Deadly Chemistry (Entangled Ignite) (4 page)

He waited while she started her car before he started his truck and pulled onto the road.

Shit
.

He didn’t know any more about the Devil’s Dust situation than he had when he got here. He’d thought the drug was probably being cooked in some basement somewhere, but after hearing about Lauren’s research, he wasn’t so sure. But there was no way she was a drug dealer—neurotic cats aside—was there? But what about that bag of pellets she’d carried out of the building earlier? He was going to have to manage to spend more time with her to find out what she was up to.

Chapter Five

Possum The Cranky Cat spent the ride from the shelter tucked beneath Mike’s legs, which made lifting his foot from gas to brake pedal a painstaking operation—but they made it to the local Food Giant without too much arguing. Until he came out of the store, that is, arms laden with litter box, litter, food, and toys—and found the upholstery shredded.

“I was only gone for ten minutes!” he told the cat when he opened the door. She hissed at him, then jumped into the passenger seat and started licking her paw. “Seriously? The seats are the only part of this truck that aren’t messed up. At least they
were
.”

He climbed in and started the engine, waving at old Miss Emmaline Tucker as she crept across the parking lot. The woman’s frail appearance belied her powerful position in the community as the brains behind Kentucky Jelly and the Tucker Foundation. He sighed when she waved at him to open his window. How she could see him, as bent over as she was, was beyond him. She’d been one of his grandmother’s best friends, so he couldn’t pretend he didn’t see her.

“Hi, Miss Emmie.”

“Hi yourself. I see you’ve moved back to town.”

“Yes ma’am.”

“That’s good. Your grandma would be happy to see that you’re in her old house instead of selling it. Happier if you’d done it before she went to her great reward, but still. She’s probably up there smiling on you now.”

Mike doubted that, given the mess he’d made of his life so far, but he nodded and said, “Thank you. I like to think so.”

“Do you like working with my son-in-law?”

Mike’s boss Jason was married to Miss Emmie’s daughter Louella. Jason referred to himself and his bride as the divine debutante and the dumbass, but they seemed to be as much in love now as any two people could be.

“Jason’s a good guy,” Mike said.

“Of course he is. And how are you doing with Dylan?”

Leave it to Miss Emmie to cut to the chase. “We’re holding it together,” he lied.

She glared at him. “Bullshit. I bet you fight like cats and dogs.” She shook her head. “I know you promised your grandma before she died that you’d look after him, and you’re probably doing a better job than you think, especially after that little fuck up in Cincinnati.”

Mike barked out a laugh at the language that came out of the prim little old lady. “Which fuck up are you referring to? Mine or his?”

“Watch your language,” she snapped, but then smacked him on the shoulder with a gnarled hand and gave him a sly smile. “You met any hot chicks since you moved back to town?”

He thought of Lauren, but said only, “No, ma’am, I’m staying out of the dating business. I don’t seem to be much good at choosing nice girls. Unless you’re available?”

She snorted but smiled anyway, then patted him on the arm and said, “You take care, now. And don’t be afraid to step out and meet somebody. I hear that there’s a pretty lady scientist over on the campus who might be single. Not too many girls as smart as me in the department these days.”

How did she know Lauren? Miss Emmaline had probably run across her at some sort of fancy University event. Emmie was a huge donor to the various charities on campus. “Well, if I change my mind, I’ll certainly ask for an introduction.”

“Ha. Unlikely. You aren’t known for your willingness to ask for help.” Her eyes narrowed. “I know people who could have fixed that mess you got yourself into a few months ago.”

What Mike knew was that if he’d called Miss Emmie for help, she would have pulled strings and covered up the whole thing, and he also knew that secrets like that required bribes and almost never remained buried. No way was he going to try to make two wrongs into a right.

Mike said goodbye and tried again to call Dylan. Either his brother was ignoring him, or he had lost his phone again. He really needed to find out what Dylan knew about Lauren’s missing drug, and if there was any way that it could be Devil’s Dust. Given his past history with the Devil’s Rangers, it seemed more and more likely that the kid was up to his neck in trouble—again.

