Bodyguards Boxed Set

by Julianne MacLean

  “Which kind am I?”

  He chuckled. “Persistent wench. You’re the second kind.”

  “The second kind? What kind is that?”

  He held her gaze. “I think you know.” Warmth suffused her face; she looked away. Quietly he said, “I’m not planning on doing anything about it, you know.” India felt both disappointed and relieved at this news. “I want you to feel safe with me,” he said.

  “I do.”

  His eyes glinted devilishly. “You wouldn’t if you knew what I was thinking half the time.”

  India arched her eyebrows. “But I do. Funny thing is, I still feel safe with you.” She shrugged and smiled. “Go figure.”

  Chapter Seven

  * * *

  THE PHONE RANG, jarring India out of her sleep. She opened her eyes in the dark and twisted her head around to read the clock. It was 2:49 in the morning. Groping around on the night table, she located the receiver and brought it to her ear. She opened her mouth to say “Hello,” biting back the greeting when she heard a growled “Damn!”

  That was Jamie’s voice; he must have picked up the call downstairs. “When?” he asked.

  “About ten minutes ago,” another voice said. Deep and gravelly, with a pronounced drawl. Sam Garrett.

  India replaced the receiver in its cradle, turned on a beside lamp, and belted her turquoise silk kimono over her nightgown. She finger-combed her hair as she padded downstairs in bare feet, mentally counting the number of days since the Firefly’s fifth note had been received. That had been the day they’d had Chinese food—last Thursday—and it was Wednesday now. Correction: Thursday morning. The arsonist had waited a whole week this time before following through on his malicious promise.

  During that week, patrol cars had guarded the house every day, and Jamie had stayed every night, reading and doing paperwork downstairs while she slept. Their evenings always followed the same pattern: a meal, some conversation, and then another session of experimental touching.

  Progress had been made. Every evening Jamie got a little further—pushed the envelope a little more—before something triggered India’s psychic reflex, shattering the enchantment. It now took only a minute or so before she was relaxed enough to be touched, and she didn’t have to lie down, or even close her eyes. He had touched her arms, face, and throat—even rubbed her feet! To India, this was the most wonderful thing that had ever happened to her. Jamie seemed delighted by her progress, although sometimes she sensed strong desires kept under tight rein, especially when the “spell” broke and she absorbed his thoughts.

  She found him in the brightly lit kitchen, gripping the phone under his chin while he penciled something on a scratch pad. “Yeah, Sam...” When he saw her, his eyes sparked with pleasure, despite the circumstances. Then he noticed her attire. His gaze raked her from head to toe, lingering for a moment on her chest, where the kimono gapped to reveal the lace bodice of her purple nightgown. “What? Yeah, I’ll be there as soon as I’m relieved. Right.”

  He hung up the phone and slumped back against the kitchen counter, looking drained. “You know the Elm Plaza shopping strip on Jefferson and Elm?”

  “Oh, no. The whole thing?”

  “One end of it.” He rubbed a hand over his jaw, dark with stubble. “They’re fighting it now. We’ll see what’s left when the smoke clears.”

  “Do you have to go?”

  He nodded. “ASAP. It’s my case. I’m meeting the state fire inspector there. Sam is sending a patrolman over to relieve me here.”

  “Go ahead, then. Leave now. I’ll be fine.”

  With a tired smile, he shook his head. “No way. Not till my replacement gets here.” He reached out to tuck a lock of hair behind her ear. His fingers brushed her cheek. “Oh—sorry...”

  India waited for the TV to snap on, waited for his thoughts and feelings to bombard her. When they didn’t, her mouth dropped open. Her hand went to her cheek, to the place he had touched. “Jamie...” She gaped at him, incredulous. This wasn’t one of their carefully planned sessions, this was the real thing—an actual, spontaneous human touch, with no unwanted psychic transmissions!

  Jamie grinned. “Yeah?” He tentatively reached out again. This time she held her breath. His fingertips trailed lightly down her face, from forehead to chin. All she felt was the warmth of his touch, nothing else.

