“Perhaps. But no one wants to hear they stink at something they obviously love. And he clearly loved being up there.”
“I’d rather hear the truth than make an ass of myself like he did up there.”
Again, she shared his sentiment. But everyone was different. “Can you stay a little longer or do you need to get home?” They might have spent the majority of the day together already, but she wasn’t ready for him to leave yet.
He gave her the same smile he had upstairs right before he’d sent her over the edge with his lips and tongue. And although they were still both fully clothed, her body ached as if he was touching her. “As long as you want.”
Her mouth suddenly drier than a desert, she opened the car door. “Then I guess you’ll be here the night.”
“Not a problem. I always keep extra clothes in the car for work.”
Good to know it was for work, and not because he regularly spent nights in someone’s bed beside his own.
Connor met her around the front of the SUV, but before he let her get any further, he gave her a taste of what she had to look forward to upstairs.
Opening the front door, she stepped inside and switched on the lights. “Any interest in some wine?” she asked. “There’s nothing more relaxing than a glass of wine and a soak in the hot tub upstairs. Or we can sit out on the deck and drink it.”
“Whatever you want.”
Connor naked in the hot tub sounded like the best idea she’d had in a long time. “Wine and hot tub.” She led him down the hall. “White or….” Her voice trailed off as she glanced around the room. “Someone has been in here,” she whispered.
“How can you tell?” he asked, lowering his voice to match hers.
He hadn’t been in the room today, but even if he had, he wouldn’t have been able to tell. No one except her would. The room looked untouched, and when people broke into a place, they weren’t usually neat about it.
“While I ate breakfast this morning, I checked my email. I left the laptop there instead of bringing it back upstairs.” She pointed toward the kitchen island. “And when I came down earlier for our snack, it was still there.” The only thing on the island now was the salt and pepper she’d used on her eggs.
“Maybe Kassidy brought it up for you.”
“She’s not around. She flew out to a conference in California. She won’t be home for several days.” Becca took a step closer to him, her arm bumping into his.
If someone had been in the town house, was it possible they were still there? Before she could ask him his thoughts, Connor took her hand and dropped his car keys in it. “Get in the car, lock the doors, and call the cops.” He pulled her out of the room and back down the hall to the front door.
She let him lead her there without argument. When he pushed her outside, she spoke up. “Aren’t you coming with me?”
“Go while I see if anyone is still inside.”
“But—”
“Go.”
When her feet seemed incapable of moving, he gave her slight nudge through the doorway. “Connor, please be careful.”
She walked to the SUV. Once inside, she glanced back at the front door in time to see Connor close it.
***
Becca walked the police officers to the door and locked it after they left, although she didn’t know why she bothered. Strangers had already made their way inside and invaded her privacy as well as her underwear drawer.
“It doesn’t make any sense.” She’d repeated the same sentiment numerous times since she got the all clear from Connor and looked around while they waited for the police.
When criminals went through the effort of breaking into a house, didn’t they take anything and everything of value? Or at least as much of it as they could carry out? Whoever had come into her home had left plenty of valuable items behind. The emerald and diamond tennis bracelet she took off last night was still sitting on her bureau, although her favorite diamond earrings and the emerald pendant she’d also left there last night were both gone. And the emerald ring and watch Mom gave her as presents were still on her nightstand. Although she needed to do a more thorough inspection, there were four rings and a pair of earrings missing from the top portion of her jewelry box, but that didn’t explain why anyone would leave behind valuable items in plain sight.
Her walk through Kassidy’s room had revealed the same thing. Her stepsister’s jewelry box was open but, at least as far as Becca could tell anyway, not much was missing from it. Why would anyone desperate enough to break into a home leave behind items like jewelry, which could be easily stuffed in pockets and later brought to a pawnshop for cash?
“You’re positive there’s not more jewelry or maybe some money missing?” Connor asked. He’d stuck to her like glue ever since she walked back inside.
Becca nodded. “It’s a bit of a mess upstairs and in my office, but yeah. Except for my earrings, the pendant, and the four rings, all my jewelry seems to be here. There didn’t seem to be any jewelry missing from Kassidy’s room, and I don’t keep a lot of cash in the house. I don’t think she does either.”
As far as she could tell the only things besides the few pieces of jewelry missing were computer devices and anything associated with them. Heck, even the flash drive she used to keep track of her checkbook was gone from her desk drawer. Why someone would want that was beyond her. They couldn’t do anything with it. The flash drive literally only contained a listing of every bill she paid and each deposit she made. There were no passwords or account numbers stored on it. She hadn’t even bothered to set a password to access it because the information was so useless to anyone but her.
“And you saw the bracelet right there on the bureau and the ring on the nightstand.” Along with all the panties she owned, because whoever broke in had rummaged through her underwear drawer as well as many others and tossed the stuff on the floor. At least she didn’t own granny panties. Talk about embarrassing. “Criminals don’t leave stuff like rings and watches behind, do they?”
“Not unless they got spooked and split before they finished grabbing everything.”
