The Intelligence Unit Series

proceed.

It took Addison a full five minutes of box breathing and high-level cursing before she could see straight again. She ordered the facts in her head, determining not just what she knew, but what she needed to find out, then methodically came up with a plan for how to Step one was going to sting, but damn it, it was necessary.

Picking up her cell phone, she scrolled through her contacts and hit send.

"Detective Hale?" came Chloe's thin whisper. "Is Ryan okay? Officer Dade said everything is under control, but-"

"Ryan is one hundred percent fine," Addison reassured her, "but I've got to ask you for something that might be a little tough. I need to take a look at the texts you got earlier. If you don't want to look at them again, that's fine," she added. "You can ask Officer Dade to send me screen shots. But, whatever you do, please don't delete them."

A beat of silence passed before she asked, "Do you think you can trace them back to Myles?"

"We are absolutely going to try," Addison said. Chloe passed her phone off to Dade, who made very fast work of sending Addison screen shots of the texts. Straightening her shoulders, Addison walked back toward the spot where Maxwell had been interviewing Bishop. Maxwell, being the kickass detective that he was, both saw her coming and saw the look on her face, and he left Bishop in the custody of another patrol officer whose unit had arrived on the scene.

"How did it go with Dempsey?" he asked, keeping his voice low even though they were out of Bishop's earshot by a good half dozen paces.

Addison battled her urge to frown. "Let's just say a root canal would've been more of a party."

"Yeah, well, ditto for this one." Maxwell lifted his chin at Bishop. "He's not saying much, other than to claim he just happened to be walking by when Dempsey jumped him, unprovoked."

And just when Addison thought she'd heard it all. "Funny, I got a very different version of events from Ryan." She relayed his account of what had happened, passing off her phone to show Maxwell the texts, and he alternated between shaking his head and swearing. "Jesus. We have our work cut out for us." He looked at Bishop, tilting his head in thought. "He stonewalled me pretty hard, but if you want to take a run at him, feel free. I'm not thinking he'll break, but..."

"At this point, we have to try everything," she said.

"Actually, I was going to say I've seen you get some pretty scary people to confess every last one of their sins, but yes." Maxwell raised a brow at her. "We also have to try everything. I don't want to cut this jackass loose tonight unless we absolutely have to." "Me, either." Turning back toward Bishop, she walked over, pasting a smile over her mouth that didn't quite fit. "Mr. Bishop. Detective Addison Hale. We met the other day. I've got a few questions for you."

"I've already explained everything to your partner," he said, looking at the spot where Maxwell stood silently behind her, and she kept her smile in place despite the effort it took.

"Then explaining it again to me should be a piece of cake. Can you tell me what happened, here?"

He lowered the ice pack from his eye, revealing a look of disdain and a pretty spectacular shiner. "I was walking by, just minding my own business, when he came barging out of the apartment building." Bishop frowned in Ryan's direction. Addison waited for him to elaborate, the silence stretching further and further until she finally had to ask, "And what happened, then?"

"He accused me of stalking his sister. I told him I had no idea what he was talking about, but he kept yelling. He was very agitated and aggressive. Then, he hit me."

"Just once?" Addison asked.

Bishop shot a glance at a trio of people standing with the second patrol unit that had arrived when she'd been talking to Ryan. "I suppose you could ask the witnesses over there. I'm sure they saw everything." "I'm asking you," she said. "Since you were directly involved."

He looked at her for a long minute before replying, "I was rather busy trying to defend myself at the time, but yes. He hit me more than once."

"Mr. Dempsey says you were out here, spying on his sister, and that when he came out here to confront you about it, you taunted him," Addison said smoothly. "Do you think the witnesses saw that?" "No, because it didn't happen."

Addison waited, but once again, Bishop just stayed quiet. "So you didn't send these texts to Chloe Ferguson?" She held out her phone with the messages easily visible on the screen.

Bishop paused, so briefly that she would have missed it if she hadn't been examining every aspect of his responses. "I don't have Chloe's number."

