Page 88 of Luke, The Profiler

A look of disgust flashed across Luke’s face. “You hear that, Eden? This coward just admitted he’s hiding behind you, using you as a shield. He’s even worse than his father.”

“Shut up, shut up,shut up!” Leopold slammed me back against him, his arm crushing the wind out of me. Frantically I made to pull on that muscle-bound arm just so I could breathe, but my hand snagged on the open zipper of my purse.

Oh.

Wait.

“You aren’t good enough for her, you piece of shit, because you don’t understand how deep her pain goes,” Leopold raged at Luke, puffing up his chest so much it jostled me. I took that opportunity to slip my hand into my purse and flip my BB gun around. Closing my eyes, I let my fingers do the seeing—safety. Muzzle. Barrel. Hammer.

Trigger.

“Easy, Leopold.” I heard tension flood into Luke’s voice, and I opened my eyes to discover he was watching me. Whoops. Closing my eyes had apparently scared him, but I needed him to know I was holding my own. He was here giving me strength, giving me a reason to live, so I was okay. I just didn’t know how to tell him that.

And then suddenly I did.

“I love you,” I said, looking straight into his eyes, and felt a sudden shock move through Leopold. “You should know that I did get angry, just like you said I would. And then I got confused. But that’s all gone now, because I remembered what you said. Count to ten.”

“Eden.” His voice was like nothing I’d ever heard before—desperate, raging, filled with pain. “Just be calm, all right? Don’t move.”

“I just wanted you to know that I tried to count to ten. I swear I did. I only made it to seven, but I swear I tried.”

A ripple of agony went through Luke’s expression. “Eden, baby, you’re going to be okay.”

“This was the first time I was able to stop my rage, and I’m so grateful to you for helping me with that. I just want to make sure I finish the task.” As I spoke, I lined the barrel upward at an angle dangerously close to where my own head was. Muscle-memory took me through the steps on removing the safety, aiming, and taking a slow, measured breath. This no-look angle was tricky, and if I shot my own eye out I’d never forgive myself. “So if you don’t mind, I’m going to do it now. Eight. Nine.Ten.”

I pulled the trigger.

A sting of pain sliced across my neck even as a rush of velocity-created wind riffled my hair over my right ear. Screams instantly emanated from Leopold as he dropped like a sack of rocks behind me, his hands over his face as he rolled over on Cobee, blood seeping through his fingers. The next second I was in Luke’s arms, half-lifted off the floor while Nix kicked the box-cutter all the way down the aisle that seemed to magically fill with a flood of police.

“See?” I wrapped my arms around Luke’s neck and held on with all my might. It was better than coming home; it was coming to the one place on earth where I knew I belonged. “I told you I could drop a full-grown man with a BB gun.”

“Remind me to never piss you off enough to prove it to me all over again,” he murmured, squeezing me all the tighter.

Chapter Twenty-Four

The Reckoning

Luke

“So the fire at your mom’s place wasn’t related to the Steadfast case?”

“Nope.” Well aware of Cap’s eyes on me, I couldn’t help but glance toward the ER doors. No matter how many times I did, I couldn’t seem to compel Eden to walk through them. “Bebe had a fondue party last night for her posse, and afterward she stowed some Sterno cans next to a bunch of cleaning rags in the garage. It’s thought that one of the Sterno cans hadn’t been properly extinguished. After that, nature took its course.”

“I’m glad to hear no one was hurt.” Cap nodded and glanced at the closed ER doors as well. “Now about the Steadfast case—”

“Cap—”

“From a procedural standpoint, you shouldn’t have been at HEG since you’re not a part of Eden Steadfast’s security detail. According to Nix and Echo, who were slated to be with the protectee, you almost compromised the entire situation.”

“I wasn’t there as a member of Private Security International.” At last I dragged my attention back to Cap, and I couldn’t seem to stop myself from scowling. “I was there as Eden Steadfast’s man. I understand if you want to fire me for that, or at the very least dock my pay for taking care of personal business while on the clock. But I have no regrets for being there for her when it mattered.”

“I see.” Cap put his hands in his pockets and stared at me as if studying an interesting slug under a microscope. “How would you evaluate your performance in the field today?”

I’d have to be an idiot to not know where this was going. “Pretty damn piss-poor.”

“When you knew our protectee was in trouble, you didn’t get on the phone and coordinate with Nix. Instead you went charging in without knowing who or what was around our protectee, or even confirming where the team members were. What if you’d shot Nix or Echo by mistake? By blundering in, you could have made a tense situation deadly.”

“I get it, Cap. I’m not one of your ninja stealth guys or an action hero out there in the field. I was a bull in a goddamn China shop today because I had only one thing on my mind—get to Eden at all costs. I can assure you that I’m done with interfering in field ops. I’m not going to try to branch out now and muscle my way into a place where I know I don’t belong. I know my place.”

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