He scooted his chair around so that it faced hers. He reached out and tilted her chin up so he could see her wound in the moonlight. Six tiny black sutures. The skin
at her temple glistened where Lopez had put ointment on it.
“You’re going to have a scar.”
“Probably.”
He let his hand drop away. For a long moment, he just looked at her and saw that same hint of fear he’d seen earlier. He was glad to see it. She
needed
to be afraid. She needed to learn some caution and not go flashing her creds in places where cops had unnaturally short life expectancies.
At the same time, though, he hated that look in her eyes. Anger churned in his gut as he took in her scraped cheek, her bruised arm. Fearless Elaina, who didn’t run when he told her to. Who waded through swamps looking for dead girls. Who spoke to desperate parents when everyone else with a badge wanted to run and hide. She still wore the torn purple dress with the blood on it, and Troy knew that if he had the chance right now, he would kill both those fuckers with his bare hands.
She broke eye contact with him and looked out at the beach.
He went inside the house to get another glass. When he came back out, he poured some tequila and slid it in front of her, then sank into his chair, facing the water.
She lifted the glass and looked at the amber liquid.
“It’s from Jalisco,” he told her, and then watched in amazement as she tipped her head back and poured it down her throat.
“Well, shit, that’s one way to do it.”
Her eyes slammed shut. She bent over and made a sound like a gagging cat.
“Laina?” He pounded on her back. “Hey, you okay?”
She shook her head vigorously, and he couldn’t help it—he started to laugh.
Her head snapped up and she wheezed something at him.
“You’re supposed to sip it, not shoot it. This stuff’s three hundred bucks a bottle.”
She winced and shuddered, and he tried to soothe her by stroking her back.
“It’s awful,” she gasped.
“You just have to get used to it.”
“Why would you want to?”
He laughed again and combed her hair back from her face. It felt soft and cool, and he liked the way it lifted in the breeze. She cast a wary glance at him.
“Guess it’s an acquired taste.” He picked up his glass and sipped. “Want something else?”
“I’m fine,” she said, and glanced at her watch. “Anyway, I should be getting back. You mind giving me a ride to the inn?”
“Happy to,” he lied, but then he didn’t move. Neither did she. After a drawn-out silence she leaned back in the chair and closed her eyes.
He looked out at the water. The surf rolled against the shore, and he heard the distant sound of rap music from one of the nightclubs not too far down the beach.
“Feels nice out here,” she said.
“Yeah.”
“Cooler than it’s been.”
“Yeah.”
“Thank you for helping me.”
She put it out there casually, but he knew she didn’t feel that way about it. She opened her eyes and looked
over at him. “I would have been in trouble if you hadn’t come. I’m not sure what would have happened.” She turned her glass on the table and looked away.
“Seemed like you were doing okay at first,” he said. “Don’t know what you did to that baseball cap guy, but he was in some serious pain when I got there.”
“Knee to the groin,” she said.
“Nice.”
“It was the other one.” She shook her head. “I didn’t even see him. He came right out of my blind spot. I can’t believe I let it happen. It was one of the first things they taught us at the Academy.”
She shook her head again, and he could tell she was disappointed with herself.
And he knew what he should do here. She needed a friend tonight, a drinking buddy. If he had a decent bone in his body, he’d rise to the occasion and stop fantasizing about getting her into bed. He took another sip of tequila.
“Don’t beat yourself up,” he said. “You just need to keep training. Take a break from the office every once in a while. Sharpen up your fighting skills instead of your pencils.”
“I’ve definitely spent too much time at a desk.”
“Then get out there, do some more training. It’s part of being a good field agent. Only way to learn how to fight is to practice.”
She gave him a wry smile. “And I suppose you’ve had plenty of practice?”
“You should know.”
She’d seen his entire rap sheet, seventeen years’ worth of bar brawls and disorderlies and public intoxication
charges. He hadn’t been arrested in years, though. He’d cleaned up his act.
It startled him to realize he actually gave a damn that she knew it.
She poured a splash of tequila into her glass.
“You go to Mexico a lot?” she asked.
“Now and again.”
