Cover Up (26 page)

Parker should have seen it. He wasn’t a therapist or anything, but he’d seen the ravages of severe trauma every time he volunteered at the trauma center. Some of his anger and hurt bled away. Not all of it, but he didn’t think Ivan had intended to make him fall in love. That was his own stupid fault.

“What can we do?” If it weren’t for the existence of the money, he might be able to attribute this whole mess to the PTSD, but that money was painfully real.

“Find out what the hell is going on and get Ivan the help he needs. He’s a great detective and a good man making the best of a bad situation. I don’t want this to scar him for life.”

Impulsively, Parker reached out and patted Kurt’s knee. “You’re a good friend. Not many would take risks like that.” And he should know. Even without this, he knew Neil would never sacrifice for him.

Kurt smiled, a sad smile that told Parker there was a long story behind it. “I’ve been rock bottom, not long ago. It took friends and family to get me out. How could I not do the same?”

“What about Ivan’s family?”

“They’re close, but my guess is he hasn’t given them a chance to see he’s self-destructing.”

Were his sisters and parents a lie, part of the cover? Parker opened his mouth to ask, but the sound of the bathroom door opening brought their discussion to an abrupt, uncomfortable end. When Ivan came back into the room, he wouldn’t look Parker in the eye, but other than that, he looked composed.

“What now?” Kurt asked when Ivan scooped up his phone.

“We need to go through the papers in the bag, find out what’s going on. It might be all we have. If Neil gets spooked, he’ll dismantle the operation at Parker’s cottage.” Now that he was observing more closely, the strain of keeping it together was obvious. Ivan needed help, and fast.

“Your suspected grow-op, you mean?”

“Yeah. I’m thinking I should just go up there, scope the place out.”

“No. Goddammit, Ivan. I may not be in the Drug Squad but I know damn well how much firepower the people protecting those things have. You’re not going. Give me the address, and I’ll call Simon. He’s still got tons of friends on the RCMP, and they’ll be better prepared to go in.”

Parker shuddered. His previous experiences with grow-ops were from movies, but if they were even vaguely close to reality, he didn’t want Ivan going there alone either. He just hoped no unsuspecting innocent tried to go hiking on his land. For God’s sake. Why hadn’t he taken more of an interest? Why had he let Neil deal with everything? He’d allowed this to happen.

“Who is Simon?”

Kurt cut off what he’d been going to say. “My partner on the force. He used to be with the RCMP before he transferred to the Toronto Police Services.”

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police. They were federal police, but Parker got a picture in his head of a bunch of men in those traditional red uniforms trying to ride horses stealthily through a field of marijuana.

Too bad Simon wasn’t Kurt’s life partner. Parker was fairly certain Kurt was gay, and given how much he and Ivan seemed to have in common, including their age, he’d be a lot happier if the other attractive man was taken.

“That’s actually a good idea.” Ivan relaxed just a little. “Are you up to sifting through the stuff I brought with me?”

“Yeah, sure. Let’s spread it out on the kitchen table, and we can go through it.”

Parker wasn’t sure Kurt was up for it. He moved stiffly and might be a little paler than when they’d arrived. He’d help if he could, but he’d probably just get in the way. Not that he’d even know what to look for.

As soon as Kurt disconnected his call to Simon, the two detectives pulled on latex gloves and began to spread out the documents, leaving the money in the pack on the floor.

Within moments of delving into the evidence, Kurt and Ivan seemed to forget about Parker. They did throw a few questions his way, all of which served to alarm him about the state of his apparent involvement in… whatever Neil and his buddies had been up to.

Parker pushed his chair away from the table, away from the pile of implicating documents. Ivan and Kurt shuffled and sorted through the jumble his life had become, old papers shoved aside with barely a glance, new ones inspected carefully.

A slender, dark-haired man, gorgeous and about the same age as Ivan and Kurt, appeared in the doorway. “Well, hello. Kurt, I didn’t know we were having guests. Are you sure you’re up to this?”

Kurt glanced up, and the joy in his expression made Parker feel like he was observing something private. Beautiful, but private. His stomach squeezed a little in envy.

“I’m fine. Strong as an ox.” Kurt winked, and the beautiful man rolled his eyes. “Davy, this is Ivan. Remember I told you about him?”