  Her eyes stung with impending tears, and she closed them. She felt his hands on her shoulders, through the silk of her robe. Then his arms encircled her, carefully, as if she were extremely breakable. “Is this okay?” he whispered hoarsely.

  She could only nod as the tears overflowed. She reached around him and returned the embrace, astonished beyond measure to be able to do so.

  He cupped the back of her head gingerly with his big hand and urged her to rest it on his chest. His rapid heartbeat thundered in her ear. “I can’t believe it,” she said in a broken voice.

  “Believe it, darlin’.” He threaded his fingers through her hair and rested his chin lightly on top of her head. He felt so large, so warm. She’d forgotten how warm people were, how their heat would seep into you, spreading throughout your body. She had fantasized so many times about what it would feel like to just hold another human being again. Now that it was actually happening, it seemed too good to be true.

  She breathed in his subtle, masculine scent, reveled in the solidity of his broad chest through the thin cotton of his shirt. He held her closer and she molded herself to him, feeling the shape of his body, the hard edges of his gun and belt buckle.

  The doorbell rang. “Easy,” he urged as she stiffened at the interruption. “Just feel. Feel what you feel. Forget everything else.”

  That’s easy for him to say. She struggled, her eyes squeezed shut, to turn off the powerful feelings—his powerful feeling—both of tenderness and longing. Hazy images scrolled through her mind, images of herself as he saw and felt her... her shapely body draped in supple silk, all soft and warm and vulnerable, pressed against him... her breasts crushed to his chest, her hips fitted to his...

  “Feel what you feel,” he gently commanded, without letting go of her.

  The doorbell sounded again, but he ignored it.

  “Turn it around, India. Turn off the TV. Pretend there’s a remote control, and all you have to do is press a button.”

  Through a profound effort of will, she visualized a remote in her hand, and made her thumb depress the little red button.

  The images blinked out. India gasped.

  “Did it work?”

  India nodded.

  “It did?” he asked incredulously.

  India laughed, rubbing at her tears. Jamie pulled a paper towel off the roll above the sink and gently blotted the wetness on her cheeks.

  A rapping on the window startled them both. They turned to see a blond patrolman—India recognized him from the station—looking in on them from the patio. His expression of confusion transformed to sheepishness as he took in the loose embrace, the tears, and India’s state of dishabille.

  Jamie let the young officer in though the back door and introduced him as Len. After a brief battery of instructions to his replacement, he left for Elm Plaza, and India returned to her room. She lay in bed for some time, reliving the joy she’d felt when he took her in his arms and held her. It was as if he’d pushed open the dark, suffocating curtain that had enveloped her for so long. It was nothing short of a miracle.

  * * *

  FOR THE SECOND time that morning, India awoke to the ringing of the phone.

  “Hello?” she muttered sleepily into the receiver.

  She heard the receiver being lifted on the downstairs extension. “Hello,” Len said.

  “Ah, I’ve got you both.” It was Jamie’s voice. “Len, you can call it a night if you’re so inclined. It’s almost seven.”

  “Okay, Lieutenant.”

  A brief pause, then Jamie said, “Hang up the phone, Len.”

  “Oh. Okay. Bye, Lieutenant. Uh
, bye, Dr. Cook.” Click.

  India sat up in bed, “How’d it go, Jamie? Any startling news?”

  “I don’t know if it’s startling or not.” He sounded very tired. “But I arrested Tommy Finn.”

  India envisioned Tommy Finn with his arms around Missy and the baby, and felt an empty sadness. “Oh.”

  A weary sigh. “Yeah, that’s pretty much the way I feel about it. Christ, sometimes I hate this job.”

  “Why’d you arrest him?”

  “I found his wallet in the Elm Plaza parking lot.”

  India mulled that over for a second. “His wallet?”

  “Complete with driver’s license, a photo of Missy, and $17.51,” he said miserably. “How’s that for incriminating evidence?”

  “A little too incriminating, if you ask me,” India said. “I mean, his wallet? What kind of a criminal drops his wallet at the scene of a crime?”

  “A sloppy one.”

  India shook her head, even though he wasn’t there to see. “The Firefly was never sloppy before. Why now? And a wallet, for God’s sake. Just strikes me as bizarre.”