The house was quiet when he got home, and he left the cat in the truck for a few minutes while he took his supplies inside. He looked at the corner of the laundry room where Dylan’s skateboard rested next to a baseball bat and glove that were dustier than Grandma’s Hummel collection. He thought about pitching them but was a little nostalgic for the days when they’d stayed with Grandma when they were younger, and he and Evan had played catch with the much younger Dylan—though he’d have his fingernails pulled out with hot tweezers before he let anyone know what a sap he was. Instead, he shoved the stuff in the hall closet and made a kitty latrine.

By the time he got the litter box set up and convinced Possum to leave her new favorite scratching post—his truck—it was fully dark.

“Come on,” he told her while she transferred her claws to his shirt. “You know, if I have to get clawed, I’d rather it be by my own species.” Lauren’s elegant fingers came to mind, and then her long, trim body. He thought about her digging her nails into him as he went into her. The cat growled and fought to escape his hold, breaking his fantasy. Just as well. He had some internet research to do before turning in for the night, and he needed to get his mind back into the head on his shoulders.

Behind him, he heard the familiar screech of brakes on Dylan’s bike. Mike turned, and for once, Dylan’s face wasn’t folded into a sneer or, worse, flatly expressionless.

After dismounting, Dylan hitched his backpack higher on his shoulders and stared at the near-bald yowling ball of nasty in Mike’s arms. “What’s that?”

“I adopted a cat. Or signed up to be a foster person.”

“That’s cool.”

As his brother got closer, Mike was assaulted with an overwhelming wave of— “Dude, did you get a new cologne?”

“Yeah. You like it?”

For an instant, the cool bravado that Dylan wore like armor slipped, and Mike masked his reaction to the god-awful scent. “Um—”

Possum yowled.
Saved by the cat
.

Dylan reached a hand toward Possum, who hissed and took a swipe at him. He jerked back and laughed, a sound nearly foreign to Mike’s ears. “Okay. I’ll let you get settled. What’s his name?”

Seeing the smile on the kid’s face made Mike doubt his suspicion that Dylan was in trouble.

“
Her
name is Possum.” At Dylan’s raised eyebrows, Mike said, “Long story.” Dylan followed him up the sidewalk and into the house.

“What did you do with my shit?” Dylan asked, scowling at the space currently filled with a litter box.

Of course he’d immediately focus on how this cat would inconvenience him, even though the stuff Mike had moved hadn’t been used in years, as far as he could tell. “It’s safe, don’t panic. I put it in the closet.”

“I wasn’t panicking, I just asked a question. Christ.”

“Don’t swear. And don’t be so defensive.” Mike realized as soon as it came out of his mouth that he shouldn’t have said that last part.

“Okay,
Mom
,” Dylan said. “I just asked a question. You’re so worried about everything I say and how I say it.”

“You don’t want to go there,” Mike said. Less than two minutes together and they were already at each other’s throats. He might not trust his brother, but he’d promised their grandmother—on her deathbed—that he’d look out for his siblings. Evan hadn’t needed Mike in a long time, but Dylan had, and Mike had failed him—miserably. He sighed. “Look. I didn’t mean anything by that.”

“Whatever.” Dylan opened the refrigerator, and then closed it again. “We need groceries.”

“We always need groceries.”

“Why didn’t you get food when you picked up the cat supplies?”

“I didn’t want to leave her alone in the car for too long. Do you want to order a pizza?”

Dylan walked to the freezer and opened it, displaying a half dozen frozen pizzas.

“I bet Evan’s got roast beef and fresh organic green beans tonight, or eggplant parmesan and tofu muffins. You could call him.” Mike tried to keep the defensive tone out of his own voice.

A reluctant smile crossed Dylan’s face. “Yeah, but then I’d have to listen to a lecture on the decay of modern society as a result of poor hygiene and video game-induced ADHD.”

“True that. See how lucky you are to be stuck with me?”

Dylan shook his head. “As long as I can keep ignoring you, and you keep ignoring me, we’ll probably be okay.”

Mike started to speak, then thought better of it and said instead, “Speaking of ignoring you, where were you tonight?”

