Defending Everly (Mountain Mercenaries #5)(21)

Detective Ramirez had stared at Ball for a beat, then nodded. “I believe you, and I’ve been doing my best to follow leads, but there just aren’t any leads to follow right now. The purse is the first.”

Ball didn’t back down, and he didn’t look away. “So what’s the plan, then? How are we going to find Elise?”

They’d ended up talking for another hour and a half. They’d gotten a much more complete rundown of the trafficking situation in the area, and it scared the shit out of Everly. If her beloved sister had been taken by one of the recruiters, they’d probably never find her. She’d live the rest of her life as a plaything for whoever wanted to pay for the privilege—and she most likely would have already been shot up with drugs to keep her more compliant and docile.

It was terrifying, and as if he could sense all the horrible scenarios that were going through her mind, Ball put his hand on her knee and squeezed.

Just that small touch grounded her and let her know she wasn’t alone. That Ball had promised to do whatever it took to find her sister.

Ever since the earlier fight at the convenience store, he’d been . . . different. It was subtle, but there. Everly felt him staring at her frequently, but when she turned to see what he wanted, he’d look away. At first she thought he was pissed that she’d come to his assistance, but it wasn’t that. She couldn’t figure it out, but as they’d had no time to talk about the attack yet, she’d just have to wait to see where his head was at.

They’d promised to come back to the police station in another day or so to touch base with the detective about the case. Everly didn’t want to go back to her grandparents’ house yet. It felt like she should be doing something. Not just sitting around and shooting the shit.

“Come on,” Ball said once they’d left Ramirez’s office.

“Where?”

“I’m hungry, and I know you have to be as well.”

“Me-Maw’s probably been cooking all day,” Everly warned.

Ball smiled. “Awesome. I have a feeling I’m gonna have to work out extra hard to keep the grandma weight off me.”

“Grandma weight?” Everly asked with a small smile.

“Yeah. Your me-maw is an excellent cook, if that meal from last night was any indication.”

“Yeah, and?”

“I do okay in the kitchen, but my weakness is home-cooked meals—that I didn’t have to make. I’m gonna make a pig out of myself, and you’ll be embarrassed when I have to undo the button on my jeans in order to be able to breathe. A few meals like that equals grandma weight.”

Everly chuckled. He wasn’t wrong. But she didn’t think he had anything to worry about when it came to gaining weight. The man was built like a brick house. There was no way he would let himself get out of shape. He was too committed to the Mountain Mercenaries. “When you were saying goodbye to Ramirez, one of the other officers told me about some food trucks parked a few blocks away. We could get something to tide us over until dinner tonight.”

“Sounds good,” Ball said. He held open the door to the station for her, and they walked out into the humid and hot afternoon air.

Neither said anything for a while as they walked, and finally Everly couldn’t stand it anymore. “You haven’t said anything about what happened.”

She didn’t need to elaborate; he knew what she was talking about.

“I know.”

She waited, but he didn’t say anything else. Deciding to let it go, but feeling disappointed at the same time, Everly walked alongside Ball toward the food trucks. He settled on a Greek-style kabob, and she got a sushi bowl. There were a few benches under some trees nearby, and they made their way over to them and got settled.

They ate in silence for a while, then Ball said, “I’ve been a dick.”

The statement came out of the blue, and Everly frowned at him. “What? When?”

He wasn’t eating, instead just staring down at his kabob like if he took his eyes off it, it would lunge and attack him. “In general. I judged you before I even met you, and worse yet, I let my previous experiences overshadow what all my friends, and Rex, were telling me about you.” He looked up then, and the emotion in his eyes made Everly freeze. “Thank you for what you did today. Intellectually, I knew you were a cop, and SWAT, but emotionally, I still saw you as merely a woman.”

Everly refused to drop her gaze. Merely a woman? What the hell did he mean by that? “Go on,” she said quietly, her own lunch forgotten in the seriousness of their conversation.

“When I was in the Coast Guard, I was partnered with Riley. She was fresh out of the academy and so excited to be assigned to patrol. I was older than her by about a decade, and I was happy to show her the ropes. After a while, we got into a comfortable routine, but we weren’t equals. I was her mentor and reveled in the role. Looking back, I know I treated her differently because she was a woman. I wasn’t as hard on her as I would’ve been with a male partner. Did far too much for her. But she didn’t complain. She did her job, but when shit got tough, and it did, she’d step back and let me take the lead.”

He stopped, and everything in Everly wanted to tell him to keep going, to tell her what happened to make him so bitter and dead set against working with a woman again. But she kept quiet. Taking a chance, she reached over and put her hand on his.