The Poet (Samantha Jazz Series #1) - Lisa Renee Jones Page 0,114
I never am. Wade, listen—”
“Save it.” He downs another swallow of coffee. “I need to get out of here.” He heads for the door.
I catch his arm and make my appeal. “Let’s just get through this case. Then we’ll figure it out. Please. Just be patient a little longer.”
He leans in and kisses me, but he says nothing. I’m not sure what to think about that, and when he walks around the island and heads toward the living room, regret settles hard in my belly. I don’t want to lose him, which is the entire point. The danger of him being close to me is real right now. Eager to reiterate that point, I quickly follow him, rounding the kitchen corner, but it’s too late to catch him. I’ve forgotten the knock and visitor, while Wade is already opening the door.
He steps back enough to allow Lang to enter the apartment, his detective uniform for the day a dark pair of blue jeans and a matching blue polo shirt. He smirks in Wade’s direction. “I guess I know who is back on overnight duty.”
He’s baiting Wade, but Wade isn’t a man to be baited. Wade just gives him a far too tolerant look.
My look is not tolerant at all. “What are you doing here, Lang?” I ask, folding my arms.
“I come bearing news.”
Wade lifts his hand in my direction. “Call me later.”
“You’re gonna want to hear this, too,” Lang says, shutting the door before Wade can escape, and then drops his bombshell. “They found Richard Williams dead last night.”
Richard Williams being the ex-con who killed my father. I swallow hard with a mental flash of my father’s face the moment that bullet hit his chest.
“Where?” I ask.
“A trailer park off Riverside,” Lang says. “He had a gun superglued to his hand and pills and money on the table. The first responders assume that the dumbass glued the gun to his hand to force himself to use it. He appears to have chickened out and taken pills instead. And then chickened out again. He called 911 to try to save himself, but it was too late. We’ll never know for sure.”
I inhale a hard-earned breath and let it slowly trickle from my lips. I expect to feel something life changing. I expect the ground to damn near quake under my feet, but it does not. It’s one of those ground zero moments again, where I wonder if I’m becoming too cold, too removed, too much like the killers I hunt. “It’s good news. Thanks for coming by.”
Wade steps in front of me. “Are you okay?”
“I’m perfect,” I say. “I’m motivated to do my job.”
He studies me for a long, intense moment and proves once again why I’ve never walked away from Wade by saying, “I understand. I’ll talk to you later.” He nods and turns to leave.
I catch his arm. “You know—”
“Many things,” he promises, his voice gentle with understanding that wasn’t present in the kitchen. And with that, he leaves me more determined than ever to catch The Poet before someone else I love ends up dead.
Chapter 95
Wade leaves. Lang doesn’t. And I know from his face that he’s going to try to start a deep conversation.
Which is why when he says, “Jazz—” I cut him off.
“I just want to catch him, Lang. That’s what I want to focus on. This is your investigation. That team at the Austin PD is your team. I’ll just aid your efforts.”
“You claimed jurisdiction.”
“Because we’re not going to be captive to the mayor and his foot soldiers.” Which reminds me that I need to talk to Wade about his dive into the mayor’s dirty deeds. “That means you aren’t, either,” I add. “Tell me what you need. I’ll help you get it.”
“Can we just take a minute and talk?”
“The day I heard about the man who killed my father is not the day for us to talk.”
He cuts his stare and then nods. “Right. Fair enough. The autopsy’s at three.”
“I’ll meet you there.”
“Okay, Agent Jazz,” he snaps. “But for the record, we’re a good team. We want to catch this guy. Call me a cheat or a liar or whatever for now, I don’t care. What I care about is letting this shit between us get in the way. You don’t have to be my friend, but we started this together. Let’s end it together, even if it’s the end of us together. This is about catching The Poet, not about us.”