Black Is Back (Quentin Black Mystery #4) (6 page)

“Okay.” I looked at Angel. “I’ll go get ready.” I turned back to Nick, trying to decide if I should say something more to him too.

Nick stared back at me.

I watched his eyes go to the giant windows and the view of the city, then to a gold-inlay mixed-media wall-hanging that looked Thai, old and probably cost more than Nick made in a year, if not several years. I’d been to Nick’s apartment in South San Francisco, quite a few times. I knew he was making comparisons there, too––I could feel it without knowing any of the specifics of his actual thoughts. A cop’s salary didn’t buy much in terms of real estate, definitely not compared to someone like Black.

I could almost feel the scowl forming on his face as Nick thought about it, although again, I didn’t read him to confirm any of it.

I felt Black reacting to me staring at Nick.

The instant I felt it, I averted my gaze.

Forcing Nick from my mind, along with any lingering guilt and the fact that I needed to have a real heart-to-heart with him and soon, I retreated down the hall to Black’s bedroom and bathroom. I paused long enough to gather up the clothes in the hall as I passed, some of which were from when we’d first gotten back from the airport after Paris. When I reached Black’s bathroom, I stuffed all of it in the hamper then turned on his shower, cranking up the heat and water pressure as high as both would go.

Seconds later, I stepped under the hot stream and let out a sigh of relief.

I didn’t really want to know how long it had been since Black and I last remembered to shower. Whatever amount of time had passed, the shower managed to do what seeing my friends hadn’t––meaning, it started to clear my head a little.

Standing directly under the pounding stream from his massaging shower head, I sighed again, feeling like the water was sluicing off a whole layer of skin. I felt indescribably better, although I hadn’t been aware of being dirty until Nick pointed it out.

Fighting to keep my mind off what was happening in the other room, I left the glass-enclosed cubicle long enough to grab a comb from one of Black’s bathroom drawers. Retreating back to the shower (dripping water everywhere in the process), I used shampoo, conditioner and the comb to bring my hair back under control. Shampooing a few more times and scouring my whole body with soap, I finally exhaled for real, feeling like I’d discovered some kind of miracle cure for all of life’s problems.

I have no idea how long I was in there, but when I finally turned off the water, I felt different. I grabbed a towel off the rack but it smelled sour, so I shoved that in the hamper too, which was now overflowing. Going through cabinets, I found a clean one.

Once I was more or less dry, I also used Black’s toothbrush.

Only when I’d finished with all that did I comb out my hair for real.

In the bedroom I looked for clothes but my options were limited. Like in the hallway I gathered everything up off the floor and put that on and around the hamper in the bathroom. That left me with whatever I could find in his closet and drawers.

I’d slept here enough times while Black was still in Paris that I managed to find a pair of jeans folded and left on a shelf in his closet. I figured his maid must have found them in his hamper and sent them to the cleaners.

For shirts, I had to borrow one of Black’s. I found a dark blue dress shirt that would work well enough with jeans and threw it on. I buttoned up the front before I started rolling up the sleeves. Being bra-less didn’t thrill me, especially after I’d already caught Glen staring at my chest, but I couldn’t see that I had much choice.

I heard voices rise in the other room.

Tensing, I headed for the bedroom door while still working on the second sleeve.

As I did, Black’s voice rose above the others.

“Just stay out of it,” he growled. “It’s none of your goddamned business!”

“Like hell it isn’t!” Nick that time, even louder than Black. “I’ve known her a fuck of a lot longer than you have, you piece of shit. If you think I’m going to just sit here and let you––”

“Let me
what?
What is your problem with me? Besides the obvious?”

“My
problem?
Are you seriously asking me that right now?” Nick’s voice turned openly angry. I heard worry in it, too. “What are you
doing
to her? Is she on something? She disappears off the face of the earth for weeks––”

“We’ve been here! The whole time! We haven’t been hiding!”

“Bullshit!”

“You
know
we’ve been here!”

“How could I
possibly
know that?”

“You think I don’t know you put me under surveillance, ‘Nick’?” Black growled. “I saw the van. Miri did, too... even before my people told me about it. I run a damned security company. Did you seriously think we wouldn’t notice?”

Nick sounded baffled. “What are you talking about?”

“You know
exactly
what I’m talking about...”

I entered the living room, my hands balled into fists.

The first thing I saw was Angel standing between Black and Nick, her expression alarmed. She had a hand on Black’s chest, which immediately clenched my jaw.

“You’re really going to try and pass this off as normal?” Nick again, glaring at Black as his hand swept the space of the apartment. “Like this has nothing to do with what that freak said in Paris? How stupid do you think––”

“Stop!” I shouted.

Everyone froze.

They turned as one, staring at me.

I glared at Angel. “Get your hands off him. Now.”

