Talon was quiet for a beat. “I’m gonna hang up and call him. He knows better than not to answer me.” Relief rushed through Daniel.
“Sorry, but he doesn’t have his wallet either.”
“No, it’s all good,” Talon assured him quietly. “You’re doing exactly what I asked you to do.”
Talon hung up after promising to call Daniel back, and Daniel glanced at the time again.
Talon called him back in exactly four minutes and twenty seconds. Not that I’m counting or anything.
“Yes?” Fuck, he hoped Talon had spoken to him.
“Daniel, meet me at the sheriff’s office on Orient Road.”
Daniel’s heart thumped. “Why?”
Talon sighed. “Because the idiot has gone and got himself arrested.”
“Arrested? What the hell for?”
“Assault,” Talon ground out.
Daniel pulled into the parking lot just as Talon was getting out of his truck. He was pleased to see he was on his own though. Daniel liked Finn, but he didn’t think Eli did, and Finn would fuss.
Who am I kidding?
Daniel fell into step behind Talon. “What happened?”
“Two security guards on a development site at Huntington Gardens saw someone break into a shuttered ground-floor apartment.”
Daniel groaned. “Their old apartment.”
Talon nodded. “At a guess, Eli was seeing if he could break in and crash there for the night. I just wish it had been the cops.”
Daniel glanced at Talon as an officer just exiting politely held the door open for them. “Wouldn’t that have been worse?”
Talon shook his head. “No. They were jerks and pulled a gun on him. Ignored him when he said who he was, and he’s scraped up.”
Daniel froze. “Scraped up?”
But Talon was at the desk showing his ID. “Ryker recognized Eli right away when they brought him in and called me.”
“Ted Ryker?”
Talon glanced at Daniel as they waited. “Of course, he’s a friend of your dad’s.”
Amongst other things.
“I doubt if Eli wants to see me,” Daniel said.
“Is this something I should know about?” Talon asked.
“You do know.” Daniel had told Talon when Gregory had offered him the job. “I told Eli why I left Washington.”
Talon frowned. “But you weren’t responsible. You took responsibility which is a different thing entirely. You have a disciplinary note in your file, but I imagine it must have been worth it.”
Because his supervisor had criticized him for going to the funeral. Said Daniel should have been doing his job. The same supervisor that had insisted they couldn’t let the local cops pick up the brother. Daniel had punched him. He hadn’t knocked him out even if it bled. Daniel had been sent home and the incident recorded.
Daniel was shaking his head, and Talon put a hand on his shoulder. “It wasn’t on you.”
“It might as well have been.” Just because it had been his boss who had made the decision didn’t mean Daniel shouldn’t have argued against it more.
They were immediately buzzed through the back and met by Sergeant Ryker. He huffed when he saw Daniel and shook hands with them both.
“The security guards have dropped their complaint and left with the threat of losing their jobs the instant I verified who Agent Stuart was and intimated he was acting undercover. I told Agent Stuart he is well within his rights to have them arrested for assault, but he wants to drop it. I don’t think I’m his favorite person either.”
“He doesn’t always play well with others,” Talon said dryly.
“It wasn’t that though,” Ryker said, glancing at Daniel. “He was calm and reasonable with the desk officers when he was brought in, but when he saw me it changed. And I met him at the hospital. I just don’t get it.”
Talon shot an enquiring look at Daniel, but Daniel shrugged. He didn’t get it either, to be honest. Ryker hadn’t said anything out of turn. In fact, Daniel had been slightly embarrassed.
Was there any chance Eli had picked up on that? But even if he had, it still didn’t make sense. Unless…no, there was no way Eli was jealous. No way. But whatever was going on, Daniel had messed up, and it was Daniel’s responsibility to fix.
“Do you want him brought out here, or do you want to talk first in private?” Ryker asked.
“Talon?” Daniel asked after Talon had decreed they had better chat first to see where Eli wanted to go. Talon glanced at him. “I think you should go home.” One blond eyebrow raised dramatically. “I think this is down to me and Eli to work out. If he won’t come home with me, I will drop him at yours.”
Talon stared at Daniel while he clearly weighed things up. Then he nodded. “Okay. I want to know when you get home though.”
Daniel nodded, and Talon left maybe ten seconds before Ryker walked in followed by Eli. Daniel hissed in his breath at the split lip and red graze on his cheek. Eli glanced around the room as if wondering where Talon was, and then he finally fixed his gaze on Daniel. Ryker shot Daniel an amused glance, then left as well. Daniel perched on the edge of the table. Eli never moved. “Talon says if we can’t work this out I’m to drop you at his.”
“Fuck, no.”
“Finn’s a better cook than me.”
“That’s crap and you know it. I don’t need pity. I don’t need you to invent a reason because you feel sorry for me. I’m a loser. I get it.” Eli swung around to the exit.
“Sergeant Ryker is a Dominant. If I’d have trained to be a Dominant, it would have started by me submitting to him.”
Eli paused. He didn’t move, but he didn’t turn around either.
“Apart from a college affair with a girl I saw in secret because her father had strict religious beliefs that wouldn’t have involved me, a boyfriend that I was heartbroken over when we split before I left for Washington, and sleeping with a colleague we both knew was a bad idea and never happened a second time, that’s it. That’s me. Daniel Connelly.
“I had another three, maybe four hookups in three years. The only other secret I have is that I was very nearly named Diarmuid because Mom and Dad had been studying their Irish ancestry. Thankfully she saw sense, or I would have had to move to Clare Island in County Mayo, which has a population of one hundred and sixty-eight, to avoid my brothers, who would have made my life a living hell if they ever found out.”
Eli’s turned his head to gaze at Daniel as if waiting for something else. It gave Daniel a little hope. He let a beat of silence go. “Are you ready to get out of here?”
Eli gazed at him for another moment but then nodded. They got out of the precinct with little fuss, and it was silence all the way home which Daniel could deal with. He could deal with anything so long as he could physically see Eli. Daniel wasn’t stupid—he tried not to laugh at the irony—but he knew he was acting all kinds of dumb around Eli. He was getting ridiculously possessive over someone he had met casually and hadn’t even dated. Why? He was still no wiser as they drove home in silence. Maybe he should get a dog?
The one thing he was sure of was giving in to any kind of temptation with Eli was going to come back and bite him on the ass.