The Departed

got a legit way to help cover your ass and this is the best way I can think of,” he bit. “It probably wouldn’t work as well anywhere else, but it will here. Are you going to let me help you or not?”
    Dez took a deep, slow breath. Just that simple action hurt her chest. She couldn’t imagine the hell it would be to walk inside that place.
    She fucking hated old places like that. For this very reason. He was right, damn him to hell. She couldn’t help all of the ghosts, but whether she could help them or not, they still whispered to her. Still called to her. She could help some. But in a place like that, she might end up going insane.
    Her hands were shaking, she realized. Shaking and sweating. Blowing out an unsteady breath, she looked at him.
    “Yeah. I’ll sign it.” Then she added, “But it’s for this, and this only.”
    He nodded. “Don’t worry.”
    * * *
     
    HE felt like the first-class bastard most of the world considered him to be, but as they walked back to the café, he couldn’t make himself apologize. It had worked.
    If he had just told her the place was old, it might not have worked.
    Showing her, springing it on her like that, had done what he’d hoped, and now at least, he could honestly tell the men in charge of the investigation that Dez was one of his people and she was here under his authority…and he could also tell them all that they couldn’t and wouldn’t discuss confidential investigations.
    They wouldn’t like it, and he didn’t give a flying fuck.
    It would work and he knew it.
    It was dancing perilously close to abusing his authority, and if it were anybody but Dez…he blew out a breath and looked away. If it were anybody but her, he knew he’d do what he could, but in the end, the person would have to deal with his or her own mess. This was Dez’s mess, but he wouldn’t risk her going into a place that would push her to the brink of madness. Not if he could at all stop it. If it took him close to a line, then so be it. If Dez wasn’t worth losing everything for, nobody was.
    The contract would cover her ass, it would keep her out of the damn jail even for a few hours, and that was what mattered—that…and he had a feeling there was more going on here than the small police department was prepared to handle.
    Ivy, their victim, wasn’t local.
    It was all too likely this was veering rather close to something he might have to take an interest in anyway. Especially since it had led one of his people here. Not that Dez was really his anymore . From behind the protection of his sunglasses, he could watch her without her noticing and he kept an eye out, waiting until that pale, ashen look faded, until her eyes stopped looking so tight and pinched, until her breathing became a little less ragged and the tension left her shoulders.
    They were almost to the restaurant when she finally took a deep breath and some of that tension finally eased. She stopped and leaned against the building at her back, staring at him. “That was a low blow, you know.”
    “Yes.” He crossed his arms over his chest and stared at her. He wanted to brush his hand down her cheek, soothe that line that still lingered between her brows. Then he wanted to pull her against him, warm her—she was still cold. Even though she wasn’t shivering, even though she hadn’t said anything, he knew she was still cold. They always lingered with her like this, left her chilled, and it was worse when it was those she couldn’t help. Those disembodied spirits that were more echoes than anything else.
    But he didn’t. He couldn’t. Instead he stayed there, waited, and watched.
    “You can be such a fucking bastard sometimes, Jones,” she muttered, shaking her head and staring off past his shoulder. “You couldn’t have just warned me it was an old place and probably not the ideal place for me to be?”
    “And if I’d said that, just like that, would you have taken me at my word?”
    She stared at him, her dark eyes boring into his like she was trying to see clear through him. Disgusted, she admitted, “The hell if I know.”
    “That’s what I figured. This way, I knew you’d get the point.”
    “So what do we do now?” she asked, staring at him, her face grim. She was still pale, despite the color slowly returning to her cheeks.
    “You have to go give a statement. But I imagine you know that.” He slid his hands into his pockets, because he ached to touch her. So badly did he ache to