Fatal Attraction (Love Kills Duet #2)

16. Sixteen

Sixteen

Phoenix

I stood next to Spike outside the interrogation room a couple days later, growing aggravated as I checked the time, wondering what the hell was taking Harley so damn long to get here. She said she’d try to buy us at least a week, two at most, before she had no choice but to offer Karl a plea deal. But thanks to having to prep and plan for tomorrow night’s mission, Harley stated she couldn’t risk putting it off any longer. Even she had someone to report to and last I heard from her—which was precisely an hour ago—she’d told me she was trying to sway her boss into officially dropping the charges for Amber’s assault. If I had to take a wild guess for the massive delay, then that likely had to be why. Perhaps the talk hadn’t gone the way she hoped.

I was a minute away from calling her when Spike tapped my shoulder, and as I looked away from my phone, the door behind us opened, and Harley stepped in with her own annoyed look marring her face, a black briefcase tight-fisted in her right hand.

I was the first to speak. “Bad news?”

Harley sighed through her nose. “The opposite, actually. I literally had to sit down and go over every case top to fucking bottom before he’d consider it. Mercifully, I came out on top. He agreed to let me drop the charges in Amber’s case.”

“What did he say about Delilah’s case?”

She frowned then, shaking her head. “There was nothing I could do. I have no choice but to charge him for aiding in Delilah’s rape. If he accepts the deal, he’ll spend the next fifteen years in prison. If not, then his fate will be left up to a jury.”

It fell silent then.

As Spike turned, gaping unimpressively at Karl who was conversing with Ben, he asked, “What are his chances the jury will find him innocent?”

Karl belonged in jail. He did. It was just a fact neither Spike nor I could disregard, not after Karl violated the restraining order and had literally slapped the taste out of Charlotte’s mouth right in front of us. It fucking haunted me, tortured me, but no matter how angry I was, I had to swallow it down and focus on the bigger picture here and think about what was best for not only Karl, but Charlotte. So did Spike whether he liked it or not. Karl may have been a goddamn prick who needed a serious fucking attitude adjustment, but… He was innocent.

“He has a chance,” she whispered. “I know we all have important matters to attend to, so it’s best we not waste time.”

Harley entered the room first, and Spike would’ve gone in after her if it weren’t for my hand winding around his wrist, stopping him as my gaze narrowed down at the text I’d just received.

Great.

Just fucking GREAT .

“What is it?” he asked, his brows furrowing. “Is it Charlotte?”

Shaking my head, I showed him the display.

Tick tock, Bonecrusher. My patience is running shorter than the time you have left.

“How much time do we have, exactly?”

“Not much,” I muttered. “Less than twenty-four hours.”

Spike swore under his breath. “Okay… We’ll talk about it when we’re done here and on the way to the club. We still have to fill Felix in. ”

This bullshit with Crow was the furthest thing on my mind, so I shoved my phone in my pocket and followed behind my partner, who’d opted not to sit in the chair beside Harley and paused behind her with his arms crossed tightly against his chest. I stood guard on Harley’s right, waiting.

“I have some good news.”

“Let’s hear it then,” said Ben. He sat up straighter, looking sharp in a dark brown leather suit and black tie. His dark hair was drowned in gel and styled in a way that somehow had each and every cowlick sticking up like a porcupine.

“I was able to drop the charges in Amber Strickland’s case. However, the masks found inside Karl’s apartment have his and Delilah Fields’ DNA all over them. I am here to offer a plea. Should you accept,” she said, turning and giving Karl a remorseful frown, “then you’ll be spending fifteen years in prison.”

“Fifteen years?” Karl repeated, his eyes bugging wide in utter disbelief. “You’re joking…right?”

“It’s either that, or let your fate be decided by a jury. I’m sorry, but that’s the best I can do.”

“But I’m innocent! ” Karl’s jaw trembled the longer he gaped at Harley, tears in his eyes. “You seriously expect me to sacrifice fifteen years of my life over something I didn’t do? Fuck that . Take your deal and shove it up your ass!”

“It’s possible you could be facing more time in prison if you take this to trial.”

Spike and I shared a confused look. Harley never mentioned that to us.