"That's not a no," Addison pointed out, and Bishop huffed in irritation.

"No, Detective. I didn't send those texts."

"You won't mind showing me your cell phone to prove it, then?"

Bishop rolled his eyes in disgust, but to Addison's absolute shock, he pulled his cell phone from his jacket pocket, thumbing the screen to life. "Here," he said, flipping the phone forward to show her the screen listing his recent texts. "See? Chloe's number isn't anywhere on my phone."

God damn it, he was right. Still, one quick peek at a single screen wasn't definitive proof. It was the mother of all longshots, but... "I'd have to take it with me to let our technical expert have a look," she said.

"Nice try." Bishop snorted. "But you and your partner, here, have already accused me of things I haven't done, and I know my rights. I showed my phone to you even though I didn't technically have to. The only way you'll be taking it is with a warrant." She'd known he'd say it, but still, she fought her frustration. There had to be a way to shake something loose, here.

Addison examined the street, tilting her head in fake thought. "This isn't exactly your neighborhood, Mr. Bishop. What are you doing so far from home?"

"I'd read about the new Asian fusion restaurant over on Chester Boulevard, and I came out to give it a try. I was walking off some of my dinner because it's still so nice out. I was about to call a Lyft to go home when all of this happened." Addison weighed her options, and f**k it. "That's an awfully convenient answer," she said.

"I'm not sure how to respond to that," Bishop said, "since it's the truth."

"You expect me to believe that you just happened to be on the exact street that Chloe Ferguson lives on at the exact time she received anonymous texts of harassment, but you had nothing to do with it? Even though she's leveraged multiple complaints claiming you're stalking her?"

"I'm not stalking her," Bishop snapped.

There.There it was. The chink in his armor.

Addison pressed harder, but with care. "That's not what she says."

"Well, she's mistaken." Bishop straightened his shoulders. "Her brother seems to be putting ideas in her head. Speaking of which, shouldn't we be talking about the fact that I've been assaulted?"

Addison's pulse tripped, but she kept it far from her face. "We've taken your statement, as well as Mr. Dempsey's. My partner and I will be interviewing all of the witnesses to get the full story," she said, nodding at Maxwell.

"You know what? It's not worth it," Bishop said with a shrug. "I don't want to press charges. I trust that I can get a copy of the incident report tomorrow, however? Just to keep for my records, in case he harasses me again." Dear, sweet Lord, this man was a shit masterpiece. "We'll file the report in a timely manner," Addison said.

"Then, I assume I'm free to go?"

As much as she hated it, until they could definitively tie him to the texts, she had to say yes. But before she'd give him the pleasure, she said, "Mr. Bishop, let me make one thing very, very clear. If you sent those texts, I'm going to find out. I'm going to get proof that you're stalking Chloe Ferguson, and then I'm going to arrest you."

"Are you threatening me, now, too, Detective Hale?" Bishop asked. Addison heard Maxwell take a step closer, but she lifted one hand just slightly to let him know she was okay.

"I'm not threatening you at all. I'm simply telling you that I am very, very good at what I do."

He leaned in, the barest hint of a smile playing at the corners of his mouth as he looked up at Chloe's window. "Really? Because from where I sit, it sure doesn't look that way."

"Christ, I wish we could lock that f*****g guy up and melt the keys," Maxwell said as soon as Bishop had walked away, and Addison's resolve turned to titanium.

"Oh, we are going to arrest him. But first thing's first." She took out her cell phone and started to scroll. "We need to get Sinclair to reopen this case. Tonight."

***

"Peas or mixed veggies?"Chloe called from her kitchen.

Ryan groaned and sank further into her couch. "Since when have you been so health conscious?" he asked, reaching for the bag of frozen peas she'd just marched over and pressing them to the cut beneath his eye, which was currently throbbing like a strobe light at a Saturday night rave.

