Calculated Risk (Blackbridge Security 5)

“For your safety,” a police officer says as he helps me to my feet, “I’m going to sit you over here until we can get to the bottom of what’s going on. Do you know who that man is?”

I shake my head as he points to the guy who has several officers and a paramedic kneeling down over him.

“Who shot him?”

“I d-did,” I stammer.

“Where’s the weapon?”

“In there,” I tell him, angling my head to the purse still on the floor in my boss’s office.

“Sit tight,” he says before crossing the room.

I watch as people shuffle around the office, too many people coming and going to keep track of everything.

Chance is handcuffed and sat in a coworker’s office chair on the far side of the area near the conference room, and he looks devastated. His head his hanging between his shoulders. As if he can feel my eyes on him, he lifts his gaze to mine.

I don’t see sympathy or remorse in his dark eyes. If anything, he’s pissed, his glare saying more than words. He blames me for what happened. If his hands weren’t handcuffed behind his back, his fingers would be pointing in my direction, and it makes me wonder how much trouble he’s going to be in, not only from the police, but from whoever this Mr. Pierce is that the bleeding guy mentioned earlier.

I have no idea what he’s done or why he would be in so much trouble that a guy with a gun showed up to the office today, but I can tell that if there’s any way for my boss to blame me for what happened, he’s going to do it. He may have confessed I had nothing to do with it when I first walked into the situation, but now that his neck is on the line, there’s no way he’s going to confess and let the police know that I’m just an accountant who was too chicken to see Quinten, so I came to work early and ended up in the middle of a shitshow.

Chance’s eyes are still boring holes into me when a man in a suit lifts him to standing and drags him away.

My skin crawls as scenario after scenario rushes through my head. I know this is a wrong place, wrong time situation, but I shot a man. Both of them could team up against me and say I was the one who went apeshit in the office. I brought a gun to work and lost my mind on my boss and his business associate while they were having an early morning meeting.

My mind is wild with conspiracy theories and how my life is going to be ruined when familiar eyes come level with mine.

Tears burn my eyes. Emotions clog my throat, and if I didn’t have steel cutting into my wrists from behind, I’d wrap them around Quinten’s neck and never let go.

“Hey,” he says, his hand cupping my jaw, thumb swiping away tears that have finally begun to fall. “You okay?”

“I’m going to go to prison,” I whimper.

“Are you a criminal?”

I shake my head.

“Then you aren’t going to prison.” He looks over his shoulder. “Franklin, get these fucking cuffs off my girl.”

I shake my head at the belligerence in his tone, not wanting him to cause any more trouble than I’m already in, but I watch in awe as one of the guys in a suit snaps his head in our direction.

“Fuck, Lake. Sorry, man. There’s a lot going on. I forgot she was over here.”

Franklin, a man wearing a black jacket with FBI emblazoned on the back, heads in our direction, helping me to my feet before unlocking my wrists from the cuffs.

My shoulders scream in pain as my arms fall forward, my fingers automatically touching the swollen areas around my wrists.

“He was,” I begin, my words coming out as sobs. “H-he—”

“Shh,” Quinten says as he pulls me against him.

My head rests between his pecs, and I try to focus on the sure pounding of his heart to calm down, but there’s so much going on I don’t know that I’ll ever feel normal again.

His fingers sweep through my hair, his voice low and unintelligible as he speaks to those around him.

His voice grows more growly, making me lift my head from his chest.

“Tomorrow,” he snaps.

“It’s best to get a statement right after an incident, Lake. You know that as well as I do.”

“Do you really think she’s going to forget being held at fucking gunpoint by a psycho?”

“Before noon,” the man says with irritation in his voice.

“Let’s get you out of here.”

I stumble a little as he turns me around, and I glare at him when he bends to lift me.

“I can walk,” I hiss.

The morning’s events have already left me feeling helpless. I’ll be damned if this man carries me out of the office like a damned baby. Instead, he takes my hand in his, fingers holding just a little too tight, but I don’t complain.