“I don’t know if monetary gain was necessarily the primary motive.” He tapped on the glass, pointing. “That caramel one in back looks great.”
Victoria pulled it out with a pair of tongs. “Then what do you think was the motive?”
Owen leveled his gaze at her, and this time she couldn’t help but meet his eyes. Clear blue, and piercingly intent. “I’m going to ask you again—do you have any enemies?”
A shudder rippled through her, and she bit back the words only you. Her voice trembled slightly. “I didn’t think I did.”
“Well, I believe you do now.”
“Who?”
“That’s what I intend to find out. In the meantime, I think you need to be careful.”
“You think they might strike again?”
Owen nodded solemnly. “Paige is very lucky she wasn’t seen. I’m afraid I may have given her the wrong impression with my questions. I don’t want her to think she needs to try to get a look at this guy if she sees him out the windows again. She made all the right choices, but I’d like you both to take extra precautions in the future. Talk to her about safety. Or if you’d rather, I can talk to her.”
“I’ll talk to her,” Victoria hastily reassured him.
“Good. And call the police if you even suspect something might be off. We’re right across the street. It’s no trouble. I’d rather stop in a hundred times for nothing than…” He let the implied danger go unspoken as he took a step back for a customer approaching, ticket in hand.
Victoria nodded. She understood. They were in danger. She had an enemy—nameless and faceless though the man was—and she didn’t know when or how he would strike next.
THREE
Owen clutched the white paper bag that held his lunch and walked outside into the crisp March air. His breath hung like a white cloud in front of him, as ephemeral as the wall of denial he’d tried to put up since the night before.
Paige was his daughter. Ignoring that fact didn’t change anything. Much as he needed time to digest the new reality, at some point, he knew he needed to act on what he’d learned—but not before Hank knew the whole story.
Staring at the police station across the street, Owen almost wished Hank would step out so he could tell him to talk to Victoria. But Hank was nowhere to be seen, and if he was honest with himself, Owen wasn’t certain what his role was regarding the relationship between Hank and Victoria. Convinced as he was that Hank needed to know the facts, Owen felt a tiny shimmer of doubt. Maybe Victoria had a reason for not telling Hank everything. Maybe there was more to the story than he knew.
But he wasn’t going to stand still and let Paige continue to grow up without him. Owen headed down the street to the Hennessy Law Office. Though the law office made it a practice of offering free cookies every Monday morning, Owen hoped he could catch Burke or his son alone.
When Owen stepped in, the offices looked deserted, save for a picked-over platter of cookies and the last of a pot of coffee on warm. But Owen heard the sound of typing through one of the open doors beyond and called out, “Good morning!”
Cooper trotted out. The fair-haired man, just a few years younger than Owen, greeted him. “Detective.” He nodded a greeting. “What can I do for you this morning?”
“I need some legal counsel.”
“Right this way.” Cooper ushered him back to an office. “My father’s not in right now—”
“That’s all right. I’m sure you can answer my questions.” Owen took a seat in the visitor’s chair. Never having been one to mince words, he let the confession spill out. “I just found out I have a child.”
“Infant?”
“She’s nine.”
“Paige Evans?”
Owen froze.
“I’m sorry, it’s not my place—”
“No, you’re right, Cooper. How did you know?”
“She looks like you. And back in high school, well, that would have been about the right time—”
“I was under the impression that everyone thought Hank Monroe was Paige’s father,” Owen said.
“That’s what I’d always heard.”
“Have people been saying otherwise? Has anyone suggested…” Owen felt a rising sense of panic. What if Cooper wasn’t the only person in town who’d guessed at the truth?
“No, no.” Cooper held out his palms as though to physically squash any rumors. “I’d never heard anything of the sort—hadn’t even thought about it myself until you said she was nine. Paige comes over with her mother most Sunday evenings when they make their cookie deliveries. She mentioned having a birthday a couple of months ago, turning nine. I just put the two together.”
Owen caught his breath, poised to get on with the legal questions he needed to ask, when a feminine voice called from the back of the offices.
“Cooper?”
“That’s my stepmom.” Cooper went to the doorway. “Christina.”
The forty-something woman jangled in, her kitten heels clacking on the floor, glittering baubles dangling from her earlobes, neck and wrists. She held a wriggling one-year-old at arm’s length. “Cooper, can you watch Georgina? I have to do some shopping, and the nanny took the day off.” The woman’s glossy lips pouted slightly.
“Sure.” Cooper smiled at the tot, who lunged for him as she was handed over. “Can she have a cookie? They’re from the Sugar Plum.”
“That’s fine. She had an early lunch.” Christina handed over a patent-leather diaper bag with quick instructions on the little girl’s care. Cooper nodded as though he knew the drill.
Owen watched in fascination, marveling at Georgina’s chubby hands as she explored inside Cooper’s shirt pocket, pulling out a pen and nearly stuffing it in her mouth before Cooper caught it and swept it off to the safety of his desk, leaving Georgina babbling insistently, wanting it back.
