by Arlene James
She took a deep breath and toyed with a potato chip on the edge of her plate. “Zach, you have to understand that Gerry—”
“Took you in after your father had dumped her for your mother. Yeah, I know, but, honey, you can’t let them walk all over you the way they do! You need—”
She leaned forward and laid a hand on his wrist, cutting off the flow of his words.
“What I don’t need is to hurt anyone,” she said gently.
“You wouldn’t hurt a fry!” he scoffed.
“Just my existence hurts Gerry,” she said. “I feel sorry for her, Zach. Can you understand that? She’s a damaged human being.”
He stared at her a moment longer, then shook his head. “I don’t know how you can be so understanding, when she treats you like some kind of lower life form.”
“We have more in common that you realize,” she told him. “We both loved my father, and Camille is all either of us have now that he’s gone.”
Something very like pity flashed across his face, only to be replaced in a blink by a mask of unconcern. “It won’t always be that way,” he said almost dismissively, attacking his hamburger again.
“You’re right,” she said, hoping that it was so.
He polished off his burger and watched impatiently as she nibbled on hers. Finally, she cut off the part she’d munched on with her fork and offered the rest to him. He gulped it down in two bites, and they were off again, chasing after one lead and another.
About midafternoon, as she was sitting in the idling truck fighting boredom and trying to keep cool while Zach purchased soft drinks in a convenience store, an old British import pulled up into the space next to her. Something about it triggered her interest, and she turned her head just as the driver got out. She nearly fell out of her seat when she recognized Janzen Eibersen. His straight blond hair had grown longer, almost to the tip of his chin, and was worn brushed back from the brow without a part and hanging about his lean face. Reflexively, she ducked down, but he paid her no mind, hurrying toward the store while digging into his hip pocket. His lanky frame bore an oversized tank top, baggy safari shorts and dirty high-top tennis shoes so old and worn that they looked as if they could be pulled apart by hand. A few days’ growth of blond beard shadowed his lower face, individual hairs glistening in the strong sunlight. All in all, he looked about as different from the slavishly well-groomed fashion plate who had escorted her sister about town as it was possible to do so.
Jillian felt her heart pounding. What if some sixth sense alerted him that he was being watched? What if he saw and recognized her? Her heart climbed up into her throat. Only God knew what he would say or do.
Just as he reached the front of the store, the door swung open and Zach came through it carrying two large soft drink cups and a small brown paper bag. He didn’t blink so much as an eyelash in recognition of his quarry as he walked past him. Jillian bit down ruthlessly on the urge to scream out an identification. Janzen breezed into the store without a pause. Jillian reached over and opened the truck door for Zach. Hugging the drinks to his chest, he tossed the paper bag onto the seat.
“Zach, that was—”
“Stay cool, sweetheart. We don’t want him to know we recognized him.”
“But he’s—”
“Take the drink, Jillian. and sit still.”
She took the drink. Zach wedged his between his thighs and reached for the ignition. The old truck rumbled to life, and Zach threw it into Reverse. Contrary to expectations, however, he didn’t act particularly excited. Instead, he calmly backed the truck around and headed it down the street.
“Did Eibersen spot you?” he asked as they drove away.
“I don’t think so.”
“You’re certain?”
“I don’t think he even looked at me.”
“Okay. Maybe this is our lucky day, then.”
“What are we going to do?” Even as she asked it, he put on the turn blinker and slowed the truck.
“We’re going to wait and follow him when he leaves that store lot,” Zach said, pulling over in front of a used-car dealership.
“What if he turns in the other direction?”
“No problem..” He pointed to a small door in her side of the dash. “Look in the glove compartment and hand me those binoculars.”
She opened the compartment and picked the binoculars out of a jumble of maps, flashlights and a heavy truncheon. The binoculars were surprisingly lightweight. A peck on her window made her jerk in that direction. A man with dark, oily hair displayed his gold caps for her.
