“You don’t have to do it alone,” Beckett said in a quiet voice, those ice blue eyes trained on Becca. “I’ll help.” Shane had a pretty strong suspicion that, like himself, the big guy was also trying to make some amends where Becca was concerned. He’d been almost as standoffish when they’d met, and soon thereafter he’d gotten in a fistfight with Nick that she hadn’t appreciated one bit. And she’d let them all know it, too.
The memory of Becca’s fierce defense of Nick almost made Shane smile. Not many people took on Beckett Murda and lived to tell the tale. But she had.
“Me too,” Nick said. “We’re in this together.”
She smiled and tucked in against Nick’s body. “Thanks, guys.”
Nick wrapped his arm around her and kissed her hair. “Now, back to the bearicide,” he said, pointing at the toy in front of Marz.
“This is some serious cloak-and-dagger,” Shane said, studying the tag again.
“Merritt always was a brilliant tactician and strategist. That’s clearly at play here. Question is, why?” Beckett said as he crossed his big arms. And he was right. Merritt had been a soldier who understood war, who knew how to use his assets and mitigate his weaknesses. Shane had always admired that about him. Part of the reason it stung so bad that the man had betrayed him. All of them.
Marz nodded. “Right. Which is why it has to be significant that he had a special ID tag made with the bank account number in place of the SSN. Then sent it to Becca.”
“I can’t believe it,” Becca said, rubbing her thumb over the stamped numbers. “First the bracelet and now this.”
“I know.” Marz met each of their gazes. “That’s why I think there’s something in the bear.”
A rush of anticipation shot through Shane, and he braced his hands on the counter. “Well, what are you waiting for? Open this bad boy up.”
Stepping back, Nick retrieved a pair of kitchen shears from a drawer. “You sure it’s okay with you?” he asked Becca.
“Heck, yeah,” she said, as Marz accepted the scissors into his grip. “My father wouldn’t have done this without a reason.”
“Agreed,” Marz said. “Here goes nothing.” He burrowed the sharp point of the scissor blade into the seam that ran up the stuffed animal’s back, then slowly opened the body, the legs, the head.
Shane peered over his shoulder, trying like hell to avoid blocking Marz’s light but dying to know what they were going to find. What it was going to be, Shane wasn’t quite sure. But it had to be something good, something important. Because there was no other reason for Merritt to go to all this trouble except as a signal to pay attention and dig deeper. At least, that’s what Shane’s gut told him. “Who thought we’d be doing another surgery tonight?” he asked.
“God help the patient with Marz as the doctor,” Beckett said. And it was really damn good to see a bit of normalcy returning between the pair. Beck hadn’t handled Marz’s amputation well and had turned into even more of a clam than usual after the ambush.
Low, tense chuckles went around the room.
“Here goes nothing,” Marz said as he began massaging his fingers through every bit of white stuffing. As Marz searched, Shane’s heart kicked up inside his chest. “Double-check me,” he said to Shane, pushing a mound of fluff in front of him.
Shane was only too happy to help. His fingers literally itched to encounter whatever it was that’d been hidden. The stuffing was silky soft and thick, forcing Shane to pull it apart to make sure he hadn’t missing something.
Nothing in the body. Nothing in the legs. Nothing in the arms.
Marz started on the head. “Come to Papa,” he said, anticipation and excitement clear in his voice. Except . . . He finished pulling through the last of the stuffing. Nothing. Shane came to the same conclusion as he double-checked him.
The bear was empty.
“You gotta be fucking kidding me,” Marz said. Disappointment deflated the air around them.
“Check the body,” Shane said, refusing to believe this was a false lead. What would be the fucking point? They each took a section of the bear’s unstuffed body and turned the pieces inside out. Still nothing. “Well, goddamn.”
“It doesn’t make any sense,” Becca said, her voice suddenly strained. And it nearly broke Shane’s heart to see her struggling to hold back tears. One broke free, and she batted it away, then Nick turned her in his arms and pulled her against his chest. “I’m just tired,” she said in a raspy whisper.
Nick nodded, his troubled expression mirroring Shane’s own feelings. “I know. Tomorrow’s another day. Thanks for everything all of you did today,” he said, meeting each of their gazes. “Come on, sunshine,” he whispered against her hair.
She nodded and offered the rest of them a watery smile. “Thanks, guys,” she said, as they left the kitchen and headed back down the hall toward Nick’s room.
“I guess I’ll call it a night, too,” Jeremy said. “And Marz? I’ve got clients until about noon tomorrow, but I’m free in the afternoon if you need more help.”
Marz dragged his gaze away from the ruins of the bear, his expression as close to pissed off as you ever saw it. “Absofuckinglutely. Consider yourself spoken for.” Jer gave a nod and said his good-nights as Marz scooped the pile of fluff into his arms. “Well, I’m too annoyed to sleep. Think I’ll go scan more of the surveillance feeds. Those fuckers have to say something about tomorrow’s delivery sometime.”
“One would think,” Shane said, feeling like they’d missed something but unable to make his brain focus through the fog of exhaustion.
“Why don’t you just throw that away?” Beckett asked, frowning at the stuffing overflowing Marz’s hands.
He shook his head. “It’s Becca’s. I’ll leave it to her to decide what to do with it.”
Beckett followed Marz to the apartment door, but looked back over his shoulder. “You wanna hang?” Beck asked.
Shane scrubbed his hands over his face. What he should do was go the hell to sleep. But despite the aches and fatigue of his muscles, the dull throb of his gunshot wound, and his fuzzyheadedness, sleep was the last thing on his mind.
Crystal.
She’d be getting off work soon . . .
And she’d promised to talk to him. Really talk to him, this time.
With Charlie’s surgery behind him, his thoughts were free to roam again, and they went back to the image of that Bruno asshole running his dirty paws all over her.
The whirlwind in his brain wasn’t going away until he saw her again, that much was clear.
“Nah,” Shane said. “I’m going to go check in with Easy. Make sure everything’s cool there.”
“Okay. Well, don’t forget to wear a raincoat,” Beckett said, totally deadpan.
Marz’s expression froze for a second before cracking into a wide smile and uproarious laughter.
“Fuck off.” Shane realized even as he said it that his annoyance probably confirmed Beckett’s suspicion. First Marz, now Beckett. This cat wasn’t going to stay in the bag much longer, was it? So be it.
Beckett gave a slow grin.
Shane rolled his eyes and beat feet for his room. He’d check in on Charlie, then he needed a quick shower and a change of clothes before he headed out, before he saw Crystal again.
Chapter 14
Crystal was so strung out with worry over Jenna that she hadn’t even bothered to change out of her skanky uniform. Instead, she’d traded her heels for flip-flops and thrown on an old hoodie she’d left in her locker. It was after two in the morning, after all, so it wasn’t like she was trying to win any fashion awards.