Page 50 of Proof

“Cass!” JJ snapped. I jerked my eyes so they met his pissed-off ones.

“Yeah,” I finally said. I automatically looked at the kitchen door to make sure it was still open.

“Jesus,” JJ muttered in irritation. He looked back down at the file in his hands before snapping it shut and lifting his head so he could look me straight in the eyes.

“The reports and witness testimony said you were found a couple of blocks from the scene. An off-duty cop who lived in that neighborhood arrested you after an APB was put out.” JJ leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms. “A former Marine shoots four people and then leaves the sceneon foot, covered in blood, only to get arrested by some random rookie cop who was out walking his dog and also happened to be carrying his radio with him even though he wasn’t on duty?”

JJ paused for a moment. I could feel the intensity of his gaze. He was studying me. Looking for some kind of reaction from me. I let him look. That was, after all, why I’d brought him here. I was a suspect he needed to question.

Just a suspect.

The reminder was like a punch to the gut. I automatically looked at the kitchen door again.

Still open.

I forced myself to settle my eyes on JJ and then donned the mask I’d been wearing nearly my entire life.

And just like that, I was back in that cell… waiting. Waiting for something that was never going to appear.

Always waiting.

CHAPTER 16

Jj

Isaw the exact moment when Cass mentally checked out. His entire body stiffened, and his eyes went blank.

It was the way it was supposed to be. We both had to play our parts. He was the suspect, and I was his interrogator and nothing more.

I couldn’t help but find myself back in that shower with him. Even though I couldn’t remember an entire chunk of my life, my memory of what had happened in that shower was crystal clear. I could still feel the way he’d kissed me, the way he’d held me afterwards, both in the shower and later.

Iwas the one who’d taken his hand after we’d silently dried ourselves andIwas the one who’d held on to him as he’d tried to move toward the door so he could leave the room.

I should have let him go.

I should have done a lot of things.

But from the moment I’d woken up in the middle of the afternoon only to find my traitorous body draped over Cass’s, I’d been caught in a maelstrom of emotions. I hadn’t moved, though. I’d pretended I was exactly where I belonged. I’dimagined what it would be like to fall asleep in Cass’s arms every night and wake up to find myself still in them every morning.

It was all a shit show. A stupid fantasy that had begun when the hero worship I’d felt for Cass since I was a kid had turned into something else.

Something I wasn’t allowed to feel.

Something that would leave me burning in the fires of hell if my father ever found out.

The thought of my father immediately led me to thoughts of Sully. If he were here, he’d know what to do. Sully always did. It was who he was. My protector, my best friend, and the stand-in father I’d needed because my real father had been forced to work two shitty jobs to keep a roof over our heads and food on the table.

While silence was often a cop’s best friend during an interrogation, I didn’t like it.

Not with Cass.

But the man in front of me wasn’t Cass. I didn’t remember much, but that Ididknow.

His own words the night before had confirmed that my gut and my brain hadn’t been in alignment since our first confrontation. I knew I was missing something important, but I didn’t know what it was.

I suddenly felt as twitchy as Cass probably did. He might have looked hard and indifferent, but his body betrayed him every time his eyes shifted back and forth between us and the open kitchen door. One of his fingers tapped his arm every few seconds and his breaths weretooeven.

A man like Cass didn’t let cracks appear in his armor. He’d been trained not to. That had been the military, though. Life with his family hadn’t been much better.

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