Page 6 of Tag (The Golden Team #9)

Aponi

I stared at the rec center through my windshield.

I drove around for a while, looking at the neighborhood. Three blocks…

That’s how far I’d gotten before turning around.

I’d told myself I needed to double-check the files. But the truth was simpler. The thought of Camille draping herself over Tag while I lay awake in my apartment had my stomach in knots.

I couldn’t sit still. Couldn’t sleep. And couldn’t pretend I didn’t care.

So I drove back.

Let myself in with the side key.

Climbed the stairs and spread out the case files like they were armor. Like work could protect me from everything I didn’t want to feel.

I’d been sitting there for less than twenty minutes when I heard the door downstairs creak open…

I sat cross-legged on the floor of the rec center’s upstairs room, surrounded by a mess of printouts, red-marked maps, and files on the missing girls. The walls felt too close, the silence too loud, and my thoughts refused to settle.

The worst part? I was less angry at Camille and more pissed at myself—for letting her get under my skin.

I was a detective, for God’s sake. Trained to read people, trained to fight for the voiceless. But the second I saw her touching him, I’d gone full middle-school meltdown.

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. One of the maps crinkled as I shifted my weight. The pins marking disappearances looked like a bloody constellation across the east side. And we still had no answers.

The door creaked open downstairs.

I didn’t need to look to know it was Tag. His footsteps were heavier when he was tired. And he had every right to be.

He’d escorted Camille home. I told myself that’s all it was. But the jealousy still burned like acid.

He paused in the doorway.

“You came back. Couldn’t you sleep?” he asked.

I didn’t turn around. “No. I wanted to go over the files again. Just in case we missed something. Then I remembered they were here.”

A long silence stretched between us.

Then I felt him sit down beside me, his shoulder brushing mine.

“She’s gone,” he said simply.

“Did she cry on the drive home? Or was that before or after she threw her panties at your head?”

His chuckle surprised me. “She tried to offer sex in exchange for a donation. I told her no.”

I stared down at the printout in my hands, the words blurring slightly.

“She also said she wouldn’t give a penny to ‘that fucking Indian.’”

My spine went stiff. “She said that?”

“She did. After I walked out on her naked ass.”

“Tag…”

“I told her we have real supporters. People who care about what you’re doing here.”

I turned to look at him, my chest tight. “You didn’t have to defend me.”

“Yes, I did.” His voice was low, steady. “And I’ll keep doing it every time someone tries to tear you down.”

I stared at him. At the man who always stood on the edge of something deeper but never quite stepped over.

“You’re not the kind of man I expected,” I said quietly.

“Good,” he murmured. “Because I’m not the kind of man who walks away.”

And just like that… the wall cracked again.

This time, it wasn’t just a crack.