Evidence of Attraction

by Lisa Childs

  He was after her.

  If she stepped out, it could appear. She glanced toward the street, to where a Payne Protection SUV partially blocked the driveway. With all the trees in the front yard, there was no way the van could get to them. But that wasn’t why Wendy hesitated before stepping out of the SUV.

  She hated lying to her parents. She didn’t want them or Felicity to think that she and Hart were any more than assignment and bodyguard. If she told them the truth, they would be so scared. She’d convinced the child that the van smashing into them was just a game. But if Felicity had realized what was really going on, she would have been terrified.

  Wendy shivered as she stepped out onto the driveway. It had nothing to do with the cool breeze whipping bright-colored leaves around the yard and across the driveway. It was a different kind of chill that gripped Wendy—the cold chill of dread.

  “You’re cold,” Hart said. “We should get in the house.”

  Wendy shook her head and murmured again, “This is a bad idea.”

  “It’s fine,” he said, as if dismissing her concerns. From the tension in his jaw and his big muscular body, she could tell that he was worried, too.

  He knew.

  No. It wasn’t fine. She was already becoming too attached to his daughter. And if her parents met the little girl...

  It was too late, though.

  The front door to the house opened and her mother limped out onto the small porch. “Who do we have here?”

  Felicity buried her face in Hart’s neck, hiding from Wendy’s mom.

  “It’s okay, sweetheart,” Wendy assured the little girl, rubbing her back. “We’re at my house. This is my mother.”

  Despite her still-healing knee, her mother moved quickly down the front steps to join them on the driveway. “Who is this little princess?” she asked, all her attention focused on the child.

  While she had retired a few years ago, Margaret Thompson still sounded like the kindergarten teacher she had been for so many years. But the little girl continued to ignore her. So Margaret turned to Hart. “I understand you met my husband...”

  Hart’s face flushed bright red. But he couldn’t have been embarrassed at getting caught in Wendy’s bed. It wasn’t as if anything had been happening. He hadn’t even kissed her yet...that night.

  “I’m sorry about that,” Hart murmured. “I didn’t want to disturb anyone.”

  She shook her head. Her hair was thick and curly, like Wendy’s, but the red had changed to white nearly a decade ago when she’d still been in her late fifties. “It’s fine,” she said with a smile. “I’m glad you finally came to your senses and realized how amazing my daughter is.”

  Now heat rushed to Wendy’s face and she groaned. “Mom...” Her mother could not have humiliated her more.

  “I always knew she was amazing,” Hart told her mother, closing one of his brown eyes in a quick wink, as if he’d shared a deep secret with her.

  “And now I know why she’s so amazingly beautiful,” Hart added. “She looks like you.”

  Her mother’s face flushed and she giggled like a girl, like Wendy and Felicity had been giggling in the SUV. Wendy was surprised that her mother, who’d always been able to tell when she was lying, hadn’t realized that Hart was.

  But then, Wendy had had no idea he could be such a charming liar. He was definitely lying, though. He had never noticed her until he had been assigned to protect her.

  Her mother, who was usually not so easily fooled, smiled brightly and clapped her hands together, which drew Felicity’s attention. She lifted her head from Hart’s shoulder and peeked at Wendy’s mom.

  “Hey, there, sweetheart,” Margaret greeted her. “What’s your name?”

  The little girl buried her face in Hart’s neck again.

  “This is my daughter, Felicity,” he said by way of introduction.

  “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you that I was bringing guests home for dinner,” Wendy told her mother.

  Her mother arched a brow, which had gone as white as her hair, over one of her green eyes. “There’s a lot you haven’t told me lately.”

  Wendy felt a twinge of regret. She and her mom had always been so close. But that was why Wendy couldn’t tell her the truth. She would be so worried. And she was still recovering from her recent surgery.

  “I’m sorry, too, Mrs. Thompson,” Hart said. “I hope we’re not imposing.”