She took a tentative sip and winced. “That where you learned Spanish?”
“Nah, I learned it growing up. Cinco’s house, mostly.”
“You guys were friends? He seems younger than you.”
“He is.” Troy tipped his glass and let the taste slide over his tongue. “He’s got four older brothers, though. He’s fifth.
Cinco.
Anyway, his oldest brother was my best friend growing up. Spent more time at their house than mine.”
“Must have been nice, growing up with all those people around.”
“Yeah, sometimes.”
“Our house was so quiet.” Another little sip. “I’m an only child. And my dad was always working. Plus, I was sort of a loner.”
“I can picture that.”
“Ha. Thanks a lot.”
“You seem like you’d have been serious, even as a little kid.”
“I was.”
“And what about high school?” he asked.
“What about it?”
“That’s when you moved to Virginia, right? I bet that was a tough time to move.”
“It was okay,” she said. “But you know, having a dad who’s an FBI agent doesn’t exactly do wonders for your social life. Most of the guys I knew were intimidated. Every time I went out, I came home to a big interrogation. ‘Where were you?’ ‘Who were you with?’ ‘Where’d you go after that?’ It used to drive me crazy.” She shot him a skeptical look. “Are you really interested in all this?”
“Yes.” He tossed back another sip.
“Anyway, I didn’t really come out of my shell until college. No, actually, I should say grad school.”
He swirled his drink and leaned back in his chair. Grad school. Troy hadn’t even gone to college. It was one of the major differences between them and definitely not his favorite topic. But still, it was nice talking to her about something besides a murder investigation.
He glanced at her and saw that she was giving the blue agave another chance. “So what happened in grad school?”
She rolled her eyes. “I fell in love. Or at least I thought I did.”
“You thought you were in love, and then… ?” He waited for her to fill in the blank.
“He was a law professor. She was his T.A.” She took a gulp, and this one seemed to go down easier than the rest. “And yes, I’m fully aware of what a cliché that is. What can I say? He was a cheat, and I was an idiot.”
“Love makes people stupid.” Troy downed the rest of his drink and offered her the bottle. She nodded, and he filled up their glasses.
“How do you know?” she asked.
“Just what I hear.”
They stared at the sky, and his buzz started to kick in. They didn’t talk for a while, just drank and listened to the waves. It felt good. This was one of his favorite pastimes, but usually he did it alone.
“You haven’t asked about the ketamine.”
He’d known it was too good to last. He turned to look at her. “What about the ketamine?”
“I bought some. No prescription necessary. It’s entirely possible our unsub is buying his supply at a
veterinaria
just over the bridge.”
“Great. Now what?”
“I don’t know. The clerk there started to ID someone from my photo array, then clammed up when her manager walked in.”
Troy closed his eyes and muttered a curse.
“I did, however, find a waitress who could ID one of my suspects as being a frequent customer right around spring break. First thing tomorrow, I’m going to see if we can get some surveillance on him.”
“Elaina.” Troy leaned forward on his elbows. “You think it
might
be possible your undercover operation is the reason you were attacked?”
She looked at him.
“Don’t you know you can’t just go waltzing down there, trying to pull some sting op with the local vendors? Shit, drugs are a serious business here. You’re lucky you didn’t get a bullet in your brain.”
Troy tipped back his glass. Forget driving. If he took her home at all tonight, it was going to be a half-mile walk down the beach.
“It’s okay to ask for help,” he said. “You don’t have to be Superwoman all the time.”
He could feel her tension now. He glanced over at her. She was pissed off at him. Again.
“You don’t think I can do my job?”
“Don’t get defensive. That’s not what I’m saying. I’m saying I would have gone with you. Purely as a friend, not a reporter,” he added when she sent him a wary look. “Weaver would have gone with you, too. Or Cinco or Maynard. Law enforcement is a team effort. You have to ask your teammates for help when you need it.”
She didn’t reply, and he wondered if she’d heard this advice before. She could stand to hear it again, obviously.
“At the very least, next time take someone who speaks Spanish. Someone who can fish for information without ticking people off.”
She stood up. Here it came. The big
adios.