Davy smiled at Ivan and shook his hand before bending over to kiss Kurt on the lips. The little tug of envy became a great swirling ball. He wanted that, so much, but at least he didn’t have to worry about Ivan and Kurt. Kurt hadn’t looked at Ivan the way he was looking at Davy, like the sun and the moon and the whole world were all wrapped in one dark-haired package.

“Kurt’s told me so much about you. It’s good to finally meet you.” Davy turned to Parker and smiled. “But this can’t be another one of your cop buddies, can it?”

Parker shook his head while both Kurt and Ivan answered in the negative.

Davy approached, hands outstretched. “Are you okay? You look a little frazzled.”

“It’s a long story, Davy. Right now, we’re trying to keep Parker from getting arrested for something he didn’t do.”

“Oh no.” Davy patted him on the head. “They’ll fix things up for you. But I can see you’re just here fretting. Let me grab us something to drink, and we’ll go watch a movie or something in the other room. Something to take your mind off this.”

Davy stumbled over the bag as he headed to the fridge. “Uh, Kurt, is this a bag full of money?”

“Yep. About two hundred thou.” Kurt handed Ivan another sheet of paper.

“Dollars?” The word was strangled as Davy blanched. “Ooookay. Parker?”

Parker stood. Anything to get away from this… unreal situation.

“Hey, it’ll be okay.” Davy gave him a quick hug, which was over far too quickly. The comfort of another person’s arms was a luxury he hadn’t realized he’d been missing. But Davy was a stranger. What Parker wouldn’t give to be back in his bed, with Ivan’s arms tight around him.

Parker nodded. “Thanks.”

Before they had a chance to leave, someone pounded on the front door. He and Davy froze while Kurt and Ivan scrabbled at their sides. Parker had seen Ivan make the same gesture a couple of times, and with sudden clarity realized they were grabbing for guns that weren’t there. His mouth dried out in fear, and he stumbled back against the counter.

“Ivan Bekker. If you’re in there, open the fuck up.”

Ivan relaxed. “It’s Trish.”

“Your partner?” Both he and Kurt asked at the same time.

“Yep.” He made a move to the door, but Kurt’s arm snaked out to stop him.

“You sure you can trust her? What about the leak?”

“Kurt, man, I don’t know. But Sarge was wrong about Parker. Maybe he’s wrong about the mole too. I can’t believe Trish would betray me… us… like that.”

Kurt’s eyes shadowed. “I’d be the first to tell you that your partner can hide things from you, but if you think we can trust her, I’ll take your word for it.”

The pounding and yelling continued.

Ivan let out a chuckle. “If we don’t let her in, she’ll break the door down.”

Kurt nodded. “Fine. Let her in.”

All three of them followed Ivan to the door. Parker was certain not one of them exhaled until the door opened to reveal Trish without any sort of weapon or evil companion.

“What the fuck is going on?” Trish shoved Ivan with both hands, and he fell back against the wall.

“Trish, Trish, it’s okay. C’mon.”

Trish glared at all of them, but let Ivan drag her into the living room.

“Talk to me, Bekker. You tell me the truth right now, or I’m asking for a transfer.”

“How did you find me?”

That was Parker’s first question too.

“I heard the call about the break in at your… house? His house.” Trish pointed at Parker. “I went there. The place was a fucking disaster, and Leo Razhin and one of Razhin’s enforcers were taken into custody. They were pissed, and they took it out on that house. No one had seen either of you, though.”

Parker’s vision blackened. His house was trashed? What would they have done if they’d found him and Ivan in the house? It didn’t bear thinking of, and he wavered where he stood. Ivan stepped back and wrapped an arm around him.

He allowed the embrace for a moment before he shook off Ivan’s arm. As much as he wanted Ivan’s comfort, how could he accept it?

“I checked your apartment and your parents’ place. I knew you were friends with Kurt, so I tried here next.” She nodded at Kurt. “Hello, by the way. Glad you’re up and about.”

“Thank you.”

“Who’s that?” Trish pushed her chin toward Davy.

Kurt answered. “This is Davy, my partner.”

Trish’s eyes softened. “Nice to meet you, Davy. Sorry to barge in like this.”

Davy waved away her apology. “Nice to meet you too.”

She turned back to Ivan. “Seriously, are you okay? Tell me what the fuck is going on.”

Parker couldn’t see Ivan’s face, but something Trish saw made her eyes widen, and she flung her arms around Ivan, hugging him. Ivan hugged her back, and an unreasoning jealousy welled up inside. Trish was part of Ivan’s real life, a life Parker could be no part of.

