Page 72 of Fool Me Twice

“Hart,” Ash whispered.

Hart blinked into the present and glanced at Ash. He looked tired and in pain. The blood on his face had dried into uncomfortable-looking scabs, and bruises bloomed dark on his skin. There was no hiding the evidence of what had just happened.

“I told you no talking!” Cyrus snapped from across the table before Hart could open his mouth, dark eyes flashing in warning. “I kept you separated for a reason.”

“We’re not going to collaborate stories,” Ash said, throwing his hands up. “We’re not criminals.”

“Are you sure about that?” Cyrus drawled.

Ash scowled and Fix reached across the table to calm him. Tension was high in the room. It was making the air stuffy and breathing harder than it should be.

As much as Hart usually respected the PUMA detective, he couldn’t help but wish him gone.

“Okay, I think that’s everyone.” Taylor interrupted the moment, walking into the meeting room with Black and Wren on her tail.

Her hair was in overnight rollers and she had a pink tracksuit on and fluffy slippers on her feet. She hadn’t been exempt from the list of people Cyrus wanted to talk to. She sat down with her tablet in hand, taking the spot closest to the entrance, her back turned to it. Fix was to her left and Cyrus was the imposing figure on her right.

Black perched himself on top of the desk right next to Cyrus, skipping the need for a chair. He was the one who knew the detective best, so he looked comfortable and natural next to him even though they contrasted so starkly visually.

The look Black shot Hart out of the corner of his eye told him Taylor had briefed him on everything that had happened already. Hart couldn’t hide his grimace, looking away before Black could discover the reasons why.

Cyrus looked around the room, assessing each member of the team in a cutting way before speaking. “We’re missing one.”

“Yeah, Midas isn’t coming,” Taylor said, seemingly the only one unbothered by the turn their night had taken.

“And why not?” Cyrus asked, voice picking up a sharpness they’d never heard from him before in all their time liaising with him. “I said I wanted the entire team present for this.”

“Because it’s Midas,” Taylor said, like that answered the question entirely. Hart wished he’d been born with Midas’s propensity to not give a single…eff word. Hart wanted to be somewhere else too. With someone else. “He did send a message saying he agrees with whatever Wren says.”

Cyrus’s frown only intensified. “This isn’t a friendly work chat he can just skip out on.”

“He was working an entirely different case. He has nothing to do with it,” Fix said reasonably. “Wren and Black too…”

“They’re not going anywhere,” Cyrus said before Fix could even suggest it. “I’ll deal with Midas later.”

Fix sighed through his nose and settled back in his seat, eyes worried. Cyrus cast another bitchy look around the room, then paused. “And where the hell is Wren? He just walked in!”

He stood up hastily before he spotted Wren tucked in the corner of the room, on the floor with a small glass tank, petting something dark green with his forefinger and ignoring everyone.

“Is that a frog?” Cyrus asked.

“Yup,” Black responded for Wren. “It’s new.”

“New?” Cyrus asked, voice deadpan, and Black beamed at him, clearly trying to carve through the butter-thick tension by being as much of his perky self as he possibly could be.

“He just got it a few days ago,” Black said. “Someone totally thought he could curse the frog into being a prince. Fairy-tale style.”

“Wait,” Cyrus said, turning to look at Black. “That’s possibly a man?”

“Nah,” Black said, waving his hand dismissively right into Cyrus’s face. Hart knew it would probably have been funny if he weren’t so on edge and desperate to have this over with. “I kissed it and it didn’t do anything.”

“You kissed a…” Cyrus said, swatting the hand away before rolling his eyes, resigned to everything that made Black…Black. He sat back down in his seat. “What am I saying, of course you did.”

“Slimy,” Black said in conclusion, and out of the corner of his eye Hart spotted Ash gagging where he was sitting next to him. The expression clearly pulled at one of his cuts, and he hissed loudly, cupping his face.

Hart gripped the armrests of his chair, catching Fix’s eyes across the desk as Cyrus was distracted by the shenanigans. They exchanged thoughts without words.

“Okay.” Fix called everyone to attention, blissfully understanding of Hart and his needs. “With all due respect to you, Cyrus, we do have cases to get back to, so why don’t we do this as quickly and as painlessly as possible?”