“Roll down your window,” Zach said. She rolled it down.
“You folks interested in trading this old heap?” the man asked brightly.
Zach took the binoculars out of Tillian’s hands, smiling at the man. “Nope, not today. We’re just trying to read the street numbers on some of these buildings. Hey, you interested in getting your number painted on the curb?”
The man waved a hand in disappointed rejection and walked away. Jillian stared at Zach. What on earth was he up to? He was up to craning his neck around and targeting the binoculars on the slender space between a tree and a metal storage building at the edge of the car lot. “What was that numbers stuff all about?” she asked.
He answered without looking at her. “Explains the binoculars and gets him out of our hair. Nothing sends a salesman in the other direction as fast as somebody else trying to sell him something.”
“Clever,” she muttered.
“Here comes our boy,” he said at the same time, dropping the binoculars on the seat. He put the transmission into gear, but then he calmly dug into the brown bag on the seat between them and extracted a package of peanuts. “Want some?” he asked, tearing open the cellophane. “There’s another package.”
“Peanuts?”
“You didn’t eat much lunch,” he said, glancing over his shoulder. “Peanuts are high protein,” he went on, watching Janzen drive right by them.
“Aren’t we going after him?” Jillian asked, thoroughly puzzled.
Zach popped a handful of peanuts into his mouth. “You bet.” He chewed, letting several more cars drive by. He wiped his hand on his jeans and finally pulled out, saying, “Pick up those binoculars and get a bead on him, will you?”
Exasperated, she snatched up the binoculars and trained them on the traffic ahead. Surprisingly, she had a pretty good vantage point, sitting high in that old truck. It occurred to her that Janzen would never know he was being watched. Clever was an understatement when it came to Zach Keller. She watched while Zach drove and munched.
“He’s turning left at the next light,” she announced. To her surprise, Zach suddenly sped up, weaving in and out of traffic and just making the turn before the signal changed. He immediately backed off again.
“See him?” he asked.
It took a second or two to get reoriented through the binoculars, but then she spotted the British-made car. “Got him”
“Good work. We’ll just hang back so we don’t get made and see where he leads us.”
She grinned at the compliment. Looked like they were making a pretty good team. A thought occurred. “How do you do this when you’re alone?”
“One hand for the wheel, one hand for the binoculars,” he replied complacently. She lowered the binoculars to give him a disapproving look, and he laughed. “Either that or I have to drive a lot closer to the target.”
She turned back to the binoculars. “He’s signaling left again, but he has to turn through traffic this time.”
Zach switched lanes as she spoke, slowing so that he came up two cars behind Janzen. When Janzen turned into the drive-through lane of a dry cleaner, Zach drove on past, changing lanes and pulling into a parking space about a block away on the opposite side of the street.
“Put down the binoculars,” he said.
And she realized that she was holding them at chest height, clearly visible through the window. He shifted slightly, aimi
ng his gaze out her window, and nonchalantly spread his arm along the back of the seat.
“So, ready to take up sleuthing for a living?” he asked conversationally.
She wrinkled her nose. “I think I’d rather grind away at my rocks, thank you.”
He chuckled. “Told you it was boring.”
“Depends on the company,” she said blithely.
His gaze focused on her face. “So it does.” Then he was staring out the window once more. Suddenly he shifted in his seat. “Here we go again.”
She was not surprised when he waited patiently for Janzen to drive past them this time, and she didn’t need to be told when to take up the binoculars.
After almost an hour, they finally trailed Janzen to an old motel that rented units by the week and month. He had parked the car and was unloading the clothing, beer and groceries he had picked up along the way.
“Bingo,” Zach said as they drove past. He pulled over down the street and made some notes in his notebook, then shoved the binoculars back into the glove compartment and pulled out his cell phone. He made two calls, informing whoever was on the other end of Janzen’s whereabouts and ordering twenty-four-hour surveillance. “Don’t worry,” he said into the phone, winking at Jillian. “The client can afford it.” He put away the phone and drove on. “Okay, we’ve run him to the ground. I’ve got an operative on the way now. Next time he steps wrong, we’ll have him dead to rights.”