In moments, they’d laid out the situation for Trish, who punched Ivan in the shoulder for even thinking for a moment she was the leak.

“So, what’s the plan?” Trish had impatiently waited for the whole story, but now she was ready to take action. Parker thought she must be exhausting to work with, but it might explain why Ivan was so laid back. Unless, of course, that hadn’t been real either. He hated, absolutely hated, not knowing which bits of Ivan were the truth, or if any of them were.

Ivan led them back into the kitchen and gestured at the piles of paper on the kitchen table.

“Simon’s going to let us know what happened up at Parker’s cottage. Since he’s not on leave, as soon as he got back into town he was going to submit the documents into evidence and run a background check on Parker, see exactly what he’s on the hook for.”

“Well, I can do that. Get this ball rolling right now. Take advantage of Leo’s arrest.”

“Somewhere in there, we’re hopefully going to be able to prove Neil stole his identity and made the grow-op purchases, but even with Leo in custody, we don’t have anything linking Neil to Razhin.” Kurt wrapped an arm around Davy, and Parker couldn’t help but notice how heavily Kurt leaned on him. The shadows under his eyes attested to his recent bout of surgery. He was either in pain or weary or both. They needed to leave before they set back Kurt’s recovery too far.

“Wait, I have something.” Ivan pulled his phone out and clicked into the pictures.

Peeking over everyone’s shoulder, Parker saw Neil blowing Leo. Outside his fucking house.

“When the hell did you take that picture? And why?” Everyone turned to look at him. Shit. He hadn’t meant to speak at all, but thinking about Ivan spying on Neil like that made him crazy.

Ivan’s cheeks reddened, and he still wouldn’t meet Parker’s eyes. Hadn’t since his episode earlier, which made Parker sick to his stomach.

“I took it when I thought he was cheating on you,” Ivan mumbled.

Trish narrowed her eyes as she inspected him, but she didn’t say anything before looking back at Parker’s life laid out on Kurt’s kitchen table.

“It’s not much, but it might work. What’s this?” She picked up a small, tattered piece of paper. Parker’s birth certificate.

“It’s Parker’s older documents. Nothing relevant to what Neil’s doing,” Ivan said.

“I don’t know about that.” Trish’s intent look made Parker squirm. What was so interesting about his birth certificate?

She flapped the certificate at Ivan. “Do you know who his father is?”

“No. Parker told me his dad was never around.”

“That true, kid?” Trish turned intent brown eyes on him.

Parker shrugged. “Yeah. He’d been cheating on his wife. When my mom got pregnant, he gave her some money to stay away. She invested it well, and between that and what she inherited from her own parents, we never needed him.”

“Didn’t you ever try to find him?”

He’d worked out his feelings about that a long time ago. “No. He didn’t want us, and I didn’t care who the fuck he was. Why does this even matter?”

A thought struck him. “Wait. He’s not part of Razhin’s organization, is he?” If he was the son of a criminal, that would more easily explain why he’d fallen under suspicion.

Ivan grabbed the certificate from Trish. Blood suffused Ivan’s face, and he looked even angrier than he had earlier.

“I don’t fucking believe it,” Ivan growled. “I don’t fucking believe it.”

“Hey, calm down.” Trish laid a restraining hand on Ivan’s forearm, but he shook her off and tucked Parker’s birth certificate into his shirt pocket.

Dialing a number on his phone, Ivan headed to the front door. “Sarge, it’s Bekker,” he snarled into the mouthpiece. “Meet me at headquarters. Now. It’s urgent.”

Ivan grabbed a set of keys from a hook beside the door, ran out of the house, and got in one of the cars outside. Tires squealed as he pulled away.

“Did he just steal my car?” Davy asked.

“What was that?” Kurt snapped. “Whose name is on that certificate?”

“Sergio Martelli.” Trish pulled out her car keys. “I’d better follow him. Parker, with me. I’m not letting you out of my sight.”

“Take this in with you. The sooner we get it logged, the better.” Kurt started to kneel to grab the bag, but Davy stopped him with a shake of his head.

“No heavy lifting. Let me do it.” Davy pulled on a pair of latex gloves and shoved the paperwork into the backpack.

He still didn’t understand. “Who is Sergio Martelli?” Besides the deadbeat who’d had an affair with his mother and abandoned her as soon as she discovered she was pregnant.