  “Trust me, that’s not the strangest thing I’ve ever seen a perp leave behind. And it’s also not our only physical evidence against him. I found something very interesting in his house when I arrested him.” A pause; another enervated sigh. “But Sam seems to agree with you. He said it strikes him as a tad obvious. He wants you to come down and give the wallet the old psychic read. Would you mind?”

  India replayed the carefully worded request in her mind. It was Sam, not Jamie, who wanted her to come to the station and check out the wallet. Despite Jamie’s obvious affection for her, he was as skeptical of her powers as ever. This rationale he’d concocted to help him deal with it—that her ESP was really her mind’s way of shielding her from repressed abuse—provided the perfect framework of logic for his disbelief. She tried to tell herself that it didn’t matter, that they had enough of a rapport in other ways to make up for this lack of faith.

  Only it did matter. Faith was faith. Either he believed her or he didn’t. And he didn’t. It really didn’t matter why. India had had enough of being doubted. The people she’d been closest to—first her parents, and then her husband—had very nearly destroyed her with their doubt. She had promised herself when she left Perry that she’d never let that happen again. She’d never let herself get close to anyone who didn’t believe in her powers. Yet she now found herself falling for a man who would never, “while there’s a sun in the sky and fish in the sea,” ever accept them. Could she break her promise to herself and have a relationship with someone who refused to accept her for what she was? Should she?

  “India? Will you come?”

  “What? Of course. I’ll be there within the hour.”

  * * *

  INDIA IDENTIFIED HERSELF to the woman officer at the front desk, who promptly escorted her through the station and into a small, darkened room. She’d expected Jamie, but found Sam instead. He greeted her warmly. “I like that sweater, kiddo. Red suits you.”

  “You think so?” She knew so. With her jet hair and pale skin, it was the perfect color for her, but this was the first time she’d worn it in four years.

  Sam nodded toward a window leading into another room.

  The other room was pleasantly furnished and much more brightly lit. Jamie sat in a large, executive style chair at one end of a small conference table, in the middle of which was a stack of magazines and his little tape recorder. He looked very commanding despite his sooty jeans and sweatshirt, and the dark circles under his eyes. She noticed he’d removed his shoulder holster. At the other end of the table, slumped in a smaller chair, sat Tommy Finn, in identical attire, except cleaner. Both men could have made good use of a comb that morning.

  When Jamie spoke, his words were audible in the room occupied by India and Sam through a microphone: “How long were you feeding the cat?”

  India moved closer to the window, which she now realized was a two-way mirror.

  Tommy shrugged, his dark eyes darting around nervously. “Couple of months.”

  Jamie wrote in his blue notebook. “Where’d you find him?”

  “He used to hang around the house. Always sleeping in everybody’s cars.”

  India turned to Sam and whispered, “Doesn’t he have to have his lawyer with him?”

  Sam shook his head and came to stand next to her. “He waived his right to counsel. Says he’s innocent.”

  Jamie looked up from his notebook. “Did you ever take the cat to work with you?”

  “To Lorillard?” Tommy folded his arms over his chest. “I didn’t, like, take him. But half the time, he’d be stowed away in the back seat of my car when I got there.”

  “And you’d bring him inside while you worked.”

  “Sure. Didn’t bother nobody. There was mice in the basement. He got off on trying to catch ‘em.”

  India saw Jamie’s jaw muscles clench, as if he were steeling himself. This must be hellish for him, she realized—playing the no-nonsense interrogator when, despite Tommy’s presumed guilt, he felt something for the kid. “Did he stow away like that when you went to set fire to Little Eddie’s?”

  Tommy sneered and shook his head. “Nice try, man, but you got the wrong guy. I never set fire to no road-house. Or no lumberyard, neither.”

  “Or no strip mall?”

  “Hell, no.”

  “Then how come your wallet ended up in the Elm Plaza parking lot?”

  Tommy grimaced. “Wish I knew, man. It disappeared yesterday, but I thought it was just one of them things.”

  Jamie cocked an eyebrow. “That’s very philosophical of you.”

