Page 34 of Lovesick Titan

But Dom scowled harder and shrugged. “Yeah, whatever. You wanna cause a little mayhem, pal, I’m with ya.”

“Dom,” Lucy chastised her, but she’d already moved around the table to look over Mal’s shoulder.

“Your services are no longer required, sis,” Mal said as he returned to making his plans. The night guard took a break at 10PM, which would give Mal and Dom the perfect window to get in, get across the floorplan to the paintings, and bust out of the south wall to create some chaos before they took their leave.

“Mickey…don’t do this,” Lucy said plaintively, disrupting his focus again and making him clench his fists to keep from snapping at her. He couldn’t give in; he couldn’t look up and see the pleading in her eyes. “Did he really do something so awful to earn this? Or are you reading too much into things like you always do, assuming he doesn’t care when he obviously—”

“You don’t knowanythingabout this,” Mal snarled, looking up but only at the edge of the table, not at her,not at her. “He doesn’t care. And neither do I. Caring isn’t part of the equation, Luce. This is just a heist.”

The short huff of air that left her was disbelieving and so verysad. “I don’t know anything about this, you’re right. But if you won’t tell me, then I’m gonna find out.” Her voice dropped lower, softer. “You’ve been so happy, Mickey…”

A chill ran through Mal, but he was used to that feeling. He’d perfected that feeling. In instilling it in others. In how to weather it himself. He didn’t shiver. Didn’t give any outward sign that he felt anything at all. He channeled his anger and let it burn inside of him to war against any encroaching chill. He was cold. And he was hard. And he would not be moved by Danny Grant; he was going toruinDanny and pull himself back up from how he’d fallen, stronger than ever.

“You want me to be happy?” he said, looking at her finally but keeping his expression stern. “Then help me pull this off in twenty-four hours.”

Lucy tore her eyes from him like he was the biggest idiot in the world. Maybe he was—hedefinitelywas. But he was still going through with his plan. It was the only thing keeping him from icing the entire safe house and losing his god damn mind.

Turning back to the blueprints, he told himself he’d make it up to Lucy later when she stormed off and slammed the safe house door behind her.

“Okay, Dom. Here’s how it’s gonna go down.”

R

Danny didn’t feel the surge of panic he expected. As he stared at the photograph of him and Mal kissing and heard Captain Shan’s words ring in his ears, all he felt was cold. All he felt wasnumb.

“Grant? Do you have anything to say to this?” Shan asked.

“No, sir.”

“No?” Reaching forward to tap the picture pointedly, Shan glowered at him. “I’m looking at evidence that you know the whereabouts of a known fugitive.”

“He hasn’t been convicted of anything yet.”

“He’s still a fugitive! You could be connected to aiding and abetting any of the crimes he’s committed since—”

“There’s no evidence he’s committed any crimes since his escape.”

“Are you—?” Shan stopped as if he was about to erupt at Danny, but he didn’t pause to calm himself down. He stood and leaned over the desk menacingly. “Are you admitting to falsifying records?”

“No, sir.” Danny returned his stare unflinchingly.

“Well, it’s not looking good for you, Grant. You have no idea how much I wanted this to be a fake, but that’s not the case, is it?” His fierce expression held a shadow of disappointment again. “There’s going to be a full investigation. You’re looking at jail time, do you realize that? Which you might,mightescape if you give up where this picture was taken and tell us where he is, but it won’t save your job.”

A few weeks ago, a small vindictive part of Danny might have told Shan what he was asking for, but he felt no urge to do that now. Besides, he knew where that would lead. If he gave up Mal’s address, he’d just reveal Danny’s identity as Zeus. He was trapped. And Mal knew he’d be trapped.

“Still nothing to say?” Shan asked.

“No, sir.”

“What were you thinking, Grant?” He collapsed back into his chair. “There’s already Internal Affairs in your office, looking through everything. Right now, no one other than me and a handful of IA know, but something like this isn’t going to be easy to keep quiet. Just tell me…if he has something on you, if he’s extorting—”

“No. It wasn’t like that.” Mal holding over him that he knew his identity had nothing to do with them sleeping together, with them coming to care about each other. Danny deserved this. He couldn’t even be angry at Mal for the low blow of sending in the photograph, because he’d brought this down on himself.

For a rare, brief moment, Shan lost his anger and disapproval completely and just looked defeated. “Give me something to help you,Grant. You’re one of the best we got. I refuse to believe you’d throw that all away just to help some thief get away with his crimes. Even if you never altered evidence, if he’s just a bad call you slept with some Friday night…give me something I can work with.”

Danny had never doubted Shan was a good man, a good officer who honestly cared about this city and its people. Now, he was trying to offer Danny a lifeline he hadn’t earned. “I’m sorry, sir. I don’t have anything to say.”

The anger and hardness returned to Shan’s expression. He snatched up the photograph and closed it inside the folder. “Get out of here. You can collect personal items from your office, but the officers in there are going to check everything you try to walk out of here with. And they’re going to have questions for you, so don’t even think about leaving town.”

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