26. Seeley Booth

TWENTY-SIX

Seeley Booth

They made out for a while, and Lucinda’s body felt even better under him than it had on top of him, but eventually, he needed to end it.

Lucinda ordered room service while Rus showered, shaved and dressed.

Now they were both at the table, Rus with his laptop open at the side of his plate, and he was watching it boot up as he spooned steel-cut oats into his mouth.

Lucinda, keeping that fine ass of hers in perfect shape, was eating a waffle.

“Now, Special Agent Lazarus.”

He looked to her to see she’d lost interest in her waffle for now.

She had her elbows on the table, fingers linked, chin resting on them, her gaze on him, and seeing her like that, knowing how she tasted, he also knew it would take superhuman control he did not have to wait until this was all over to be with her in all the ways he could.

Seriously.

The woman did not know how to be good.

“It’s not romantic,” she began. “But it would seem apropos for us. So how do you feel about our first date being at the town council meeting tonight? If you’re able, we can go to The Lodge after for dinner. That being The Lodge, the fancy restaurant with a chef not as good as Angelina, not the restaurant here at Pinetop. They have a delicious thick-cut pork chop. As I’m sure I don’t have to tell you, it’s not as good as Angelina’s brown sugar-glazed one, but it’ll be a change of scenery for you.”

With the thought he’d just had, he wanted to say yes.

With what their plans were for the town council meeting that night, he wasn’t sure.

Bohannan had said CK would not hurt him or anyone he cared about.

But Rus didn’t want to take the chance he was being watched, and walk into the council meeting with Lucinda, and Bohannan being wrong.

Instead, having it be that CK felt he owned Rus, his time and his attention, and anyone else taking it would be in danger.

Therefore, regrettably, he had to respond, “I have to have my wits about me at the council meeting tonight, and since this guy I’m hunting may be close, I’m concerned about his reaction to anything…and anyone. This means I don’t want you on his radar. I can come up to your club to have dinner with you there, if I’m not busy after the meeting.”

He reached out and stroked her jaw.

And then he finished, “But even though it’s important you know I’m all in to move this forward, honey, I think we need to be low-key.”

Her gaze had turned soft when he touched her.

When he was done speaking, it turned shrewd.

“Is this about the killer or the town?”

This was an excellent question, and in case she was worrying about any aspect of it, Rus took his hand from her in order to get into it so she wouldn’t be concerned.

“This is the thing,” he started. “Cop shows are great. But they aren’t real. People watch them and think they know what policework means. The truth of the matter, it’s a slog. It’s talking to a lot of people who don’t know anything or don’t want you to know what they know, so you gotta figure out how to get it out of them. And half the time, you fail. It’s witnesses who misremember or have ulterior motives who send you in the wrong direction. It’s others who are scared to talk, or don’t trust cops, so they don’t say anything.”

Chin still on her hands, eyes riveted to him with fascination, Lucinda nodded.

Rus kept going.

“It’s also a lot of waiting. You don’t find evidence that needs processed and boom, techs have nothing better to do and they’re on it right away. In the TV shows, it’s sent off and in the next scene, detectives are in a lab that looks like it’s on the Starship Enterprise and not in some inner-city police precinct. And they’re talking with a technician wearing a lab coat who has a lot of time to do their hair, and suddenly, they’ve got all the proof they need to get their man.”

Her lips curved up.

Rus’s did too.

And he continued.

“That’s not how it is. There’s a backlog. There’s always a backlog. Sometimes it’s days, sometimes it’s months. I mean that. Most DNA, for example, takes months to run, and I don’t mean one or two. I mean it could be six or eight, or even longer. Every crime is important. You can’t skip the line.”

“That makes sense,” she said, lifting her chin from her hands and reaching for her coffee cup.

She did this, but she didn’t take her attention from him.

Rus was realizing as he was talking, and with how she was responding, it felt good for someone to show they were interested in what he was saying, especially about his work.

Jennifer had never asked and didn’t want to know. His kids were too young to tell and would be probably until Rus left this earth.

