The Wolf (Black Dagger Brotherhood - Prison Camp 2)

Over the male’s heavy shoulder, Rio’s eyes squeezed shut and she embraced him back. “Oh, Apex, I’m so sorry, I really tried to help—”

The nurse ducked her hooded head out from behind the drapery. “He’s resting comfortably. For the first time since he came to me.”

Now Rio’s eyes flared back open. There were tears in them. “Thank God he’s not in pain.”

Lucan exhaled a breath he hadn’t been aware of holding.

And wondered what the hell the story with her brother was.

Captain?”

As José came up to the open office door, he knocked on the jamb. “You receiving there, Captain? Willie isn’t at her desk.”

From out of the private bathroom in the far corner, a muffled voice answered with what could have been anything: Hello. Not now. Come in. Fortunately, a second later, Stan emerged from his favorite crapper, as he called it. His frown was deep as a cavern, and at his throat, a tie was in the process of being redone. Or undone. Hard to tell which.

“You taking that off or making sure it stays on?” José asked.

“Wish I didn’t have to wear it at all. But the one I put on this morning got mustard on it at lunch. Well, I got French’s on my sport coat, too.” Stan nodded over to the sofa where a wad of navy blue had been tossed onto the cushions. “Good thing I have second sets of everything in my favorite crapper.”

Nailed it, José thought.

“The sacred private head, a joy to behold.” He entered and parked it on the hard chair just inside the door. “Where no one but the chief ever goes.”

“It’s the only throne I have. What can I say.”

José nodded. “I’d protect it jealously, too, if I were you. Especially considering how many officers hit the food trucks for lunch.”

“That’s where I got mustarded, as a matter of fact. And I can’t show up at Stephan Fontaine’s with part of a ham and cheese on my chest. Right by my name tag.”

“Wow, Fontaine’s. Fancy.”

“Just another rubber chicken dinner.”

As they went back and forth, José let his eyes go on a roam. He’d spent so much time updating Stan on cases and problems in the department that he was familiar with every framed picture on the walls, as well as the window that looked out over the back parking lot, and the perpetual clutter on the desk, and the American flag folded military-style in its triangled box on the shelves. Closing his eyes, it was like a video game he’d overplayed when he was a kid, the details projected on the backs of his lids.

Was he going to miss this? he wondered.

No, he didn’t think so, he decided.

“I’d be surprised if they serve chicken,” he murmured, “much less the rubber kind of poultry, at Fontaine’s.”

“You’re probably right.” Stan finished knotting the tie and flipped his collar down. “But at the end of the day, this event is just like any other one. You know the deal. Some rich jackhole’s giving money to every nonprofit in town, and we’ve got that Police Benevolent Fund. Wouldn’t mind if some of his benevolence headed in our direction.”

“You’ve always been about the rank and file, Stan.”

“Speaking of which, what’s going on with our missing officer.” The captain sat down in his leather chair. “Any leads on Hernandez-Guerrero’s location?”

“No, I’m sorry to report.”

Stan cursed and smoothed that new tie. Which looked exactly the same as all of his ties. “Jesus, José. What are we going to tell her family?”

“She doesn’t have any.”

“Wait, did I know that? I think I knew that. And no boyfriends, husbands, that kind of thing, right?”

“No, she lived alone. There are a couple of cousins out of town, and we’re waiting to hear back from them.”

Shaking his head, Stan’s eyes got a faraway look. “You’re lucky you’re retiring. I don’t know how much more I can take of this shit. What about Officer Roberts? How’s his family?”

“Awful. Just awful.”

“Goddamn. Least he didn’t have a wife and kids, and if that’s all you can say about a situation, it’s pretty fucking crappy.”

As Stan stared off into space, they stayed in silence for a minute, no longer captain and subordinate, just two men who had known each other for over twenty years, in a context that could get really tough sometimes.

“You know,” Stan said, “my Ruby used to be great in situations like this. That woman would bend over backwards for any family of a slain officer. She’d cook them meals that froze well—big deal, the whole freezing-well thing. She’d visit and do chores. Pick up kids, if she had to. She was great, an extension of the department.”

“Yeah. How’s she doing?”

“Good. Her second marriage is going way better than her first. Big surprise, huh.” Stan rubbed his face and looked over his messy desk with an expression of hopelessness that had nothing to do with all the paperwork. “She was right to leave me. Too many frozen meal orders, and that wasn’t the half of it. You’re lucky you’re still married.”