So that was what his daughter had looked like at one year old. He’d missed that stage. He’d missed two and three and four…all the years up to nine, and he was missing that, too.
The anger he’d been fighting down began to rise again. Victoria had stolen all those precious years from him, all the chubby-fisted, toddling, baby-talking experiences that were integral to parenthood.
Christina excused herself quickly and Cooper settled Georgina in with a cookie and some playthings he apparently kept in a basket under his desk for just such occasions. “Sorry for the interruption, Owen. Now, your daughter—”
“Yes. Paige.” Owen finally realized exactly what he wanted to ask. “I need to find out how to attain parental rights.”
“Visitation rights?”
Owen did the math in his head. Victoria had gotten the first nine years. Paige would graduate from high school in nine more. He had to take what he could get. “Joint custody.”
Eight o’clock. Victoria watched the hand on the large grandfather clock creep toward an upright position. It was dark outside, and she found herself jumping at every shadow. What if their robber came back? What if he was lurking outside this very moment?
“I’ll get the tables in the back dining room.” Paige swept past her, cleaning cloth in hand, and Victoria felt tempted to stop her.
The back dining room was around the corner, out of sight from the front counter. The last customer had already left, and Victoria was busy closing out the register and totaling the Tuesday receipts. She wouldn’t be able to keep an eye on Paige.
It bothered her. Much as she wanted to trust God to keep her daughter safe, she didn’t want to be foolhardy and invite trouble. Besides, Paige didn’t need to help out so much.
For the past two days Paige had been eager to be extra helpful, but Victoria wasn’t sure why. Had she caught on to how strapped they were for cash? Victoria didn’t want her dau
ghter growing up with those kinds of concerns on her shoulders. That was the way Victoria had been raised—first worried about the expenses of her mother’s illness, then the toll of her father’s drinking. She knew how stressful money concerns could be to a young child who didn’t even understand financial affairs. No, she wanted her daughter to have an innocent childhood.
She hurried to count out the cash so she could check on Paige, keeping her ears pricked up to the distinct patter of her daughter’s feet against the floorboards.
By the time Victoria zippered the cash safely into a brand-new bank bag, the long hand on the clock had moved into an upright position. Finally, they could close. The day had been a grueling one, and all the uncertainties she’d been dealing with of late only made her feel that much more exhausted, and eager to get the doors solidly locked. She headed toward the front door, keys in hand.
“Mom?”
Victoria nearly jumped. “Yes, Paige?”
“He’s back.”
“Who?” Victoria asked, though from the fear in her daughter’s voice, she knew exactly whom Paige was referring to. The shadowy figure—maybe the same guy who punched their safe.
“The bad guy, outside the back dining room—I saw him through the big picture window. I don’t think he knows that I saw him.”
Victoria shoved the bank bag into the waistband of her pants and grabbed the cordless phone from Charlotte’s hostess podium. “Where’s Charlotte?”
“I don’t know. But it wasn’t her. It was a man.”
“Did you see his face?”
“No.” Paige took the phone that Victoria pressed into her hands.
“I’m going to take a peek. You stay right here. Be ready to call 911.” Victoria tried to look casual as she crossed through the front dining room to the large back dining hall. She didn’t want to scare the intruder off, not if they were going to have any chance of catching him. But she also had no intention of calling the police if it was just Charlotte outside—though why Charlotte would be outside on this blustery March evening, Victoria couldn’t imagine.
Straightening the napkin holders on every table, Victoria worked her way toward the big picture window, head down, eyes surreptitiously up. There was a fire exit out the back corner of the room, an emergency-only door that was always locked.
Or at least, it had been locked every time she’d checked it, for so long that she hadn’t checked it in a while.
The skin prickled on the back of her arms.
Was it her imagination, or did she hear something brush against the door?
Her eyes riveted on the antique brass knob. For the first time, she wondered if the inn’s antique appointments she’d once found so charming were really such a good idea. A modern safe would have kept her money from being stolen. Was the antique doorknob going to betray her, too?
The doorknob rotated a fraction of a turn and stopped with a click, then turned back the other way. Another click.
What should she do? Victoria was torn between throwing open the door or running the other way.
“Paige,” she called out in a voice that was meant to sound casual, though she could hear fear screaming through it. “You can place that phone call now.”
Her ears pricked up. She could hear the faint tones of the dialing phone. But closer and somehow louder, scratching at the emergency exit door.
From the entrance, she heard Paige’s trembling voice answering the dispatcher’s questions. “The Sugar Plum Café. The bad guy came back. I saw him outside.”
Victoria could imagine the dispatcher’s side of the conversation, but she prayed the woman would stop asking questions long enough to send an officer over. And preferably not Owen Fitzgerald this time.
Another scraping sound came from the doorknob. Was someone trying to pick the lock? She watched with wide eyes as the knob began to turn. Again a smidgen to the right. A click. And now to the left, but this time, it turned and continued to turn.
