Tattoo (Take It Off #7)(45)
Author: Cambria Hebert

Until Taylor.

“I’m not running,” I growled.

“It’s the girl, isn’t it?”

I stared at him in stony silence.

“Taylor Shaw,” he said.

I crossed my arms over my chest.

He whistled between his teeth. “You got it bad, don’t ya? You know her daddy is a powerful, rich man in this town.”

“Edward Shaw does not intimidate me.”

Mac grinned because I pretty much just confirmed what he was implying. When I offered no more information on my personal life, he wiped a hand down his face.

“Five minutes.”

I smiled and turned to leave.

“West.”

I stopped but didn’t turn back.

“Keep your hands to yourself. Don’t force me to suspend you. You’re one of the best on the PD.”

I left the room without response. I wasn’t going to make a promise I couldn’t keep. Out in the hall, Newman was passing by with a folder full of papers. “He’s down the hall.”

“What’s he been saying?”

“He won’t say shit. Says he’ll only talk to you,” Newman spat. “He keeps grinning like he has some big secret. We’ve sent three guys in there already and all of them have come out wanting to punch out someone’s lights.”

Weariness smacked me in the gut. Shit, I was tired. All the games that went into this kind of life were starting to wear on me. The damn media actually did me a favor when they outed me. I was tired of being undercover. I was glad this was the end of that chapter in my life. Moving on sounded like a pretty good idea.

I paused outside the interrogation room and took a breath, reminding myself to keep my cool. The reminder was likely useless. If he pushed me too far, I wouldn’t be keeping my hands to myself.

The door flung wide when I walked in, smacking against the wall with a loud crack, and then swung shut. Snake was sitting at the table with his back turned to me and he jumped from the sudden burst of sound and movement.

“I heard you’ve been asking for me,” I said, stepping farther into the room to walk around the table.

Snake didn’t say anything. His dark head just lounged lazily in the chair like being under arrest was nothing to worry about. He was still dressed in the same T-shirt and jeans from the day I met him at the bank.

“Let me tell you how this is going to work,” I said, slapping my hand down on the table and looking ahead at the dirty wall. “I’m going to ask you some questions and you’re going to answer. If you don’t, I’ll make your life a living hell in this place. If you do, maybe I’ll see about sending you to the cushy prison upstate.”

That was a lie. I was going to make sure he went to a hellhole and had a roommate named Tiny.

“How about you do the listening?” he replied.

There was something about his voice… something that wasn’t quite right.

I whipped around, focusing on his face.

He started to laugh.

My blood ran cold and a strange buzzing sound filled my head. I stood there staring at him, suddenly understanding exactly why he seemed so unworried about being arrested.

This was not Snake.

He was the same height and build. He had the same coloring and he was wearing Snake’s clothes. But this wasn’t the guy who masterminded the robbery on Shaw’s Trust. This wasn’t the guy who tried to kill me. Who tried to kill Taylor.

Rage lit within me like a candle to a flame. I burst forward and grabbed up the decoy by the collar of his shirt, yanking him out of the chair and lifting him off the ground.

“What the hell is this?” I growled.

He grinned, his breathing coming in uneven bursts. “Payback.”

I slammed him down on the table, making it rattle under his weight. I enjoyed the way his head bounced off the tabletop and his eyes registered surprise.

“You can’t touch me,” he said, his smile slipping just a little bit.

I smiled. “That’s where you’re wrong.” Holding him down, I plowed my fist into the side of his jaw. The force of the hit sent him sliding off the table and onto the floor.

He scrambled up, blood spilling down his chin. “He said you had to play by the rules, that as a cop you couldn’t do shit but release me,” the kid said, fear coming into his eyes as he backed away from me.

“He lied.”

Decoy Snake’s eyes grew wide and his back hit the wall. He was a lot younger looking than the actual Snake, and he was too green to know to hide his anxiety. I slapped my hands against the wall on either side of his head.

“Lying to a police officer, giving false information, conspiring with a known criminal,” I listed. “All legit offenses. You could do some jail time for this.”

His eyes bulged.

“Don’t worry. You’re young and you got that innocent look going on. I’m sure the Tinys and the Butches of the prison will take a liking to you and protect you.” I leaned a little bit closer to whisper, “In exchange for favors, of course.”

“I didn’t do nothing!” he burst out, trying to push me away.

I stepped back and he tried to rush past me toward the door. I grabbed him by the sleeve of his shirt and hauled him back, slamming him against the wall. My hand closed over his throat, applying just enough pressure so he knew I wasn’t fucking around.

“How many people did Snake tell my real identity?”

“I don’t know,” he said, his voice strained.

I squeezed harder. “How. Many?”

He gagged and clawed at my hand. I didn’t release him and I didn’t loosen my grip. I just stared at him, waiting.

“Not many!” he wheezed.

I lightened my grip and he gulped in great heaves of oxygen. “How many is not many?”

“I don’t know, man,” he said, leaning against the wall. Sweat had broken out across his forehead. “There weren’t many of us in the room. Just me and four other guys.”

There were three guys at the lake today. “He put out a hit on me?”

He nodded. “Three guys never came back.”

“That’s because I killed one and threw the other two in jail,” I growled.

“He said you were a spineless cop!” he burst out. “He said once we got rid of you, he’d make me second-in-command for doing this!”

Now we were getting somewhere. So it seemed Snake only had a small crew on his payroll. Most of which were now in jail. The rest of his would-be crewmembers were likely still scrambling from all the previous busts. Maybe word hadn’t gotten out as much as I thought. Maybe there was a chance to keep my identity mostly contained.