But it was Ben who cleared his throat and asked, “What do you mean?”

“What I mean,” Harley said thickly, “is that Karl pleading guilty to the stalking charges brought upon by his ex-wife is already on record. In the eyes of the law, and with the evidence we have against him, that puts a huge target on his back. I know he’s innocent—we all do—but as the prosecuting attorney and regardless of what I believe, I still have a job to do, Ben. I’ve done everything I can to help, but if this goes to trial, I can’t hold back. I will not be your friend. So, this is the one and only time I will ask this.” She paused and then locked eyes with Karl. “Are you sure you don’t want to take the deal?”

“Like I said, take it and shove it up your ass. I’ll take my chances at trial.”

“Very well, then.” Harley let out a sigh before she stood tall and smoothed her hands down her dress suit, offering her hand to Ben. “Talk to Delilah and Amber and convince them to testify on his behalf. Rhodes and Hutch will speak with Charlotte and see if she’ll be willing to—”

“I’m sorry, what? ” Spike interrupted. “Who says you get to volunteer us? That isn’t our job Harley, it’s yours and Ben’s.”

“Well, given you two are in a relationship with her, I thought maybe you could—”

“Fucking excuse me?” Karl growled, his dark eyes flashing.

Harley froze, her body steeling as stiff as a cutting board. Her lips parted, and then her eyes grew fretfully wide as her pupils bounced between us, the apology written all over her fallen features.

God damnit.

“You’re fucking my wife?” Karl growled again, his chest heaving as he made to stand up but couldn’t thanks to being cuffed to the table.

“Ex-wife,” Spike said with a shit-eating grin, which had me reactively stalking over and slapping him upside the back of his head, eyes tight.

It wasn’t enough though.

Spike just kept grinning and continued to escalate it, bucking his chest against the hard pressure of my shaky hand and saying, “She’s your ex-wife , Karl. You had no problem cheating on her with a teenager, so why do you care who she fucks?”

Karl lost it then, roaring like some untamed predator, and it was all Harley and I both could fucking do to shove Spike back as Karl began yanking at the chains clamped around his cuffs, desperate to break them and start an all-out brawl .

“That’s ENOUGH,” Ben shouted as he shot to his feet, his arms spread and chest heaving. He then pointed a stiff finger at Karl and demanded he sit the fuck down.

Unhappily, Karl obliged

Harley and I released Spike but remained skin-tight close, ready to pounce again if we had to.

“You made your fucking bed doing what you did with Kate,” Ben snapped. “Like it or not, it’s time for you to lay in it.”

Karl’s face bloomed a deeper shade of red, but he didn’t dare speak.

“Thank you, Harley, but our meeting is done. I need some time to speak privately with my client.”

“You do that,” Spike said with a tense chuckle that did nothing but rile Karl up more.

This time Harley popped him upside the head, earning a bare teethed growl in response. Harley only scoffed and then shoved him closer to the exit. I was the last to leave.

“Are you out of your fucking mind?”

“Are you?” he shot right back at her. My head fucking spun the more the revelation of what she’d done washed over me. “You should’ve known Karl didn’t know about our relationship with Charlotte!”

Harley opened her mouth, then tightly shut it, her lips pursed. “I’m sorry.”

“Are you?” I asked skeptically. “Or was this your plan all along?”

She shrugged, a ghost of a smile flashing in her eyes. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, Detective Rhodes.”

I angrily shook my head and called her out on her bullshit. “Oh, I think you do.”

Now it was Spike who was confused. “Would someone care to explain what the fuck is going on?”

“Harley just gave Ben everything he needed to make this a mistrial.”

“Come again?” Spike said like he’d misunderstood me, his brows pinched. “How?”

“Ben didn’t know we were in a relationship with Charlotte, did he?” I asked Harley. “And now that he does, he can file an appeal to have all charges against Karl dismissed.”

Spike blinked, and bit by bit his skin paled as his large brain slowly absorbed the information. He then turned to Harley and shakily asked, “What have you done?”