Though, it felt more than good Lucinda made it so obvious she felt this way.

But this wasn’t the only reason he kept talking.

“Yeah,” he replied. “It took until Saturday for a tech to have the five minutes needed to get into Brittanie’s laptop, and it’s a surprise we didn’t have to wait longer. Not to mention, cops don’t spend all their hours working one case. That’s happening now for me, but that’s extremely rare. At my office, I have more than one open file. I’m not just tracking CK. All cops have several open cases they’re working. They’ll also have superiors telling them what to do, when to do it, and how many resources they can expend. There are only so many hours in a day and only so many tax dollars allocated. Every victim or family wants justice, and they’re pushing for it, not having any idea how fucking hard it is to do this job.”

Lucinda nodded again.

He took a sip of his own coffee.

When he put down his cup, he told her, “I’m used to people thinking I’m John McClane or Seeley Booth. Seriously. This might be my first town council meeting, but it’s not the first time I’ve experienced pressure to provide answers to people who are flipped out. They don’t get it. Even if I explained it, they wouldn’t get it. They want answers and they want to know they’re safe, and they’re depending on me to take care of both.”

“That’s a lot of stress,” she remarked, still following him word for word, but there was concern in her expression now.

He shook his head.

“Not really. It’s the job. You learn what to care about. I care about finding the people who did this to Brittanie and building a solid case so they’ll be punished for it. I care about you and Madden and Keyleigh, and even her dad and brother having answers and closure. I also care about this town not living under a cloud, but that’s low on my priority list. I don’t give it time or headspace. I also don’t answer to anyone but my superiors. If people don’t like I’m spending time with you, fuck ’em. I answered to Pastor Richard for sixteen years, and that wasn’t my choice. I choose who has authority over me and a say in how I spend my time, and I do this in a way that, if I’m done with it, I’m free to quit and move on. What I know right now is, that entity isn’t the townspeople of Misted Pines.”

“So, in short, you’re going to be fine at the meeting.”

He felt his lips twitch. “In short, yeah.”

“If you can come to the club after, I’ll wait to eat, and we can have dinner together.”

“I’m ordering that brown sugar-glazed thing.”

She smiled.

He leaned slightly her way, hand lifted, crooking a forefinger at her.

He saw her eyes flash before she leaned a lot farther his way and offered her mouth.

He took it, just a quick stroke of his tongue because he wanted another taste, but he didn’t have time for more.

“You seem to be okay with the fact there might be a serial killer in Misted Pines,” he noted.

“I’m not,” she returned. “But I have tight security on my club. Also on my house, which is close to the club. And I’m a realist. I’ll be alert to the danger. I’ll have a face-to-face with Kleo to tell her what’s going on, making sure she keeps it confidential, but she heightens things as they need to be. And I’ll look out for myself and my daughter. There’s nothing else I can do, but if there is, I’ll do it.”

“It’s sexy-as-fuck how rational you are.”

He was teasing.

He was also relieved because she was being rational.

“Of course it is,” she replied, cool as always.

That was sexy as fuck too.

That said, a woman had been murdered, and a serial killer was in town.

He and Lucinda were feeling their way. At this point, it was nowhere near his place to make demands.

It was attractive she was rational.

But if this was going to go anywhere, she’d have to understand he was protective.

“How close is your house to the club?” he asked.

“Walking distance, honey,” she said, her voice soft, indicating she understood very well he was protective. “So…very close. We’ll be fine.”

Right.

Then, walking distance from a building that had lots of lights, cameras and great number of people coming and going until the early hours of the morning.

He could live with that.

He shot her a smile and was looking back to his laptop when she spoke again, so he returned his attention to her.

“Just so you know, you’re a lot better looking than David Boreanaz. I mean, on a normal scale, he’s a nine or ten. But you’re on a different scale, one where he’s only about a five.”

Rus burst out laughing at that, and this time, he leaned all the way to get to her mouth.

When he was done kissing her, he’d started to return to his laptop when she waylaid him again.