Taking a gallon of milk from the fridge, Dylan removed the lid and sniffed. He shrugged, then turned to get a glass. He poured his drink, then lied straight to Mike’s face. “I was helping my boss, Dr. Kane, at her lab.”

His boss, Dr. Kane, who had been with Mike at the animal shelter. How fucking dumb did Dylan think he was? And whose ass was he trying to cover—his own, or someone else’s?

Chapter Six

Why did mornings have to be so damned bright? Couldn’t one just ease into the day with gradually increasing light? Oh yeah. One could. If one got up
before
the sun. But Lauren had experienced her dawn’s early light for the year yesterday.

She slammed the door of her aging Ford Explorer and heard something crunch inside the panel. She looked, but didn’t see any stray car bits laying around the parking space. Hopefully, whatever it was wouldn’t wind up costing too much to fix. If she were really lucky, it would be a random gremlin noise and not even be anything that
needed
fixing. Until proven otherwise, she was going with that hypothesis. She was pretty good at ignoring problems unless they interrupted her workflow. Hoisting her bag over her shoulder, she walked toward the Bio building.

The trash can serving as a possum home rattled, and she dropped in a handful of dry cat food as she passed.

Lauren pulled open the door to the building, annoyed with herself for looking to see if Mike was anywhere nearby. She paused, taking a moment to appreciate the ancient part of the building, and breathed deep, the scents of old wood, a little mildew, strong coffee, and the faintest undertone of sweat socks filling her lungs. The coffee scent was pleasant—the sweat socks, not so much—but it was all part of her home turf, and she loved it.

She mounted the worn marble steps to the second floor and pushed through a set of double fire doors to the new wing, where her lab sat behind a steel door, in sterile brightness, between other clean, shiny labs.

She needed to focus on her presentation to the Pemberton people—the one where she explained about her study and begged for funding—but after her interesting run-in with Mike The Hot Maintenance Man the night before, funding wasn’t front and center in her mind—Mike was. Something told her he hadn’t stopped by intending to adopt a pet. Had he gone there because he was interested in her? Maybe? She was pretty sure she’d caught him checking out her boobs. And he’d gotten that look on his face that sometimes meant a guy was about to kiss her. Except the usual guy who wanted to kiss
her
wasn’t generally someone she wanted to kiss back—so she could be very wrong about that body language. There was certainly nothing
usual
about Mike Gibson.

If he wanted to see her, why go all the way out to the shelter? Why not just visit her again at work? Maybe he had some sort of thing against flirting on company time. But then, if he was interested in her, why didn’t he ask her out? Not that she was going to go out with him, anyway, but she wanted to know what was going on. She was a scientist. That’s what scientists did. They solved interesting puzzles—they didn’t moon around, obsessing over hot maintenance men.

As she rounded the corner at the end of the hall, she saw what appeared to be all of her co-workers standing in the hall outside of her lab. When someone saw her, a murmur went through the crowd, and everyone—like some sort of a departmental cyborg—turned to look at her.

“What’s going on?” Was there a dead custodian in her lab? That had happened to someone she’d known in grad school. A professor came in one morning and found one of the cleaning staff dead on the floor of his lab. Apparently, the guy had a bit of a drinking problem and had decided to sample the alcohols that were stored in the flammable cabinet. Unfortunately, the custodian hadn’t understood that “methanol” wasn’t interchangeable with the drinkable “ethanol” and had poisoned himself. It was a messy way to die.

The group outside of her door parted and Dr. Hector Jerrold, the department chair, stepped forward, running a gnarled hand through his thick, gray hair. He looked like an overweight, Hispanic Einstein. Wait—Jerrold was there? A sudden jolt of adrenaline hit her.
Uh oh
. It must be bad if the old man left his hallowed office. This was not going to be good.

“Lauren,” he began, then stopped and looked back through the door of her lab. He didn’t smile.

She forced her lungs to push air over her vocal cords, her lips to move. “Is everything okay?”

Hector frowned. “I don’t know how to tell you this—”

By this time, Lauren was almost even with the door, so she took a few more steps forward and looked inside. After her heart started sending blood back through her brain, she recognized utter destruction.

There were broken bottles and beakers on every surface, liquid dripping from the blue composite counters. Books and papers were scattered, pages torn out and soaked. Her little centrifuge was tipped over, the electronics ripped out of it. The scale was crushed.

