messaged her acceptance had him quickly echoing with his own before setting his cell aside to regard the unexpected visitor on the other side of his polished desktop.
Byron Atcliff wasn’t one to betray emotion. The tic in his lean cheek spoke volumes. “So, this is how you protect her?”
Instead of protesting that unforgivable failure, Max went into attack mode. “What I’m wondering is how the details of our plan were available to those who’d use ′em against us.”
Hard eyes flashed. “Explain.”
“They knew she’d be there. They knew I’d be there. This was no random act. It was planned in advance.” Max let that sink deep before demanding, “Who else knew? I think it’s understood that I’ve no damned reason to endanger my wife and child for anyone’s agenda.”
For a long moment, Atcliff remained as still as Andrew Jackson’s monument in the Square. “I’ll find out,” he promised.
“Do that. And do let me know. I think we can both agree this situation has grown too dangerous considering what . . . and who is at risk.”
“Are you asking for official protection?”
“From you and yours?” His thunderous laugh exploded. As Atcliff’s glare slit dangerously, he amended, “Do what’s necessary on your end to keep her safe on the streets. I’ll make my own arrangements . . . that I prefer to keep to myself.”
“I’m surprised you don’t want her pulled off the job.”
Until that instant, Max thought that’s what he wanted. Funny how his aversion to agreeing with the police captain opened his eyes to the true situation.
“No,” he amended in both word and mind. “The streets are better when she’s on them, until she decides to make that change.”
“Even at the risk of your child?”
“If you think she’d risk the life of that child for anything in this world or beyond it, you don’t know her. That baby is safer than she’d be in the Federal Reserve.” A pause for emphasis then he added, “Is this going to be a problem?”
Atcliff pushed out of his chair. “Not to me, no. I run my shop as I see fit. You do the same with your home, and we won’t have an issue. I think it’s been proven that we can’t cooperate even though forced to co-exist in her life.”
“Agreed.” Max waited until Atcliff reached the door to softly drawl, “Mind telling me what happened to the officers you assigned to shadow her?”
Without turning, he fired the answer like a shot. “Yes. I mind.”
The door closed quietly behind him.
– – –
Philo Tibideaux worked out of Jacques LaRoche’s old trailer on the docks but lived in the walk-up apartment that had belonged to his brother, Tito. His old friend had encouraged him to move into Savoie’s high rise complex on the riverfront, but Philo didn’t like to be crowded. Or controlled. Following LaRoche’s suggestion felt like a bit of both.
Savoie’s immergence as their leader had brought the deadly Trackers from the North into their territory. After they killed Philo’s misguided though innocent brother, he’d lost his desire to follow the supposed savior of their kind. Instead, he formed his own group to police the docks and keep his men and their families safe. His Patrol began as a shifter Neighborhood Watch but had expanded far beyond those goals into a paramilitary force to be reckoned with. Through them, he kept an ear to the ground and a finger on the pulse of their world. And a wary eye on Max Savoie.
Like most, he’d thought the rise of the Promised One would bring those good times legend foretold a-rolling in. So far, he’d seen death and threat and fear. He’d had enough of all three. Only the softening presence of Mary Kate Malone kept him from acting on his worries more aggressively.
The vivacious blonde cheerleader he’d once admired from afar had infiltrated his world while tutoring his brother when they were teens. She was the one bright spot in their hand-to-mouth struggle to survive. Damned if Tito hadn’t had a magical way with the horn, a skill his big brother hoped would lift them out of their bordering-on-illegal livelihood. Tito thought Mary Kate was an angel. Philo knew she was. An angel far and above his reach even though he’d occasionally catch her eying him with what he didn’t dare call interest.
What could a gorgeous thing like Mary Kate Malone see in him?
There must have been something he’d missed because there she was when Tito died, holding his hand, drying his eyes. And there at