with need.
“Yeah, until he slides the crackpipe between them.” Ronan drove away from the man, and Miranda’s trailer.
Jude had a feeling Ronan was right about meth being Ralph’s drug of choice, but he kept his mouth shut.
Finding out Marc was cheating on Peg wasn’t a huge shock. Hearing that he was on the lookout for LSD to dose her with, that was another matter entirely. This case kept getting stranger by the day. “Guys, I can’t thank you enough for helping me out today.”
“Anytime.” Fitzgibbon was all smiles from the backseat. “Made me feel like I was back on the force again. I wouldn’t mind doing more of this P.I. stuff.”
“Get your license, both of you.” Jude poked Ronan’s shoulder. “After that, we can open West Side Private Dicks.”
“I’m sure Ten will be thrilled.” Ronan burst out laughing along with Kevin.
As upset as Jude was about this case and its constant plot twists, Jude was grateful to be sharing this job with his friends.
29
Copeland
“This is the best dinner I think I’ve ever eaten.” Cope pushed his clean plate away. He’d woken up to the happy sounds of Wolf babbling and Jude chatting back to him while he started dinner. Cope had ended up sleeping on the sofa for nearly four hours.
“It’s Ronan’s recipe. He’s the master of marinades.” Jude snorted.
Cope knew for a fact Jude and Wolf hadn’t been home with him the entire time he’d been snoozing. Which, of course, begged the question, where had Jude been? So far, his husband had been mum on the subject.
“Ronan came to the supermarket with me after we dropped Kevin off at the Magick shop. I’d never thought of using flank steak instead of steak tips before. Made all the difference in the world.” Jude popped the last bite in his mouth. “Can I get you some more?”
“No, I’m good.” Cope raised an eyebrow at his husband. “With this amazing dinner and asking if you can refill my plate, are you buttering me up to tell me what you were out doing?”
“Sort of, but it’s not what you think.” Jude scooped up the dinner dishes and brought them to the sink. He turned on the hot tap and started to rinse them.
Nothing in Jude’s behavior made Cope think he’d done something he was going to need to make up for. He looked more like he had bad news to share. When it came to this case, the bad news could be almost anything.
“Dadadada!” Wolf was happily singing to himself and slapping his hands on the tray of his highchair.
Cope lost himself in Wolf’s playtime while Jude did the dishes.
When Jude came back to the table, he was carrying a plate of oatmeal raisin cookies from the bakery and some banana puffs for Wolf. He was crazy for the star-shaped cereal.
“Hmm, treats for everyone.” Cope bit his tongue on asking just what the hell Jude had done.
Jude grabbed a cookie and ate half of it one bite. He looked like someone had died. “Ronan, Fitzgibbon, and I went on a stakeout.”
A stakeout? What the hell was so bad about that? “Who were the three of you staking out?”
“Marc Waller.” Jude looked Cope directly in the eye.
“After what Peg told us today, I don’t blame you. What did you find?” This definitely wasn’t as bad as Cope thought.
“Aside from the fact the man is a degenerate gambler and a drunk, he’s also cheating on Peg with his high school sweetheart, who lives in a trailer park with more meth heads than an episode of Breaking Bad.”
“I can’t say I’m surprised. Do you think he’s on drugs himself?” Cope was glad he missed the outing to the trailer park.
“No, I don’t think so. One of us would have picked that up when we met him last week.”
Jude had a point. Usually, people on drugs read differently when Cope used his psychic gifts. He hadn’t gotten any hint of drugs when they’d met Marc. “What aren’t you telling me?”
Jude sighed. “Turns out our advice to Peg about getting out of the house was spot on. I met the guy who owns the trailer park and he said Marc was asking where he could score LSD.”
Cope’s mouth fell open in shock. “He was going to drug Peg, so she’d think her hallucinations were a sign of mental illness.” He’d never heard of something so diabolical.
“It seems that way. Ralph couldn’t tell me if Marc was successful in finding the drug, but I’d bet the house he did.