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“So that’s how it worked? People would pay Hunter to drug their targets?”
“Or just buy the shit, sure.”
“Who pulled the trigger on Smith?” Simon asked.
“Think I’m going to tell you?” Thompson leaned back in his seat and laughed. “No thanks, I’ll keep my reasonable doubt.”
Simon regarded the young man for a moment and looked at Antony. They shrugged their shoulders at each other and watched as Thompson visibly relaxed. He thought he’d an obvious out.
“Specialist, you’ve watched a few too many crime shows,” Simon said. “We don’t need to know who pulled the trigger when we can just charge you both for it. And since you’ve confessed to being there, well, that should make it easy.”
Antony stared at the man, face as unreadable as it was prior. Thompson was looking at Simon when what he was saying sank in. He looked at Antony, who hooked his thumbs in his pockets.
“You conspired to drug two United States Soldiers. You murdered another United States Soldier,” he said, voice low. “The United States isn’t thrilled that their property was damaged by, well, more of their property. And we haven’t even gotten to the trafficking part. I imagine they’ll be looking for the maximum punishment.” He paused, never breaking eye contact. “I mean the death penalty, in case you didn’t get that.”
Thompson’s face slowly fell, and he turned a light shade of green. “I—I’m going to be sick!” he yelped. Simon handed him a trashcan from beside the door, and the man lost his breakfast.
“You ready, Ramos?”
Antony pushed away from the window and punched the button on the wall. “You bet. Where are we going for lunch?”
As the door opened, Thompson called out weakly, “Wait, I want to make a deal!”
The men didn’t turn around. Antony called out over his shoulder. “You probably want that lawyer now.”
“You wanna talk?” Simon asked when they got to the car.
“Nope.”
“You want me to talk?”
“Again, nope.”
“Tough. You need to go talk to her.”
“I will.”
“When?”
“Do I need to have everything on a timetable?” Antony asked, glaring at his friend over the top of the car.
“No, but stop making her pay for needing time. You needed it, too, jackass.”
Antony kept his mouth shut. He’d been about to argue that he was working on his own stuff, but he’d finally admitted to himself that he wanted her to hurt just a little bit and hadn’t bothered to think that she was just as much a victim of Victoria as he’d been. He was the asshole in this.
The drive from the jail was quiet. As soon as they pulled up in front of the office, Antony jumped out of the car and jogged to the gym.
Fifteen minutes and a leg change later, he had a good rhythm set up and beat the shit out of the bag. Thompson’s face was plastered all over it. So was Smith’s. Antony kept pounding, over and over again, until he couldn’t lift his arms.
Once he’d exhausted those muscles, he jumped on a treadmill. He ran in place from all the bullshit of the last two weeks. Sometimes, he didn’t want to be in CID. Seeing friends die, families get torn apart, young Soldiers lose themselves in poor decisions. And then reliving it all in court. It was all a recipe for disaster and even though good outcomes happened, they didn’t happen often enough for him. At least in this case, Lesley and Charlie hadn’t been seriously hurt. Well, Lesley had, but by him.
He punched a button and knocked the incline on the machine up a notch. He couldn’t get her out of his mind, even with the torture he put himself through on the machines. Her face flashed in his mind, smiling at him, leaning in for a kiss, thrown back in pleasure. All he could hope was that he hadn’t fucked it up beyond repair.
***
Lesley turned off the car and got out, looking up at his apartment. The curtains were closed, but that was normal. No car anywhere in the lot. She frowned and looked at her watch. It was after duty hours, but he could still be wrapping up the case. Never hurt to go check.
As she rounded the last turn up the stairs, she almost ran over someone heading down. They caught themselves at the last minute. Charlie. Lesley looked at the petite woman and smiled weakly. “Sorry, not paying attention.”
