“You reported a break-in?”
“Yes, I did. They broke a window.” She led him around the side of the house and past the back patio—next to a good-sized limb. She had been so focused on the window, she hadn’t seen it.
Alan noticed it, too. “How long has this limb been down?”
“I don’t know. I didn’t see it until now.”
He picked up one end of the branch. “It seems as if it would have hit the roof overhang rather than the window, but I suppose it’s possible, especially if it got hung up on the way down.” While he dragged the limb away from the house, she stepped up to the window. Miniblinds swayed gently behind a fist-size hole, and jagged shards of glass littered the wooden sill, more inside than out.
Alan picked up one of the larger pieces and laid it back on the sill. “Anything missing?”
Embarrassment crept over her. Why didn’t she notice the limb before she called the police? “Uh... I haven’t checked.”
“It’s okay.” He smiled his understanding. “We’ll go in together.”
She unlocked the back door and followed him inside. His broad shoulders filled out the uniform well—she was still trying to get used to the transformation. When she left, he was a scrawny fifteen-year-old that looked like a brisk wind might carry him away. Now he was quite the protector, striking in navy blue, a pistol at his hip. It was amazing what a growth spurt, a set of weights and a stint in the police academy could do.
He walked into each room ahead of her and waited while she searched. Nothing appeared disturbed. In the family room, several shards of glass had found their way through the blinds and onto the back of the couch, but most of it lay on the windowsill. Some of the slats had been left cockeyed, no doubt shuffled by the end of the branch.
She climbed the stairs, and when she walked into the master bedroom, her pulse began to race. The large walk-in closet held everything of value that she owned. She swung open the wooden bifold doors. Her camera bag sat untouched on the shelf, and her laptop stood against the built-in shoe rack. Two rows of necklaces hung on vinyl-covered pegs, cut glass and semiprecious stones glittering under the overhead light. Inside the drawers of her jewelry box, the rings, bracelets and earrings lay just as she had left them. Nothing was missing.
She heaved a sigh of relief and turned toward Alan, who waited patiently in the doorway. “Nothing’s been touched. I guess I’ve only been invaded by a tree branch.” She smiled sheepishly. “Sorry I bothered you.”
“You didn’t bother me.” A teasing grin curved his mouth, reminding her of the mischievous little brother who was forever crashing her, BethAnn and Adrianne’s activities. “You just spared me from another boring afternoon. This is the first excitement I’ve had since old Harry Jones thought his car got stolen last week.” He turned to walk from the room and continued talking over one shoulder. “We ended up finding it at C.J.’s Garage. He forgot he had taken it in for service.”
Melissa laughed. “It’s scary he still lives alone.”
She followed him down the stairs, then stopped suddenly. Smudge didn’t meet her at the door. And he wasn’t in any of his usual spots. “I haven’t seen my cat.”
“He’s probably hiding. I imagine breaking glass would scare a cat half to death.”
Probably so. But loud noises don’t scare deaf cats. A familiar uneasiness settled over her, that ever-present sense of being on edge. It waxed and waned but never disappeared.
Alan studied her for several moments. “Do you need help with the window?”
“Thanks, but you’re on duty. I’ll just nail up a board for tonight and call Handy Andy tomorrow.”
“Are you sure? I don’t mind.”
He didn’t, but his chief would. “I’m sure. You get back to your police duties, and I’ll take care of the window.”
She could handle it. She was used to taking care of herself. She had been alone for five years. But even before then—before she left Harmony Grove and her mom sold the house and left, too—she was alone. For almost as long as she could remember, she had been alone.
And it was starting to get old.
* * *
Marge Tandy followed Chris onto her front porch. She had just conned him into helping her at the arts and crafts show, and he wasn’t even sure how it had happened. Sure, Roger was going to be away on a business trip, but there had to be someone who could help set up her canopy and display her paintings.
But she had begged, and he didn’t have a valid excuse—Derrick and Sam really could man the store without him. One look at those pleading eyes, and he was a goner—the word no fled his vocabulary.
But that was nothing new when Marge was involved. His dealings with the Tandys went back fourteen years, when they bought their first boat from Jamison Marine. He was fifteen, working in his father’s store after school. His dad and Roger became fast friends, and Marge became the mother he never had.
She pulled the door shut behind her and smiled up at him. “I’m sorry about the circumstances that brought you here, but I’m glad you’re back. This is where you belong.”
“Actually, I’m not staying. I’m planning to sell the store.” Either that or shut it down. But hopefully it wouldn’t come to that. Closing the store felt like erasing part of his dad’s memory.
“That’s a shame. You’d be perfect. You’ve got a sharp mind, and you’re good with people. You could really make it a success.”
Maybe he could, but staying in central Florida was out of the question. There were too many memories, too much water under the bridge.
“I guess you know Melissa’s staying at the Tyler place.” She tilted her head toward the end of the street.
“I knew she was back,” he answered, with the eerie sense that she had read his mind. “I just didn’t know where.”
