Have Gown, Need Groom

by Rita Herron

  Seth. He’d been a good friend for years. He had treated Mimi like a little sister when they were dating. He’d know what to do. He should have returned from the conference last night. And he was the most levelheaded person she’d ever known. He’d never done a wild, impulsive thing in his life. Unlike gullible her. She only hoped he didn’t despise her too much to help her with Mimi. Quickly punching in his number, she waited, her heart pounding. He answered on the third ring, his voice groggy.

  “Seth, it’s me, Hannah.”

  “Hannah?” He cleared his throat. “What is it?”

  “I…something’s come up. I wondered if you’d meet me at Mimi’s.”

  “What’s wrong?”

  Hannah explained briefly about the investigation, for-going any details about her bedroom rendezvous with Jake. “You know how impetuous Mimi is, Seth. You can never tell what she’ll do when she finds out he’s a crook. And I—I didn’t know who else to call.”

  “She is pretty unpredictable,” Seth agreed.

  “Then you don’t mind? I mean, after what I did to you?” Hannah’s voice broke, tears spilling over.

  “Shh, Hannah, I don’t mind. You know I think of Mimi and Alison as little sisters.” He sounded so sincere. “I’ll meet you there. And Hannah?”

  “Yeah?”

  “After we see Mimi, I’d like for us to sit down and talk. Okay?”

  “Sure.” Hannah’s mind raced ahead to her father. “I’ll see you in about an hour. I want to go by Dad’s car lot first.”

  “All right. Be careful.”

  Hannah hung up and hurriedly dressed, grateful her dependable Volvo had power as she drove like a maniac to rescue her father. She couldn’t bear to see the man who had raised her and loved her unconditionally hauled away in handcuffs by the man she loved.

  No, she quickly amended—by the man she had thought she loved.

  “THEY HAD a first-rate operation going here, didn’t they?” Muldoon said.

  Jake grimaced, glad the warehouse held the evidence they needed. “Yep. Everything from paint to phony license plates right under our noses.”

  “You did a good job, Tippins.” His partner slapped him on the back. “In spite of your injury.”

  Jake glared at his partner’s smirk, his stomach still balled in a knot, Hannah’s face flashing into his mind.

  “I’m sure fingerprints will place DeLito here, and his contact, Buffy Ford.”

  “That has to be an alias,” Jake said, referring to the woman’s name.

  “One of about twenty. The woman changes names and addresses as often as she does hair color. One reason it’s been so hard to nail her. But we have a good lead and I’ve put out an APB on her.”

  Jake watched as the team from the crime lab began to sweep the warehouse, dusting for prints, taking samples, doing all the monotonous details that would help them make the case stick in court. “Did you find out anything on Hartwell?”

  “Not a thing. The locals say he checks out clean.”

  Jake nodded, deciding he’d use the direct approach with Wiley. He was tired as hell of lying.

  The hair on the back of his neck pricked and an uneasy feeling slid into his gut. Jesus, while he was standing here tying things up, Hannah was most likely on her way to Wiley’s. What if Wiley were innocent and DeLito showed up and…

  He took off running to his car.

  “Where are you going?”

  “To Wiley’s.”

  His partner issued an order to the crime lab team, then jogged after him. “I’m right behind you.”

  “HANNAH, HON, what are you doing here so early?” Wiley poured a cup of coffee, his normal cheerful self.

  Hannah’s heart squeezed. Why hadn’t she appreciated her father more? He’d always been there for her. The day she’d ridden her first bike and crashed and skinned her knee. The day the boys at school told her she couldn’t be a doctor and she’d slugged one of them in the mouth. The day her mother had walked out. Even the day she’d canceled her wedding.

  He’d loved her and supported her without question. Tears burned her eyes, shame burned her throat. “Dad, I…”

  “What is it, baby?” The look of affection brimming in his eyes tore at her.

  “I love you, Daddy.”

  He paused, his hand shaking as he set his coffee cup on the white counter. “I love you, too, hon.”

