Ravished (The Teplo Trilogy #1) (38 page)

Oh, god.

Her stomach turned. She sucked in a sharp breath before ducking outside, her heart in her throat.

"Hurry, Tristan," she pleaded, stumbling away from the crowd at the door. "Oh God, please hurry."

Tristan watched Lillian until she was on her way out the doors before grabbing his phone out of his pocket to scroll through the contacts for Warner's number. His fingers flew across the keys as he typed in a text, demanding Warner keep Hannah and Stephan busy as long as possible.

He had no fucking clue if Warner would see it in time, but he hoped like hell that he did. Having him inside, occupying Hannah and Stephan while the others were somewhere outside the club was a one in a million opportunity. Perhaps the only one he'd get.

He slipped his phone back into his pocket and veered toward the storage room, weaving through the nameless, faceless until the door appeared less than five feet to his right. He paused at the edge of the dance floor, waiting.

He was calm, focused.

Lillian was outside, in the clear.

Now or never.

A group of people broke away from the crowd on the floor and started in the direction of the door, laughing loudly. Tristan moved like a leopard, attaching himself to the group. He held his breath, hoping like hell they didn't break off and scatter too soon. If they did, he'd be on his own.

Four feet… three…

The group started peeling off, veering away from the door.

Tristan swore to himself.

"Warner, don't let me down, you big bastard," he muttered.

Two feet…

Tristan spun toward the door as the group moved farther away, slamming into the wall beside it before falling to his knees, his back toward the camera and his hand grasping at the handle as if trying to drag himself back to his feet.

Locked.

Of fucking course.

"Motherfucker," he swore, delving into his pocket for the lock-pick he kept there at all times. As soon as his hand closed around the slim instrument, he jerked it from his pocket and shoved it into the lock.

The hairs on the back of his neck stood at attention.

He manipulated the pick, swearing when it slipped out of the locking mechanism.

Blood rushed in his ears in a roar.

"Son of a-"

The lock clicked.

The door popped open.

Tristan bounded to his feet, keeping his head down so the camera didn't catch his face, and all but dove into the storage room.

Fuck, yes!

He was in.

He took a deep breath, pulling the door closed behind him before he made his way deeper into the room. Shelves lined the walls, piled high with cleaning supplies. Empty cases of beer overflowed the round trashcan in the corner. The fluorescent light overhead hummed and flickered, the bulbs dying. Shadows bounced around the room like finger puppets.

His eyes landed on the door, situated on the opposite wall, halfway across the room.

He was at in in three steps, pulling it open before bounding forward into darkness. He stepped carefully, planting his feet solidly on the steps leading downward as he pulled his cell from his pocket to activate the flashlight feature.

The air was heavy, thick, dust motes dancing in the air in front of the weak light. His heart raced, excitement pumping through him as he descended.

A string of curses rattled from his lips one after another when he reached the bottom.

The basement was boarded up, cobwebs stretched across the corners of the old wood. There was no way into the lab through here. Frustration boiled through him, raging unchecked when he realized there probably never had been. They'd set him up, and he'd fallen for it.

He clenched his hands into fists, glancing around. Every part of him wanted to kick the boards free, prove that he hadn't fallen into a trap. But Warner couldn't keep Hannah and Stephan busy forever. And who the hell knew when the rest of their people would reappear?

"Think, dammit," he muttered, turning this way and that, trying to come up with a plan. He reached into his pocket once more, pulling out the little hidden camera he carried. He glanced at it, and then up the stairs at the mass of crap piled around. Back and forth.

"Fucking hell," he muttered, seeing only one option.

Jason would kill him when he found out.

Didn't matter though. He didn't have another choice.

Cramming the cellphone back into his pocket, he strode back up the stairs and to the shelves directly across from the basement door, running his eyes along the items stacked there. In the far corner, hidden behind a bottle of Mr. Clean, was a battered box. Tristan nudged the cleaning supplies out of the way and wedged the lighter into the top of the box, camera lens facing out. Making sure it was aimed at the door and secure, he tapped the record button, and then arranged the cleaning supplies to help camouflage the small device. Before he could talk himself out of leaving it there, he hurried from the room, his head down and his heart racing.

Lillian huddled near the wall outside the club, fighting for calm. The urge to pace ran rampant through her, but she refused to give in, instead planting her feet and gritting her teeth.

It felt as if Tristan had been inside forever. Logically, she knew it'd only been a few minutes, but God, time stretched on and on.

Her heart raced so fast, it actually hurt. Her skin crawled. Everything in her screamed, pleading for Tristan to appear at the doors.

He didn't.