Marge nodded. When everything blew up between him and Melissa, Marge stayed neutral. Most of the other townspeople didn’t. News spread, and his status plummeted overnight from favored fiancé to rotten scumbag.
She flashed him a sympathetic smile. “I thought you should know.”
“Thanks,” he responded, returning her smile. But it really didn’t matter. He wasn’t staying in Florida long enough for it to become a problem.
“And thank you. I’ll see you Saturday.”
So Melissa was staying at the Tyler place. He followed the circle drive and braked to a stop at the road. One quick glance to check for traffic. That was all he would allow himself. But his eyes refused to obey. They traveled to the end of Shadowood, past the place where asphalt disappeared and trees swallowed the Tylers’ gravel drive.
Red-and-blue lights flashed through the greenery. Adrenaline spiked through him, and he forced himself to pause and think. She had help. Whatever had happened, Harmony Grove police would see to her safety.
But were they prepared? Did they even know the dangers she faced?
He hesitated a moment longer, then raced down the street. He was a public servant, sworn to defend and protect. And he couldn’t forget that oath simply because he’d left Memphis.
He ground to a halt behind the cruiser parked in the driveway. Just as he stepped from his truck, Melissa followed a uniformed officer out the front door. The tension contracting his muscles fled so rapidly that a wave of weakness flooded him.
He summoned a professional tone. “Everything all right?”
“Everything’s fine.” It was the officer who answered, a man he now recognized.
“Alan, hi. This is a surprise. When did you get into law enforcement?”
“I just finished the police academy in June.”
“Congratulations. So what happened here?” Nothing against Alan, but three months’ experience wasn’t exactly reassuring.
“Everything’s fine.” Melissa repeated Alan’s words. “I ha
d a broken window, so I called the cops. Better to be safe than sorry.”
“And?”
“It was nothing,” she said. “Just a tree branch.”
He turned to Alan. “Did you take prints around the window?”
“Uh, no, I didn’t.”
Melissa cut in. “It wasn’t necessary. Tree branches don’t leave prints.”
He ignored the annoyance in her voice. “Let me see how the branch landed.”
“Um, it’s not there.” Alan shifted his weight from one foot to the other. “I moved it.”
“Did you take pictures before you moved it?” His words came out sharper than he intended. But she didn’t need her safety further jeopardized by shoddy police work.
“No, I—I didn’t think about it.”
Melissa put both hands on her hips. “It’s okay. We did a nice chalk outline before we moved it.” Sarcasm dripped from her tone. “Look, Chris, this isn’t your jurisdiction. It’s Alan’s. So butt out.”
Alan cleared his throat and once again shifted his weight. “I better get back to the station.”
Chris watched him walk to the patrol car, a pang of guilt stabbing him. He’d been a little hard on the kid. But he needed to learn—a good detective doesn’t discount anything, no matter how insignificant. Of course, if Alan didn’t know Melissa’s history, the situation wouldn’t trigger any alarms, especially in a sleepy town like Harmony Grove. From Alan’s view, the investigation was simple—branch down, window broken, nothing else disturbed. Act of God. Case closed.
And knowing Melissa, Alan had none of her history. She always was stubborn and independent.
She turned flashing blue eyes on him. “That was uncalled for.”
“What?”
“Making Alan feel incompetent.”
“I wasn’t trying to make him feel incompetent. He just wasn’t thorough enough.”
“Under the circumstances, he was plenty thorough enough. A limb blew down. It’s not a murder investigation.”
“Tell me why you left Atlanta.”
Something flashed across her features, so briefly he might have imagined it. Then the mask of indifference snapped back into place. “I already told you. I came here to house sit for the Tylers.”
“Melissa, you’re running from something. Tell me what it is so I can help.”
“Do I look like I’m running?” She crossed her arms in front of her, defiant pose and firmly set jaw daring him to argue.
He expelled a frustrated sigh. Stubborn to a fault. “Are you sure no one went into your house?”
“I’m positive. Alan and I searched every room, and nothing has been touched.”
“What about the broken window? Your house isn’t very secure right now.”
“I’ve got it under control.”
Her tone was growing more and more clipped. But he couldn’t walk away knowing the house wasn’t secure. “Let me board it up for you.”
“I appreciate your concern, but I’m perfectly capable of taking care of myself.”
He studied her for several moments, then turned and strode back to his truck. “I’ve never doubted that for one second.”
She was capable, all right. Capable, independent, intelligent and exasperatingly stubborn. And something told him she was in over her head.
Maybe there was a reason their paths had crossed. Not anything so grand as divine intervention. More like fate. God had a universe to run. He was too busy to get involved in the details. It was up to man to make his destiny.
But first he had to know what he was up against. And that wouldn’t happen until he heard from Ron.
Which had better be soon.
Or one off-duty Memphis detective was going to lose his mind.
THREE
“You seem distracted. What’s up?”
Melissa eyed BethAnn Benson across the large pepperoni-and-mushroom pizza on the table between them. It wouldn’t do any good to deny it. BethAnn knew her too well. All through grade school and middle school, they were inseparable—her, BethAnn and Adrianne—until BethAnn’s father landed a job in Orlando. Then it was just her and Adrianne.
