The makings of a sheepish grin tugged at his mouth. “It was in a head-on collision with your colleague’s face.”
My eyes widened when I realized what that meant. “You attacked Dean Kincaid?”
“I didn’t attack him.” Noah lifted his hands, glancing at Ed for support. Ed sealed his lips a little tighter. “I punched him. Once.”
“And what did he do?” I cried.
The corners of Noah’s eyes squinted. “He flew across his office, fell across the desk, and swore he was going to sue me.”
I had to force myself to take a breath. “And how did you respond to that?”
“By threatening to end his life.”
I threw my hands in the air. “If he sued you?”
Noah gave me a funny look before answering. “If he so much as looked your direction again and I found out about it.”
His expression changed, as though he were waiting for me to explain something to him.
My eyes lowered. “How did you find out about what happened that night in the parking garage?”
“Why did you keep it from me?” he asked gently.
“Because I wanted to take care of it on my own.” I bit my lip. “And I was afraid of what you would do when I told you.”
“And did you take care of it?”
One corner of my mouth lifted as I replayed the look on Dean’s face when I’d confronted him a few days ago. “I showed him the parking garage footage and promised if he ever tried that again, I was leaking it to the review board and press.”
“Good. You threatened his job. I threatened his life.” Noah clapped once. “You won’t have to worry about him anymore.”
Reminding us of his presence, Ed snorted. “You’re one crazy son of a bitch, Wolff.”
Noah smirked. “I believe I qualified for that merit badge years ago.”
The main cathedral doors thundered open and a handful of police rushed inside.
“Doc Wolff, it’s time to get you all out of here!” the one in front shouted after lifting his protective shield covering his face. “It’s a goddamned circus out there. We’ll escort you out through the back.”
Ed and I jumped as if we’d been caught in the middle of an actual murder. Noah didn’t so much as bat an eyelid.
“Take my wife and Detective Baker out the back,” Noah instructed, striding down the aisle and leading me toward the officers. “I’m leaving through the front doors.”
The room went quiet except for the escalating roar outside the cathedral walls.
“What?” Noah asked when he noticed the way several of the officers were staring at him. “I have nothing to hide. I’m on their side,” he finished, pointing out the doors.
“There’s a stuffed likeness of you out there swinging from the end of a rope.” A different officer lifted his face shield and wiped the sweat dotting his face. “They won’t be high-fiving you if you walk out those doors, Doctor Wolff.”
“So no thunderous applause either then?” Noah teased.
“Doc, I really must insist.” But the lead officer divided up his team into two groups, one going with Ed and me out the back and the second going with Noah through the front.
“I’m going with you,” I said, whipping my arm out of Ed’s hold when he started to guide me down the hall.
Noah broke away from the officers, and his hands circled the outsides of my arms as he lowered his face in front of mine. “Some doors you can go through with me. Others you cannot.” There was another message in his eyes, one only I could read. He waited for me to acknowledge it before proceeding. “This is one of those I must walk through alone.”
I gave in with a slight nod. “Be careful. Those freaks are out for blood.”
His mouth twisted. “I’m familiar with the type.”
“Don’t worry, ma’am.” A different officer approached, steering me back toward the group veering us out back. “Captain will get him out safely and you’ll be speeding away in the back of an armored vehicle in three minutes flat.”
All I could do was nod before our group jogged down another hallway to an exit. One of the officers went through first, then waved the rest of us out. As promised, an armored SWAT vehicle was waiting right outside.
“I’ll be enjoying my ride home in the comfort of my Buick, thank you very much,” Ed said when they opened the back doors for us to climb inside. He helped me up, giving my hand a squeeze before letting go. “Glad we’re on the same side.”
I smiled at him as the rest of the officers filed into the truck. “Me too.”
Ed backed onto the sidewalk, waving as the doors sealed us inside the tank on wheels.
“Your husband will be sitting right there next to you in thirty seconds, ma’am,” the same kind officer promised when he noticed my hands wringing in my lap.
“Thirty. Twenty-nine,” I counted off as the vehicle whipped around toward the front of the cathedral.
The radios the officers had attached to their vests hummed. “Requesting immediate backup,” the voice thundered from the other end. “We need you now Bravo team.”
Tires squealed to a halt, doors exploding open right after, armed officers leaping out the back. There were no windows to look from, so I stuck my head out the door to see what was going on.
Mayhem was the only way to describe it.
The crowd outside had surged to double in size from when I’d arrived. The noise swelled to a deafening volume as a sea of black descended upon an epicenter of armed guards surrounding Noah. Things were hurled in his direction—everything from glass bottles and rocks to spoiled produce and shoes. Fists and bats and signs were swung at the officers and Noah, chants of Doctor Perv chiming off the walls of the cathedral.
Indignation erupted from inside me, along with the temptation to curse at them for persecuting the very person they idolized.
But keeping his secret kept him safe.
Though nothing about what was unfolding on the cathedral steps embodied security.
The other team of officers was cutting through the mass slowly, like sawing through timber with a length of rope. All at once, the entire group of officers, along with Noah, appeared to be swallowed whole by the crowd.
Leaping from the truck, I rushed toward the crowd, ready to throw aside every body that stood in my way if that was what it took to get to him.
Then several streams of smoke erupted from the crowd, shouts to scatter spreading among the masses. Tributaries of bodies flowed out of the huddled mass, dark bodies skulking back into the black chasm they’d rose from.
Climbing from the smoke like a spirit rising from the earth, Noah’s dark form slashed through the haze and broke into a jog when he saw me.
A couple of officers flanked him, while the rest diverted the crowd from charging our direction. My eyes rounded when he got closer.
“What happened?” I cried, trying to keep my composure as I inspected him. Ripped shirt, blood dripping from several lacerations on his face, angry red marks peppered in between.
Noah’s brow lifted, a gash going through the center of it weeping a drop of blood as he did. “They don’t believe I’m on their side.”
“Too soon for jokes.” My eyes lifted as I fretted with a rip torn down the sleeve of his shirt. “They would have drawn and quartered you from the looks of it.”