He knew by the expression on her face what she had to say next was of a significantly different bent, so he braced.

“I’m enjoying getting to know you,” she stated. “I’m excited to know more. I admire what you do. It’s incredibly interesting.” She wrapped her fingers around his wrist. “But I want to make sure you know you don’t have to explain yourself to me.”

“I go overboard in the debriefing?” he asked self-deprecatingly.

She squeezed his wrist and said firmly, “Not at all.”

She seemed to struggle for a second.

And then she carried on.

“This isn’t my call to make, Rus. And at this juncture in our relationship, I don’t have near the information I need to make it. But my preliminary read on a situation with a man I very much enjoy being with and very much enjoy getting to know, I also very much enjoy kissing,”—she gave him a small smile—“is that he’s been shoved into a corner and forced to defend his choices, pretty much all his life. This includes with his ex-wife. I’m just saying, that isn’t me. I want to know you. What I don’t want is you feeling you have to twist yourself in knots to convince me of anything. If I don’t get you, I’m not the person for you.” She gave him a much bigger smile. “Fortunately, I feel like I get you.”

She leaned in close before she finished.

“What I’m saying is, you can be you with me. It’s you I’m attracted to and have been since you walked into my office. And everything I’ve learned from that moment on only makes me want more.”

Rus felt that sear through his chest, it was strong, it was lasting.

And it was a burn he hoped never healed.

He’d also never made out with a woman over oatmeal and a waffle, in a suite with a view, but he did it then.

It was terrific.

When they came up for air, she had her cat’s-got-her-cream look, which almost meant they were going to have to make out more, preferably in the bedroom.

But he had to focus.

So he rubbed his thumb along her lip as a way to end it gently at the same time tell her how meaningful it was what she said, just in case she didn’t get it from the making out.

After that, he turned to his laptop, this time made it all the way, so he opened his email.

He saw one from McGill with the subject heading: 61 FR 2659, BI/7690 / 09-16-22 - email.

Brittanie’s case file.

He pulled it up and McGill had typed, Of interest, line item 3.

Rus opened the attached file, typed in the shared password and waited until the big file opened.

The top was a table of contents with hyperlinks.

He was not thinking happy thoughts when he clicked on line item three, which was titled, [email protected].

First, both names were spelled wrong.

Second, anyone could get a Gmail account in about ten seconds.

Third, he knew what he was going to see, he wouldn’t like it, and if Jason ever found out, it would gut him.

He clicked on the hyperlink and was taken to a screenshot of an email from that address to Brittanie’s.

It said,

B-

No texts. You and me. Back together. Better Times Motel. We’ll talk. Work it out. Meet me there. Tomorrow night. Don’t text me. Just be there.

Check into room seven.

Reconciliation.

Love you,

-Jace

She was into him. She wanted to live with him, marry him.

She’d think this was romantic. She’d think this was getting away from the Bohannan Compound and being about nothing but her and Jace.

She’d go there. No thoughts. No doubts.

Happy.

Excited.

Reconciliation.

Love you.

Motherfuckers.

He wondered if they’d ever exchanged emails so she’d know what his address was. People texted. You lived close to each other, there was no reason to email.

It wouldn’t matter. Rus got emails all the time from people in his life, and he only ever cursorily noted the address to see who it was from.

A glimpse of Jasn Bohannnan, excited he was reaching out after a breakup she didn’t want, and she’d assume.

And she’d go to the motel for Jason. From what everyone said, he might be the only one she’d go to that motel for.

Which meant…

He surged out of his chair.

Lucinda was startled at his sudden movement and was looking up at him.

“Gotta go,” he said.

Her eyes dropped to his laptop, but they came back to him when he bent to press a kiss to her lips.

“You’re good to—?” he began.

“Go,” she urged.

He didn’t delay.

He strode to the bedroom. He strapped on his guns and shrugged on his blazer.

Back to her, he slapped the laptop shut, nabbed it and gave her one last kiss before he prowled out the door.

He texted Moran in the elevator.

Then he got his key fob from the valet and jogged to his vehicle himself.