“I got flowers.” It wasn’t Valentine’s Day, her birthday was two months ago and no congratulations were in order. But when she got home that afternoon, a dozen red roses waited on her front porch.
BethAnn’s brows rose. “That’s a bad thing?”
“They were left anonymously.”
BethAnn pursed her lips, concern etched into her features. “Knowing your history, that’s just creepy. Any chance they could be from Eugene?”
“I thought of that. But it doesn’t seem like something he would do. Maybe early on.” Back then, he was just a friendly neighbor who shared her laundry night and occasionally talked her into walking across the street for ice cream. There wasn’t even anything scary about him. Maybe a little quirky, like how he always carried a notebook but would never show her what was inside, and how he entertained her with more tales of adventure than could ever happen in a single lifetime. She didn’t even try to separate fact from fiction. But with his buzz cut, muscled arms and tough-guy tattoo, the war stories probably had some root in reality.
“We moved beyond the possibility of flowers the first time he pinned me against the fitness room wall with his hand around my throat.” A shudder shook her shoulders. Things went from interesting to scary overnight. Laundry, working out, visiting the pool—wherever she went, he was never far behind. Soon he began to threaten any man that looked her way. Once she got the restraining order, those threats were turned on her.
No, if Eugene ever found her, the last thing he would do was bring her flowers. Unless he was demented enough to think he had a chance of wooing her. If so, he wasn’t just scary; he was insane.
“At any rate,” she continued, “I don’t think he could have found me. He doesn’t have my new name. There’s nothing connecting me to the house. And I never told him where I’m from.” Even when he said that as a child he spent a summer with his cousins in Fort Meade, she hadn’t revealed her roots—Fort Meade was too close to Harmony Grove.
“Maybe the flowers are from Chris.” BethAnn’s green eyes sparked with mischief, and her blond curls bobbed with each movement of her head. If there was one word to describe BethAnn, it was enthusiastic, a quality that was especially present when the topic was romance.
Melissa looked at her askance. “Why would Chris send me flowers?”
“I don’t know. To butter you up? To make amends for past wrongs?”
“He thought he was justified, remember?”
BethAnn shrugged. “Have you seen him this week?”
“He was at the house yesterday, throwing his weight around and telling Alan how to do his job.”
BethAnn’s brow creased. “What was Alan doing at your place?”
“I had a broken window. Turns out it was just a tree limb.”
“You sure?” The creases were still there.
“You’re as bad as Chris. I’m positive.” She picked up her fork and pushed a bite-size piece of pizza across her plate. “Anyway, Chris had no business butting in like that.”
“He was worried about you. I think that’s sweet.”
“It’s his police training, nothing more, which is fine with me. Believe me, I’m over him.”
BethAnn’s gaze narrowed. “Then why haven’t you dated?”
“I’ve dated...some.” She pushed the piece of pizza back across her plate, her tone a little defensive.
“Who?”
“Pete, for one, the guy I met at the gym.”
“You were just friends. You told me so yourself. So Pete doesn’t count. Who else?”
Great. BethAnn wanted real dates. Okay, she had a few of those, too, c
omplete with flowers. “Keith.”
“Three dates is too brief to count.”
Then that would eliminate Dan and Richard, too.
“Who have you dated seriously? If it wasn’t for those weekly calls and emails for the past five years, maybe you could fool me.”
“I was too busy to get serious with anyone. The first three years I was putting myself through school. And the last four months I’ve been here.”
“Well, Chris wasn’t any angel,” BethAnn began, “but I blame Adrianne more than him.”
“Maybe so. But when I walked into his apartment that night, he wasn’t exactly putting up a fight. They were wrapped so tightly in each other’s arms, a paper clip wouldn’t fit between them.” She expelled a disgusted sigh. “Here I was, crazy in love, three weeks before my wedding, and there was my fiancé in the arms of my best friend.”
Blackness settled over her soul, followed by an immediate prick of conviction. She had felt quite a few of those lately. And Sunday’s sermon didn’t help, something about leaving your gift at the altar and making things right with the one who wronged you. But how could she forgive someone who completely knocked her world off its axis?
Of course, that was her fault. She should have known better. Her father had taught her well—men are faithful until something better comes along. He walked out, straight into the arms of another woman, her mother fell apart, and suddenly the nine-year-old child became the responsible adult.
She stabbed the bite of pizza that had traveled around her plate for the past several minutes, but couldn’t bring it to her mouth. Playing with her food was more appealing than eating it. And it wasn’t the fault of the pizza. For thirty years, Pappy’s Pizzeria had served the thickest, tastiest pizza south of the Mason-Dixon line. And during that time, nothing had changed—not the cracker decor with its scuffed hardwood floors, not its status as a favorite gathering spot for most of Harmony Grove, and certainly not its sumptuous fare that could compete with any big-city Italian restaurant.
Midnight Shadows (Love Inspired Suspense) Page 3
