Dead Center (The Rookie Club Book 1) (12 page)

He wore prison orange. His hands cuffed together, they dangled at his waist as he walked. Another chain around his waist connected to the cuffs and prevented him from raising his hands higher than his waist. He watched her through the glass, looking terrified. She forced a reassuring smile to hide the fear tight in her chest.

The guard slid back the metal chair, motioned him to sit.

Tim held his hands out, shook the cuffs.

The guard shook his head and instead unlocked the chain between the belt and the cuffs, allowing Tim to lift his hands high enough to reach the phone. Tim watched the guard in confusion.

Jamie picked up the phone on her side and rapped it on the glass.

Tim sank into the chair, took the receiver awkwardly between both hands. He was still watching the guard as Jamie started to talk.

"Have you talked to anyone?"

He shook his head.

"Ed Goldman will be here soon."

He frowned, distracted. He looked through the glass, behind her.

"He's an attorney. He's good."

He nodded.

"Tim, what evidence did they say they have that you killed her?" They would know about the blood, of course, and the argument that had occurred within earshot of at least thirty or forty officers. And maybe that was all, but it felt thin to her.

His gaze shifted to hers, but he didn't answer. The rims that circled his eyes before were deeper and darker now. The bruise under his eye was gray-black, shadowed in the dim light of the jail.

She reminded herself that she'd had a similar set of rings after finding him and Devlin in bed together. That hers still weren't totally gone. What strange twist of fate had brought her to this point? She could have walked away. Tim was not her problem. Only he was, because she couldn't let go. Had somehow refused.

"Tim," she repeated, knocking on the glass. "What happened?"

He glanced at the cuffs. "We had a fight."

"The one at the banquet?"

He shook his head. "Another one."

"When?"

"The night before."

"Where?"

"In front of her house."

She watched him, shook her head.

"It was bad."

"Tim, you didn't—"

His gaze steadied, his eyes hard. "I didn't kill her."

She exhaled, sucked in a breath, nodded. "What was the fight about?"

"Her." He shook his head. "Us. About how she used me. She'd called me over, desperate. I gave up tickets to the Sharks game. When I got there, she said she had something more important to do. She had to leave." He paused, defeated. "I was furious." He dropped his gaze. "I slapped her."

Violence. Jamie felt her chest deflate. Tim had never touched her that way. She couldn't imagine the fury that had driven him to strike Devlin. "Did anyone see you?"

"The couple next door." He glanced up. "An older couple. The woman came out and asked Natasha if she wanted her to call the police."

Jamie sank deeper into the hard plastic chair. Bad. "What time was that?"

"Maybe nine or so."

"What then?"

"She got in her car and left."

"And you?"

"I went home."

"Tim?"

"Okay, I went to O'Brien's and had a few drinks and then I went home."

"What about the next day?"

"She called—" He halted. "That day. I went to see her." He looked down.

"When?"

"Before the banquet. A couple of hours before."

"Where?"

"At her office. We were fine. It was like the fight had never happened."

Jamie frowned. "Then what was the deal at the banquet?"

He shook his head. "I don't know."

"There must have been something," she pressed. "What happened?"

"I don't know," he said again. "I swear. I thought we were fine and then she blew me off again. It's like there are two of her—one hot, one cold. It's not the first time. She does this from time to time—kind of freaks out and distances herself. But it got to me this time. I was furious."

Jamie noticed how he spoke of Devlin in the present tense. Like she wasn't dead. "And you hadn't talked since you were in her office?"

"No."

She shook her head. It didn't make any sense. "So after the banquet you went back?"

"I went out for drinks with Marshall and Ramirez then Ramirez dropped me off. I saw her car in the lot, so I went up to her office."

"And?"

"I called her name, but she didn't answer. I walked in. The office was dark and I saw her on the floor. I leaned down to check her and someone hit me."

"Did you see the attacker?"

He shook his head.

"Did you hear anything?"

He glanced up. "Yeah. He said something."

"What did he say?"

"He said, 'Stupid bastard.'" Tim's eyes widened. "I think he stuttered it, actually."

"Stuttered?"

Tim nodded.

"Did you tell all this to the police?"

"Yeah," he said, deflated. "I told them."

Jamie tried piecing it together. It was enough to charge him. The blow to the head was hard to explain. He couldn't really have given it to himself, but maybe they thought it had happened in a struggle with her. "Do they have anything else?"

"They talked to her neighbor about the fight."

"And that's all?"

He didn't respond.

"Tim."

"I wrote her a note. I gave it to her when I was leaving her office that day—before the banquet."

The guard appeared behind Tim. He pointed to his watch.

Jamie put a finger up. "One minute." She looked back at Tim. "What kind of note?"

He didn't answer.

The guard stepped forward, took Tim's arm. Tim tried to pull free.

Jamie stood up and rapped on the window to get Tim's attention. "What did the note say?"

The guard yanked Tim to his feet. The phone clattered against the glass.

Jamie banged against the thick plastic window. "Answer me," she shouted.

Tim shook his head, kept silent.

