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This was getting all beyond screwed up now.

It had been spiraling for days.

Since the moment Kimball had changed everything.

Heather was probably never going to forgive him, but Daniel needed her as far from Melvin Stillman and that man's cronies—including Daniel's own father—as he could get her.

Daniel was just trying to figure out how to make that happen. Fast. Like before noon, five hours away. He’d come in early to get a jump start on what was happening. It hadn’t been early enough.

Daniel was running out of time.

His father was there, across the desk from him. Waiting. Smirking like the arrogant prick he was. "So is this woman someone you are willing to risk everything you've built for? I mean, I know what she can do to a man when she looks at him like she does?—”

"You know her." Of course , his father did. Why else would he be there now, at seven a.m., demanding to know what was going on? The man was supposedly retired , after all. But there he was, in Daniel’s office, speaking to Daniel for the first time in over a year.

About Heather . Imagine that. Another man from the TSP curious about Lieutenant Heather Coleson. What was it about that woman?

"Worked with her before. Can't say she has a great attitude—but damn, she is fun to look at. To imagine—" His father held his hands up in a crude way and gestured the sexual act. And groaned.

Daniel held up a hand, disgust filling him immediately. It took everything he had not to ram his fist down the old man’s throat. His father had looked at Heather and had wanted her. It was in the man's eyes now. His father was the ultimate dog where women were concerned. Daniel had always known that. "Lieutenant Coleson is a professional, a colleague that I greatly respect, and is very good at her job. Her personnel jacket more than illustrates that. Anything else you are going to say right now is inappropriate. Don’t do that in my office, about one of my people, ever again.”

"When did you become such a stick, boy?" His father smirked at him like he had so many times before. There was condescension in his eyes. Like always. He felt Daniel was weaker because Daniel wasn’t just like him—he had made that clear so many times before. Daniel forced himself not to react. Not to rise to the bait. “Women like that always get talked about. Thought about. Dreamed about.”

This man had lost any relevance to Daniel's life long ago.

His old man was as dirty as mud. Daniel had always known that. He just hadn't been able to prove it. Yet.

It was a lifelong quest.

"About the time you fathered me. What are you really doing here? Stillman send you? You playing errand boy?" Daniel had chased that stupid bastard Stillman out of Major Crimes late last night after Daniel had dropped Gunnar off at the airport to head up to Wyoming.

Stillman had been there—with questions. About Heather. He had been looking for Heather. Daniel wasn’t a fool.

Heather knew something they didn’t want getting out there. Daniel just had to get it out of her first.

Daniel couldn't stop them from going to Heather directly. Hell, his father even lived in Hughes Heights, twelve blocks from Heather now. His father could walk Melvin Stillman right up to Heather's front door. And Daniel wouldn’t be able to stop that from happening—or protect Heather and Hope at all.

He wouldn't put it past his father to do that either. Not if it helped his good buddy Stillman achieve his goals. Good old boys patted each others’ backs all the damned time. Regardless of who it hurt.

Never mind that Stillman had had an obligation to take Heather's statements seriously back then. That Stillman had also committed crimes by not thoroughly investigating the charges. They all knew that. They just didn’t give a damn because protecting Heather hadn’t mattered at all then.

Then.

Now that it had been revealed that she was connected to both the governor of Texas and one of the richest damned men in the world—oh yeah. Things had changed fast.

Heather was worth her weight in gold now.

His father and Stillman wanted access to that woman. And they would stop at nothing to get to her.

Daniel grabbed his phone and dialed the chief the instant his father left. They were going to talk. It was time to make some choices.

But for now, Heather.

And what had to happen next.