She surprised him yet again by picking up her drink and taking it to the wooden railing. She rested it there and looked out over the beach.
“I think you’re right,” she said, and the words were almost lost on the breeze.
He got up and joined her, resting his glass beside hers.
“I get this feeling all the time that so many people expect me to fail,” she said. “Sometimes I even think they
want
me to fail. My boss. My coworkers. My own father.” Her hair blew around her face, and she gathered it up and twisted it into a knot. “I guess I’m distrustful of people’s motives. I don’t think they really want to help me. I think I need to do everything myself. Prove to everyone that I’m capable.”
She looked at him, and he saw the vulnerability in her eyes. She gazed back out at the beach. “You want to know the worst thing about tonight?”
He watched her closely. She was letting her guard down. Slowly, but surely, she was doing it. And it had only taken countless hours alone with her and half a bottle of Don Julio.
“What was the worst thing about tonight?”
“I felt completely helpless. My whole life I’ve spent trying to get away from that feeling. Ever since my mom walked out.”
She shook her head. “I think about how hard I worked at the Academy, all the weapons training, the hours of sparring. And it only took two thugs with a switchblade about one minute to reduce me to a defenseless, terrified woman in that alley.” Her voice wasn’t quite steady now, and he knew she was revealing a side of herself—a weakness—that she usually kept hidden. A lone tear slid down her cheek, and she quickly swiped it away. She looked out at the water, and he had the urge to wrap his arms around her and say something protective and comforting. But he sensed she wouldn’t want the usual weepy-female treatment. Hell, he didn’t want to give it. If either of those guys had pulled a gun, Elaina would likely be dead right now. And her death would barely make the news—just one more casualty in the border wars. She knew it, too. She knew just how close she’d come to being a statistic.
She took a deep breath, and Troy watched her get her composure back. She shivered, and he hoped it was just because of the cool breeze.
“Sorry,” she muttered. “Too much information, right?”
“No.”
“Must be the tequila,” she said. “I’m not usually this chatty.”
“
I like you chatty.”
She went back to the table and got the bottle. She poured a few fingers into his glass, then hers.
Troy pushed the last of his prurient fantasies out of his mind. She was trying to get good and drunk, and he didn’t blame her. She’d been through a trauma tonight. She felt emotional. And if he manipulated the situation to his advantage, he deserved to end up in the seventh level of hell.
She took another sip and held the glass up to the moonlight. “Is this stuff really three hundred dollars a bottle?”
“That’s if you smuggle it in. Retail, it’s more.”
“That’s ridiculous,” she said, and took a gulp. “Wasteful. I can’t believe I’m drinking it. Every sip is what, twenty bucks?”
She wanted to change the subject, and he was happy to oblige her.
“Depends on your definition of wasteful,” he said. “How much is a line of coke?”
“I have no idea.” She shot him a peevish look, like the Elaina he knew, and he felt reassured that she was back in control. He wasn’t about to have a soggy drunk on his hands.
“How much is a Louis Vuitton purse?” he asked. “Or an iPhone? Or a pair of Bulls tickets?”
“Okay, okay, I can see your point. I love basketball.” She cast him a sidelong glance, and he saw the faintest trace of a smile now. Progress.
She turned to face the water. For a few minutes, she got quiet and he tried not to notice how pretty her neck looked with her hair pulled up like that.
“I can’t believe you live on the beach,” she said. “Do you ever wake up and look out the window and have to pinch yourself?”
“No.”
“Really?”
“I grew up on the bay, so being surrounded by water’s pretty normal for me. I think I could swim before I could walk.”
She sighed wistfully. “I’ve never been skinny-dipping. It’s on my list. Or it was.”
He looked at her for a second, not sure he’d heard her right. “What list?”
“My ‘Things I’ve Never Done But Secretly Want To’ list.” She glanced at him. “When I joined the Bureau, I crossed a lot of stuff off it.”
“Why’s that?”
“Well, anything illegal is out. Plus anything ethically questionable.”
He turned around and leaned back against the railing, enjoying the conversation now. “What’s unethical about getting naked in the ocean?”