  “Not at all,” a male voice chimed in. Her father stood on the porch, holding open the front door. “Mags always makes more food than we can eat.”

  She laughed. “That’s your fault,” she said, “from all the years you brought home football players for me to feed.” She turned back to Hart and his daughter. “I certainly have enough to feed these two.”

  “I don’t know,” Hart said. “Felicity might look little but she can really put the food away.”

  “Put it where, Daddy?” she asked.

  He tickled her tummy. “Here.”

  She giggled and Hart’s face...

  Wendy’s breath caught in her throat as she stared at him. His eyes were so warm, his smile so happy. He loved his daughter so much.

  That look chased her chill away as warmth spread through her. She knew now that her crush on him had been silly and superficial, but it hadn’t been wrong. He was good-looking and sexy, but more important than that, he was a good man and an incredible father.

  Even as that warmth moved through her, Wendy also felt a pang of jealousy that Hart would never look at her like that—with such love. She was only an assignment to him.

  “My tummy feels funny,” Felicity said.

  “It sounds funny, too,” Hart said as he tickled her again.

  She didn’t laugh now. She shook her head. “It feels funny from the roller coaster and the bumper cars.”

  “Did you all go to an amusement park?” Margaret asked. She wound her arm through her daughter’s.

  Wendy didn’t know if she’d done it so that Wendy could help her walk up the steps of the front porch or so that Wendy couldn’t get away from her. Instead of answering the question, though, Wendy suggested, “Let’s find some crackers to settle Felicity’s stomach.”

  Margaret leaned on Wendy as they made it up the steps and through the door her father held for them. Wendy avoided meeting his questioning gaze and continued with her mom down the hall toward the kitchen in the back of the house.

  Her mother remarked, “You always loved amusement parks, especially the bumper cars. Guess that you still do.”

  Wendy had had to admit to crashing her mother’s car. She just hadn’t admitted how it had happened—because she’d had no brakes. If her mother had been driving...

  As they stepped into the kitchen, Wendy wrapped her other arm around her mother and hugged her close. She hated the thought that she could have lost her.

  Mom pulled back and stared up at her, her eyes narrowed. “What’s going on, sweetheart? I know it doesn’t take this long for an apartment to get fumigated.”

  “I told you that this particular strain of cockroaches seems to be resistant to—”

  Her mother shook her head. “You’re a terrible liar, Wendy.”

  “I...I’m not—”

  “Yes, you are lying,” her mother said. “But I think I understand why...”

  Wendy tensed. Her mother was very intuitive, but could she have figured out that they were being threatened? That Luther Mills had threatened them?

  “You’re scared,” her mother said.

  Oh, God, she had figured it out.

  “You’re scared of your feelings for Hart,” her mother continued. “And for that little girl.”

  Wendy released a little breath of relief that her mother hadn’t figured out the truth.

  Margaret Thompson continued. “I saw the way you looked
at them, the father and the daughter. That much emotion—that much love—can be frightening.”

  Wendy shook her head. She didn’t love Hart or his little girl. That was ridiculous. She barely knew them. But then Hart, with Felicity still clasped in his arms, followed her father into the kitchen and Wendy felt it. The overwhelming emotion and the fear...

  * * *

  Woodrow Lynch studied the wall of monitors in the security room at the police department. He’d had the footage brought up for the time frame immediately after Wendy Thompson had been in his office.

  “What am I looking for?” he asked into the cell phone pressed to his ear.

  “Did someone leave either right before or immediately after I left with Wendy?” Hart asked. His voice was pitched low, as if he didn’t want his conversation overheard.

  Woodrow glanced at the monitors. “It’s a busy station,” he replied. “People keep coming and going.”

  “Detectives? Officers? Evidence techs?” Hart asked.

  “Yes. Yes. Yes,” Woodrow replied.

  “We need to investigate them all. See if we can link any of them to Mills.” Despite having resigned from being a detective, Hart Fisher hadn’t completely left the job.

