Cavanaugh on Call Page 20

  “I guess that ties up most of the loose ends,” Bryce said. “Let’s get you back to the station. The sooner we get your statement, the sooner we can wrap all this up.”

  Relieved beyond words that her brother was all right and that this ordeal was finally over, Scottie smiled up at her partner. “Sounds good to me,” she told him, grateful that, for once, she’d let her guard down enough to share her burden with someone. Otherwise, neither she nor her brother might have lived out the day.

  “Give me a minute, okay?” Ethan requested.

  Scottie turned to look at him. “Something wrong?” she asked.

  “No, I—” Ethan didn’t finish answering her. Instead he crumpled to the floor right in front of her, unconscious.

  Chapter 20

  Frightened, Scottie immediately bent over her brother.

  “Ethan? Ethan, talk to me,” she begged, trying to rouse him while she quickly scanned his torso for any possible bullet holes she might have missed.

  “Not something he can do right now,” Bryce told her, squatting beside her brother. He felt for a pulse and was relieved to find one. “He’s unconscious. I need two buses sent out immediately,” Bryce requested when he heard a voice come on the line in response to his 9-1-1 call.

  He gave the dispatcher the address then terminated his call.

  “My guess is that, given what he’s been through and how you found him, he’s probably just really dehydrated, Scottie. You can get a better idea of what’s wrong once they have him in the ER,” he said, gently easing Scottie away from her brother and helping her back to her feet.

  Upright again, she blew out a shaky breath. “You’re right. I should focus on the fact that he’s alive. I wasn’t a hundred percent sure that he would be,” she confessed.

  “Well, he is and he’s going to be fine,” Bryce told her in an authoritative voice that left no room for argument or doubt.

  In her heart she knew that Bryce couldn’t guarantee what he’d just said to her, but she appreciated the fact that he was deliberately giving her something to hang on to, just as he had when he’d told her initially that they would find her brother. His upbringing had made him a far more positive person than she was and, right now, she needed to tap into that.

  “Thank you,” she told him.

  Rather than say anything, Bryce just squeezed her hand. They both ignored Rubin, who was on the floor, handcuffed and cursing them both to hell.

  The sound of approaching sirens grew louder. The ambulances were on their way.

  * * *

  Ethan still had not regained consciousness when she rode with him in the ambulance. She held his hand, a thousand fragmented memories crowded her head, reminding her of the long, hard climb she and Ethan had had, to get to a stable plateau in their lives as well as to a stable relationship with one another.

  The second the ambulance doors opened, Scottie quickly jumped out and then followed her brother’s gurney into the ER.

  She would have followed it into the exam room if she hadn’t been stopped by one of the nurses.

  “I’m sorry, you’re going to have to wait out here,” the older woman told her, standing in her way and barring her access.

  Swallowing her protest, Scottie retreated only as much as was absolutely necessary. She waited in the corridor while the physician on call was brought in to examine her brother.

  She hardly remembered sitting in one of the seats against the wall.

  Her imagination kept running away with her.

  In an effort not to panic, she deliberately shut it down. It would do her no good to speculate and drive herself crazy with different scenarios of what might have been done to Ethan to coerce him to help plan and execute the break-ins. She knew that he had been adamant about staying out of trouble. For him to have helped Eva, a woman he’d only a few months ago described to her as “Toxic Evil,” she knew he’d been given no choice.

  She felt her eyes moistening. Ethan had almost gotten himself killed just to protect her. He should have known she could take care of herself.

  Hadn’t she always?

  “What a time for you to play the hero,” she murmured under her breath to the brother hidden from her behind the exam doors.

  “This seat taken?”

  Startled, Scottie looked up to see Bryce standing over her. She’d been so lost in the awful scenarios she was conjuring up, she hadn’t even heard him approach. “What are you doing here?”

  Sitting next to her, Bryce struck a nonchalant tone as he answered, “I was kind of in the neighborhood and thought I’d stop by to give my partner some moral support.”

  Scottie glanced at her watch. It was late. She’d completely lost track of time. “Don’t you have a home to go to?”

  “I can go to it later on. It’ll still be there,” he told her. “So, how’s your brother doing?” He nodded toward the closed door. “Did the doctor come out and tell you anything yet?”

  Another wave of helplessness washed over her. It was getting harder and harder for her to just rise above it and not succumb to the dark thoughts that were plaguing her.

  Scottie shook her head. “Not a word. Not yet.” She looked at Bryce. He’d already done so much for her. She didn’t want to put him out any more. “You don’t have to stay here and keep me company.”

  He made no move to get up. “I’m lead on this case. That means you don’t get to tell me what to do.” His eyes narrowed just a little as he remembered the way he’d felt when she’d taken off earlier. “It also means that you were supposed to listen to me when I told you to wait,” he reminded her.

  “I know. And I’m sorry. But if I had waited, they might have killed Ethan. Besides,” she told him with a grateful smile, “you did come in the nick of time.”

  “Almost didn’t,” he reminded her. He wondered if she had any idea how afraid he’d been that he wouldn’t manage to get to her before something bad happened. One second later and he could have just as easily watched her being zipped up in a black body bag.

