Sanctuary Found (Pelican Bay 2)

“I suspect he’s with your man still, since he hasn’t come storming in here to threaten me some more.”

“He threatened you?” I asked. Oh God, if Maddox got himself tossed in jail…

“Relax,” the man said. “He was just sending me a message.” The sheriff seemed unfazed by the whole thing. “I’m Cam, by the way,” he said as he held out his hand.

I almost laughed. Was he for real?

Since he didn’t retract his hand, I figured he was. “Isaac,” I said. “But you know that already.”

He shrugged, then pulled a box of playing cards from his shirt pocket. “You know how to play Rummy, Isaac?” he asked.

“Um, no?”

“I’ll teach you,” was all he said as he began dealing out the cards. I tried to listen as he explained the rules, but I couldn’t make sense of what was happening. When I said as much, he looked up at me. But he didn’t answer my question. Instead he said, “How’d you get that bruise on your face?”

“I can’t tell you, remember?” I said.

“Yeah,” he responded with a nod. He drew a card from the pile and studied it before discarding it. When I realized he was really expecting me to play the game, I picked up a card. I was in the process of discarding a different card when he said, “My dad used to knock me around when I was a kid.” He glanced at my discarded card, then grabbed it and tossed off a different one. “I never told anyone. Figured it was my fault. Figured there was just something about me that ticked him off. Never found out what it was, though,” he said almost casually. “Wasn’t till I joined the force that the truth hit me.”

When he didn’t continue, I found myself saying, “What truth?”

“That fuckers like him didn’t need a reason. Your turn.”

I looked down at the cards and absently played my turn. Cam was such an intimidating guy, it was hard to imagine him as ever being someone who’d been on the receiving end of a heavy hand. “Did he ever pay for what he did to you?” I asked.

Cam shook his head. “Nope. But you can be sure that a lot of people paid because of him.”

“What do you mean?”

“I learned that silence doesn’t mean a person’s got nothing to say. Just means sometimes you have to listen harder to what they aren’t saying.” He played his turn before adding, “And then you’ve got people like that Gary fella who do a whole lot of talking and not much else.”

As badly as I wanted to ask him what he meant by that, I couldn’t risk it. This man wasn’t my friend. His only job was to make sure I ended up in a cell like this permanently. Cam didn’t seem surprised at my lack of response. We were still playing when the door to the building slammed open. Cam glanced at his watch as Maddox came barreling through the door. “Hmmm, thought I had a few more minutes. I almost had a winning hand,” he said as he flashed me his cards, then began cleaning them up.

“Lieutenant,” Cam said as he motioned to a frantic-looking Maddox. We both stood as Maddox stopped outside the cell, his eyes locked on mine. I could feel myself on the verge of falling apart at the sight of him. Cam moved past Maddox and gave him a gentle pat on the shoulder. “Go on in, Lieutenant. He’s been waiting for you.”

It was all the permission Maddox needed. I let out a harsh cry when his arms closed around me.

“I’ve got you, Isaac,” he said as I began sobbing uncontrollably. I’d managed to hold it together up until that point… from being handcuffed, to going through the booking process where my picture had been taken and my fingerprints scanned into a computer, to being placed in the jail cell and the door locking behind me. But now I couldn’t even manage to pull it together long enough to get a few words out. Maddox didn’t seem to mind because he was holding onto me and answering questions he knew I wanted to ask.

“Newt’s fine. There was no frostbite or hypothermia. They gave him fluids and discharged him. He’s with Dallas and Nolan. I got him a lawyer and the first thing he did was file a protective order against Gary.”

I pulled back and wiped at my face. “A protective order? What does that mean?”

“Gary’s not allowed to go anywhere near Newt or anywhere that he is. The sheriff has already served him with the order.”

I looked up at where Cam was sitting at his desk. He shifted his gaze to me briefly, then gave me a little nod.

I didn’t know what to make of the guy.

“Isaac,” Maddox said softly to get my attention. “Newt’s lawyer thinks Gary is going to file a protective order against you… to keep you from seeing Newt.”