Page 375 of A Matter of Time

I let Regina gently ease me out of my new old jacket and peel off the sweater underneath so I was down to my T-shirt.

“I smell bad,” I mumbled. “I should go home and⁠—”

“Just lie down a minute, Jory,” I heard Thomas order as he steadied me, at the same time lowering the bar on the side of Sam’s bed. “Have you got him?”

“Yeah,” Sam answered, and I felt his hand in my hair as his other smoothed down my back, pressing me against him before he enfolded me in his arms. “Lie down, baby, close your eyes.”

“But, Sam, I⁠—”

“Baby,” he soothed me, “you’re killing me. Please lemme hold you just for a minute.”

My eyes drifted closed, and I realized that the warmth radiating off Sam was amazing. The way he stroked my shoulder, rubbed his chin in my hair, pressed my hand down on his chest… All of it was so soothing, so comforting, my body got heavy fast. I never wanted to move.

“Baby.” He sighed heavily, and I felt his lips on my forehead. “Stay here. Just rest.”

I couldn’t argue, didn’t want to argue. I just wanted to lie in his arms, have him hold me for the rest of my life. Nothing mattered but that.

It was his tone that woke me.

“Just fuckin’ pray that you have this guy found by the time I can get out of this bed,” Sam growled, and his voice was full of a sort of quiet rage. It was scarier than if he’d been yelling. “You left Jory out all alone on the fuckin’ street for a week ’cause you can’t fuckin’ find him, and now you tell me that he alone found the place where he was held, and the guy that all along he said he heard killed was in fact killed, and the goddamn body is still there.” He was seething, he was so mad. “This is what you’re fuckin’ telling me? Jory found the crime scene all by himself?”

“Sam, we canvassed the neighborhood where the car was left, where Jory told us it was, but no one talked to us. You know how that works, and the car thieves he found, he didn’t even tell us about them, so how⁠—”

“All you had to do was follow him, keep eyes on him. How hard was that to do? If all you’d done was that, he would have led you right to the guys. To Rego’s guys.”

“Shit,” Hefron groaned.

“As it was, Jory had to bargain with a guy who runs drugs and prostitutes just to get what he needed, while you and Moore were sitting on your asses!”

“Sam—”

“Are you kidding? Did you somehow forget who fuckin’ Rego James is?”

“No, Sam, I’m very well aware who⁠—”

“I suppose you would’ve liked your wife in his place, or your kids, or⁠—”

“Sam, I fuckin’ get it, all right? Jesus, I get it!”

“Goddamn it, Jim, how many of his boys have we fished out of Lake Michigan because he strung ’em out, had them turning tricks for him, and then when they weren’t pretty anymore, he gave them over to some fuck makin’ a snuff film or some bondage shit that went way wrong? How many tweakers is he responsible for? How many guys sell their bodies for him? And he had Jory alone in his place without anybody fuckin’ knowing shit about it? He could’ve been raped or…” Sam trailed off, taking a breath. “And he’s all beat up. Doc says the eye should’ve had four stitches for that cut, but as it is—nothing to do now but leave it. Where the fuck were you?”

“Sam—”

“Fuck you! Fuck Moore, and fuck those idiots that were supposed to be watching out for Jory instead of jerking off in the car in front of the apartment when he went out the window! How fuckin’ hard is it to watch one guy? He’s not fuckin’ Houdini.”

There was a long silence.

“He kind of is,” Detective Moore said quietly.

“I agree,” I heard Chloe Stazzi, Sam’s partner, say gently. “He’s good, Sam. He knows people and how to play them. I mean, I personally have no idea how he got out of Rego’s club in one piece. Everything we know about Rego… guy who looks like Jory goes in, he’s selling his ass by the next day, or worse, never seen again.”

“That’s what I’m⁠—”

“But what I’m trying to tell you,” she said slowly, soothing him, “is that you need to give Jory far more credit. He’s actually very smart. He’s shitty at knowing his limits, but so are you.”

I felt him take a deep breath and clutch me tight. “I’m here at least another few days. You guys gotta watch over him, especially now that we know Greg Fain had a partner that killed him.”

“God bless dental records, because that was all that was left.”