Hidden Crimes (21 page)

“Boss,” he said. “You really want those
sandwiches?”

Adam sighed, letting some of the tension run
out of him. “Yes,” he said. “I want Vasili nice and relaxed before
we question him again. First, though, send an unmarked unit out to
that smoke shop. Actually, make it two. I don’t want the owners
sneaking out the back.”

“We’re taking the owners in?”

“We are,” he confirmed. “Nate here made a
drug buy from them.”

“Boss—” Nate began.

“Don’t.” Adam cut him off with a chopping
motion. “Do not tell me you don’t think this is the right
approach.”

Nate clamped his lips together, though this
was exactly what he thought. In the end, it didn’t matter whether
he stuck to his guns or not. When the unmarkeds pulled up at River
Smokes, it wasn’t simply closed; it was shut down, its dubious
inventory absent, its glamorous-grungy owners off in the wind
somewhere.

This, of course, was too easy to blame on
him.

The others seemed to think it was his fault
too.

“Kid,” Carmine said, wagging his curly head
the moment they were alone. “You need to watch your step.”

If Nate had been a fraction more childish,
he’d have said Adam needed to watch his.

IN return for the babysitting her mother did,
Evina sometimes ran errands for Rita. Today, she was dropping off
two of Rita’s business suits at her old dry cleaners. Back when she
and Paul had been together, he’d sworn it was the only place in
Resurrection that got the starch in his shirts just right. Rita
concurred, but Evina had switched cleaners after Paul’s marriage to
Liane, because he’d trained his wife to go there too. Running into
her beautiful younger replacement on a regular basis was more than
Evina was up for.

It’s not cowardice
, she assured
herself as she pulled into the small shopping center.
You see
Liane when you have to, and you’re perfectly nice to her
.

If Evina preferred to skip the reminder that
Liane—and not she—was marrying material, well, even alphas had weak
spots.

This afternoon she was spared the trial. The
dry cleaner’s had no line, and she finished within minutes. She
checked her watch, gauging how much of her break remained. She
could drive to the little park near the fire station, maybe sit on
a sunny bench and daydream about Nate. She smiled, unable to recall
when she’d last done something that frivolous. He’d been so sweet
and funny with her kids this morning. She could tell he liked them.
He wasn’t putting it on. Just maybe it wouldn’t be the stupidest
thing in the world to allow herself to indulge in a fantasy.

Ahead of her, on the shopping mall’s
uninspired sidewalk, a man emerged from a Postboxes Unlimited.
There were other people around. He didn’t stand out especially.
Evina wouldn’t have given him a second glance except that every
hair on her arms suddenly stood up.

She didn’t know him, or not that she could
tell from behind. He was of average height and build, with short,
neatly cut brown hair. His suit was well made but unexceptional.
His stride was more confident than average—brisk, she’d say, with a
smidgen of impatience. He stepped off the curb toward a new-looking
black SUV. She recognized it as a converted Cadillac Escalade, too
rich for her blood but very nice. As he turned to open the driver’s
door, she caught sight of his profile.

Still, she didn’t know him. He was handsome
in a stern sort of way. Then, as if he felt her staring, he twisted
to look at her.

The chill that went through her was like
nothing she’d ever felt. She knew those eyes. The last time she’d
seen them, they’d been above a surgical mask. She thought she
hadn’t noticed, but now she wondered how she’d forgot. Their irises
were a gray so clear they could have been made of glass.

This was the head doctor from the blanket
factory.

Except he couldn’t be. Nate said the trio had
been arrested and, due to the seriousness of their crimes, weren’t
eligible for bail. Evina looked at the Cadillac owner’s hands. She
could have sworn they were the same that had smothered the werefox
boy with the small pillow. His fingers were long and bony, their
nails buffed to a soft sheen. The RPD must have arrested someone
else. Perhaps the scheme had involved more than the three men she
saw in her vision. Nate hadn’t asked her to identify them. Neither
of them realized she could.