Sounded like a reasonable theory, and one she hadn’t considered. Unfortunately, it didn’t change the fact that she now had to buy all new underwear because the idea of wearing ones some stranger had touched skeeved her out.
“Or they were looking for something specific, not just stuff that would make ’em a quick buck,” he said, again bringing up a possibility she’d not thought of herself.
“Like what?”
Connor led her into the living room and sat, pulling her down next to him. “Do you keep any sensitive info on your computers? Anything someone could use against Senator Lynch? Details about a bill the public hasn’t been told about yet? Info about some secret backroom deals he’s involved in that his opponents might like to learn about?”
She had a laptop she used only for work-related tasks, but she didn’t keep any sensitive information on it. The device with that information never left her office in D.C. “No. Besides, they took more than my work laptop.”
“Yeah, but whoever broke in wouldn’t have stopped to figure out which devices you use for work and which ones are for personal use.”
He had a point. “My work laptop only contains information that’s already public knowledge, as well as the senator’s daily schedule and a few projects I’m working on. But none are a matter of national security or anything. I don’t keep any sensitive material on it. I really can’t see why anyone would be interested in it.”
Leaning forward, he rested his elbows on his knees. “You’d be surprised who might want a United States senator’s schedule.” The lines of concentration deepened along his eyebrows. “What does Kassidy do for work? Is she on the Hill too?”
Well, she knew where her stepsister worked, but not exactly what she did there. “She works for Lafayette Laboratory. Something to do with developing artificial intelligence systems. Honestly, the few times she’s mentioned anyth
ing about the subject my head has started to hurt. Anyway, Kassidy can’t bring anything home from work. And sometimes I envy her for that. Makes doing any work-related tasks at home impossible.”
“It’s possible whoever was in here thinks you or Kassidy do keep sensitive information at home and hoped to get it.”
Until now she’d never minded living alone. But a shiver wracked her body at the thought of being in bed and having someone creeping around downstairs. “Do you think they’ll come back?”
“Doubt it. But you need to change the locks on your doors. What you’ve got might look nice, but they’re crap. I could pick them half-asleep and be inside before you ever realized it.”
His comment did nothing for the shivers coursing through her body.
“I’d feel better about you staying here tonight if you let me go buy new ones and install them for you. When I’m done, I’ll help you clean up the mess the assholes left behind.”
She’d take him up on both offers. “Yes, please. But I’m not sure I’ll sleep here tonight.” New locks or not, she might not stay here for the next couple days. “Actually, I probably won’t stay here until I get some type of security system installed.”
It’d been on her to-do list for a long time and yet she’d never gotten around to it because she’d always felt perfectly safe. Whoever had come in today had destroyed that.
“Do you have a place to go?”
Becca nodded. “I’ll give Ted and his wife a call. They’re like family. I stayed with them when I first moved down here before I closed on this place. They won’t mind if I spend a few days with them.”
“You’re welcome to stay with me instead,” Connor said. “The commute into D.C. won’t be as good as it probably would be from the senator’s house.” He leaned closer to her and touched her cheek. “But I guarantee you, the stay will be much more pleasurable.”
Connor covered her mouth with his lips, preventing her from answering—not that it was a difficult decision to make.
“As long as you don’t mind,” she said when he finally gave her an opportunity to speak again.
“I wouldn’t have offered if I didn’t want you there.”
“Then it looks like you have a new roommate for the next couple days.”
Connor smiled, and desire replaced the unease she’d felt since she discovered someone had been in the house and rummaged through her belongings.
“Do you want to come with me to get the new locks, or stay here and start on the mess you have?” he asked as he stood up.
Like he needed to ask. Even if some creepy stranger hadn’t walked through her house and searched through her underwear drawer earlier, making her not want to be here alone, she’d take every opportunity she could to spend time with Connor. “I’ll come with you.”
Chapter Seven
Dale had purchased the two-story brick colonial in Leesburg, or rather one of the many shell corporations he was involved with had, when he’d still been married. It didn’t matter if he was meeting with a less-than-reputable business associate or his mistress when he’d still been married, the home provided him ample privacy while not requiring a long commute.
Tonight he wasn’t headed out there for any type of meeting.
Regardless of when he’d last been there, Melanie came in every Monday afternoon to clean and accept any packages he had delivered there rather than to his condo. She’d worked for him since he bought the place. He trusted very few people, but he knew she’d never go to the authorities regardless of what was delivered to the house or by whom. He’d made it clear when he hired her that immigration officials would suddenly learn her husband was once again living in the United States if she ever drew attention to who or what showed up at the door.
Her husband was a former client he’d helped beat drug and weapon trafficking charges, although he’d been guilty as hell. The man, who had overstayed his visa by five years, had been deported following his trial. However, mere months after he’d been sent back to his home country, he’d reentered the United States illegally and was once again living with his wife and their two sons. Under no circumstances did his employee want her husband sent away again.