“What I had to,” she said sharply. “I’m sorry I didn’t mention it sooner, but I had to do something, Detectives. If Ben is as smart as I think he is, then expect all of us, Chief and Captain Burgess included, to meet in the chambers in a few hours. It'll be the judge’s call but if we’re lucky, Karl should be released within seventy-two hours. I’ll call as soon as I know something.”

Her explanation was completely unrelated to the new problem at hand, and as Spike opened his mouth to tell her she’d made a huge mistake, it was already too late. Harley was gone without so much as taking the initiative to stop and listen.

“Fuck!” Spike gripped his head and blew out a furious breath, his hands tremoring as he scoured them down his face. “She seriously has no idea what she’s done, does she?”

Spike was right. This was bad. Worse than fucking bad.

“We’ll need to put him under surveillance. Have officers inside and posted outside of his apartment for not only his protection, but Charlotte too.”

Again, Spike was right. Like fucking hell if our perp was going to just sit back and do nothing , not after all of the time and planning he’d put in to remove Karl from the equation. Assuming Harley’s plan worked, then WITSEC was the way to go—at least until we could catch this son of a bitch—but there was no guarantee Karl would agree to it.

And now that he knew about our relationship with Charlotte …

Fuck .

There was no telling what Karl would do now.

“We’ll figure it out. Let’s just hope we can catch this bastard before Karl gets—if he gets released, I mean.”

Spike nodded, saying nothing as he walked out the room, grumbling he’d meet me out at the car.

All I could do was sigh and stare briefly through the window at Ben and Karl before I spun on my heel and followed my partner’s footsteps.

I needed a fucking drink.

Fine. I’ll help you.

I hit SEND on the text, hating that I’d ever gotten myself involved with this bullshit to begin with. It was necessary though. Speaking with Gibbs and Hammett hadn’t entirely been a bust, but there wasn’t much info they could give us aside from a man named Rio, the same man Peter put behind bars for Fiona McMann’s death. Supposedly, Rio was one of the Pines’ most deadliest drug dealers who had a client list larger than both of his forearms combined and immediate access to Rohypnol, and possibly to who harbored the shipments. Unfortunately for us, Rio was murdered in prison about a week after being incarcerated.

Which led us to where we were now.

If Crow had information about our perp, then fine, I’d play his stupid fucking game. It wasn’t like we really had much of a choice in the matter anymore .

“You good?” Spike asked from the passenger seat. We were parked outside The Flirty Sanctum, having arrived barely two minutes ago.

“Fuck no,” I spat, my grip tightening around the phone when Crow’s reply came in.

I knew you’d come around. Daggers. 7PM tomorrow. Don’t be late.

“Jesus fucking Christ,” Spike groaned, his head falling back against the headrest. “We have to be at the club by nine. How the hell are we going to pull this off?”

“We’ll figure it out. And remember, this is just round one. We still have the shipment to worry about.”

“Have you told Charlotte about this?”

I darkened the display and dropped my phone in my lap. “I haven’t. She doesn’t need to know, so promise me this stays between us.”

I felt like the biggest piece of shit in the world. It destroyed me, fucking butchered me having to hide this from her. I loved Charlotte, and despite the promise I’d made for us to have a happy, honest relationship, here I was breaking that sacred promise and keeping secrets. But when it came down to Crow and his crew and knowing firsthand what they were capable of, I wasn’t taking any chances. I couldn’t. Crow trying to go legit didn’t mean a goddamn thing to me. For all I knew, he was lying and had much deeper, darker intentions for wanting to intercept this upcoming shipment. This was dangerous—far too fucking dangerous for someone so sweet and innocent like Charlotte to get tangled up in, and I said as much to Spike.

“I agree,” he finally approved, nodding more to himself than me. “But once we do this, we’re done , Phoenix. You’re done. And if Crow doesn’t uphold his end of the deal—”

“Then we’ll arrest him, Spike. We’ll arrest him. ”

Even though my words were genuine, I could tell he didn’t fully believe me. That he was unsure if I’d really take it that far given my history with Crow and his sister, Kendall.

That was fine though.

If I had to prove it to him, then so fucking be it.

With nothing left to say, we got out the car, greeted Felix at the door, had a few drinks, and got to fucking work.