“Lauren, I don’t know what to say.”

She took a deep breath and her brain kicked back into gear. “Oh, God. My algae.”

…

“Hey, bud. Perfect timing.”

“S’up?” Mike barely glanced at Jason as he walked into the office and swiped his ID badge through the card reader, clocking in. He checked the time. “I’m okay. I’m on the later shift.”

“Yeah, I know.” Jason peered at him. “You look a little rough. Out all night partying?”

“No, my house guest was up howling.”

“Dayum, son, did you get laid?” Jason held up a hand for a fist bump, but Mike ignored it.

“No, I got a cat.”

Jason snorted. “Anyway, there was some vandalism over in the Bio Building last night. I’m gonna need your help over there today. I already let the dispatcher know to put your other jobs on a back burner for the time being.”

Mike looked up. A fire engine had pulled out of the lot as he’d parked, but he hadn’t thought much of it. He’d figured it was just a fire drill in a dorm. “What happened?”

“Somebody trashed one of the labs. It’s your girl’s place.”

Adrenaline spiked through Mike’s veins. He barely knew Lauren, but the thought of her in danger made him want to growl. “Is she okay?” He didn’t bother to argue that “his girl” wasn’t his girl. That was kind of a non-issue under these circumstances.

Jason shrugged. “Cool as a cucumber. I saw her when I went over. She wasn’t there when it happened. We got called over to check it out right after I got here, but there wasn’t anything we could do until the cops left. Housekeeping’s got a big job ahead of them, and a lot of equipment was damaged, so I need you over there to try to figure out what’s fixable and what needs to be replaced.”

“Damn,” Mike said. He grabbed his work phone and clipped it to his belt. He wanted to rush over, make sure Lauren really was okay, but forced himself to slow down. Who would have done this? Someone after her drug?

His stomach clenched.
Dylan
. His little brother had said he’d been working late in the lab with Lauren, which was a lie because Mike had been with her. But maybe Dylan had been alone in the lab, destroying it. Except why tell Mike he was there when he knew the damage would be discovered?

He briefly considered that maybe Lauren herself had done this. Maybe she’d driven away from her bleeding heart animal rescue shelter to destroy expensive equipment in a crazy, savage fit of psychosis.
Yeah, right.

Every time he wondered about her being part of the Devil’s Rangers, his heart gave a weird squeeze. Although he wasn’t into self-delusion, he didn’t really think that she was involved—hopefully, that was true, and not just because he wanted
her
, in spite of himself. At any rate, he wasn’t going to find out anything standing there gathering wool while Jason scratched his armpits. “Okay, I’m heading over there.”

…

Lauren stood in the doorway of her lab, holding a lab coat and box of gloves that someone had handed to her. She couldn’t leave this mess for the housekeeping staff—she needed to find out what was salvageable. And find out if she still had a project.

The cops had come and gone, too, although they’d kept her out of her own lab as they’d processed the scene.

They’d asked her the same questions—
any sign of forced entry?
Nope, the doorframe was completely unscratched. Which was weird, because she was sure she’d locked up before she left last night.
Did she know who would have destroyed her lab?
Nope again.
Who would do something like this? Did she have enemies?
Yeah, riiiiight. She’d almost laughed at that one.

While the police had been there, the other members of the department kept popping by, surprisingly generous with offers of refrigerator and freezer space—commodities that were often jealously hoarded. Evan was the only one who was still physically present, however. Once the police left, there was no more gossip to collect. She sighed and held the box of gloves between her knees while she wrestled her arms into the lab coat. Time to get to work.

Evan handed her a pair of plastic shoe covers. “Here. Wear these. You don’t know what’s contaminating the floor.”

“Thanks.”

“Are you okay?” Evan’s formal reserve slipped a bit, and he put his hand on her arm. He was a good guy under all that uptight armor, which made her think of his completely-wrong-for-her brother with the mysterious background and dark look in his eye.

“I will be. I just can’t believe someone came in here and did this. I can’t believe no one saw anything.”

