Fuck. That.
“She’s lucky I was even here,” Derek said. “Most of the guys don’t even know about this case.”
I nodded. “I know.”
We had pursued this case secretly for the better part of a year. Given the number of obvious bribes Carson and therefore Gardner had at the FBI, the CIA, and the U.S. attorney’s office, we could never trust anyone else completely to help us with the case. The smaller the circle, the better. Until, of course, I fell for the defendant’s wife.
“So…you want to talk to her? Or should I?”
I was about to answer when my phone buzzed loudly in my pocket. I looked at the number and swore.
“What is it?” Derek asked.
“Cardozo,” I said. “At five in the morning? I have to take this.”
I turned my back on Derek and walked out to the hall. The voice of Greg Cardozo, executive assistant district attorney of the Kings County office, chief of the organized crime and racketeering bureau, and my boss, blared through my phone’s tinny speakers.
“Zola, you want to tell me what you’re doing down at the station? I called the chief last night to let him know you’re off the Gardner investigation, and now he wakes up me, my wife, and my schnauzer to ask if I changed my mind. Because apparently, you’re at the fucking station!”
I frowned. Apparently the cat was out of the bag. Yeah, okay, only yesterday I’d handed Cardozo my resignation due to my involvement with Nina (who was officially a suspect now). But then he had apparently notified the entire NYPD about everything?
So much for secrecy. At this point, Gardner was already as slippery as an eel. We were basically giving him a two-day head start with this shit.
“I—it was late,” I said weakly. “And I’m not technically on leave yet. You said yourself that you had to send the paperwork to HR today, and—”
“Get the hell out of there!” Cardozo shouted. “Look, Zola, you did the right thing coming to me and submitting your resignation. Don’t make me accept it by sticking your nose back where it doesn’t belong. Leave it to Derek and Cliff and me. Your part is done.”
“But—”
“I’m on my way down now to question Mrs. Gardner,” my boss said. “If you’re still there when I arrive, you’re fired, Zola. End of discussion.”
The line went dead. I walked back into the observation room. On the other side of the mirror, Nina still hadn’t moved.
“What did he want?” Derek asked.
I sighed and rubbed the back of my neck. “To remind me that I am off this case and, as soon as HR processes everything, on unpaid administrative leave for the next six months. Minimum.”
Derek reared. “What? Why? What the fuck did you do?”
I didn’t need to answer, though. His eyes flew between me and Nina, who was still sitting at the interrogation table, hands folded calmly in front of her like she was waiting for someone to bring her a mimosa, not take her confession.
“Zola,” he rumbled. “Tell me you didn’t…”
I shook my head with obvious regret. “I have to go. King, can I have a minute with her first?”
He frowned, looking a lot like Nonna when I dragged muddy shoes all over the house. “If you’re off, I really shouldn’t…”
“Just a minute, cameras off? Cardozo said he’s on his way, and if he catches me down here, I’m fired for good. But I need to talk to her. I need to say…fuck, man, I need to say goodbye.”
Derek looked like he wanted to say no. I understood. I was putting him in a tight spot. But the other side of it was that I was one of his best friends, someone who had pulled all number of strings for him over the years, and he knew it.
“All right,” he said, resigned as he moved to the cameras and flicked the off switch. “One minute, Zo. That’s it.”
“That’s all I need.”
She looked up when I entered, and the expressionless ice was immediately replaced by a flurry of emotions I had come to know so well. Eagerness. Shame. Remorse.
Lightning-bolt attraction.
Goddammit. A million questions flew through my mind as those silvery gray eyes lasered through me.
Why had she lied to me for as long as she did?
What the hell was she doing here?
Why did she have to be so crazy beautiful?
I had told Cardozo that I was off the case because I was in love with Nina de Vries, with the full conviction that the emotion was firmly in the past and had been since the moment I discovered her deception. Who the fuck are you kidding? I thought as I looked at her. You are in love with Nina de Vries. Then. Now. Forever.
The fact made me that much angrier.
“Hello, Matthew.” Her voice was low, almost husky, like she hadn’t had enough sleep or had maybe just woken up. It was pretty damn early.
Her sleek blonde hair was tied back, away from her clean, ice-sculpted face that included those big gray eyes, long nose, and full, pink lips that I knew turned the color of ripe plums when I sucked on them hard. She looked a far cry from the sex-tousled siren I’d left in Boston just a few days prior.
“Nina,” I said as I let the door close behind me. “What the hell is this? Some plea for attention? Trying to lure me back into your web?”
Neither of us mentioned the several dozen calls and texts she had sent me since Tuesday. All of them unanswered.
She refolded her hands. “I thought it was clear. I told Detective Kingston I was here to turn myself in.”
“For what, exactly?”
She looked up, and her eyes landed on me with the force of a gavel.