"Since I found out how much butter you put in those noodles," she said. Her smile didn't reach her eyes, though, and it disappeared completely as soon as her gaze drifted to the front door of her apartment, which Ryan had deadbolted and chain-locked behind him as soon as Xander had let him come back up here to trade places with Officer Dade. Eventually, the ambulance and patrol cars had dispersed, the bystanders following not long after. Addison had called Chloe to check in briefly and let her know she was requesting an immediate reopening of Chloe's complaints against Bishop. Ryan had been rip-shit mad that they'd let the bastard go when he'd so clearly been watching Chloe, then all but rubbed it in Ryan's face. But Addison had promised that a protective order was forthcoming now that they had these texts, and Chloe was safe behind a locked door and curtained windows, with a patrol car doing regular drive-bys to make sure she was safe. Ryan had promised to stay here with her tonight, then take her to their parents' house in the morning, which had a doorbell camera and a neighborhood watch that rivaled small armies. He hadn't spoken to Addison since she'd threatened to have him arrested, and while he still stood by doing anything necessary to keep Chloe safe, he had to admit that now, in hindsight, maybe he'd been just a hair too reckless when he'd confronted Bishop.

I took you at your word when you said you trusted me, but I should have known better...

Addison had trusted him, and he'd smashed it to pieces.

Check that. He hadn't just been reckless. He'd been a f*****g idiot.

"Are you okay?" Chloe asked, sitting down beside him on the couch.

"Shouldn't I be asking you that?" he asked back, partly because he meant it and, yeah, partly as a deflection.

"Oh, I'm definitely not okay," she said, wrapping her arms around herself. "But I'm going to be less okay if I dwell on this thing with...yeah." She looked at the window with fear in her eyes, and for the nine thousandth time tonight, Ryan wanted to scream. But Addison was right. He needed to be calm for Chloe. Christ, she'd been right about a lot of things. "I kind of f****d up tonight," he said, lowering the peas to look at her fully. "I shouldn't have gone after Bishop like that. I wanted to keep you safe, and I was—I am- unbelievably angry," he added. "But we had a plan in place, and I didn't follow it."

"You're a firefighter, Ryan. Your knee-jerk reaction is to jump into action to protect people." Chloe tilted her head. "Sometimes, that's great. Other times....well, let's just say that even though your heart is in the right place, your brain needs to be a functioning organ, too." Damn it. Of course, she was right. "I'm so sorry."

Chloe's small laugh surprised him. "Don't apologize to me. Addison is the one who nearly arrested you."

"She told you that?" Ryan asked.

"No, but Officer Dade did."

His WTF must have been plastered all over his face, because Chloe added, "I asked her if you were okay and to tell me what was going on, so she did."

"Her honesty policy is dialed up to the brutal setting," Ryan muttered, but Chloe just shrugged.

"It is, but I was grateful she gave it to me straight. At any rate, the point is, you should probably apologize to Addison."

He thought of the pure anger that had blazed across her face when she'd arrived at the scene tonight, so at odds with the smile she almost always wore, and yeah... "That might be far easier said than done. I'm pretty sure she'll revisit her red-hot desire to drag me to central booking by my ear if I get anywhere near her."

"Ryan, you pissed her off. Yes, it was dumb-"

"If this is supposed to be a pep talk, it isn't working," he said.

Chloe rolled her eyes and sighed. "It was dumb," she repeated. "But you also did it because you want to keep me safe. It's not like Addison doesn't understand that. She wants the same thing."

"That's true," Ryan said. He'd never doubted Addison's desire to keep Chloe safe.

"Anyway, you owe her an apology regardless of whether or not she forgives you. You're a Dempsey. We own our mistakes."

Oh, ow. "Low blow, Ruby Red," he said, tweaking a strand of copper-colored hair that had come loose from the knot on top of her head.

"Happy to deliver, Daredevil. You know I'm not wrong."

Ryan let go of a slow exhale. "You're not wrong," he agreed. He had screwed up, and not a little. He didn't just need to apologize. He needed to make it right. "I'll go talk to Addison first thing in the morning." Chloe smiled. "I'll have bail money ready, just in case."

"Thanks," he said dryly.

Now, all he had to do was come up with an apology good enough for her to not need to use it.