Angel flinched, then paled, removing her hand from Black’s chest. She didn’t take her eyes off me as she did it, and I saw her expression flash a surprised hurt, as if I’d slapped her. Black glanced down, then backed further away from Angel’s hand, as if noticing it for the first time.

“What is going on?” I was still shouting.

Nick, Angel and Glen stared at me like they didn’t recognize me.

Black walked towards me then, moving purposefully despite the gracefulness of his strides. He crossed the room in a few quick beats of my heart, and then he had his arms around me. He held me against his bare chest, squeezing me against him in a hug.

Heat pulsed off him, enveloping me.

It smoothed away that electric jolt of fury.

I immediately felt that layer of violence on me drop.

He held me a few seconds more, then kissed my neck.

I felt him wanting to kiss my mouth. I felt him decide not to because of the others... then I felt him noticing I was clean, suddenly self-conscious about himself being not-clean. I felt him wanting to fuck in the shower, or maybe just on clean sheets in his room... a fleeting thought of calling housekeeping to get more sheets, then again a realization that I was clean and smelled really damned good and he’d better stop touching me and thinking about sex or he was going to do something really inappropriate. Then he was remembering the last time he did that, at the restaurant, what he’d said to his friend...

I felt him frown.

All of that passed between us in a confused flicker of information and emotion and affection and worry.

Then Black released me.

Immediately, I felt off-balance again.

“I’m taking a shower,” he announced, also speaking too loudly. “I’ll meet you there. At the station.”

I looked up at him, hesitating.

He sent me a reassuring pulse.

I felt his awareness that we were already making the others uncomfortable.

“It’s better if I don’t ride with him,” he added, still too loud.
He’s reacting to the bond. He’s reacting to it, Miri. He’s fucking in love with you... I wish you’d told me.

Black, no. I really don’t think...

When he gave me a harder look, his mouth a flat line, I fell silent.

Then I sighed. He was right. Nick told me he was in love with me while Black was in Paris. I guess some part of me hadn’t really wanted to believe it.

Black’s jaw clenched. Enough that I knew he’d heard me.

He glared at Nick and I felt hostility expand off him in another hard jolt. It made me tense all over again. I reached for him without thought, but Black blew warmth at me, sidestepping my hands but reaching out to caress my neck with his fingers.

“...I shouldn’t ride with you either right now, doc,” he said in a lower voice. “Not until I clear my head a little. And I should do a few things before I go... make sure everyone’s still making money for me. Bark a few orders. Throw my weight around. I think there’s a new employee since I left for Paris, someone Dex hired. They could probably use a good scaring...”

I let out a short laugh in spite of myself.

I felt the tension behind Black’s casual attitude though, enough that my fists remained clenched. He didn’t really want me going with Nick without him. I also wondered about what he’d said to Nick about the surveillance van. I
had
noticed the van. I hadn’t known Black noticed it. I also hadn’t known that Black’s people contacted him to tell him about it.

Like Black, I’d assumed Nick was behind it. Now I wondered. I was pretty good at reading Nick, even without the psychic stuff. I was pretty sure he’d been telling the truth when he said he had no idea what Black was talking about in reference to surveillance.

Now wasn’t the time to talk about that either, though.

Kissing me a last time, Black turned towards the corridor leading to the master bedroom. I watched him until he disappeared.

Only when he was gone did I look at the others.

Seeing the glare from Nick, the lingering hurt expression from Angel and the uncomfortable darting glances from Glen, I folded my arms like nothing had happened, glaring around at all three of them as if daring them to say something.

“So?” I said. “Are we going or what?”

Three

THAT THING THAT YOU DO

THEY BROUGHT ME to a conference room instead of an official interrogation room. I would have been fine with either, truthfully––I’d spent a lot of time in the Northern Precinct’s interrogation rooms already.

Of course, I’d been there as a profiler generally, not as a witness.

Well, and the last time I’d been inside one of those rooms, it was as a suspect. Maybe that was why Nick took me into the conference room instead, with its stained Mr. Coffee, mismatched mugs, gray cloth chairs and U-shaped wood table facing white boards at the front of the room next to the rolled up projector screen.

I’d managed to get my head straight, more or less. Of course, I’d done it by clamping down on every aspect of my mind I could control and forcing it to operate within rigid lines.

I’d also talked Glen into letting me stop for a real cup of coffee.

Nick was doing most of the talking so far.

“...We’ve got some evidence this isn’t this first guy’s kill,” he was telling me. “A detective from Los Angeles called me this morning. I sent out a notice for West Coast precincts, looking for matches because the
m.o.
was unusual, but this guy claims he’d planned to reach out to me already. I guess he saw the story in the news and thought it might match his big unsolved. He thinks our guy might be ex-military, or possibly from some kind of merc group.” Nick grunted, glaring at me. “...Maybe your boyfriend can help us with that.”