Page 115 of Brutal Ice

High-tech.

The safe opened. “Got most things out already. Just needed to get one more item.” His hand swept inside. Royal pocketed something so small she could barely even see it. “A drive with some important files,” he told her as he turned back her way. “I like to have a backup.” He shut the safe. Put the canvas back into place.

Then he turned toward her.

And when he turned toward her, horror flashed on his handsome face. Horror, wiped away immediately by blinding rage.

She tensed. “Royal?”

That was when she felt the flutter on her shoulder. A light, soft touch.

And then the blade of a knife pressed to her throat.

Chapter Twenty-Two

“Get him out of my sight!” Teresa blasted.

The uniform hauled Micah away from the table.

Blood covered the lower right side of the guy’s shirt, red staining the garish orange. Dammit. “He tore open his stitches,” Curran said. What a pain in the ass. The last thing they needed was this guy saying he’d been roughhoused into an injury. If he’s our killer, this case needs to be airtight. No walking. No doubt on anything. And no accusations that cops are getting too physical.

“Infirmary first,” Teresa directed the uniform, “then back in a cell.”

But Micah kept fighting. “I didn’t do it! I’m being set up! It wasn’t me!”

The uniform got him out of the room. The overpriced lawyer hustled out after them. Teresa shook her head even as her hands went to her hips. “Always the same line from perps like him. Even when you have them dead to rights.”

Yeah, the evidence was all lined up. Maybe too lined up? Curran’s gaze slid to the bagged knife. “Tied up with a pretty bow.”

“What?”

His gaze rose even as his jaw clenched. “If I hadn’t followed Royal, Micah would be dead right now.” Because Royal would have pulled that trigger.

“Georgia has the death penalty. Let a judge and jury decide if that’s his fate.” She scooped up the bagged knife.

“There wouldn’t be questions.” His voice was low. “It would have been tied up. Royal wouldn’t have cooperated worth a damn with investigators. Violet would have said she stabbed her attacker?—”

“She did stab him. That’s the wound the prick just broke open when he charged at me.”

“Royal would have killed him,” Curran muttered. “The suspected serial killer would be cold in the morgue. No more questions…” His voice trailed away.

“Uh, Detective Barlow? You with me?”

He didn’t speak.

A long sigh escaped her. “I get that this is your first big case, so I’ll explain things to you. This is what we call a win. The evidence is piling up, and Micah Wright is going to be convicted of multiple murders. I don’t know about you, but I’m going out to celebrate tonight.” She swung on her heel and headed for the door.

He didn’t follow. His mind wouldn’t stop spinning.

Everything was a little too neat.

Tied up with a freaking bow.

If he hadn’t been there that night, if he hadn’t stopped Royal…

Maybe I wasn’t meant to stop him. Maybe Royal was supposed to kill Micah, and Micah would have taken the fall for everything. Not like a dead man could proclaim his innocence.

And if that had been the case, if Royal had ended Micah, then no one—not even Royal—would still be looking for the man who’d abducted Violet.

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