  “Not we,” Woodrow corrected him. “I will do that. You need to keep Wendy safe.”

  “I’m trying,” Hart said, his voice going even lower and deeper with frustration. “But that van, it just kept appearing out of nowhere.”

  Frustration gripped the chief, as well. “And you think it was a cop driving?”

  Woodrow hated that he couldn’t trust his own people. But then, the Payne Protection Agency were more his own people than the RCPD...because they were family. Eventually he’d hoped that his officers and support staff would become family, too. He shook his head in self-disgust. And he’d thought Wendy Thompson was naive.

  “I just think it was no coincidence that it tried to run us down as we were leaving the building,” Hart persisted.

  Woodrow didn’t believe in coincidences, either. “No. But it doesn’t mean a cop was driving the van.”

  “You’re thinking someone could have called the driver,” Hart surmised. “That makes more sense about how they were ready for us the minute we stepped outside. Do you see anyone picking up a phone?”

  Woodrow glanced at the monitors again and sighed. “Just about everyone.”

  A muffled curse emanated from Woodrow’s cell. Hart’s frustration was turning to anger.

  So was his. He was furious that he was no closer to finding the leak in his department than when he’d first learned of Luther Mills’s threats.

  The rookie cop, who had died while trying to kill Rosie Mendez, hadn’t been the only member of the RCPD on Luther’s payroll. The young officer hadn’t been in the department long enough to know the things Luther had learned about the case, like who had collected the evidence. Some of that could have come from the district attorney’s office, so there was obviously a leak there, too.

  Woodrow scanned all the faces on those security monitors. Which of them, which one of his officers who had sworn to protect and serve, was selling out justice for Luther Mills?

  Woodrow was worried that the rookie cop wasn’t going to be the only one who died before Luther’s trial. There would be more losses—on both sides of the law.

  Chapter 9

  “This is like a princess room,” Felicity whispered almost reverently as she lay on her back in Wendy’s twin bed staring at the soft pink walls and frilly curtains.

  “Yes, and finally there is a real princess in this room,” Wendy acknowledged.

  The little girl glanced nervously around as if she expected to see someone else.

  Wendy, sitting on the bed next to her, pressed her fingertip to the tip of Felicity’s cute little nose. “You’re the princess, sweetheart. You’re so pretty.”

  Felicity reached up and ran her finger over the freckles on Wendy’s cheeks. “You’re pretty.”

  Only a child would find her red hair and freckles pretty. Wendy smiled at the little girl’s innate sweetness.

  “Just like my doll,” Felicity said as she tucked the rag doll beneath the covers and under her arm so it was snug against her side.

  Even though dinner had settled the little girl’s tummy, she was exhausted, her long, thick lashes fluttering as she struggled to keep her eyes open. So Wendy had brought her upstairs for a nap while Hart and her father did the dinner dishes. That had always been the rule around the Thompson house: her mother cooked and her father cleaned up. And Hart had magnanimously offered to help.

  Suck-up.

  She couldn’t understand why he was laying it on so thick with her parents. Why was he being so ingratiating?

  Was that just part of his bodyguard boyfriend cover? Or was he actually that perfect?

  She’d always thought so; that was why she’d developed that damn embarrassing crush on him.

  “You’re the doll, sweetie,” Wendy said, and she leaned over and brushed her lips over the little girl’s forehead.

  Felicity’s little rosebud mouth curved into a faint smile. “I’m not a doll, silly...” she murmured as her eyes closed completely.

  Wendy moved to stand from where she sat on the edge of the twin bed, but a little hand gripped hers.

  “Stay with me,” Felicity implored her. “Please, don’t leave me...”

  A twinge of pain constricted Wendy’s heart. Who had left her? Her mother? It was probably why Hart had full custody. Maybe he hadn’t fought for it. Maybe his ex had just given it to him, had just given him his daughter.

