CHAPTER THREE

Luca's apartment was a minimalist's wet dream. Spartan chic, clean lines, enough floor space to park a tank. The only signs of life were a framed Boston Celtics jersey on the wall, an espresso machine gleaming like a showroom Porsche, and a single bookshelf crammed with FBI mandatory reading and, much to her surprise, romance novels. Guess there was more to Luca Hawkins than she thought.

But interior decorating and questionable reading tastes aside, Ella was here to lick her wounds and regroup, not play Martha Stewart after the morning she'd had.

She stomped into the living room, ignoring the twinge in her back that could have been an injury from last week or last year. By now, she"d stopped paying the aches any mind. Everything hurt and everything sucked, but the pounding in her skull drowned out all the other complaints. Ella made a beeline for the couch, collapsed onto it, and planted her feet on the table.

Luca emerged from the kitchen with a wide grin on his male model mug. ‘What is this, your grandma's porch? Shoes.'

Ella popped her head up and spied her dirty Nikes. Dammit. She couldn't even get the basics right anymore. She kicked them off and said, ‘Sorry, my bad.'

‘Forgiven. Now, what's eating you up?'

Ella cracked an eye, grunted something that could"ve passed as a human sound with enough stretch. She wanted to spill this whole mess out from the start, but she couldn't even cast her mind back far enough to discern the beginning. It felt like this whole thing had begun the day she accepted the rank of Special Agent.

‘Ripley,' Ella said. In a way, that one word covered everything.

Luca strolled in with two steaming mugs big enough to swim in. ‘Sounds like you need a Luca Special. Here, go nuts.' He set the cups down on the table in front of her then took a seat beside her. Close enough to smell the shower gel.

‘What's a Luca special?'

‘Two coffees.'

Ella took one sniffed, wary as a stray eyeballing a hamburger in an alley. ‘What"s in it? Should I be worried?'

‘I don't mess around with java. Two different single-origin roasts, hand-picked for peak flavor. A little Sumatran for the bass notes, some Ethiopian for the high end. Finished with a twist of orange zest to make those taste buds sit up and sing.'

Ella stared at him as though he might sprout a second head. She reached out and rested two fingers against his brow. ‘Are you okay? Do you have a temperature?'

He clutched her wrist and gently pushed it aside. ‘If you want to touch me, you only need to ask.'

Despite herself, Ella felt her lips twitch. Damn him. Smug pretty-boy thought he was slick with the charm offensive, wearing her down with caffeine and quips.

‘Is that right?'

Luca shrugged. ‘Hush and tell me what's so urgent you had to interrupt my busy morning.'

Ella scanned the room and saw nothing but domestic normalcy at every compass point. ‘You were busy?'

He pulled his laptop up from beside the couch. ‘Emails. Some of us actually read them.'

‘Ah,' Ella said. She sipped the coffee and had to physically stop herself from groaning out loud. It was perfect, because of course it was. Rich and robust, with a bright zing that made her eyes snap open and her brain kick into high gear. Leave it to Luca to know exactly how she needed it – hot, strong, with just the right amount of sweet.

Just like, she thought. Nope. She shoved that thought back into the box it sprang from, welded the lid shut for good measure. Not going there. She and Luca were partners, that was it. Never mind the stolen glances, the "accidental" touches, the tension ratcheting up in their few short interactions. They had a good thing going here, and she"d be damned if she let her overactive libido screw it up.

Even if his mere proximity set her nerves to sizzling and made it hard to remember why dipping into the company ink was a bad idea. Even if the way his eyes crinkled when he smiled made her think horrible, treacherous thoughts about playing connect-the-dots with her tongue.

Ella slurped the coffee, using the mug to hide the flush climbing up her neck. From the heat. Definitely the heat and not the six-foot-something distraction sprawled out next to her in sweatpants that defined everything.

"So," Luca said, dragging the word out. "You gonna spill, or do I have to work for it?"

‘You want the list? Pull up a chair.'

Luca glanced down. ‘I'm on a chair.'

‘It was a figure of speech.'

‘Start with the greatest hits. I can fill the rest in from there.'

Ella sighed, set the mug aside before she cracked the ceramic from clenching too hard. ‘Mia"s still pissed about the whole Martin thing. Won"t return my calls, won"t drop the ice queen act.'

Luca made a noise halfway between a cough and a grunt, the universal dude sound for "that sucks". ‘Can you blame her? You accused her boyfriend of being a murderer.'

‘He is,' Ella bit out. ‘But apparently eighteen months of keeping each other alive is no match for Vitamin D.'

‘You"d think she"d at least hear you out, what with you two being the wonder twins and all.'

"You"d think." Ella couldn"t keep the bitterness out of her voice. It stung like a bitch, the cold shoulder, the silent accusation. She and Mia had been through hell and back, stitched each other up and dragged each other through the shit more times than she could count. They were each other"s bulletproof vests, each other"s ride or die. To have that questioned, thrown in her face over some silver fox with a hero complex, was a punch to the teeth.

Luca shifted, bumping her knee with his. Ella tried not to glance at the point of contact for fear he might retreat. She stayed put, soaking in his heat, his solidity. Stupid. Reckless. But it settled something inside her.

Luca, because he had some kind of sixth sense for knowing when to poke a bear, pried further. ‘Look, I'm on your side here, but are you certain that this Martin guy is guilty? I mean, there are rumors all around HQ about Carter's death. Some people are saying it was a political thing.'

Ella"s molars creaked from how hard she clenched. ‘That or I"ve lost my mind.'

