needed help, and she trusted you to give it. And just now, when she and I came in here and found this place trashed, with her dress on display and that message obviously left to taunt her, what’s the first thing she did? She called you. She knows exactly where DuPree lives. She could’ve gone over there all commando to take care of the threat herself, but she didn’t. She called you. Do you really think she’d do that if she didn’t honor your chain of command? Or if she didn’t trust you? Because I sure as shit don’t. She’s a good cop, Sinclair. She cares about finding justice for these women, and she deserves to be back on this goddamn case.”
Holy…hell.
For a second, Isabella couldn’t breathe. Kellan wasn’t wrong about her trusting Sinclair—in fact, he’d made the same argument she’d been ready to launch, albeit maybe a bit more bluntly. Not only had he beaten her to the punch, but the absolute certainty of what he’d said rang hard in her ears.
He didn’t just believe her, and he didn’t just think she was good at her job.
He had her back.
“Walker.” Sinclair’s voice broke the silence, gravelly and low. “Can you give me a minute with my detective? And before you think about arguing with me, you should know that I’m not really asking.”
Kellan paused, and Isabella’s heart gave up an involuntary squeeze. She stepped in next to him, her boots quiet on the floorboards even though her pulse pounded like a runaway freight train in her ears.
“It’s okay. Why don’t you check in with the rest of the unit and let them know I’m good. I don’t want them to worry.”
“I’ll be right in the next room,” he said, sliding one last frost-blue glance at Sinclair before stepping carefully through the mess and out her bedroom door.
Isabella braced herself for Sinclair’s reaction, and true to form, he didn’t disappoint. “Your boyfriend’s a little territorial.”
She bit back the urge to tell him she hadn’t had a boyfriend since she’d been seventeen. Not that it wasn’t the God’s honest, but all things considered, they had bigger fish to fry.