"Christ, what did the note say?" she yelled.

He met her gaze. His words were barely a whisper. They struck her ears like thunder.

"That I couldn't live without her."

Chapter 12

Hailey Wyatt parked the department's brown Taurus in a spot at the far end of Washington Square just below Russian Hill. The residential neighborhood was quiet at lunch time. Anywhere else, she would have flipped down the police lights on her sun visor and parked in the red. Not here. When she was here, she didn't want to call attention to her car. Or herself. They always arrived separately. She always left first. Her rules, not his. There was too much at stake professionally and privately to get caught.

She sat in the car, stared across toward Buck's building, wondering the same thing she always did when looking at this view. Why was she here? There was plenty to keep her occupied with Natasha's murder. CSU and the lab were scrambling to solidify the evidence against Tim Worley. She and her team were interviewing everyone to identify any witnesses. Though they were trying to narrow the window, the time of death was currently estimated between eleven and two. Even at that hour, Hailey had to believe someone saw something. It was always that way. There was always a case that required her attention, more to do to finish off the workload, tie up one murder as another landed on her desk. This one was worse. This was the murder of a police officer. Everyone was putting in one hundred and ten percent. The pressure was as heavy as she'd ever felt it. And despite all that—or perhaps because of it—Hailey was here.

She pictured John kissing her good-bye that morning, saw the girls in their bath the night before. They'd had a good night. As near perfect as ever. So why did she do this? Why wasn't that life enough?

She imagined how she'd grown up—the comings and goings of her mother's men. Men Hailey never knew, a long line of shadows whose faces never had the chance to imprint. That had been her mother's choice. Not to keep those men around. She didn't want a partner; aside from the occasional companionship, relegated to the hours when her daughter was sleeping, she didn't want companionship. Hailey wasn't her mother. Nor did she blame her for her own failings. That would be pointless. Still, she knew the answer lay somehow in that past.

Giving in to her desire, Hailey stepped from the car and crossed through the park. The sun cut between two fat clouds that looked like unshorn sheep grazing in a blue pasture. A woman in sweatpants ate a McDonald's hamburger and fed bread to pigeons. She spoke to them in a low jabber that Hailey associated with mental illness. The pigeons didn't seem to mind.

The woman reeled her arm back over her head and threw bread to the far reaches of the flock like a fly fisherman casting. She paid no attention to Hailey.

Head down, Hailey hiked the steep block of Union Street, then turned in to the familiar marble facade on August Aly. She stared at the bell, felt more guilt. Rang apartment number 10. The door buzzed and clicked open. Without a word, she climbed the two flights. The halls were empty. His door was cracked. The first time she'd made this trek, a nest of rattlesnakes had been hatching in her belly. Now, just the eager flutter of a dozen butterflies.

She let herself in, closed the door behind her, turned the lock, and made her way into the kitchen.

Buck drank ice water from a tall plastic cup, handed it to her. She took a thirsty gulp before he pulled it from her hands. He set it down with a splash and yanked her to him. She heard her breath seize as he took her mouth, pressed against her. Intense.

His mouth on hers, he backed her down the hallway toward the bedroom. No words. Her jacket dropped to the floor. He unfastened her buttons, kissed her neck, the small of her throat. He hung her shirt off the bathroom doorknob. They fell onto the bed, the rest of their clothes soon a tangled mess on the floor.

"God, I missed you," he said when they were done. The first words they'd spoken.

She smiled, rolled over, and leaned her chin on his chest. "Me, too."

He tucked an arm under his head, wound a finger through her hair.

She pushed his hand away, the motion too much like John. They couldn't be the same. She forced the guilt out, closed her eyes. Tired.

Buck ran a finger down her spine. She felt the stretch of her muscles in the small of her back and legs. Sighed. "What's going on in IA?" she asked. Talking work made it feel less personal, less like she and John.

"You heard Scanlan's latest?" he asked.

"No. What'd he do?" Scott Scanlan was the deputy chief's son. Though Hailey never met him, rumor had it that he was a punk with a tendency to drink too much and act like a total asshole. After getting kicked out of the Los Angeles Police Department after a drunken incident at the annual police ball, he made his way home and hooked up with Daddy's department.

"Couple of investigators from General Works made some jokes. Scanlan got so upset, he took them on in the parking lot."

She winced. "He's only five seven or something."

"Yeah. And he was already on probation."

She remembered the story. A few months back, Scanlan was out drinking at Balboa Cafe, one of three bars that made up a hot spot called the Triangle in San Francisco's marina district. Drunk, Scanlan demanded a college kid give up his burrito. The kid had refused and Scanlan hit him. The kid hit back and although Scanlan had suffered most of the injuries, the kid had called the police.

The department had tried to sweep the incident under the rug. The attempt to conceal Scanlan's misadventure had led all the way to the chief of police, but the media had gotten wind of the story and the attempted cover-up and hung the whole department out to dry over it. There was a flurry of press releases issued about Scanlan's mental state—references to post-traumatic stress though no one could identify the incident to which the reaction was related.