Since Melanie would be here today, he’d instructed Zane to deliver the items retrieved from Becca and Kassidy’s house this morning. The chances of the information he wanted actually being on any of the devices were slim, but worth a shot. Honestly, what he really hoped to find at this point was a lead as to where Kassidy had disappeared to. She and her stepsister lived together. Hopefully, she’d sent Becca an email or text message with her location. Even if she’d only sent a general location, Zane had enough associates across the country to find her. And once Zane got his hands on Kassidy, it’d be easy to get the information Dale wanted from her.
A nondescript cardboard box sat on the kitchen counter. Dale sliced through the packing tape keeping it closed. Inside he found three laptops, numerous thumb drives, a backup hard drive, and two tablets. There was no way to tell which, if any, of the items belonged to Kassidy and which ones belonged to her stepsister. Dale hoped none would be password protected, though. While he had a guy, another former client, who’d be able to crack almost any password either woman might have used, it’d be one more person he needed to get involved. Already he’d involved more than he was comfortable with.
Before he touched a single item, Dale slipped on a pair of latex gloves; even if the chances of anyone finding the devices later were virtually nonexistent, he saw no reason to leave his fingerprints on anything. Then he pulled out the laptops and headed back out. While he often connected to the unsecured Wi-Fi network in his neighborhood, he didn’t want to use it for this. Instead, he’d drive over to the busy shopping center and access the Wi-Fi from one of the fast food restaurants there.
Ten minutes later, Dale was parked in a far corner of the center’s lot. Grabbing one of the laptops off the front seat, Dale opened it and powered the device on. Immediately an icon picture of a sailboat appeared, along with a password box. Despite advice to come up with complex passwords, people still used easy-to-remember ones like their birthday or a pet’s name. He didn’t know if Becca or Kassidy had any pets, but thanks to public records and the internet he knew their birthdays. He typed in Kassidy’s birthdate first and hit Enter. When the laptop rejected it, he tried Becca’s.
A picture of the ocean filled the screen, along with at least a dozen labeled file folders. The one marked Christmas photos suggested this was Becca’s personal laptop and not one she used for work.
Unable to move the cursor with the gloves on, he tore off the latex covering his right index finger and used it to move the cursor over the system preferences icon and connected to the burger joint’s network. If Becca had her cell phone linked to this device, like so many other people, every text message she received would also show up on her computer now that it was connected to Wi-Fi. Dale clicked on the messages icon at the bottom of the screen. As he scanned through the recent text messages she’d received, he made sure not to touch any other part of the computer with his exposed finger. The less he touched, the less he needed to wipe down later.
Becca had a few incoming messages, but Kassidy’s number—or at least neither her normal cell phone number nor the one they’d been using to communicate with recently—wasn’t attached to any of them. He’d expected as much. If Kassidy was hiding or trying to avoid being found by him, she’d used a device he couldn’t trace back to her. Or at least one she thought he couldn’t trace back to her.
It didn’t take him long to read through messages from Becca’s mom and stepmom, as well as ones from her father. None of them were more than a few days old either. Unlike most people, the woman obviously deleted text messages on a regular basis. Dale reached the final few messages.
Someone broke into the house today, a message Becca sent out Saturday night read.
He scrolled to the next message. It didn’t have a name or a phone number attached to it. Instead, it
had a screen ID and came from a messenger app he’d heard of but never used himself. Dale didn’t need a name to know the messages were between Kassidy and Becca. Who else would she be telling about a home invasion?
Are you okay?
Yes, just a little unnerved. I decided to have a security system installed.
Good idea.
They went through your things too. Not sure if they took anything.
I’ll worry about it when I get home. Just so you know, I’m going to use two weeks’ vacation time after the conference out here ends.
Have fun. What do you want me to do with your mail? It’s piling up.
Toss it. I’m not expecting anything important. See you soon.
The messages confirmed Kassidy had been in contact with Becca but didn’t give a clue as to where Kassidy was holed up. He’d check the rest of what the laptops contained and the items in the box at the house, because he had nothing to lose by doing so. If he didn’t turn up something useful, he’d contact Zane again, tell him to take more aggressive actions.
Chapter Eight
Connor pulled open the door to Shooter’s Pub and walked inside. Despite the joint’s run-down appearance, the popular sports’ pub had a steady stream of regular customers every day of the week, many of them military men and women from the nearby base. This evening was no different. He hadn’t even made it to the bar yet, and already several friends had called out greetings to him. Any other evening, he would’ve joined them for a few beers or maybe a game or two of pool.
But not now.
Tonight he was only here to pick up the takeout order he’d called in.
“Hey cutie,” Candy said, stopping him before he reached the bar. As usual, the pretty waitress was wearing a sprayed-on T-shirt with the name of the pub on the front and extra-short shorts. She’d piled her hair on top of her head and applied the perfect amount of makeup to make her dark brown eyes grab you and pull you in. “I haven’t seen you in weeks.” Despite the loaded tray in her hands, she moved in closer to him, her breasts brushing against his arm. “I have one table open. It’s over by the windows. Go grab it, and I’ll be right over.”
Born To Protect Page 7
