Abrute pushed out of his chair, but kept his cuffed hands flat on the table and glared up at Owen. “I did not have any part in that. All I did—”
“All you did,” Owen cut him off, slamming his hands on the metal table. Abrute flinched and cast his eyes downward. “Was stand by and do nothing about it when you knew Cash O’Shay was imprisoned at the Castle illegally. When you knew Senator Schaeffer was using O’Shay to develop a military-grade protective device. A device you suspected would be sold independently through his own company, not offered to the U.S. military through the Department of Defense, which funded the project—whether knowingly or unknowingly.
“Crime, Mr. Abrute, is not only a matter of committing an act. Crime can also be manifested by the failure to act. Such as your failure to report Cash O’Shay’s wrongful imprisonment and Schaeffer’s fraudulent actions. And in the case of conspiracy, a coconspirator such as yourself need not know the full scope of crimes they’ve been involved in to be found guilty of that crime in its entirety and punished accordingly.” He grinned at the man. “Ain’t America great?”
“But that’s not . . . I mean O’Shay wasn’t . . . You’re twisting everything around—”
“Looks like you’ll be telling that to a jury.” Owen gave the man a moment to consider the ramifications.
Abrute’s gaze drifted toward the table again. His fingers curled into his palms, leaving his hands in fists against the gray metal.
“Well.” Owen’s voice was cool, but inside he boiled. He wanted to choke Abrute with those damned cuffs. “Since the deal I’ve offered you doesn’t seem to sway you either way, I’ll be rescinding—”
Abrute’s head popped up, his black eyes wide, mouth open in shock. “What? What do you mean?” He straightened. “I’ve been working night and day on that damn formula. You can’t—”
“I can do anything I want, Abrute.” Owen straightened slowly, put his hands on his hips, and stretched to his full height, a solid five inches taller than the other man. “The way you did anything you wanted while O’Shay worked night and day on that formula for you. The way you let Schaeffer run rampant. Not much fun to be on the other side of the razor wire, is it?”
“O’Shay wasn’t working on that formula for me! He was working on it for Schaeffer!”
The echo of Abrute’s yell was still bouncing off the cement walls of the cell when the realization of what he’d just said reflected as terror in his gaze. A thrill of accomplishment traveled through Owen’s gut in the sudden, cold silence that followed.
That statement was the first solid confession Abrute had made directly implicating Schaeffer in both the imprisonment of O’Shay and his work on a private project utilizing DoD facilities and resources. And he had it on record with both the voice recorder in his briefcase and the facility’s video.
Foster would probably tell him it was inadmissible because of how Owen had obtained it, but Abrute didn’t know that. And Owen would definitely use it to manipulate the man to the stand. A few more weeks in here and Abrute would probably drop to Owen’s feet when he entered, begging him to tell every last secret he held on Schaeffer, which was all he really needed. But Owen didn’t have weeks. And Abrute might not either. Prisoners like Abrute with men like Schaeffer gunning for them had a way of ending up dead even in solitary confinement.
“You have the ability to help yourself, Abrute. All you have to do is exercise it.”
The other man pushed off the table and lifted his hands to gesture, forgetting the cuffs. They clinked loud, jerking at his hands. Rage and fear mixed and blasted across Abrute’s face. “I told you before, if I say anything against that man, I will be dead within twenty-four hours of leaving this place.”
Owen lifted his brows and shrugged. “Your other option is to plead out or go to trial. You’d be sentenced to prison and moved into the general population—”
“You can’t do that.” Abrute’s gaze grew frantic. “Schaeffer would get someone in here to kill me just as fast.”
Sweat trickled down Abrute’s temple and Owen decided this was the perfect time to leave the man with a parting thought.
“I’ll help you out here, Mr. Abrute. We’re in a time crunch, so I’m going to put an expiration date on that deal I offered you a few weeks ago. It goes away in exactly forty-eight hours.”
“B-b-but—”
Owen turned and pounded on the door. It immediately swung open, handled by a beefy middle-aged male officer. “Work fast,” Owen said on his way out. “Or pray, Mr. Abrute. Pray hard.”
Mitch followed Halina up the steps of the jet, carefully keeping his gaze down, averted from her ass. Harder to do than it sounded when he’d awoken with a steel erection pressed into that softness. And his entire body pressed to the back of Halina’s. His face tucked into her hair. His arm draped over her waist. His fingers entwined with hers.
The way they used to sleep together.
He was such an idiot.
In his own defense, he didn’t remember shifting into that position after sleep had grabbed him and dragged him under. Maybe she’d done it. Though, if she had, she was regretting it as much as she was regretting having sex with him, because she hadn’t yet looked him in the eye this morning.
Halina stopped short just inside the plane and Mitch almost ran into her. He put a hand to the wall to halt his forward movement, doing his damnedest not to touch her.
At her side, Dex glanced up, his metal tags clicking.
“New fear of flying?” he asked, not bothering to hide his irritation. Without waiting for an answer, he said, “Pick a seat.”
She glanced through the cabin with all the empty, wide, luxury leather chairs. “Aren’t we assigned seats?”
“Nope. It’s all ours.”
“This is awfully big for two people.”
“I think Dex qualifies as a third considering he weighs as much as you do. And it’s the only size they had available on such short notice.” Mitch stepped past her and walked down the aisle. Pausing in the center of the plane, he turned, held his arms out, indicating the seats around him.
Her gaze made a quick, hot slide down his body before she surveyed the plane again. Mitch gritted his teeth against the desire climbing inside him.
When she shrugged, Mitch dropped into the nearest captain’s chair and called Dex. The dog didn’t even look at Halina before he abandoned her to perch beside Mitch’s chair. He let a vengeful smile lift his mouth as he scratched Dex’s ears with one hand and pulled a laptop from a nearby compartment with the other. While the hourglass spun on the computer screen, Mitch scrolled through messages on his phone.
A text from Seth Masters, the only team member who remained a firefighter, said: Call me when you can.
Halina approached, assessing the seating arrangement—two chairs on either side of a small table. Before she decided to get as far away from him as possible—even though the idea had merit—Mitch grabbed her hand and swiveled toward the aisle.
When Halina halted in front of him without pulling her hand from his, he looked up. Her hair was a mess, finger combed into an untidy bun. The lump on her forehead at her hairline, developing a horrible green rim around the purple center, could never be completely hidden. She didn’t have a shadow of makeup on her face.
And she was so beautiful she made his chest ache.
There was something so sexy about a woman who didn’t mind being messy. Who cared less about how she looked and more about how she felt. About life, fun, pleasure. Halina had introduced him to that kind of woman, which was why he didn’t date them now. And after watching her in sexual abandon the night before, he had an overwhelming urge to lift her by the waist, part her legs with his knees, and pull her over his lap. To press against her and make sure she realized just how hot she made him.