“My ex broke into my house,” she announced, looking at her back door and then walking over to it. It was locked.
“What? When did he do that?” Captain Sullivan stood in her kitchen, his thick arms crossed over his chest, watching her with a shrewd eye.
Another person would have been intimidated by his commanding presence. But John Sullivan didn’t hold half the dominating, protective aura that Chase did.
“When we,” she began, but then turned, facing him, and started again. “I came home and realized someone was in my house. The jerk damn near got himself shot,” she added, forcing a dry chuckle. “I chased him out the back door and then recognized his car idling in the alley.”
“You know it was him for sure?”
“Yup. I called him and chewed his ass.” Her gaze fell on a bottle of water on her counter. The cap was barely on it and it was almost full. Ashley walked up to the bottle, remembering taking it out of the refrigerator. “I thought I was out of bottled water,” she mused.
“What?”
Ashley picked up the bottle and the cap fell off it, rolling under the kitchen table. She brought it to her nose, sniffing the water.
“Does this smell funny to you?”
Captain Sullivan tried taking the bottle, but she wouldn’t let him. “Don’t touch it. Just sniff it. If I’m right, I don’t want anyone else’s fingerprints on it.”
CHAPTER 8
CHASE PICKED up his phone, already knowing why his supervisor would be calling. “What’s up, Doc?”
Harry Docking, his immediate supervisor, was calling from his private line. Whatever he wanted to say, it was off the record. Nonetheless, Chase answered with the code words he’d used for years, “What’s up, Doc?,” which told Harry there was no situation at his end.
Unfortunately, Chase was damn near positive that was anything but the case.
“Do you remember Big Al Crete?” Doc’s tone was all business.
Maybe the events in his hometown hadn’t reached his supervisor’s desk. “The Greek who was shipping drugs over the border a year back? Didn’t he turn evidence over to the state?”
“Yup. And walked free. Apparently he walked right back into his old lifestyle.”
“Don’t they usually?”
“He just got picked up down there in Wichita, apparently he moved beyond the acceptable drugs of heroine and cocaine. They busted him with a fair amount of ISIS on him.”
Chase froze. He didn’t realize he’d been pacing his living room until he stopped, a tightening throughout his body having him gripping his phone so hard he damn near broke it in two.
“Was he dealing here in Wichita?” Chase’s mind started racing. He’d put Ashley in one hell of a position walking out on her, and it bugged the crap out of him knowing she was keeping his cover for him and he wasn’t there for her.
“I’m surprised you don’t have the answer to that question.” Doc continued with his hard tone, which was impossible to read over the phone. “If you’ve been behaving, though, and not taking the law into your own hands and trying to solve cases without following protocol, I might be willing to put you on another case.”
Chase didn’t like being asked if he was behaving. Doc knew Chase was one of his best operatives. And if nailing a perpetrator meant breaking a few laws along the way, he sure as hell wasn’t breaking as many laws as the bad guy was.
“That’s up to you,” he growled, unwilling to keep the grumpiness out of his tone.
“You aren’t some rookie, Chase. You know how it works. I hate thinking you’re burned out. You’re one hell of a good agent, but you’ve got to follow the rules.”
“Yup,” he said, heading into his bedroom to get his keys. “Where did you say they booked Big Al Crete?”
“I didn’t. Why do you care?”
Chase didn’t care any longer about protecting who he was, not if he could help Ashley crack this case. And especially if he could see her again. From what he’d observed on the few drive-bys he’d done today since she’d come home from the hospital, her captain was hanging around too close. If she was protecting Chase, it wouldn’t surprise him a bit if her captain felt she was hiding something. Which she was— his identity.
“I don’t know if I care yet, or not.” And he wouldn’t until he talked to Big Al.
“Stay out of it, Chase,” Doc ordered. “It’s not your case. Stand by and I’ll fax information to you there in an hour or so. I’ll get you a plane ticket and tomorrow you’ll be in New York.”