“Well, yeah,” he drawled sarcastically. “Seein’ my ass is in a sling with all this shit with Carlito. Feds up in my shit. Ryker up in my shit. If Carlito found out I’m a rat, no tellin’ what he’d do, just know that shit would be jacked up and it’d hit wherever the fuck he wanted it to hit.” He turned wounded, angry, narrowed eyes to Harleman. “Just like it hit.”

“That was unfortunate,” Harleman muttered uncomfortably.

Garrett felt that in his throat and turned to look at Mike, who had his brows raised and his eyes locked to Harleman. Then Garrett turned his attention to Tanner, who no longer looked amused and was shaking his head at Garrett.

“Yeah. Fuckin’ unfortunate,” Cutler fired back in a way that made Garrett return his attention to him. It was also in a way that Faria moved closer to him and Tanner rolled his chair to the side, alert, in case Cutler lost it.

“At the risk of this guy losin’ his mind, which, from what I’m gettin’ from this shit, he’s got the right, you wanna explain what the fuck is goin’ on?” Mike asked.

“Stay cool, Cutler,” Tanner warned.

Cutler glared at Harleman. Then he turned his head and glared at Tanner.

After that, he stood down, doing that by dropping his head to stare at his feet.

Garrett studied him, thinking if anyone had told him he’d ever feel sorry for that guy, he would have told them they were crazy.

But at that look of sorrow, helplessness, and defeat, he felt sorry for the guy.

“We’re unaware of exactly what Wendy Derian had to talk with Carlos Gutierrez about,” Harleman began to explain. “We have Cutler and another informant inside his operation, some bugs, and eyes on Gutierrez and his men. Even with all that, we were unable to hear what was said. We just know that Ms. Derian spent quite a bit of time hitting various players in Gutierrez’s operation late Tuesday night through early Wednesday morning until she was able to secure a face-to-face with Gutierrez. Their meeting lasted just over fifteen minutes. She left and did it in a hurry.” Harleman’s eyes slid to Cutler as he finished cautiously, “Clearly, whatever she had to say displeased Gutierrez. It’s our belief, at his order, one of Gutierrez’s soldiers followed her and wasted very little time taking care of what had become a problem.”

At the last, Cutler’s head came up, his jaw hard, a muscle jumping in it as he pierced Harleman with his stare.

“You didn’t follow her?” Mike asked Harleman with annoyed disbelief.

“Ms. Derian was not a part of our investigation.” Harleman’s eyes again slid to Cutler briefly before he finished, “Part of the deal. She knew nothing of importance. She stays out of it. She stays uninformed. She lives her life untouched by this mess.”

“That didn’t work.” Mike’s words were now just annoyed.

Harleman gave him an aggravated look, but his stance remained uncomfortable.

They’d fucked up.

Huge.

Everyone knew it. It was time to move on.

“You know what she talked to him about?” Garrett asked Cutler.

Cutler looked to Garrett. “I disappeared. I broke shit off when we were good. She didn’t want that. I didn’t want that. She didn’t know any of this mess was happenin’. She knew I worked for Carlito. She was probably just tryin’ to find me,” Cutler answered.

“And Carlito ordered a hit on her for trying to find you?” Garrett pushed.

“Yeah, man, ’cause I disappeared. Carlito likes to know where his boys are.” He jerked his head Harleman and Faria’s way. “Assholes yanked me. Carlito no doubt got tweaked. Doin’ Wendy coulda been a message or he figured I shared and thought she knew somethin’. She’s sweet, but she can be not so smart. She coulda even made some fucked-up play, thinkin’ she could scare Carlito into tellin’ her where I was. Doesn’t matter though, does it? My woman is dead.”

It did matter. The cop in him had a need to know.

But the man in him looked into Cutler’s eyes and decided not to push further.

He turned to Harleman.

“Do you know which soldier?” Garrett asked.

Harleman shifted, alert to Cutler but eyes on Garrett. “We know which ones were unaccounted for, so we have our suspicions.”

“You gonna share those with us?” Garrett pushed.

“Not at the present time,” Harleman answered, and both Harleman and Faria became more alert as they faced a room with a pained and pissed Cutler and two cops investigating a homicide with uncooperative Feds not handing over crucial information.

“With chatter we’ve been hearing since Ms. Derian’s death, concerns we had that led us to yank him have been confirmed—Mr. Cutler is blown,” Faria told them. “He’s emphasized that he did not share with Ms. Derian he was working with us and we’re apt to believe that because, before Ms. Derian even sought an audience with Gutierrez, Gutierrez hired a man I believe you know named Ryan Danvers to surveil Cutler.”

Jesus, Ryan wasn’t working for Ryker?

Shit.

Ryan had never said he was working for Ryker. Cher had. Ryan had just said he was working for a scary guy who he didn’t want to give up.

And Carlito Gutierrez was a scary guy. Unless you had a solid deal with the Feds or a beef with him and were capable of laughing in the face of death like Ryker, you didn’t give him up.

“Right now, Gutierrez is scrambling,” Faria carried on. “We’re coordinating our men to make arrests before that scrambling takes anyone to Mexico. In the meantime, we need to get Mr. Cutler into protective custody. This is something that’s being arranged as we speak. And when the arrests are made, something we hope will happen this afternoon, we’ll turn over what we know about who may have killed Wendy Derian.”

“As you can see, we’re up to our necks in it. Lots of shit to do and not a lot of time to do it. So this, right here, is a courtesy,” Harleman added, pointing to the floor to indicate the meet. “With that, we’re askin’ you to return it and curtail your investigation until this afternoon.”

“A courtesy,” Mike muttered irritably.

Garrett was irritated too.

However, he, like Mike, was aware that the RICO case took precedence and there was no way in hell their cap would let them push the homicide at this juncture. But it didn’t matter. They wouldn’t do it anyway. Especially not when their suspects would be hand delivered within hours.

So he didn’t focus on that.

He looked to Tanner and asked, “How is any of this funny?”

“None of that is,” Tanner replied.

“So what’s funny?” Garrett asked.

“Bro, serious as shit, you were hung up on that ex-twat of yours and takin’ way too long.”

This came from Ryker, and it was so out of left field considering what was being discussed, Garrett braced.

“Come again?” he asked Ryker, who was looking up at him from his chair, mouth wiped clean but powdered sugar still all down his front.

“It was drivin’ Lissa crazy,” Ryker said in answer, an answer that wasn’t an answer.

“Explain, Ryker,” Garrett clipped.

“Two birds.” He tipped his head to Cutler. “One stone.”

“Come…” Garrett bent slightly toward Ryker. “Again?”

“Right, son, Cher’s so into you, the minute you hit that bar, it was lit up in neon, right there in front of your face for everyone to read,” Ryker declared.

Garrett’s body got tight.

“Everyone but you,” Ryker carried on. “You were so hung up on your ex, completely fuckin’ blind. Finally, that woman tags another guy with her ball and chain, you pull your head outta your ass long enough to tap Cher’s. Problem is, after, you two start fuckin’ shit up. Lissa got worried. So when Cher called me and she heard shit comin’ down the way from someone I got on a string…”

He shrugged, threw out a hand, and said no more.

Garrett clenched his teeth.

Tanner urged helpfully, “Think the man needs more, Ryker.”

“Fuck, gotta spell it out? Okay,” Ryker muttered impatiently.