He shrugged. ‘Well…'

Ella shot him a look. ‘I have not lost my mind. We caught Carter's attacker on CCTV footage. Hell, I saw the guy with my own eyes. It was Martin freaking Godfrey, one-hundred percent.'

Luca made another one of those man noises, all constipated concern. ‘So, why don't we tell the director? Drum up some manpower and get this guy found?'

Ella shook her head. ‘The director won't take it seriously, plus what evidence do I have? Some grainy CCTV footage? My own word? Edis already had me in the office last week and told me to stay away from this.'

‘This Martin guy, maybe he's… you know. Working through some stuff.'

‘Like?'

‘I don't know him, never met the man, but you said he was a military man and a field agent at one point?'

‘Yeah. That's how Mia met him.'

‘Two types of frontlines. That's gonna leave a mark on the psyche.'

Ella didn't know where Luca was going with this. Truth be told, she hadn't stopped to consider the why of Martin's actions, because she'd stopped understanding psychos' motivations ten cases ago.

‘So you think Martin might be doing this for what, redemption?'

‘I'm just spit balling here, but I reckon Martin's lost a few people along the way. Comrades, colleagues. He's gonna have that survival instinct, that protective instinct. Call me crazy, but he might be doing this to… protect you. To show you how much he cares.'

‘Which means he's messed up in the head. What happens when the objects of his affection don't return his love? What if he and Mia broke up? Then what would he do?'

Luca scratched his jaw and said, ‘He'd turn on her.'

‘Exactly. Plus, Martin killed three people. We can argue for hours whether they deserved it or not, but we can't say murder is wrong in one breath and then say praise them in another.'

Ella didn't go into the story about Logan Nash, the man who assassinated her father. When Ella found his body slumped in a storage cupboard, she felt like the rug of justice had been pulled from under her feet.

Luca went quiet, drumming blunt fingers against his own mug. She waited, watching his profile out of the corner of her eye. That blade of a nose, the stubborn set of his jaw under a dusting of stubble. Those pretty boy lines that Ella prayed wouldn't fall prey to the stress of the job.

‘I don"t want to tell you your business here, El. But you ever think maybe you"re too close to this one?'

She whipped around to face him. ‘And I'm just supposed to let Mia fend for herself?'

"Hear me out. Mia"s your girl, I get it. But this is Mia Ripley. She"s up there with Douglas, Ressler. The woman"s no idiot. Her papers are mandatory reading for newbies at the Academy. Last year, she gave us a talk on how to profile someone based on their thumbs."

‘What's your point?'

‘That Ripley knows the human mind, probably a lot better than we do. Martin's the overprotective one, right? And, well… No one likes a hypocrite.'

Ella felt a smile tug at the corners of her mouth. Luca didn't know the half of it, but damned if he didn't try his best to turn that pessimism upside down.

‘Yeah, I guess you"re right,' Ella conceded. ‘Mia can handle herself. Hell, she"s probably the best shot in the Bureau. Woman could shoot the wings off a fly.'

‘No kidding?'

‘Nope. I once saw her shoot a guy in the ass. She said it was an accident, but…'

Ella"s phone exploded into a violent buzz. She fished into her pocket, pulled it out. The display flashed "EDIS", and Ella felt her stomach sink to her toes.

‘Director wants me,' Ella said.

Luca gestured for her to answer, then strode off to the corner. A gesture of privacy.

Ella braced herself and swiped to answer.

This was it. Back to the grind.

‘Morning, sir,' she said.

‘Ella, need you at HQ, immediately.' Edis' tone was a barbed wire rasp, all gravel and no nonsense. She could hear the roar of voices in the background, like he was stepping out of a White House briefing. Maybe he was.

‘I can be there in twenty. What's the situation?'

‘The situation is a damn mess. I can't speak much here, but someone close to me is…' The Director trailed off.

‘Got it.' Ella knew better than to demand details over the phone. ‘But sir, you know I should be on R and R until tomorrow?'

‘I'm going to have to call an audible. Consider your pay doubled for the next month. I need my best on this yesterday, we clear?'

Ella took a deep breath. Perfect. A solo mission on top of this whole soap opera with Mia and Martin. The universe must be busting a gut laughing at her right now.

‘Understood, sir.'

The line went dead. Across the room, Luca was watching her with wide eyes, brows drawn together in a question mark.

‘Duty calls?' he asked.

Ella groaned, hauling herself upright on protesting joints. ‘Looks like. Edis wants me in the office, says it can"t wait.'

Luca made a sympathetic noise. He knew as well as she did that it was a bad move to reject a summons from the Big Man. Probably another sick puppy crawling out of the woodwork, looking to make a name for themselves in the most gruesome way possible.

But before Ella could launch into a full-blown bitch fest, Luca"s own phone started buzzing and chirping like a digital aviary.

He glanced at the display and his eyebrows made a bid for his hairline.

He answered with a brisk ‘Hawkins' and then lapsed into a series of clipped ‘yes sirs' and ‘no sirs' and ‘right away sirs'. Ella watched, foot tapping impatiently, as Luca hmm"d and uh-huh"d his way through what sounded like a one-sided ass chewing.

Finally, after an eternity and a half, he hung up and slipped the phone back into his pocket. When he turned back to Ella, there was a manic gleam in his eye.

‘What?' she asked. ‘What"s with the face?'

‘That was Edis,' Luca told her, grinning like a loon. ‘Guess you're stuck with me at least one more time.'