She shouldn't have left him inside by himself. She should have made him take her with him. She could have watched his back and made sure no one saw him. She could have done something, anything but wait outside while he took all the risk.

He needed her and she was-

A familiar head of dark hair broke through the group milling right outside the doors.

"Oh God," she sobbed, throwing herself at Tristan as soon as he stepped clear of the crowd.

"Hey," he whispered, catching her to his chest.

She shook in his arms, and couldn't seem to stop.

"Shh, beautiful," he crooned when another relieved sob broke from her lips. "I'm right here."

"Oh God, Tristan." She burrowed deeper into his arms, clinging as hard as she could. Had she been able to do so, she would have climbed him right then and there.

"I told you I'd be just fine," he said, rocking her back and forth. "Why are you crying?"

"You… and…" She took a deep breath, trying to calm herself down.

"Just breathe," he encouraged, walking her further from the doors.

She took another breath and then another, feeling herself calm as the truth began to set in. He had his arms around her. His heart beat beneath her ear. He was safe.

"Better?" He pulled back to ask, concern glowing in his eyes.

She nodded.

He brushed his lips across hers. "Talk to me. What's wrong?"

"I know why Warner's here," she whispered, wishing like hell she hadn't heard the boys walking in the door. Hoping it wasn't true and knowing all the while that it was.

Tristan looked at her, waiting for an explanation.

"Someone was murdered last night, Tristan."

"Excuse me?" He blinked at her as if he hadn't heard her, his brow wrinkled in confusion.

"Warner had a picture. He showed it at the door and someone saw it," she explained, fighting the urge to cry. "I think it's…. I think it's Emma, the girl we talked to last week."

Tristan didn't say anything, but he didn't have to either. She felt his body tense around hers, could almost see his thoughts flickering across his face. Right up until he blinked them away.

In the space of a breath, he flipped a switch. A blank mask dropped into place like blinds falling closed, closing him off from her. The change sent chills racing up and down her spine.

"I need you to wait for me at home."

The chills raced faster.

"No." She shook her head, refusing to obey that demand this time. Not when she didn't know what he'd do. Not when the girl they'd spoken with was dead, and he'd lost it the last time someone died. Not when… not when she loved him.

Oh, god. She loved him. So much, she couldn't breathe at the thought of something happening to him. It was just black. Pain and black and a thousand times worse than hearing her bone snap or listening while her therapist and doctor explained that she'd never dance again.

"I don't have time to argue with you." He stepped backward, away from her.

"Tristan, don't do this," she whispered, suddenly cold. "Please, don't shut me out again. Let me help you."

"I don't need your help, Lillian," he interrupted, his expression hard, unwavering. He sounded so far away, so detached. Nothing she said would change his mind or stop him. Not now.

"I love you," she whispered the truth anyway, praying he heard it.

He hesitated for a brief moment, and her heart soared.

"Wait for me at home," he said then, his voice cold and hard.

Lillian's shoulders slumped, defeat winding through her.

"Fine," she said, tears pooling in her eyes.

He vanished around the side of the building before the word ever left her lips, shattering her heart.

Chapter Twenty-Eight

"Tristan, go home," Jason said, leaning back against the wall beside the industrial sink in the autopsy suite, his arms crossed over his chest.

"Fuck off," Tristan muttered under his breath, refusing to look at Jason. He couldn't take his eyes off the girl beneath the sheet in front of him. He'd seen a lot of fucked up things in his life, but not like this.

Emma Bradford was just a kid, and they'd destroyed her. Every inch of her body was bruised and bloody, broken. Knife wounds littered her torso, her arms and legs. Even her palms were shredded as if she'd held her hands up in a desperate attempt to fight off her attacker.

He'd been expecting someone else to die before all was said and done, but he hadn't been prepared for this. He hadn't expected it to be the girl who'd recognized Lillian... the one he knew she'd searched for in the crowd every damn night since. And he hadn't been prepared for the stark brutality.

How was he supposed to tell Lillian that the teenager she'd worried over had died bloody and terrified?

Christ, how was he supposed to protect her now?

"I got into the storage room," he muttered, glancing up at Jason, Warner, and Dr. Swanson, who watched him with matching, sympathetic expressions. "The fuckers were nowhere to be found, so I went in. I was certain I'd find the lab, but the goddamn stairwell was boarded up. Has been for a while, looks like."

"Fucking hell," Jason cursed.

"They've been watching that damn door for weeks," Tristan continued as if he hadn't even spoken, "and I walked right in. Didn't even stop to consider it might be a trap. Joke's on me, right?" He laughed shortly. "I dragged her into this, and now we're all fucked."