Unsure whether to run or stand her ground, Victoria felt frozen by fear. Surely it wouldn’t take long for an officer to arrive. The police station was right across the street. But what if all the officers were out on patrol? What if they arrived too late?
The doorknob continued to turn. Had someone picked the lock? Were they going to make it inside?
She heard the sound of the front door opening. Thank God she hadn’t locked it yet.
“Thanks, he’s here.” Paige’s voice echoed through the front hall. “The back dining room.”
Victoria watched the antique doorknob turn and the door begin to ease inward. She braced herself for the sight of whoever might be on the other side. The reassuring sound of heavy boots strode across the oak floors behind her. An officer.
“Blustery cold, blast it all.” Charlotte Newbright’s voice surprised her a split second before the back emergency-only fire exit door opened all the way, revealing the spiky red hairdo of the hostess.
“Charlotte!” Victoria sagged with relief.
“Charlotte?”
Victoria didn’t have to turn around to recognize the voice of the responding officer. Why did Owen Fitzgerald always work the evening shift?
Charlotte closed the door behind her and stomped her boots on the floor. “What’s all this now?”
“We received a phone call—” Owen began.
“Did you see anyone out there?” Victoria asked with urgency. What if the shadowy figure was still lurking around?
“Someone?” Charlotte shook her bright hair and relocked the door. “Just that stray cat that’s been hanging about. Chased him around the side of the building from the back kitchen door. Didn’t feel like trudging all the way back around after a chase like that.”
Victoria realized Charlotte was panting. The round woman was easily winded, and her story made sense. Sure, Victoria had seen the stray cat plenty of times in recent weeks, but she hadn’t given it any more thought than she had the shadowy figure. “You have a key to this door?”
“I don’t use it much.” Charlotte had worked for the Sugar Plum long before Victoria had bought it. The woman knew all sorts of things about where items were kept, which floorboards creaked and all manner of details about the place that Victoria was still learning.
Paige had entered the room and sidled up against her mother. Victoria put an arm around her daughter. She was glad no one had been hurt, but at the same time, frustrated that they hadn’t come any closer to catching the robber.
“What caused you to think Ms. Newbright was an intruder?” Owen asked.
Victoria spun around to face him. She wanted to remind him that he’d told her to call at the first hint of danger. He’d put them all on high alert.
But Paige spoke first. “I saw someone outside the window. It wasn’t Charlotte. It was a big man—just like the big man who broke the safe.” She crossed her arms over her chest. “I know what I saw.”
“Perhaps when Charlotte chased the cat around the building, the intruder ran off before anyone saw him.” Victoria didn’t come right out and say it, but she was fairly certain the cat would have had a good lead on Charlotte, allowing plenty of time for the man to retreat. She placed a comforting hand around her daughter’s shoulders.
Owen must have realized he’d offended Paige, because he crouched down to her eye level. “Did you get a better look at him this time?”
Paige wrapped her fingers around Victoria’s arm. “He looked like the same guy. I was scared. I came to get my mom. Do you think I should have tried to get a better look?”
“No!” Victoria wanted the robber caught, but not at the risk of endangering her daughter. “You did the right thing by coming to get me, Paige. I’m glad you didn’t get any closer.”
“Your mother’s right.” Owen nodded. “We d
on’t want you to put yourself in danger, Paige. I’m going to take a look around outside. The ground is frozen, so there probably won’t be any footprints, but I’ll see what I can find.”
“Thank you. I’m going to lock all the doors behind you.”
But Owen raised a hand as if to stop her. “I’ll come back in and discuss with you what I find.”
Victoria was tempted to argue with him, to suggest that there was nothing more to discuss, but she had some questions of her own—questions she didn’t want Paige overhearing. Her daughter had been frightened enough. The little girl didn’t need any other worries keeping her up at night.
Owen stomped the hard earth in frustration. The cold weather wasn’t helping his investigation. Not only did the firm ground resist the impression of footprints, but the freezing temperatures had everyone wearing gloves—eliminating the chances that he might find fingerprints on the windowsills. March had certainly come in like a lion. Hopefully it would go out like a lamb. Maybe then he’d get a break—or at least some traceable footprints.
He turned toward the front entrance to the café in disgust. At least he’d get a chance to talk to Victoria.
His discussion with Cooper the day before had been enlightening. While the young man had sympathized with Owen’s desire to make up for the nine years he’d missed, he had warned him that attaining joint custody of Paige wouldn’t be easy, especially considering that he had no relationship with her and hadn’t contributed to her care in the past nine years.
But the fact that Victoria had hidden Paige from him was one item solidly in his favor. From what he’d observed so far, she was a loving mother. But he deserved a chance to be a loving father.
The front foyer of the Sugar Plum was a wide, gracious room, with its quarter-sawn oak woodwork and the glass pastry case nearly emptied of treats by the day’s customers. Owen closed the door behind him and studied the room, as though answers might be hiding anywhere, if only he could open his eyes wide enough to see them.
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