Cut & Run (Cut & Run #1)(19)
Author: Abigail Roux

“Logic doesn’t mesh with the fact that you’re a raging bitch, too, and you hate me,” Ty pointed out drolly.

Zane glanced back at Ty, not fazed by anything Ty said anymore.

“Fair enough.”

“How’d your night go after you left me?” Ty asked as he followed.

“Quietly. Henninger was still in the office so he got me the maps I wanted, tracked down pictures of the tokens left at each scene,” Zane said, pulling the door shut behind them. “Then I got coffee and came back here.”

“Thanks for the itinerary, man,” Ty muttered sarcastically. “I was referring more to the anyone following you, trying to kill you, getting laid aspect of it.”

“If I could have been so lucky for the latter,” Zane said, his voice dry.

“No. No one followed me, no one tried to kill me, and no one propositioned me.”

“Shame,” Ty sighed sadly. “Anything bother you at all?”

“Except for Henninger around the office, no. He’s so eager it even makes me wince. Morrison’s even worse. I imagine you wanted to kill them right off.”

“Maybe,” Ty affirmed with a nod.

Zane snickered. “And you accused me of being a candy-ass brown-noser.” They walked across the lobby toward the parking garage elevator. “I think Burns must have put us together figuring we’d strangle each other and do his job for him.”

“You’re really on the chopping block?” Ty asked in some surprise.

Going quiet for a long minute as they entered the elevator and it started moving down, Zane finally shrugged, emotionless mask sliding back into place. “I don’t know. Maybe. Probably. I’ve been told several times that I’m on thin ice, no matter how stellar a job I do. I guess it depends on who’s jonesing for an example that week.”

“Example of what?”

Zane looked over at him significantly. “An example of what not to do. How not to behave. Who not to be. To show others what happens when you f**k up royally. I’m sure you’re familiar with the feeling.”

“I couldn’t possibly know what you mean,” Ty sniffed daintily as the elevator doors opened. He stepped out and started toward the car.

Zane snorted, clicking the key fob and unlocking the car.

“So, what, you’re a reformed version of me?” Ty asked with a derisive snort as he went around to the passenger side.

Zane got in the car and pulled on his seat belt, all the while wondering why he allowed this conversation to continue. “I am not reformed. I just want to keep my job,” he said curtly as he started the car. “If that means acting like a yes-man in the office, wearing a damn suit, keeping my opinions to myself, and kowtowing to the directors, that’s what I’ll do.”

Ty snorted again as he shook his head. “Forgive me if I don’t buy it.”

“Don’t buy what?”

“You,” Ty answered bluntly.

“What’s that supposed to mean, Grady?” Zane asked as he started the car and put it in reverse. “It’s not all that difficult to understand.”

“You seem to have carefully created yourself,” Ty told him candidly.

“This whole overly reformed bright and shiny image you want to project. It’s all very bad cop movie. And I don’t buy it.”

“What of it?” Why should he care what Ty thought about how he dealt with life now? There was nothing wrong with what he was doing to stay in the Bureau.

“I’m talking about the fact that you want to project it,” Ty answered with a soft laugh. He shook his head again in amusement. “If you were truly reformed from any state of less than perfect, you’d keep your mouth shut about your past. You’re doing a lot of telling and not enough showing.”

“So help me God, I am going to thrash you to within an inch of your life someday,” Zane gritted out, simmering. Possibly because Ty was right, in a way; Zane had reformed, but he wasn’t proud of it. On some level maybe he did want people to know this wasn’t the real him. “You drive me absolutely insane. And I’m almost sure you do it on purpose.”

“I like you better when you’re angry," Ty responded absently as he looked out the window at the passing scenery. “It’s more natural to you.”

Zane shook his head. “You like me better when you’re making fun of me,” he muttered.

“I’ve never made fun of you,” Ty responded instantly. “Making fun of you would imply that something about you is fun.”

Zane’s hand shot out to smack Ty’s chest with the backs of his knuckles. “Asshole,” he muttered. “You’re no fun yourself.”

“Ow!” Ty cried out in surprise, rubbing his chest and scowling.

“Dammit,” he muttered in protest. “Don’t you know you’re supposed to wait at least a week before you physically assault your new partners?” Ty asked plaintively as he rubbed his chest where Zane’s class ring had thumped against his sternum.

“I must be out of practice. You’re the first partner I’ve had in a long time,” Zane said, trying not to think about the last one. A real partner. Not an assigned one.

“Pft,” Ty responded with a roll of his eyes and another yawn he tried and failed to repress.

Zane halted the car at a stoplight and turned his chin, eyes glancing over Ty. His eyes were sunken and dull, and he still looked exhausted. “You need some more rest?” he asked. “Won’t be able to concentrate for shit if you’re tired.”

“You worry about your own self,” Ty griped.

He thought some of the sharpness hadn’t returned to Ty’s voice, so Zane didn’t push. Seeing a sign for a diner, he turned the corner and parked in a Police Only space on the side of the street. “Food,” he said happily.

“What the hell?” Ty muttered as he stared out at the diner. “Can’t you eat stale bagels and shit like normal people?”

“We all have our vices. You want to eat a stale bagel and brighten your oh-so-lovely disposition with constipation, be my guest,” Zane invited as he got out of the car.

“Kiss my ass,” Ty shot back as he sat in the seat and huffed.

“Maybe after breakfast,” Zane answered with saccharine sweetness as he shut the door and walked toward the diner, lighting up and pausing just around the corner to smoke.

After a couple minutes, Ty got his holster redone correctly and his jacket collar straightened, and he trudged after Zane into the greasy spoon. “I think I just got heartburn by osmosis,” he grumbled as he sat down opposite Zane. He didn’t trust New York eateries as far as he could fling one.