“What happens then?”
“Your sister presses charges, and our problems are solved.”
Jillian tried to sigh with relief, but two things bothered her suddenly. For one thing, it just seemed too easy. For another, when it was over, she’d have no more excuse to see Zach Keller. She voiced neither concern, however, and instead tried to take comfort in the idea that Janzen Eibersen might finally be on his way out of their lives for good.
She had been a champ. He hadn’t heard a word of complaint all day, and he’d known dam few partners with such amiability. Moreover, she was sweet and gentle and understanding—too understanding, if you asked him, at least when it came to her sister and her sister’s mother. Not that it was any of his business. He ought to keep out of it. He intended to keep out of it, but she provoked a protective instinct in him that he’d never known before, not even with Serena. In truth, if he’d been a little more protective of Serena, she might still be alive. This protectiveness with Jillian troubled him, though. She wasn’t his client, and she wasn’t his girlfriend, even if he had let compulsion override his good sense when he’d kissed her. Yet he couldn’t shake the feeling that he should be concentrating on protecting her. He shook his head, puzzled by his own behavior and emotions. She noticed.
“What’s wrong?”
“Wrong?” He smiled. “Nothing. Why?”
“I don’t know, you seemed troubled.”
He dredged up a believable lie. “I was just thinking about how, after all our hard work, we lucked onto Eibersea in the end.”
She thought about that, her hand languidly ruffling her wispy hair. “It wasn’t all luck,” she said. “We were in the right neighborhood because the trail took us there.”
“True, but sometimes I hang out in the right neighborhood for days before I latch onto someone.”
“Then I guess we were lucky,” she said with a shrug. He smiled and tried not to notice the long, creamy length of her slender legs when she crossed them. She folded her hands in her lap and said, “I thought we made a pretty good team today, though.”
Something leaped inside him, something gleeful and hopeful, something wary and dismayed. He didn’t trust himself to speak. so he merely nodded and tried to concentrate on his driving. A flutter of sensation at the back of his neck prompted him to lift a hand and rub the spot. He’d been on edge all day in some way that he couldn’t quite put his finger on, and it didn’t have a dam thing to do with Eibersen or anyone else but the lady sitting next to him. With that silent admission, the flutter of sensation dropped to his groin. He sat up shraight, irritated with himself. She laid her head against the window and hummed along with the music from the radio. The sound crawled over him inch by antsy inch like a physical touch. Did she know how sexy that husky voice was? He couldn’t believe that she did.
It was with profound relief that he turned down the street where she lived. She sat up straight and nervously fluffed her hair with both hands. He guided the truck to the curb and to a stop. His arm went out, bridging the backs of their seats. “Thanks for your help today.”
She smiled. “Thanks for taking me along.”
His hand reached, of its own volition, to tweak a strand of hair that curved against her cheek. The realization that he wanted to kiss her again hit him with all the weight of a sledgehammer. He took his hand back, very slowly and deliberately, hoping she wouldn’t notice. The way she glanced down at her lap seemed to indicate that she did. She reached for the door handle, and he heard himself saying, “Don’t forget to punch in the deactivation code after you open the door.”
“I won’t.”
“You do remember the code, don’t you?”
Jillian laughed. The sound moved up her throat in slow, husky ripples that threatened to mesmerize him. “I’m hardly likely to forget,” she said, or it was something very like it. His mouth was dry, a condition he’d been fighting all day.
He tried to swallow, made himself smile and said, “Have a good evening.”
“You, too,” she said, letting herself out of the truck and climbing down to the ground. She closed the door, gave him a little wave through the window and moved off up the walk.