  So Hart was all Felicity had. But he kept leaving her to protect Wendy. She hated that she was causing problems with them. She needed another bodyguard, and Hart needed to focus on his child.

  “I’m right here,” Wendy assured her. But for how long? Once she got a new bodyguard, she wouldn’t see Hart. She wouldn’t be in his life or in his daughter’s.

  “Tell me a story,” Felicity pleaded.

  Wendy felt a flash of panic. From all her years of working crime scenes, she didn’t know any stories fit for a little girl’s ears. But she suspected she wouldn’t need to say much before Felicity was fast and deeply asleep.

  She began. “There once was a princess who—”

  Felicity gripped her hand. “No. No princess stories. I don’t want to be a princess,” she said. “I want to be like you...”

  That twinge struck Wendy’s heart again but it wasn’t of pain; it was of something far more dangerous. “Well, this princess was no regular princess,” Wendy assured her. “She was as smart and as strong as she was pretty.”

  Felicity’s lips curved into a smile and she relaxed into the pillow. “That’s you...” she murmured.

  Now Wendy’s eyes stung and she blinked hard. How had this child got to her so quickly? Wendy had never felt any maternal urges to have or even be around kids before. Sure, she oohed and aahed at her friends’ new babies and liked all the pictures on their social media pages. But she never offered to babysit.

  She’d never thought she would be good with kids. But Felicity wasn’t just any kid. She was exceptional.

  “This princess is so tough that she isn’t afraid of anything,” Wendy continued. It was a lie. If this princess was truly her, she was afraid of plenty. Like Luther Mills and his murderous crew.

  And Felicity...and the little girl’s father.

  When Wendy glanced up and saw Hart leaning against the jamb of the open bedroom door, that fear gripped her heart—along with something else.

  Something that she was afraid to name.

  “This princess...” she murmured as her mind went blank.

  “Is fast asleep,” Hart finished for her as he stepped through the doorway and approached the bed. He moved around to the other side of the twin bed and sat on the edge. But
the mattress was so narrow that he was still close to Wendy.

  Too close.

  She would have stood to put more distance between them but Felicity’s little hand still held hers in a grip that was surprisingly strong. She peered down at the little girl’s face, wondering if she was really asleep or just pretending.

  Her thick black lashes lay against her smooth cheeks, though. Every feature was perfect, and so different from Hart’s that she had to look like her mother. She’d already heard that Hart’s ex was a beauty. Now she had no doubt. No wonder everybody had teased her so mercilessly about her crush on him; they’d known how foolish it was. How unrequited it would always be...

  But there was something in his gaze as he stared across his sleeping child at her. Something that had heat rushing through Wendy for a reason other than embarrassment.

  “You are amazing with her,” Hart whispered, and he sounded awed.

  “She’s amazing,” Wendy said. “It’s all her.”

  He smiled with fatherly pride as he gazed down at his daughter. “She is a sweetheart.”

  Wendy wanted to ask what had happened to her mother, why he had full custody, but she wasn’t sure she had the right. She and Hart weren’t really dating. He wasn’t even her friend. He was just her bodyguard.

  “Usually she’s so shy with women,” he murmured, his brow furrowing slightly as he glanced at Wendy. “But she’s taken to you so quickly...”

  And she wondered if he considered it too quickly. He would be smart to worry about Felicity becoming too attached since their relationship was only temporary...until Luther Mills was put away for life. But maybe it should end even before then.

  It wasn’t her business, but she found herself asking anyway. “Why is she shy with women? Isn’t she close to her mother?”

  He uttered a soft snort and shook his head. “It’s hard to be close to someone who’s thousands of miles away. My ex remarried and moved to France several months ago. But even before that, Monica didn’t have time...” He shook his head. “Or interest.”

  Wendy gasped. How could a mother not be interested in her own child? Her heart ached for the little girl. “That’s her loss,” she said, her voice cracking slightly with the emotion overwhelming her. “Felicity is so sweet and special.”