Cut & Run (Cut & Run #1)(76)
Author: Abigail Roux

“Maybe if we weren’t ducking and covering every other day we’d have made more progress,” Ty muttered sulkily as he sat down on the edge of the bed. “Where are the files again?”

“At the other room,” Zane answered evenly, trying not to show how worrying it was that Ty was having trouble remembering. “I’ll run out and pick them up, get us some food other than room service and some snacks, and head back this way,” he continued nonchalantly.

Ty looked up at him, something like hurt resentment in his eyes.

“What about Henninger? Can you call him to go with you?” he finally asked resignedly.

Zane turned his chin and looked at him evenly. “I’d rather have you there. But yeah, I can call him.”

Ty merely looked up at him blankly, his façade from the first several days slowly returning. Zane’s lips twitched ruefully. There was “his” Ty. It was something like protective armor. If Ty was feeling threatened, he turned into that man. Zane stood and walked out to the front room to call Henninger.

At least this Ty he knew how to handle. The other, softer man threw him totally. But oddly, Zane’s chest hurt. It was something he had said that made that newer man disappear again.

“I’ll go with you if you trust me to,” came a soft call from the bedroom.

Torn, Zane held the cell in one hand. The past day and a half, Ty had threatened him with bodily harm if he went back to the Holiday Inn without him—something Zane had first thought was disdain for his abilities, but later discovered was concern. Now, Ty was acting like Zane was the one who was sitting in judgment over his abilities. Sliding the phone into his pocket, Zane walked back to the bedroom door.

“You know I’m not all here,” Ty said to him flatly as he sat on the edge of the bed with his hands clasped between his knees.

“Even not all here, you’re better than I am,” Zane said conversationally. “It’s up to you to believe me or not.” Ty was Recon. A goddamn Marine. A top undercover agent. Survival was ingrained in his instincts and reflexes, things that just didn’t come naturally to Zane.

Ty jerked his head slightly and looked up at Zane appraisingly. “Give me a minute to get dressed, then,” he finally muttered.

Zane nodded and walked to the dressing table where he’d set out their guns and started adjusting his holster. Ty dressed slowly, quietly dreading another attack of dizziness or nausea. Finally, he looked over his shoulder as he buttoned his shirt and muttered, “I don’t like feeling useless.”

“I know,” Zane replied, not turning around from where he was checking over the guns. Ty turned and watched the movements of Zane’s shoulders as he checked that the guns were loaded and working properly. He moved closer, bare feet on the carpet letting him move almost soundlessly. He stopped just out of arm’s reach and slid his hands into his pockets.

“Is there anything else I’m not remembering, Zane?” he asked softly, the words slow and pointed.

Zane looked up, though he didn’t turn, hands still moving knowledgeably on the weapon. “Such as?”

“I couldn’t say,” Ty answered in quiet confusion. He could feel that Zane expected something of him, and he knew whatever it was, he wasn’t delivering.

The falter in Ty’s voice made Zane’s shoulders stiffen. He turned around. “Ty,” he sighed. “I’m just worried, all right? This isn’t … exactly …

you. It’s not bad, it’s not wrong, just not the same, and it worries me. It worries me what you’ll think about it after. What you’ll think about me.

Okay?” He held out Ty’s gun, butt toward the other man.

Ty looked down at the weapon and then back up at Zane in confusion.

“What I’ll think about you?” he echoed, sounding slightly lost.

Zane’s smile was self-deprecating. “I’m fairly sure that, f**king aside, you’re not at all fond of me. Remember the pansy-ass comments?” He offered the gun again. “You meant them wholeheartedly. And not undeservedly, I guess.” He shrugged and looked at Ty evenly, and his voice was slightly flatter. “Don’t think too hard about it. Give it another day or so, and you’ll be okay. Then all this can be as unfond of a memory as you want.”

Ty frowned harder as he took the gun. “Fine,” he said softly, checking automatically to see if the gun was loaded.

Why it hurt when Ty turned away, Zane didn’t know. And he refused to think about it.

ON the way to the Holiday Inn the call came over the radio. Another murder.

The dispatcher gave the address, the name of the hotel, and the room number, and Ty inhaled sharply.

“I know that number,” he said softly. “Why do I know that number?”

he asked Zane in frustration. His head was pounding, but Zane didn’t need to know about that. Or about the black around his peripheral vision.

Zane glanced over at him worriedly as he drove.

“Go there,” Ty requested. “Go to the scene.”

Zane nodded and punched in the address on the GPS, then turned on the siren as they made their way through traffic toward the hotel. The front entrance was already busy with city cops and FBI forensics. An ambulance idled in the tow-away zone.

Ty was opening the door and getting out of the car before Zane even had it in park, and Zane cursed creatively and followed him hastily. Ty walked out into the middle of the road, and Zane spared a thought that it was a damn good thing the street was cordoned off, or Ty would have just wandered into traffic unheeded. The fact that his partner was definitely not all there came crashing down on him so quickly that it hurt.

“Jesus, Garrett,” Ty gasped out in horror as he stared up at the façade of the hotel building. “It’s her,” he said breathlessly.

“It’s who?” Zane asked in confusion.

“I’ve been here. That room number,” Ty answered as his breathing began to accelerate even more. “It was hers.”

“Whose?” Zane asked in frustration.

“The little stewardess,” Ty whispered. “From the flight.”

“The girl you f**ked the other night?” Zane asked in dread as he looked back at the ordered chaos of the police vehicles.

“I’ll be all over that room,” Ty told him quietly. “She was leaving that night. If it’s her, I was the last person with her.”

“Fuck,” Zane hissed as he ran his hand through his hair.