His gaze went to her rear end like a magnet to a lodestone. She didn’t walk like fashion models, legs crossing in front of each another, hips swaying exaggeratedly. Instead, she walked like a kid, all but skipping with a kind of elemental innocence that both shocked and drew him. He remembered the way she’d kissed him back, the tensile strength in her slender arms, the thrust of her breasts against his chest, the way her mouth parted beneath his, her tongue curling and tangling. A shiver ran through him. She was no kid. She was a woman, all woman, and his body had recognized her as such even before his muddled mind had. He’d do best to keep his distance from now on.
She opened the door, disappeared for an instant, then returned to wave a farewell. He didn’t even realize he was waiting for that wave until it came. He answered it with one of his own, then pulled the truck away from the curb, his attention resolutely trained out the windshield. Distance. Yes, from now on he’d definitely keep his distance.
He drove home, aware of the heat in a way he hadn’t been before. Why was it that everything seemed to have changed? The radio music suddenly irritated him, so he turned it off. The sun literally radiated through his untinted windshield, magnifying and sizzling. He turned the air conditioner up to its highest setting and tried to plan his evening. A cold plate of arroz con pollo, chicken in rice Mexican-style, that waited in his refrigerator would make a fine dinner. He’d watch the early news, write a brief report on the day’s activities, work out, shower, read a little and turn in early. He was expected to spend the day with his family tomorrow, starting with church. He wondered if Jillian would be attending church somewhere tomorrow morning and immediately turned off the thought.
After parking the truck himself in its usual spot, he went up to the apartment and changed his clothes. Donning knit shorts and athletic shoes, he put the arroz con pollo in the microwave. When it was steaming, he topped it with salsa and sour cream and wolfed it down with corn chips and rolled tortillas. The peppers singed his mouth, but he hardly tasted them somehow. After rinsing and swabbing the plate and fork he’d used, he stacked them in the drainer and moved into the living room to switch on the television and listen to the news. He deliberately turned on Canidle’s station, but she was not a weekend anchor, and he soon lost interest. Apparently nothing noteworthy had happened anywhere that day, because he couldn’t seem to concentrate on the national n
ews, either. Switching off the television set, he went back to the kitchen and sat down at the desk.
He typed out a brief report on his laptop computer, saved it and glanced at his wristwatch. It was appallingly early yet. He toyed with the notion of calling up one of his buddies and suggesting some activity, bowling, maybe, or billiards, but when he tried to think of whom to call, he couldn’t think of anyone with whom he really wanted to spend time. Restlessly, he moved back into the living room and took up position among his workout equipment.
As usual, he lost himself in the physical exertion and mindless repetitions, working himself into a pleasant state of exhaustion. Sweaty and satisfied, he walked into the bedroom, stripped and went into the bathroom to turn on the shower. He let the hot water massage his muscles, shampooed his hair and scrubbed his body. The tiny room was filled with fog by the time he stepped out of the shower and reached for his towel. He felt relaxed and in control. After drying off, he wrapped a fresh towel around his hips and went into the bedroom. Folding back the covers, he swept out the bed with his hand, then sat down on the edge of it and reached for the book on the floor beneath his bedside table. That was when he saw the clock.
It was just past eight, far too early to call it a night. What was Jillian doing? Scrubbing walls? He mentally jerked back from such thoughts and snatched up the book. Reclining, he opened it to the marker and began to read. Hours later, he yawned and bent down to look at the clock on the floor beside the bed. Thirty-five minutes. He’d been reading thirty-five lousy minutes and couldn’t remember a single word of what he’d read. God help him.
Determined to turn off his mind and sleep, he hit the lamp, shoved away the towel and pulled up the covers. Sometime later, he drifted off to sleep. The ringing of his cell phone in the deep dark of night disturbed an embarrassingly erotic dream. Rubbing his face with one hand, he grabbed for the phone with the other. Only when his rough greeting was answered by the familiar voice of a man did Zach fully realize that he had expected to hear Jillian on the other end. It took a moment to put a name to the voice.
