My Tye (28 page)

Fuck.

He tore away from watching her and followed Mac across the street and up the other side of the ditch. They made their way over to a line of trees twenty feet or so past where his incapacitated truck had landed to where the tire had ended up. Mac crouched in front of the tire and worked the hubcap loose using a good-sized pocket knife, obviously giving the same two shits Tye did that the tires, rims and caps had all been custom made for his truck. After Mac pried the hubcap off, he dropped his head and slumped his shoulders.

“That bastard,” he swore, setting the hubcap aside and stabbing the sharp end of the knife into the thick of the grass beside it. “You two are lucky,” Mac added as Tye squatted next to him.

Lucky? Tye didn’t feel very lucky. “How so?” he asked.

Mac plucked up two lug nuts from where they’d landed along the inside of the rim from the spinning tire’s centrifugal force and held them flat in the palm of his hand. “Looks like you’re missing a few.” If they’d all been there to start out with, there should have been six.

“Son of a
bitch,
” Tye spit out.

“That’s putting it mildly.”

“We weren’t inside the grocery store more than fifteen minutes.”

Mac stood, bouncing the two lug nuts in his hand. “So he was being conservative. With that kind of time, he could’ve loosened more than just this one tire.”

But if he’d done that, Tye would’ve felt the truck steering oddly right off the bat. The guy had counted on being followed. The asshole had counted on them crashing as well, which stoked Tye’s ire even further.

“And to add insult to injury, we’ve got company,” Mac said, hitching his chin back toward the street.

A Channel 8 van, complete with a satellite uplink rack, came to a roaring halt behind all the other vehicles. Out popped Haven Sims from the passenger side with a microphone in hand as Matt climbed out of the sliding door shouldering a video camera.

Fucking perfect.

Mac pocketed the lug nuts as he and Tye headed over to cut them off. Mac held out his arms to his sides and put a scowl on his face before Haven and Matt could get around the back end of the TV van. “Sorry. No press allowed past this point.” Mac called out to the deputy heading over to them. “Block off the road at each end and re-route traffic. Let’s keep an eye out for any other rubberneckers, too. I want this area to stay clear.”

His order was followed immediately, much to Haven’s chagrin. She pouted, but only for a second before stepping back and pouring on the charm. “No need to throw up a blockade on my account, Sheriff McKay. We just heard the call come through the scanner and knew it was one we couldn’t pass up, that’s all. I’ll be good. Promise,” she said with a wink before turning her attention to Tye. “Sheriff Carter. We meet again. And at such an opportune time.”

Tye had to mentally restrain himself to keep from spouting off something really nasty to her. She’d be good, his ass. If the opportunity arose for her to stir up trouble, she’d grab on to it and hold on tight. And he had a feeling she was geared up to do just that. When she looked past his shoulder, her eyes lit up and a devious smile popped up on her high-glossed lips.

Pride surpassed the irritation running through him when Laine simply glanced at Haven, then looked away to concentrate on what the EMT was saying to her.

“Ms. Morgan? Ms. Morgan!” Haven shouted, smiling that scheming smile and waving in her direction.

Laine continued to ignore her, which didn’t make Haven happy in the least.

“Sheriff Carter,” she huffed, planting her hands on her hips. “What’s going on here? The public has a right to know.”

The public has the right to know shit about this, was all Tye wanted to toss back to her. He stiffened, crossing his arms and lowering his chin. “Nothing is going on, Ms. Sims. I had a tire malfunction, that’s all.”

His evasiveness was worth a shot, but Haven didn’t buy his excuse for a second.

“Then why all the hoopla? With the way you two are acting, I expect to see the SWAT team roar up and helicopters hovering any minute.”

“That’s a little over the top, don’t you think?” Mac cut in.

She turned to Mac. “Not from the way you sounded on the scanner. You were panicked. I heard it in your voice.”

“Sheriff Carter is an old friend. I was concerned—”

Haven took a step closer to Mac and pointed at him with a perfectly manicured fingernail. “You were downright freaked out. First the unconfirmed reports of Ms. Morgan being attacked last week, and now this? Come on, guys,” she said, glancing between the two them. “Confession is good for the soul.”

So was beating someone bloody, namely the asshole he’d been following, with the butt-end of his gun. But that wasn’t going to happen anytime within the next fifteen minutes, either.

“You want the story I report to be factual, don’t you?” she went on. “I mean, the things I could come up with if I let my mind wander.”

“I wouldn’t—” Mac started.

“Then tell me what’s going on.”

“I’m afraid you’ll have to wait for the official police report. I have no comment at this time.”

Tye couldn’t help but smirk at the put-off glare she drilled into Mac at his apathetic statement. But that smirk fell away when Haven nodded toward Matt, then called out to Laine once again. Matt hefted the camera onto his shoulder, the telltale red light on the thing screaming to Tye that the digital feed was rolling.

Miniature powder kegs blew off inside Tye, one at a time. He gritted his teeth and turned to Mac. “I think we’re done here.”

Mac tossed him a set of keys. “Take mine. I called Marcia. She’s waiting for both of you at the station. We’ll release the sketch and put out an APB as soon as you’re done.”

Tye caught the key ring and didn’t look back. He thundered toward Laine, pissed as hell at Haven, Matt and the rest of the world. Concern flashed across Laine’s face as she met his stare an instant before glancing past his shoulder. She understood then. It was time for them to get the hell out of there.

He blocked her from Haven and Matt’s view with his body. He was doing it again, taking over, taking control. He couldn’t help it. He
wouldn’t
help it. Not this time. This had nothing to do with any sort of decision-making on Laine’s part and had everything to do with him protecting her, whether it be from danger or just from a couple of really irritating people.