  “I know, but you did,” she pointed out and then said quietly, “I never thanked you for saving my life.”

  “No, you didn’t,” he agreed, his expression unreadable.

  She turned her face up, her eyes meeting his. “Thank you.”

  “About that,” he began sternly. “You run off like that again after I tell you to wait and there will be hell to pay, Detective Scott.”

  She didn’t doubt that he meant it. “I will try to remember that.”

  “Don’t try,” he told her with controlled anger. “Remember.”

  Grateful as she was to him for everything—helping her locate Ethan, saving her life—she felt she had to point this out. “You would have done the same thing in my place.”

  He wasn’t about to let her off the hook so quickly. Especially since she had scared the hell out of him. “We’re not talking about me, we’re talking about you,” he told her.

  “Excuse me, are you here about Mr. Loomis?” The attending ER physician asked the question as he walked up behind them.

  Scottie popped to her feet as if she was sitting on a spring-triggered cushion.

  “Yes,” she responded breathlessly, “how is he?”

  “He was severely dehydrated, but we’ve got him on an IV to take care of that. The tox screen we did on him turned up a drug we’re trying to narrow down... I think it’s safe to say that wherever you found him, he didn’t go there voluntarily. I’d like to keep him here overnight for observation but I don’t see any reason, barring complications, that we won’t be sending him home tomorrow.”

  “That’s wonderful news, Doctor,” Scottie cried, fighting back tears of relief. “Can I see him?”

  “I gave him something to make him sleep. Detective Cavanaugh filled me in earl
ier,” the doctor went on. “Your brother’s been through a lot and his body needs the rest. But he’ll be awake in the morning,” the ER physician promised. And then he looked at her pointedly. “In the meantime, I suggest you get some sleep, too. In my considered medical opinion, you look like you haven’t been getting any sleep recently, either.” He paused, allowing her to fill him in if she chose.

  “Long story, Doctor,” Scottie told him, the corners of her mouth curving. “But now that my brother’s been found and he’s safe, maybe I’ll finally get some sleep, too.”

  The physician looked at her over his glasses. “I strongly advise it.”

  Bryce put his arm protectively around her shoulders, silently indicating that he was taking charge. “I’ll see that she does, Doc,” he told the physician. He began to steer Scottie toward the exit.

  “You’re not the boss of me,” Scottie told him, trying to keep a straight face as she said it. It was obvious that she had no intentions of fighting him on this.

  “Shut up, Scottie, and keep walking,” Bryce told her, then added for her benefit, “I parked the car right across from the ER entrance.”

  * * *

  “Are we going back to the precinct?” she asked Bryce as she got into the car.

  He gave her a puzzled look, wondering why she’d think that. “You heard what I said to that ER doctor. I’m taking you home.”

  “But we have to file our reports on the case.”

  “We got all the bad guys,” Bryce reminded her. “The reports can wait until morning. Besides, our only witnesses are in the hospital. Your brother’s asleep and, according to the text Duncan sent me, now that he’s been patched up, Rubin’s singing like a canary in between cursing up a blue streak. He told Duncan where to find all the stolen goods. Seems that they hadn’t been fenced yet,” he told her with satisfaction. “The lieutenant sent a team to retrieve everything. Case closed,” he declared.

  “But we could still write up most of the reports,” Scottie protested.

  She was exhausted, but at the same time, extremely wired. Even though she’d told the ER physician that she thought she could finally get some sleep, she highly doubted it.

  At least, not immediately.

  “Do you never not argue?” Bryce sighed as he shook his head. He was clearly going to have his hands full dealing with her. Somehow, he didn’t mind it.

  “Wait, there’s too many negatives in that question for me to sort out properly and my head hurts.”

  He spared her a look, doing his best not to allow the smile he couldn’t suppress to curve the corners of his mouth.

  “Funny, mine does, too,” he told her. “I just figured it was a side effect from dealing with you.”

  She leaned back in the passenger seat, finally allowing herself to exhale. Really exhale. It was hard to believe that this was really over—or at least that it was in the homestretch.

  “What’s going to happen to Ethan?” she asked.

  “Well, seeing as how he was held prisoner and forced to plan and execute those break-ins against his will—and since everyone who could possibly contradict his story is dead or under arrest—I’d say nothing.” Had she thought of something to change that? “Why?”

  She laughed softly at herself before she answered him. “I’ve been worrying about him for so long, it’s just hard to stop worrying, I guess.”

  “Well, stop,” he ordered. And then he said something she wasn’t expecting to hear. “No guy wants to have his big sister hovering over him as if he’s some fragile, breakable kid who needs help tying his shoes.”

  She wasn’t sure she liked the picture he was painting. “I don’t do that,” she protested.

  Bryce didn’t bother arguing the point. That would get him nowhere. Instead he built on what she’d just said. “Good, so stop trying to take care of him and give the guy a chance to take care of himself.”

  She was about to repeat her denial that she was trying to take care of her brother, then stopped herself. “Maybe there’s a germ of truth in what you’re saying.”