“I was here until late,” Evan said. “I saw the cleaning people leave, and everything was fine. The perpetrators must have come in during the dead of night.”

“Miss Kane?”

Lauren turned to see a man in a Tucker Police Department uniform striding toward her. He was about thirty, African American, with a gleaming shaved head and the height and lean power of someone who hadn’t stopped playing basketball after his high school—or maybe even college—career had ended. Of course, she was making an assumption that all incredibly tall guys played ball. His long face was serious, but not unsympathetic.

“I’m Chief of Police Dwayne Crawford,” he told her, shaking her hand. “I’m sorry it took me so long to get here.” He turned to Evan. “Nice to see you, Evan.”

Evan nodded stiffly. “Hello, Chief Crawford.”

The man sighed. “Oh, for God’s sake, we went to preschool together. You really,
really
don’t need to call me ‘Chief’.”

Evan almost smiled.

Chief Crawford turned his attention back to her. “This your lab?”

Lauren nodded.

Evan said, “I’ll be in my office if you need me.”

“Thanks,” Lauren said. Then, puzzled by why a police chief would be at her lab, she turned to the police chief. “Since when does the police chief show up at the site of a little vandalism?”

“Tucker’s a small force, and we don’t get crimes like this often.”

He looked over Lauren’s shoulder, into the lab. “It looks like you’ve got a hell of a mess to clean up. Mind if I look around a little with you?”

“I was just gearing up.” She handed him some gloves.

“I’d like to see if you can identify anything that might be missing and get an in-person look at the graffiti.”

“Graffiti? I don’t know anything about that.”

“The first responders noticed it, but didn’t mention it to anyone because of its threatening nature.”

Lauren looked through the door. She was hesitant to take a step over the threshold, as if by staying in the corridor, she could keep the destruction from being real. God, how was she going to replace all this stuff? “I don’t see anything. What kind of threats?”

“Not very nice ones,” Crawford said.

But before they entered the room, Mike burst through the fire door at the end of the hall, long legs eating the distance between himself and Lauren. He came toward her so quickly that she stepped back, lest he bowl her over, but he pulled up before that happened. She was close enough to feel his energy. A nice little vibration crawled up her back—one that had nothing to do with all the bad stuff that had happened in her lab.

“Are you okay?” His dark brown eyes were nearly black, searching hers. Somehow he was more handsome this morning than he’d been last night. Probably a reaction based on the overflow of stress hormones running through her system. Yeah, that had to be it.

Crawford was covering a smile with his hand. From the corner of her eye, Lauren noticed Evan come to his office door and stare at his brother. What was all that about?

“Um, hi,” Lauren said weakly. She found herself leaning slightly forward, wanting to put her hands on his and pull his strong arms around her.
Oh, no
. That wouldn’t do. “I’m…I’m okay, I think.”

Evan shook his head, turned, and shut the door.

“Crawford,” Mike said, turning from her to shake the cop’s hand.

“Gibson! It’s about time you showed your face. I told Evan you needed to come see me.”

“Yeah, I’ve been pretty busy.” Mike said, looking away.

Were they old friends? Enemies? Frienemies? It
was
a small town.

“Uh, huh. Nice outfit, by the way.”

Mike didn’t respond, but Crawford continued. “I told your brother you should have come to me for a job when you moved back to town. If you want to be back in a blue uniform, I could hook you up in something a little more up your alley.” He held up a hand when Mike glowered at him. “Not my business, I know.” He looked at Lauren, then back at Mike, who frowned. “What I didn’t know was that you’re involved with our victim.”

“Oh!” Lauren said at the same time Mike said, “Huh?”

“We’re not—I mean, there’s not—” She stopped and looked at Mike.

“Do you know who did this?” Mike asked Crawford, not addressing the implication that there was something between himself and Lauren. There wasn’t, so that was a reasonable response. Except…God, she was just really glad to see him.

“No clue who did this…yet,” Crawford said to Mike. “I was just about to take a look.”

Mike hesitated, then said, “I’m supposed to make a list of equipment that needs repair. Should I come back later, or—”

“You might as well come in now.”

Lauren was so relieved that Mike was allowed to come in with her that she almost missed the hint of satisfaction that crossed his face.