Page 59 of Grissom
The stranger’s upper lip peeled back to reveal a mouth of perfectly straight white teeth. Had to be implants, as scarred as his face was. “You could say that. I worked with Fred, your, uh, ex-husband. What he did to you was wrong, and I’m here to set things straight.” He extended a gloved hand as if he expected her to simply trust him.
Pursing her lips, Tuesday looked beyond the guy to the gray sky overhead. “No, thanks. I’m g-good where I am.”Cold and dying, but good.
“You see, that’s where you’re wrong. You got what I want, and you’re coming with me.” He tipped closer, too close, until his face was the only thing Tuesday could see. His cheeks and nose were covered with pock marks left from a bad case of acne, possibly road rash. White scars bisected both brows. One trailed over his forehead into his hairline. The other crossed one eyelid and ended high on his cheek. The guy’s greasy black hair needed to be washed and his breath smelled of garlic, tooth decay, and booze. His leather trench coat was unbuttoned, its sides tossed behind him like a marauder’s cape. He was her idea of a typical New York mobster.
“No—!”
“Yessss,” he hissed, his fist cocked, ready to strike. “I’m the guy you’re gonna marry soon as I get you back to the city, so shut up. Fred cheated me by dying like he did. But that don’t matter, cuz everything he left you is gonna be mine now. And it’ll be legal.”
He struck hard then, his fist another brick to her face, this one with sharp knuckles and a bolt of thunder that knocked herhead back. Closing her eyes, Tuesday took the hit. Her poor nose was mashed and bleeding. Her upper lip was cut and swollen. This was her. Who she was. The eternal loser. Tuesday Smart, forever destined to be alone. But this creep was also her last chance to make sure Grissom and his boys lived. A somber thought flickered through the burgeoning haze in her head.‘Darn. I ruined Christmas.’
Chapter Thirty
Grissom was so damned angry at his ex-wife that he wanted to kill her. Illegal or not. Smart or not. He wanted Pamela dead. What she’d done to the little boy she’d claimed to love more than Tanner was unforgivable. She’d poisoned Luke! With a bagful of ‘treats’ she’d known the greedy little three-year-old couldn’t resist. THC-laced gummies. Damn her!
Thankfully, the ER doctor had been pacing, primed and ready for Luke’s arrival. Doc Pratt had checked Luke’s vitals, then whisked his gurney down the hall, past the admissions desk, to the ER cubicle where Grissom now stood, stressed, and planning revenge. Pratt transferred Luke to a bed and ordered Grissom to: “Say your prayers. Your son’s heart rate’s still solid. We may have caught this crap in time. When did he get into your shit? How much did he eat? How long has it been since he ate them?”
Everything about this intense man declared:‘How stupid are you?’
“About an hour ago, I think. But it’s not mine. I have no idea how much he ate,” Grissom explained. “I wasn’t home. My ex, she gave Luke a bag of THC-laced gummies. She did it to get back at me.”
Tossing a disbelieving glare over his shoulder, Pratt snarled, “If you say so.”
Turning back to Luke, he barked a string of medical orders into the mic clipped on the collar of his scrubs. As if waiting on standby, several men and women in scrubs hurried into the room and sprang into action. As if they knew precisely what to do. As if they’d done this before. Muscle action. That was whatGrissom was watching, all because these folks had performed this exact same rescue too many times in the past. People really were too dumb to live, and he was one of them.
“Relax,” Eric murmured in his ear. “Pratt’s a good guy, and Luke’s in good hands. Don’t borrow trouble.”
Grissom stared up blankly at the men he’d forgotten had come with him on his run into the hospital. Eric was there. The medics who’d transported Luke waited in the hall. Alex stood at the foot of Luke’s bed, staring down at the little guy, his sharp blue eyes fastened on what the medical team was doing.
“What’s that even mean?” Tears filled Grissom’s damned eyes. “This is my fault. He’s my son. What if he—?”
“It means don’t get ahead of yourself and start planning a son-of-a-bitching funeral!” It was Eric’s firm hand on Grissom’s shoulder, but it was Alex who answered. “Your boy’s a fighter, Grissom. He’syourson, and your boys know how to fight. Give Luke some credit. He might be three, but it’s your blood in his veins, not his chicken shit mother’s. Don’t forget that.”
Ah, but it’s not my blood in his veins. He’s not biologically mine. He’s—
“And these guys know what they’re doing.” Alex turned on Grissom then, and damned if those icy blue bolts of lightning didn’t pierce Grissom’s heart. Fuck. Alex knew Luke wasn’t his biological son. How the hell?
But Luke is mine, damn it.In every way that mattered, LukewasGrissom’s son, and he’d fight to the death before he’d ever let anyone call his boy a bastard or try to take him away.
“Copy that,” Grissom whispered. “He’s mine and I’m keeping him.”
By then, a male nurse had stripped Luke down to his cartoon underwear, while another attached monitors on his little chest to track heart rate, oxygen saturation, and a bunch of other important stuff Grissom couldn’t recall at the moment. Placing ahand on Luke’s foot, he told his tiniest warrior, “I’m here, Short Stack. I’ve got your six, and Tanner’s waiting at home for you. Fight, baby boy.”
Doc Pratt pried Luke’s mouth open, tipped his head back to access a straight line to Luke’s gut, sprayed something into the tiny guy’s airway, and gastric suction began. Grissom cringed as the machine on wheels sucked stomach acid and a shit ton of whole gummies into the clear gray jug on its lower shelf. Whole gummies. Not partially chewed bits and pieces, but whole damned gummies.
His eyes brimmed. The greedy little boy of his hadn’t wasted time chewing. He’d guzzled Pam’s poisonous treats whole. Nothing else was coming out of his tummy, just thumb-nail-sized blobs of yellow, orange, and green mixed with bile and stomach acid. That had to be a good sign, didn’t it?
Splat. Hiss. Thunk.At last, only clear fluid trickled into the jug. Pratt inserted another tube down Luke’s throat. He was rinsing the inside of Luke’s tummy, going after every last bit of Pam’s ugly poison.He’s saving my boy, God, please bless him.
“There,” Pratt said, carefully easing both tubes out of Luke’s mouth. The man turned dark, stormy green eyes on Grissom. “You say your ex did this intentionally?” he asked warily, no doubt scrutinizing Grissom for a lie.
“Yes, she’s—”
“She’s in police custody, Dr. Pratt. In my jail,” a gruff male voice stated loudly from the hall beyond Luke’s cubicle. “And she’s talking, make that screaming her fool head off. Pamela McCoy hasn’t shut her damned mouth since I dragged her out of Grissom’s house and sat her ass in my patrol car. She’s proud of what she did, Pratt. Says Grissom made her do it.”
Howie Prince, the local Chief Deputy Sheriff, personally patrolled Alex’s gated community. Tall, dark-haired, and strong as an ox, he was every bit as lethal as any TEAM agent. He’dserved in Somalia years ago, part of the USMC leg of a joint op that had netted the latest tribal lord. That guy had been an insane dictator who’d killed his enemies with impunity, his own people by starvation.
Sergeant Presley Forsythe stood behind Chief Prince, her shiny black hair pulled tight in a bun, the brim of her deputy ballcap pulled so low Grissom couldn’t see her amazing tropical-blue eyes. Was she judging him? Was that why she didn’t want to look at him? Was she condemning him like Pratt had?