  “‘Germ’?” Bryce repeated incredulously. “How about an entire infestation?” Bryce suggested.

  “Don’t get carried away, Cavanaugh,” she told him as they pulled up into her driveway. “I owe you a lot, but that’s not going to stop me from arguing with you.”

  “I’m fully convinced that nothing would ever stop you from arguing,” he told her, amused.

  “Oh, is that so?” she asked, getting out of Bryce’s car.

  “Yes, that’s so. So I’m not going to argue with you. I’ve got something else in mind,” he told her.

  “Oh? Like what?” she asked.

  “Well, the case is solved, your brother’s alive and well and there’s every reason to believe that our victims will be reunited with their ‘treasures’ in the not too distant future, so I’m thinking that a little victory celebration might be in order. Feel like going to Malone’s?” he felt obliged to ask, although that wasn’t his first choice.

  She stared at him, stunned at the suggestion. “You’re serious?”

  He laughed then, catching her up in his arms and kissing her right in front of her front door. Drawing back, he said, “Not in the slightest. At least, not about going to Malone’s.”

  There went her heart again. His close proximity had a habit of doing that to her. She hoped that never changed. “What are you serious about?”

  Bryce took the key from her hand, unlocked her door, then gave the key back to Scottie as he pulled her into his arms again. “The celebrating part.”

  Scottie laced her arms around his neck. “Right out here?” she asked just before he brought his mouth down to hers and she allowed herself to fall deeply into another delicious kiss.

  “No,” he answered after a couple of minutes had passed and he finally drew his lips away from hers. “We don’t get to the good part until we go inside,” he told her.

  She could feel joy dancing through her veins as she looked up at him. Everything in her world was finally in the right place and she had him to thank for that.

  And she fully intended to—for as long as he would let her.

  “So what are we waiting for?” she asked.

  He laughed, delighted. “Not a damn thing.”

  And with that, Bryce pulled her inside the house and shut the door. “You’re not too tired?” he asked her.

  Anticipation was ramping up all through her. “What do you think?”

  “I think I should shut up and find out for myself,” he told her, trying—and failing—to appear solemn.

  Laughter bubbled up in her throat as she told him, “Good idea.”

  It was the last thing either one of them said for a very long, long time.

  Chapter 21

  “So, are you going to put in for a transfer back to Homicide?”

  Bryce had made hot, exhilarating love with her until she was at the point of elated exhaustion. From what she could determine, he wasn’t exactly far from that himself.

  So when he asked her if she was transferring, it was definitely not the sort of pillow talk she’d been expecting.

  Pulling the sheet up against her, Scottie looked at the man lying beside her in bed. The full moon’s rays were invading her bedroom, but not enough for her to be able to read the expression on Bryce’s face. She was left to feel her way around in this brand-new territory she’d found herself in.

  “Do you want me to?” she asked him.

  He looked at her in surprise. “Why would you think that?” he asked.

  “Why would you ask that?” she countered. “If I’m transferring back,” she clarified in case that had somehow gotten lost in the exchange.

  “Well, you transferred to Robbery in order to shield your brother in case he did ha
ve something to do with the break-ins, so now that we found him and he’s okay—and his girlfriend and her cronies are never going to be a threat to him—or you—again—I thought that maybe you’d want to transfer back to Homicide. I mean, it’s not like you initially transferred out because you wanted a change.”

  She was still trying to figure out what he wanted her to do. After making love with him, she thought she understood him, but now, she wasn’t so sure.

  “What would you like me to do?” she asked.

  Her question surprised him. She wasn’t behaving the way he would have thought she would.

  “You’re asking me?”

  “Well, you are the only other person in bed here besides me, so, yes, I’m asking you,” she answered, amusement in her voice.

  He was honest with her. “I don’t want you to transfer back. I want to be able to walk in every morning and see you sitting at the desk across from me.”

  She never thought she could feel so good about something so minor. “Okay, then I won’t transfer back. I guess that settles that.”

  “Not entirely,” he told her.

  Her heart did a little hiccup. Was there more? “What did I forget?”

  “I was thinking along the lines of a more...permanent arrangement,” he told her, winding a strand of her hair around his index finger.

  She had to remind herself to breathe. He couldn’t be saying what she thought he was saying, could he? “What kind of a permanent arrangement?”

  He let the strand of hair fall and he took a breath. “Let me back up for a second.”

  She was desperately trying to follow this. “You mean like someone getting a running start before they go off a diving board?”

  Bryce laughed. “Not exactly what I’m going for, but that’ll do for now. Your brother is a genius when it comes to doing things on the computer.”

  “I really wish he wasn’t.”

  “What if we have him use his ‘powers’ for good?” Bryce suggested. “I know that both Valri and Brenda could use the extra help,” he told her, mentioning the Chief of Ds daughter-in-law, who was the head of the computer lab. “They’re both really sharp and both really overworked. Having someone else with them in the lab who was on top of his game, like your brother, would really be welcomed. Plus, as an added bonus, you get to keep an eye on him—if that’s what you want,” he added.