Tender Is The Night(31)

She thought he was extremely lucky not to have lost his life. Car chases  were always dangerous, especially when done in a car with no siren and  no way to clear the path of other vehicles. But she knew that excuse  wouldn't sit well with Devin, so she kept her thoughts to herself.

"Do you want something to drink or eat?" she asked, as they walked into his den.

"No, I'm fine."

"You're not even close to fine," she commented. "You're probably going to hurt tomorrow."

He shrugged. "Whatever. It is what it is. Let's see if we can do anything with the partial plate."

"Now?"

"We don't have time to waste."

"We have some time. The third fire has never happened less than three  days after the second one, and I'm guessing that the car the suspect was  driving is hidden away in some garage right now. You need to go to  bed."

"No, I need to find the suspect," he said, glaring at her. "I need to work."

"You're in no condition to work. I'll do it if you go to bed. I can  access resources you can't. So you can let me do my job, or you can  stand here and argue with me for a couple more hours."

"You're really pissing me off right now."

"I don't care. Go to bed."

He gave her another irritated look, then said, "You wake me up as soon  as you find something. If that plate comes close to matching any suspect  we've talked about, I want to know."         

     



 

"Got it."

"I mean it, Kate."

"And I said yes."

He walked out of the room and down the hall. She moved over to her  computer and ran the partial plate through the Bureau's database. She  really did hope they would get lucky and find a match to one of their  suspects.

The partial plate unfortunately resulted in thousands of matches across  the country, several hundred in California alone. She turned her  attention to the list of suspects and ran them through the DMV, almost  holding her breath in the hopes that at least one of them had a license  plate with the same three letters.

But there was no match-just hundreds of possible leads to check out, none of which could be done at this moment.

Stretching her arms over her head, she yawned. She was exhausted, but she was also wired from all the adrenaline.

Getting up from the table, she walked down the hall and into Devin's  bedroom. The lights were out, but he hadn't closed the curtains and  there was enough moonlight to see him sprawled on his stomach across the  middle of the king-sized bed.

She turned to leave, but he called her name.

"I thought you were asleep," she said, as she moved into the room.

He rolled over and sat up in the bed, resting against the pillows and  the headboard. "I can't sleep. I keep reliving every minute of the  night, trying to remember if I saw anything that would be helpful. What  did you find out?"

She shook her head. "Nothing. Sorry."

"Dammit."

"There are leads to check out, but no vehicles registered to anyone on  our suspect list match the partial plate." She sat down next to him on  the bed. "We'll start again tomorrow."

"We were right there, Kate. How did we miss him?"

"He came down the other street, probably with his lights off. Or he was  there before we were and entered the building from the other side. He  could have been in the building for awhile and just didn't have the  lights on."

"We should have split up. We should have had you on one side and me on the other."

"That would have been a better plan," she agreed. "But it was a long  shot we were even at the right location. And what about the other side  of the park?"

"But we were at the right place, and he got away. I was behind the car,  and I couldn't get close enough to see the person driving. I got  nothing." He groaned and banged the back of his head against the  headboard.

"Hey now, you've already bruised your head. Don't make it worse."

"It couldn't get worse."

"Yes, it could. You could have been killed tonight, Devin. But you  weren't. You got the make of the car and a partial plate; that's not  nothing."

"It's not enough, and you know it."

"I'm not willing to dismiss it that quickly. We just need to work the  problem. We go back to investigating. It's what we're trained to do, and  that's what we're going to do. But we can't do that when we're both  exhausted." She paused, knowing she needed to say the words that had  been running through her head for the past several hours. "This is my  fault, Devin. This is on me. I was talking my ass off in the car. I  distracted you. I distracted myself. It was unprofessional and worst of  all, not smart. We were there for a reason, and I should have stayed  razor-focused. This wouldn't have happened if you'd been by yourself. I  was not helpful tonight. I was not a good partner, and I am really  sorry."

"So you're finally admitting you weren't helpful. That's a first."

"I can admit when I'm wrong. And tonight I was wrong."

He stared back at her for a long minute, his gaze still filled with  angry shadows, but his tension was starting to ease. "It wasn't your  fault," he said quietly. "It was mine."

"No, it wasn't. You got us to the right place. I should have had the foresight to think about splitting up."

"Why? I didn't. And I have more years than you on the job."

"But you're more emotionally invested than I am. I'm supposed to be the cool, objective party."

"I'm just as objective as you are."

"Well, I am going to make it up to you."

"How are you going to do that?"

"I won't stop working on this case until we find the person who killed  Sam and who almost killed you. Even if Agent Roman pulls me off the  assignment, I'll work it on the side, okay? I might have to take a few  hours or a day off for Mia's wedding, but other than that, I will be  doing everything I can to help you. Even if I'm sent back to DC, I'll be  on the computer, I'll be on the phone with you. I'll recruit Emma and  whatever other members of my family I can get to help you. You won't be  alone." It felt so important to make him understand that this wasn't the  end, and that she wasn't giving up on the truth or on him.         

     



 

"Kate, are you done?"

"What? You don't believe me?"

"I believe you."

"Really?"

He nodded.

"Okay, good." She blew out a breath of relief. It wasn't really about  screwing up the assignment that bothered her; it was about letting Devin  down. She hadn't realized until just this second how badly she'd felt  about it. But she'd come to respect him, to like him, to care about him,  to want him to be free of the painful weight of the past year. She knew  how much this case meant to him. And while she wanted justice for Sam,  mostly she wanted it for Devin.

"Your dedication to this assignment is really impressive, Kate. I  couldn't have asked for a better partner. You've gone above and beyond  the call of duty. Tonight was just another bad night."

"Tomorrow will be better," she said.

He gave her a reluctant smile. "You're relentless in your belief."

"That's how I get what I want. You do the same thing, Devin. Just  sometimes from a more cynical place." She yawned at the end of her  sentence. "I should probably go home."

"You could do that, or you could stay here," he said.

"Maybe that's a better idea," she agreed, thinking the last thing she  wanted to do was go back out into the cold, dark night. "I'll lie down  on the couch."

"Or you could lie down here."

His suggestion sent a tingle down her spine and definitely changed the tenor of their conversation.

"That's not a good idea, Devin," she said, as her brain was already coming up with an argument for why it was an excellent idea.

"It's the best one I've had all night."

She shook her head, fighting the temptation sweeping through her. "You  need to rest. You're hurt. And I'm too wired to sleep. I'd probably toss  and turn and keep you awake."

"I'm wired, too. My thoughts are running around in circles. Why didn't I do this? Why didn't I do that?"

"Just think about something else."

"I am thinking about something else-or I'm trying to."

"That is not going to solve anything."

He put his hand over hers, and she almost jumped off the bed at the heat of his touch.

"You've been so helpful to me, Kate, I'm thinking that maybe I should start trying to be helpful, too."

Another tingle shot through her body as his expression changed from  somber to flirtatious and teasing. "Really? You want to help me?" she  asked suspiciously. "Since when?"

"Actually since a lot longer than you might think."

"What did you have in mind?" She could barely get the words out because  she had a feeling the answer was going to be more than a little  tempting.