Thirty-Eight

“Go home.”

Sabrina had said it about a hundred times in the past hour, but he wasn’t listening.

Instead, Ben shuffled the deck of cards and dealt in stubborn silence. Sometimes she wanted to strangle him. He picked up his cards and fanned them out, studying them intently. “It’s your turn to go first,” he said.

She walked around the bed from one window to the next. “I don’t want to play cards,” she said a bit too harshly. She hadn’t felt like this in years. Scared. Angry. Paranoid. The back of her head throbbed in a reminder that she was smart to feel all three.

Ben hardly seemed to notice. “I’ve already told you, I’m not having sex with you, Sabrina.” He smirked at the cards in his hand, moving a few here and there. “Begging only makes you sound desperate.”

She laughed in spite of herself. “The only thing I’m desperate to do is get you out of my house.”

“Not gonna happen. You heard O’Shea; I’m supposed to stay here,” he said, glancing up at her.

“Oh, and you always do what you’re told?” Stepping away from the window, she approached the bed, giving him the once-over.

Ben shrugged. “When it suits me.”

“You mean when it bugs me?” she said dryly and picked up her cards. He wasn’t leaving anytime soon; might as well pass the time. “Do you have any fives?”

Ben scowled and tossed her a card. She paired it with the card she already held and laid them on the bed, next to her SIG.

“Got any jacks?” he said.

“Go fish.”

Ben picked up a card and stuck it in the middle of his hand.

She’d meant to ask him if he had any threes—what came out of her mouth was a different question entirely. “Why did you bring him here?”

He shot her a look and shrugged. “You called. We came.”

“Bullshit. You’ve been here a dozen times over the past year and never once have you even mentioned him. You could’ve just as easily split up and come here while sending him on to question the Maddoxes. Instead you plopped him in front of me like a cat would a dead bird. Why?”

Now he wouldn’t look at her. “I told him.”

She stared at him for a full ten-count, but he didn’t elaborate. Didn’t explain. The realization of what he meant detonated in her belly, knocking her slightly off-kilter. “You told him what?” she said, just to make sure they were on the same page.

“You know what.” Ben glared at the cards in his hand, not even having to look at her to gauge how angry she was. “Don’t look at me like that. It’s not like I had a choice.”

“You’re Ben Shaw—if there’s one thing I’ve learned about you, it’s that you always have a choice.” She continued to watch him, looking for a sign that would tell her what angle his confession had helped him play. As far as she could tell, there wasn’t one.

“Look, Lark started running his mouth about you. In front of my father.” He shrugged. “When Michael realized that your existence wasn’t exactly a revelation, he damn near shot Daddy Dearest in the face.”

“And that’s a problem for you how?” She was well aware of how Ben felt about his father. That he would intervene was surprising.

“A problem for me? Hardly. But for you? Michael …” He sighed. “My father’s realized that my tenuous loyalties have shifted. I’m no longer his failsafe when it comes to our boy, which means if something were to happen to good ol’ Dad …”

“Michael would be killed.” Someone else, besides Shaw and Ben, had their finger on Michael’s kill switch. The thought about how close he’d come wiped her anger clean.

“Bingo. So, back to your original question. Why did I bring Michael here.” Ben looked up at her. “Because there is a very real, very frightening part of him that works very hard at getting himself killed, and it’s getting stronger by the day. I brought him here because he needs to remember that he still has things in this world worth fighting for. He loves you. He wouldn’t be fighting it so hard if he didn’t.”

He loved her. Yes, at least that’s what he told her a year ago. But things change. “You think he’s suicidal?” she said, barely able to get the words out.

His eyes slid away from her face, resting on a spot just above her shoulder. “No. I think he no longer cares if he lives or dies. There’s a difference.”

She had more questions, but she knew Ben well enough to know that when he wouldn’t look at you, it was because there was something going on in his head that he didn’t want you to see. She also knew that pushing him was counterproductive. “Got any threes?” she said, closing the subject.

He fished a card from his hand and tossed it at her. “No one likes a cheater, Sabrina.”

“I don’t cheat.” She smiled as she matched up the card with her own and set it to the side. “I lie a lot, but I never cheat.”

He smiled back for a moment, but it faltered. “You’re still bleeding.”

She swiped at her neck, her hand coming away wet and red. “It’s nothing,” she said, tossing her card on the pile before she stood.

“You’ve been bleeding off and on for the past six hours. That’s not nothing. Let me stitch it up,” Ben said to her back as she headed for the bathroom.

She sighed. “Alright. There’s a suture kit in my—” Her cell rattled against her hip. She pulled it off and glanced at the screen. It was a text, alerting her that one of the motion detectors she’d set around the property had been triggered.

There was someone on the front porch.

She looked up, ready to explain, but Ben must’ve been able to tell by the look on her face that something wasn’t right. He stood, the offer of first aid forgotten, and twitched the curtain away from the window just a touch. “I can’t see who it is.”

She wiped her hands on a towel before leaving the bathroom. “Avasa, come,” she said, swiping her SIG off the bed and tucking it into the waistband of her jeans.

“Where do you think you’re going?” Ben said, stepping in front of her.

“Move.”

“I’ll go. You stay here. It’s probably just a cat or something,” he said, but they both knew it wasn’t a cat. The sensors set around the house and surrounding property didn’t register anything under seventy-five pounds. Despite the doubt she’d been tossing around earlier, she felt a certainty settle into her bones. One word chased itself around her head.

Church.

From the look on Ben’s face, he was thinking the same thing. She looked down at the .40 Desert Eagle he held in his hand and shook her head. “Yeah? That’s a pretty big cat, Shaw.” Sidestepping him, she managed to make it to the door before he dropped a hand on her shoulder.

“At least let me go first. If you get shot again, O’Shea will kill me.”

She highly doubted that, but she moved aside, letting Ben ease the door open on silent hinges. They both stepped onto the landing, letting their eyes adjust to the dark before making their way down the stairs.