"Son of a bitch." Jason turned to Warner and Marita. "Give us a few minutes, will you?"

"We'll just be in my office," Marita murmured.

"Thanks."

Tristan watched as she and Warner filed out and closed the door, leaving him alone with Jason. He turned to meet his boss's gaze, not speaking. What else was there to say? The girl shouldn't be dead. She shouldn't be half-zipped into a body bag, waiting to be crammed back inside one of Marita's freezers when Tristan was finished with his self-flagellation.

It killed him that she'd died, and likely for nothing more than speaking to him and Lillian. Failure burned. So did the outright terror that he was going to fail Lillian, too. He'd promised to keep her safe, and she wasn't.

She was in love with him, and he was in the lowest level of hell.

"What do you want to do?" Jason asked, stepping up next to him.

He wanted to hit something.

"I don't know," he whispered hoarsely, still staring down at the girl. "Christ, Jase, I don't know how to keep her safe. I don't know what the fuck I'm doing anymore and I can't…." he broke off and inhaled sharply. "I can't…." He shuddered.

Jason squeezed his shoulder when he fell silent again, not able to finish the sentence. Not that he even needed to finish it. If anyone understood, Jason did. He'd helped put Lillian in harm's way. Wasn't his fault since Tristan hadn't really given him much of a choice, but if something happened to her, Jason would carry that on his conscience, too.

Christ, this was a nightmare. Pure fucking torture.

"You did what you thought you had to do," Jason said.

"Bullshit. I did what I wanted to do, and you know it. We're going to need a fucking miracle to find that lab now.
Fuck
!" He slammed his hands into the freezer door above Emma's, his breath coming in jagged pants. "I'm so fucking tired of this shit, Jase. I thought I could keep her safe. Now I have to tell her this girl is dead and they're probably coming for her next. How the fuck am I supposed to do that?"

"She's stronger than you're giving her credit for," Jason answered.

"You think that matters?" Tristan laughed and spun away from the freezers to glare at him. "The only person she spoke to inside that club was murdered. Do you really fucking think she's going to be okay with that? That she isn't going to be upset or scared? That she isn't going to feel like it's her fault? She shouldn't be doing this shit!"

"And you should?" Jason demanded.

"It's my job!"

"No, it isn't. It's your punishment, Tristan. You do this shit because you feel like you have to do it. Because you were a thirteen-year-old kid and your parents were murdered. And that isn't your fucking fault, but you punish yourself anyway. You feel guilty because they were coming to get you or because you survived or who the fuck knows why you do this to yourself, but you drive yourself insane with this shit because you think that's what you deserve."

"Bullshit," Tristan snorted.

Jason raised a brow, challenging him. "Tell me you don't remember the name and face of everyone that has ever died on one of your cases. Tell me you don't torture yourself with those images every time you screw up."

Tristan glared, unable to deny it. They both knew he couldn't. He did remember their names and faces. They fucking haunted him. At least they had until Lillian. She made it better though. When he touched her, he could breathe.

"You hate this job," Jason continued when Tristan said nothing. "You fucking hate it, but you do it anyway because you feel like you have to."

"And you don't hate it?"

"No, I don't hate it. It pisses me off that people like that little girl," he said, pointing at Emma's body, "die for no reason. It pisses me off that people like Lillian get hurt. And it pisses me off that you're standing here now, blaming yourself for this girl dying. But I don't hate this job. I never have."

"She died because of me," Tristan muttered. She'd died because she'd spoken to him and Lillian, and Jason knew it as well as Tristan did. She was a warning to back off, or a reminder that Francisco didn't take kindly to the DEA butting into his business. She hadn't known a damn thing about Tristan, but they'd tortured her for speaking to him anyway.

"Really? Is it Lillian's fault as well? I mean, she's the one Emma really talked too, right? She's the one the girl recognized. So is it Lillian's fault that she's in that freezer now?" Jason demanded.

Rage wove through Tristan. He balled his hands into fists. "Don't," he warned.

"Don't what?" Jason pushed ruthlessly. "Don't tell you the truth?"

"Don't blame her for this shit. We're the ones that involved her in this. We're the ones that asked her to do it. And I'm the one that asked her to stay. Don't fucking blame her for this," Tristan answered softly, fighting to rein in the anger burning in his gut.

"Then knock it the hell off!" Jason roared, slapping his hand down against the freezer beside him. "Standing here blaming yourself isn't going to solve a fucking thing and we both know it. So knock it the hell off already and figure out what the fuck you need to do next to keep her safe! Because I'm telling you right now, Tristan, I will jerk you off this case if you don't get it together and help me end this shit."