  Tommy looked as if he weren’t sure whether he’d been insulted or not. “Stuff turns up missing at home sometimes. There’s all these kids around...” He shrugged elaborately.

  Jamie rose, pulled out one of the smaller chairs, and sat close to Tommy, facing him squarely, his elbows resting on his knees. “Why’d you lie when Dr. Cook asked you about the cat at the lumberyard? You said you’d never fed him, never even seen him.”

  Tommy held his hands up. “Look, man, I wasn’t under oath or nothin’. What’s the big deal?”

  “No big deal,” Jamie said smoothly, “except you lied. I was just wondering why, that’s all.”

  Tommy looked away, scrubbing his hands on his legs, and then met Jamie’s direct gaze. “I just didn’t want any trouble, is all. I heard they found Max at—”

  “Max?”

  “The cat. That’s what I called him. I heard they found him at Little Eddie’s after it burned down. Is that true?”

  “Close enough,” Jamie confirmed. He sat back and rested an ankle on the opposite knee. “So you didn’t want to be connected with Max ‘cause it might incriminate you.”

  “Somethin’ like that. I can’t get arrested, man. I can’t be off the streets. That’d screw things up good.”

  “You have been arrested,” Jamie reminded him.

  “Yeah, well, I’m getting myself bailed out. I can’t stay in here. I gotta get out today.”

  “What’s the hurry?”

  “That’s my business.”

  Jamie’s brows drew together. “You on dope, Tommy? You need a fix, is that it?”

  “Hell no! I’m clean!”

  Jamie nodded. “I thought so.” Jamie regarded Tommy in silence for a moment. “Did you know we had your house under surveillance the night of the lumberyard fire?”

  Tommy frowned at Jamie and recrossed his arms over his chest. “How come?”

  “How come is my business,” Jamie said. “Fact is, you never went home that night after your shift ended at Lorillard. Makes me wonder where you were while the lumberyard was being torched. Care to enlighten me?”

  Tommy just stared at Jamie, obviously trying to make his expression as neutral as possible. But his eyes shifted nervously as he struggled to composed a response. Jamie crossed his own arms and sat back, regardin
g Tommy with studied patience. Tommy looked down at the table and rubbed his fingers over an invisible spot on the wood. His face took on a sheen of perspiration. India realized that Jamie was literally sweating him out.

  Grinning, Sam turned to India and whispered, “I love watchin’ Jamie interrogate folks. It’s better than TV.”

  Finally Tommy said, “Man, I don’t know what I’m doing here, answering this crap. A Finn can’t get no justice in Mansfield. This town wishes we’d all drop dead. I know. I know what people think of us.”

  “Is that why you’re burning the town down building by building?” Jamie asked. “To get back at Mansfield for—”

  “No!” Tommy slammed a fist down on the table; the cords in his neck stood out. “I told you! I didn’t do it!”

  Jamie leaned forward until he was nose to nose with Tommy. “Then where were you the night the lumberyard burned up?”

  Tommy pointedly looked away and drummed his fingers on the table. “This is bullshit,” he muttered. “I don’t have to answer this shit.”

  “You do if you want an alibi.”

  “I didn’t do it!” Tommy screamed. India sensed a kind of helpless frustration beneath his rage. My God, he’s telling the truth.

  “Oh, you did it, all right,” Jamie said grimly.

  “No,” India whispered. From the corner of her eye, she saw Sam throw her a curious look.

  “You don’t know what you’re talkin’ about,” Tommy said.

  Jamie lifted the stack of magazines and held them in front of Tommy’s face. “If you’re so innocent, what were these doing under your bed when I arrested you this morning?”

  “I never seen them before, but so what? They’re just magazines.”

  Jamie tossed aside all but the top magazine—an issue of Town & Country—and opened it up to a page marked with a red tape flag, which he held up for Tommy’s inspection. “They’re just magazines in which letters from ads and headlines have been methodically cut out. I compared the missing letters to the latest arson note, and also to a note that was put in Dr. Cook’s mailbox a week ago. They’re re an exact match. Do you have an explanation for that?”