The doctor’s glass-gray eyes narrowed. No
doubt he was wondering why she gaped at him.

Go up to him
, Evina ordered herself.
He doesn’t know who you are. Pretend you’re flirting. Get his
name and number the way Rita would
.

She couldn’t make her feet unstick from the
sidewalk. Her skin was clammy, her muscles rippling with shivers.
Her fear triggered her impatience. If he’d been on fire, she’d have
chased him across the city until she put him out. The reminder of
her training let her take a few steps forward, let her paste what
she hoped wasn’t a sickly smile on her face.
Just do what your
mother would
, she urged.

The man’s lips formed words she wasn’t close
enough to hear. The movements were too rapid for normal speech—more
like a chant, she thought. Her terror increased, freezing her in
place.

Crap
, she thought, powerless to budge.
Was he putting a whammy on her?

He moved, getting into the SUV and slamming
the door. He started the engine, swiftly reversing the shiny black
vehicle. The windows were tinted so she couldn’t see inside.

Get the license plate
, she
ordered.

When she tried to, her eyes refused to focus
on the numbers. Some power outside her was blurring her vision. Her
growl of frustration caused a young woman with a baby stroller to
veer away from her. At least her anger broke her paralysis. She dug
in her purse for her phone, intending to report to Nate what she’d
seen. The number he’d given her rolled to voicemail. She growled
again, then left a message for him to call her as soon as he was
free. She debated dialing 911, but didn’t know what she’d say.

Nate was the only cop she had a shot at
convincing she wasn’t imagining things.

~

Embarrassed, unhappy, and a breath away from
driving his fist through the nearest wall, Nate returned to the
squad room to go through the Galina file again. He had the place to
himself. Adam didn’t come back to yell at him. Tony didn’t rap on
his desk to see if he was hungry for take-out. Now that his initial
defensive anger had guttered out, Nate felt the pack’s disapproval
like a hunch he couldn’t get out of his shoulders. He’d screwed up.
Rebelled against the way things were supposed to be. He’d wanted so
badly to be the one who was right he hadn’t thought through what he
was doing.

Nothing he found in the files helped him make
up for that.

He gave up when his eyes got tired of him
rubbing them. He drove straight home in his Goblinati. He didn’t
stop in a bar or pick up a fifth of scotch. In his current mood,
he’d have overdone it, and that wouldn’t help either. He was so
deeply into his pity party he didn’t immediately notice Adam’s wife
sitting on the floor outside his condo. Ari’s eyes were closed, her
head bobbing to the music playing on her ePod. She didn’t look much
like a mother in her ripped jeans and gray hoodie. A half-full
liquor bottle sat beside her hip: Tullamore Dew, unless he was
mistaken—Adam’s special occasion indulgence.

“Ari,” he said, stopping in his tracks in
surprise. “What are you doing here?”

She looked up and took out her earbuds.
“Good. I was hoping you wouldn’t be too long.” She got up before he
could help her. “Come on then. Open the door.”

Bemused, he let them both in and turned on
the lights.

“This is for you,” Ari said, gesturing with
the bottle as she headed for his kitchen. “You’re helping prevent
my darling husband from drinking any more tonight.”

“Adam’s drinking?” That wasn’t usual, not
hard drinking anyway. Was his alpha upset about their fight
too?

Ari pulled a pair of Irish crystal tumblers
from a shelf. She poured Nate two fingers and herself maybe half of
one. She sipped hers, squinched her face, and set it back down
again. “Ugh. Whiskey is disgusting. I swear I don’t know how you
men drink it.”

To prove he could, Nate tossed his back in a
single gulp. The ensuing burn rose from his belly into his eyes.
“What are you doing here?” he asked again in an unavoidably
alcohol-roughened voice.

Ari covered the hand he’d laid on his
counter. “You know what I’m doing. I’m playing peacemaker. Adam
doesn’t want to lose you, but you’re triggering his alpha
instincts. You’re making it hard for him to be reasonable.”