"How the hell do you propose I do that?" Tristan flexed his hands before raking one through his hair. "My girlfriend lives across the street from these fuckers. The one person in that club that she spoke to is dead. Francisco has one of his men planted in that damn club and has for weeks. I couldn't find the fucking lab, and walked into a trap instead. So tell me exactly how the fuck I'm supposed to get it together and help end this because I sure as fuck don't know!"

"Jesus motherfucking…." Jason swore harshly before grabbing his phone from his pocket and dialing. He held it to his ear, his eyes locked on Tristan. "Zoë, I need you to talk to your cousin before I kill him."

Tristan eyed him balefully when he held the phone out toward him.

"Your husband is a prick," he said, snatching it from Jason's hand with a scowl.

"You know that's not true," she said immediately. "What's going on, Tristan? Talk to me."

"I don't even fucking know," he sighed before filling her in. Somehow, no matter how badly he wanted to keep her out of this kind of thing, he always found himself talking to her. Zoë had been there for him through everything, had seen how messed up he was after his parents were killed, and had dragged him back from the brink more times than he cared to admit. She knew the hell he'd gone through, had gone through it with him. She was the voice of reason when all else failed. And Jason knew it, the bastard.

"It's not your fault," she murmured quietly when he finished. "You didn't know they'd do this just because she talked to you, and you can't blame yourself for her being there. She may have been young, but she made her own choices. Those choices put her in that club, not you. And blaming yourself now isn't going to make Lillian any safer, Tristan."

"I know that," he muttered.

"Then stop being a pain in the ass and do something about it. If you care about her, find a way to close this case and keep her safe."

"I'm trying."

"Try harder," she suggested and then paused. "You're in love with her, aren't you?"

"I-" Tristan hesitated for a long moment, unsure how to answer that question. Was he in love with Lillian? Christ, yes. She owned him, probably had from the minute he'd dragged her onto that dance floor. But that didn't make it right, and it didn't make it okay. He'd crossed too many lines with her, and this was the result. "She deserves better," he finally muttered, remembering the broken look on her face when he'd walked away.

"Oh, Tristan," Zoë sighed. "You stupid, stupid man."

An hour later, Tristan felt calmer, less crazed. He still didn't have a fucking clue what he was going to do, but Zoë had talked him down from the ledge, at least. He no longer wanted to set
Teplo
on fire and watch it burn, or kill Jason.

"Jase," he started, knowing he owed his friend an apology.

"I know," Jason answered, cutting him off before he even figured out where to begin. "I get it. You good now?"

"No, not even close." He laughed humorlessly and tossed Jason his cell before leaning back against the wall of freezers and closing his eyes. He was tired down to his bones, weariness and defeat like shackles dragging him down.

"What are you going to do?"

What was he going to do?

What
could
he do?

"I'm moving her to the penthouse tonight." He just hoped to hell she understood why and didn't hate him for it. He'd see this through because he had to do it, but he couldn't keep dragging her into it with him. Not now that he knew she loved him.

Christ, had she meant it?

He hoped to hell she had, and he hoped to hell she forgave him for all of this shit when it was said and done.

"You think she's going to agree to that?"

Tristan shrugged a shoulder. "Doesn't matter. It's not her choice to make, it's mine, and I'm not letting her walk back in there now."

"What does she want?" Jason asked softly.

"That doesn't matter either." He cracked one eye open and glanced at Jason. "I can't keep convincing myself that putting her in danger is okay."

"You love her."

"She owns me completely. She's… fuck. She's everything." He paused and shook his head again, bemused. "How the fuck did that happen?"

"Does she know?" Jason asked instead of trying to come up with an answer they both knew he didn't have.

"I haven't told her."

"Will you?"

Tristan shrugged again. Everything in him had demanded he say it back to her when those words had tumbled from her lips, but he hadn't. He hadn't had the right to say it back. "It wouldn't change anything if she knew. I don't want her doing this anymore. I
won't
put her at risk for this anymore. It's not worth it, not when we know for sure they've figured it out."

"I think you need to discuss that with her," Jason answered, a little too carefully, as if he didn't believe it'd be as simple as Tristan made it sound.

Tristan had no illusions either. She'd fight him, but it wouldn't change anything. Her safety came first to him. It had to, because the thought of visiting her in the morgue killed him as much now as it had after that damn nightmare. It'd probably kill him to let her go, but at least this way, she'd be alive. He'd know she was safe. Didn't matter if letting her go would be like cutting his own heart out of his chest, he had to do it.