Hold On (The 'Burg #6)(134)

He watched her smile as she pocketed her tips and moved back his way, making eye contact with other folks who had asses to stools to see if they were good.

She had to stop to mix a drink.

And while she did, Garrett decided he didn’t give a f*ck if it was an overreaction or if his gut spoke true.

With her history and his, he hoped she picked door one or door two, either of them meaning Garrett had access so he could look after Cher and Ethan.

Because he didn’t want to take any chances.

Chapter Eighteen

It’s Just Merry

Garrett

Early Wednesday Morning

Garrett woke up to his phone ringing.

On his stomach, alone in his bed, he reached a hand to his nightstand and tagged it.

He looked at the cracked screen, made another mental note to go out and get a new one, and took the call.

“Yo, Mike,” he greeted.

“Sorry, man. Call out.” Mike sounded just as drowsy as Garrett, meaning he’d been woken too. “Homicide.”

Fuck.

Garrett pushed up and reached out to his light.

Homicides in the ’burg were rare.

Death happened all the time. Accidents. Disease. Old age. Suicide.

But homicide, not so much.

The ’burg was too small to have units dedicated to specific crimes. This meant the ’burg’s detectives bought cases on rotation no matter what they were.

Garrett had been on the job a while. All the men in the bullpen had been on the job a while.

But he felt it was safe to say none of them had been on the job long enough where they took a homicide in stride.

It wasn’t the gruesomeness of death.

It was that his job was not the kind of job that at the end of the day, you were filled with joy. Or energy. Or anything.

Except, if you closed a case, you got a high off of your part in bringing justice.

Luckily, those highs were huge and they made the job worth it.

Homicide didn’t give you that. Not ever. Not even if you caught the killer.

It was too final. There was no going back. No coping.

It was just done.

The bad guy had to be caught. He had to be punished. You busted your ass more than any case you had to see to that.

But the only thing a successful takedown offered was closure to those left behind.

And that didn’t mean shit.

“Meet you at the scene,” he muttered unenthusiastically.

“Text you where,” Mike replied in the same tone.

“Right.”

“Later.”

They disconnected and Garrett’s phone sounded again the second his feet hit the floor as he pulled his ass out of bed.

He looked at Mike’s text and texted back his ETA considering shower time, dressing, and getting to the location.

He was there before Mike even though Mike’s house was closer. Then again, Garrett didn’t have a woman in his bed to slow things down, even for a morning kiss.

This reminded him that day was the day Cher’s time was up on making a decision.

Ryker was MIA. Even Tanner couldn’t get a lock on him.

This did not make Garrett happy and it made Tanner worried.

Without Ryker to explain, none of them had any idea what Jaden Cutler had to do with Carlito Gutierrez—Ryker being their usual informant on all things Carlito—or what Robert Paxton had to do with either of them.

And Colt having a conversation with Ryan the day before didn’t shed any light on the situation either. Ryan had been on the job for approximately two hours before Cher spotted him. He’d planted his bugs but hadn’t heard anything since Cutler hadn’t returned home.

A mystery.

And cops didn’t like mysteries.

But all this going down on Cher’s street, Garrett really didn’t like this particular mystery.

He approached the address Mike texted and saw uniforms at the scene, crime tape already up. Marty, plus Marty’s new partner (a rookie), Abe, and Adam were milling around. Ellen, Adam’s partner, wasn’t, which meant she was likely talking to a witness somewhere.

It was early. School and work traffic hadn’t even started, so the scene was deserted except for police presence.

And the scene was right at the mouth of a cul-de-sac in a lower-middle-income development that had been so hard hit by the recession the country was just pulling itself out of, half the houses in the development were abandoned, and they looked it, or they were for sale, and that didn’t look much better.

Empty was empty. There was a feel to it, and no matter what it was that was empty, it didn’t feel good.

Garrett parked, got out, gave a chin lift to Adam and Abe, then moved toward Marty, who had seniority over all the uniforms, and he was closer to a blue Ford Fiesta, the lone car parked on the street. Also the scene of the crime.

“ME’s on his way,” Marty announced when Garrett got near. “Ellen’s inside with the lady who called it in. Mike comin’?”

“Should be here soon,” Garrett muttered, his eyes on the driver’s side of the car. “Fuck,” he whispered.

It was a woman.

He hated homicide because he was a human being.

But he hated it worse when it was a woman.

This one young. Too f*cking young.

Then again, they always were.

“Far’s I can see, she took three. The one to the throat did it, though,” Marty said.