“Did he send you here?”

“No, but when I told him I was coming and
shoved the baby into his arms, he didn’t say a word in
protest.”

Nate snorted. He could imagine her doing
that. Ari wasn’t cowed by Adam at all.

Seeing he was amused, she rubbed his hand.
“He loves you, Nate. Everyone does. No one wants you to end up
pushed away.”

“I don’t want that either. I just . . .
There’s something prodding me inside lately. I mean to back down, I
swear, but somehow I never can.”

Sympathy filled Ari’s Iowa-blue eyes. “When
the people you work with are also family, the chain of command
thing doesn’t always sit well.”

“It’s supposed to,” Nate said. “I’m supposed
to know my place in the pack and feel comfortable in it—just like
Tony and Carmine do.”

“But for you it’s work,” Ari said softly.
“For you not being Number One feels unfair.”

What she said was so true he teared up. Ari
saw it, of course. “C’mere,” she said, holding out her arms.

She was a shrimp and only had a human’s
strength, but she hugged pretty well. He felt better as she held
him; she had enough pack essence in her for that. After a bit, she
sighed and pushed back from him. “You’re a smart man. So is Adam.
Sometimes, though, neither of you are very good at not thinking
like your wolves.”

Nate tugged one spike of her strawberry
colored hair. “We are what we are.”

“Oh blah-di-blah,” she scoffed. “Thinking
like that is defeatist.”

He shook his head, and she raised her
eyebrows. Then, probably considering this as good as getting in the
last word, she craned around him to peer at something in his living
room.

“Your message light is blinking,” she
informed him.

Nate loved high tech gadgets. He had his
virtual answering machine set up to display on his wide screen TV.
Six messages showed there now, all from the same number.

Heat rose into his cheeks as he recognized
whose it was.

“Why, Nate,” Ari teased, “I do believe you’re
blushing.”

“It’s just a woman I’ve been seeing.”

“The tigress.” Ari wagged her eyebrows
meaningfully. “Believe me, I heard an earful about that too.”

“Evina is a really nice person.”

“I’m sure she is, considering you like her
enough to blush.” She cocked her head, still amused by this. “I’d
like to meet her some time, if it isn’t too soon for that. You know
I don’t give a hoot about the supposedly deathly important cats and
dogs conflict.”

Nate supposed she wouldn’t, given that she’d
grown up Outside. He tried to imagine Ari and Evina enjoying a
girl’s lunch together. It made for a strange image. Though they
both were mothers, Ari still reminded him of a street kid
sometimes. He wouldn’t lay odds as to whether they’d hit it
off.

“That’s nice of you to offer,” he said
cautiously.

Ari punched his arm like the tomboy she used
to be. “Get your voicemail. I know you’re dying to. Besides which,
I believe I’ve accomplished as much of my peace mission as I
can.”

“Thank you,” he said as she swanned comically
to the door.

She stopped there to grin at him. “Call your
love interest, lady-killer. Someone has to distract you from
getting into more trouble.”

Rather than listen to six messages, as soon
as Ari was gone, Nate dialed Evina on his cell. Evina answered on
the second ring. She must not have had caller ID service on her
phone. “Mohajit residence,” she said in a harried voice.

“It’s Nate.”

“Oh thank goodness. I was hoping you’d call
me back tonight. I’m sorry to bother you—” A thunderous noise
interrupted her, not unlike a stampeding herd of cows. “Abby! Stop
chasing your brother down the stairs while I’m on the phone. Can
you come over? I need to talk to you, but I can’t leave the
kids.”

“What’s the matter? You sound upset.”

She blew out a gust of air. “Maybe it’s
nothing. I thought I saw the head doctor from my vision at the dry
cleaners, the one who smothered the little boy. Also, he—”

“I’ll be right over,” Nate said, having heard
enough.