Page 44 of Perfect Order
That stops me in my tracks. I counter, “Have you ever screwed up under them?”
He lifts a phone and asks the caller to hold. “Can’t say I have.”
I roll my eyes. “Try it. You’ll have a better understanding that way.” I move forward to knock on Caleb’s door to the guffaws ringing out behind me.
Caleb barks out, “Enter.” Flinging the door wide, I’m—as always—immediately enraptured by the view behind his mammoth desk. It causes my footsteps to falter.
And the lips of the man behind it to curve. “You and my wife,” he murmurs.
“Excuse me?”
“Both of you have the exact same reaction every time you walk through those doors. Come on in, Kane. Close the door.”
Before Caleb can launch into the story of what happened with Beckett at Snowy-T’s that hit the media, I go on the offensive. “I was with the principal up until the point he went to get Ms. Miles. Then he decided to try to protect us.”
Caleb sneers at that comment but makes no comment. I plow on. “Other than those few minutes, at no time was he alone from the time he left his penthouse to the time we returned Ms. Miles to her condominium and returned to his residence.”
Caleb leans back in his chair and stares thoughtfully at a painting that hangs over his couch. He doesn’t say anything for long moments. “It’s not Beckett I want to ask you about. I need your opinion regarding another matter related to what happened.”
“What is it?”
“Do you think Erzulie was truly that drunk, or do you believe she was drugged?” Caleb’s quiet question causes my body to jerk as if I’ve just been shot.
I surge to my feet and begin pacing as I recall the events from the night before. “Erzulie, given name Kylie Miles, often known as Ky by close friends, has been through a serious trauma recently. Her older sister—her twin—was found mugged and barely alive.”
“She prefers to be called Lee, but yes. So far, your report is correct. Carys obtained the originals of those photos from the social media site, StellaNova. I want your opinion of what you saw, Kane. Do you think she was just drunk?” Caleb sits forward and steeples his fingers together.
I stop moving and brace my arm against the glass. I squint against the sun flooding the room as I recall Beckett relaying the scene he walked in on after we peeled away. Erzulie passed out in the bed. Her clothing rumpled, but not unusually so. Not moving at all, not until she started talking about her “Lee.” I murmur aloud, “Drugged? How the hell did she text him?”
“Exactly what I’ve been wondering.” Caleb shuffles the papers on his desk for a moment before he finds a file and slides it down toward me. I snatch it and flip it open. There’s Beckett, wearing loungewear pants and a hastily thrown-on shirt—unbuttoned—looking for all intents and purposes as if he’d just rolled out of bed. Which, I know for a fact he had been since he called me to tell me we were going to get Erzulie, and I insisted on going.
But being in the moment and staring at the picture, I take in details I didn’t notice. Erzulie’s not holding on to Beckett as much as he’s forcing her against his chest. Her head’s lolled back against his shoulder, blonde hair streaming down his arm haphazardly. It’s the look on her face that draws me in.
It’s completely blank. There’s nothing there. Not even a mild recognition of who has her. I glance to the side and catch the hard edge to my own face—the irritation because the individual I’m supposed to be protecting is putting others ahead of himself again. And I realize I missed all of this in the moment.
I screwed up huge.
“No, that’s not someone who’s just passed out. That’s someone who has no idea where she is. There’s something else in her system,” I say slowly. “I FUBARed. I put people at risk.”Just like you did the day Gene convinced you to continue the mission, you ass.The taunting words float in my head.
“So did a lot of people, Kane. You did your job, which is to protect Beckett. You’re the head ofhisdetail, not hers.”
“She doesn’t have one.”
“Carys is working on that.”
I snort. Convincing people they need to have protective services is next to impossible until it’s too late. “Good luck with that.”
Caleb holds out his hand. “These will help.”
I hand him back the photos. “Did you just show them to me because of the screw up?”
He hesitates before answering. “They’re friends. You may be in a situation where you notice something. Your primary job is to protect Beckett, but…” His voice trails off.
“But neither of us would feel great about ourselves if something happened to an innocent when we could have prevented it,” I conclude.
He relaxes. “Exactly. It’s difficult to express that to someone who just doesn’t understand that. And yet, I wouldn’t want them to.”
“I completely understand.” I hesitate before asking him a question I’ve always wondered the answer to. “How did you do it, Caleb?”