“EMT’s say I’m fine,” Laine said, stepping away from the ambulance and speaking before he could get a word out. “I might end up with a few bruises, but that’s it. I’ve got the go-ahead to get out of here. And not a moment too soon, I see.”

Tye interlaced his fingers with hers and rubbed his thumb along her knuckles. “Haven’s getting antsy, but we’re not giving her any info. She’ll be on the warpath soon enough, though. Not that it’ll do her any good. Mac’s got that ‘no comment’ thing down to a science.”

“So now what?” she asked quietly.

“Mac’s letting us use his car. He’s got a sketch artist waiting for us back at the station. Once we’re done there, we’ll head back to the ranch and regroup.”

She peeked over Tye’s shoulder again, her eyebrows drawing together and her shoulders scrunching up. “Is it bad that all I want to do is flip her off?”

Tye raised an eyebrow and stifled a smile. Hot damn, that was his girl. “If I were here in any other capacity, I would.”

“But we’re always being watched, aren’t we? Always on the job and always being judged.”

He couldn’t disagree. “By some, yes.”

“By most,” she amended.

“We chose our professions,” he said, trying to ease her concerns, even though he knew he was doing a shitty job of it.

She laid her other hand over their entwined ones and eyed him with a deep if not fatigued understanding. “We did. To do some good. To make a difference.”

“Which we’ve both done, time and again.” He shifted his body so he could move in even closer. Her scent drifted under his nose and he had to hold back from taking her in a deep kiss. “Don’t let someone like Haven Sims make you doubt yourself. Don’t give her that power.”

“It’s hard sometimes,” she huffed. “I just get so irritated. So… God. What I do outside the court system shouldn’t matter to her. It shouldn’t matter to anyone.”

He got it. Hell, he lived it too. But he was never one to hide in the shadows, and he knew Laine wasn’t that type either. “So we ignore her. No one is saying you have to sit down and do an interview with her. The more we let it go, the more she’ll let it drop. And before you know it, some other poor sap will catch her attention, and she’ll go after them just like she’s going after us now.”

“I know,” she agreed, even though Tye could tell he’d only eased her irritation on the surface. Her personal volcano was just beginning to bubble, and it was only a matter of time before she’d let everything that had happened to her rise to the surface and spew out in rivers of emotional molten lava.

“Let’s go,” he said, still holding her hand and walking her around the back of the ambulance and deputy’s car to reach Mac’s vehicle. He opened the door for her, and as she climbed into the passenger seat he glanced over to Mac and Haven. She’d dropped the microphone to her side and Matt had the camera lens pointed toward the ground. Mac’s arms were crossed with that
I’m not gonna budge so don’t bother trying
stance he was so famous for.

Good. It was time somebody put Haven Sims in her place. And damn if Mac wasn’t just the man to do it.

Dusk was beginning to edge over the horizon as he turned away from them and the rest of the scene to settle himself behind the driver’s seat. With a quick twist, he turned the key in the ignition and looked over at Laine. “I suppose after we’re done at the station we could stop somewhere for burgers—”

“I’m not hungry,” she threw at him before he could get another word out.

“Laine. You need to—”

“Don’t. Please.”

She stared out the front windshield, her gaze steadfast and angry. So much for him easing her irritation.

“Okay, I won’t. For now.” He’d let her have her anger. In truth, maybe it was time she felt a little more of it. As long as it didn’t make her lose her focus, that was.

Because he needed her here. He needed her centered. Now that they were firsthand eyewitnesses and had a more definite vehicle description, they could possibly get a lead on a name and address, too. Just like that, the case had shifted into overdrive. Time and time again, he’d watched victims as they lost their cool when their cases came closer to a head. He wasn’t going to let that happen this time, not with Laine.

So much was out of their control, out of
her
control. And he damn well knew that losing control wasn’t an option at this point, not for either one of them.

But, Lord help them both, she was hanging on to hers by a thread. The beginnings of her unraveling laid just under her surface, simmering with an annoyance she wasn’t going to be able to keep knitted together for very long.

Helplessness, fused together with her anger, reddened her cheeks. Her chin quivered and his gut tightened. For fuck’s sake, he’d do anything right about now to give her back even a fraction of the control she felt she was losing.

Anything
…

An idea struck him, one that gave him an epiphanic rush. But it was also one he didn’t know if he could pull off. Because he knew, deep down, that in order to give her a taste of her control back, it would mean he was going to have to give up his.

Laine and Tye spent the ride back to the station in silence. She kept her arms folded over her breasts, trying to hold back the frustration and fear ricocheting around inside her, but it wasn’t working.

Someone wanted to kill her.

And she had no idea why. The man wasn’t familiar to her, but that didn’t mean anything. He could’ve been one of the hundreds of cases that had crossed her desk since she took her seat as Public Defender. Or, he could be some completely random freak who just happened to follow her out of the club that night. Either way, his hatred of her was unjustified. And that just pissed her the hell off.

As she and Tye were shown to the same interrogation room they’d been in earlier to meet with the forensic artist, her anger began to itch like poison ivy under every inch of her skin. She wanted to scratch everywhere, to claw into her muscles until the creeping prickle faded away.

Tye pulled up two chairs and they took their seats on the opposite side of the table from the artist. After quick introductions, Marcia didn’t hesitate to get down to business. She listened intently, swirling her pencil rhythmically over the paper. Slowly—eerily—the man’s face started to take shape on the page. Seeing it again, recreating the image that would forever be embedded in Laine’s brain from only her and Tye’s words, made her feel as if she’d swallowed a gallon of liquid sugar. Her heart rate went berserk. Her stomach curdled. Her palms flooded as sweat broke out over the rest of her body.

Somehow, she wasn’t exactly sure how, she made it through the next hour of constant descriptions and changes and tweaks without losing it—until Marcia held up the finished drawing for their approval.