  “I know.” Hannah suddenly swayed forward and collapsed into his arms. He embraced her, pulling her into the safety of his hug as if she were a child.

  He gently stroked her back, the same way he’d done when she was little. “I do love you, honey. Now tell me what’s wrong.”

  She pulled back and gazed up at him, remembering all the times he’d reached out for her and she’d pushed him away. Why had she been so stubborn?

  Because she had been afraid of loving, of being left again. It hurt too much.

  He jerked a bright orange handkerchief from his pocket, dabbing at her tears. “Has your old man done something to embarrass you again?”

  Hannah nearly choked at the understanding she saw dawning in his eyes. “No, Dad, you…you don’t embarrass me.”

  His right eyebrow lifted slightly as he folded his handkerchief and stuffed it back in his pocket.

  Hannah smiled, the bitterness of her mother’s parting words fading as she realized the depth of her father’s wisdom and love. “I’m sorry. I never meant to make you feel that way.”

  “And I never meant to make you or your mother ashamed of me,” he mumbled in a low voice. “I’m just who I am, honey. That’s all I can be.”

  Hannah pressed her hands to her father’s cheeks, looking into his eyes, hoping he could see the sincerity in hers. “I’m not ashamed of you, Dad, not now. Not ever. You’re the best father a girl could ever want.”

  Moisture pooled in his brown eyes, his chin quivering. “Honey, do you know how much I’ve wanted you to hug me? To hear you say that?”

  They both laughed then, soft at first, then a little more relaxed.

  “Now tell me what brought this on. You’re my tough one, so I know something is seriously wrong. Has some guy hurt you?”

  He’d hit closer to home than she’d have guessed. But she wouldn’t divulge her humiliating experience with Jake to anyone. Her feelings weren’t important right now, only her father’s freedom and reputation mattered. “Dad, that man, Jake Tippins, he’s not who he says he is.”

  Her father’s eyebrows drew together. “He’s not? Then who is he?”

  “He’s a policeman,” Hannah said. “He’s been working here undercover, investigating an illegal car theft ring located in the south. He claims that the cars have been sold through your car dealerships.”

  “I see.” Wiley’s voice grew soft, resigned, making Hannah shiver.

  “He says Joey is involved.”

  “And he thinks I am, too?”

  Hannah nodded, the words too painful to say.

  “And what do you think, Hannah?”

  “Oh, Dad.” Hannah’s voice broke. “I told him he was wrong, that you couldn’t, that you would never—”

  “Well, isn’t this a happy little family reunion?”

  Hannah jerked sideways, stunned when Joey walked in, his eyes full of fury, his hand holding a gun.

  JAKE’S HEART was roaring so loudly he could hear the blood pounding in his ears. Snow flurries still fluttered along the highway, painting the trees and ground with a thin layer of white. So beautiful, exactly like Hannah Hartwell had been in that wedding dress the first time he’d seen her. But she might be in trouble.

  He raced into the parking lot and climbed out, scanning the lot to see if Wiley and DeLito were there. Thank God it was too early for Wacky Wiley’s to be open. He spotted Hannah’s Volvo perched in front of the office and his stomach knotted. Jesus, she’d come here to warn her father and might have put herself in danger. Muldoon flew up behind him, easing out of his sedan.

  “You think DeLito’s h
ere?”

  Jake’s eyes raked the lot. “I don’t know. He has his pick of demo cars to drive and never shows up in the same one twice.” He gestured toward the glass-windowed office.

  “I’ll cover you,” Muldoon said.

  Jake nodded and inched inside the building, easing the door closed so as not to alert anyone of his presence. Voices drifted from Wiley’s office. Wiley’s. Hannah’s.

  DeLito’s.

  Damn.

  He moved forward, channeling his weight so he barely made a sound on the plush carpet until he hovered near the door. Leaning against the doorjamb, he peered through the crack. His throat closed. DeLito stood in the center of the room with a gun trained on Hannah and Wiley. Fury swept through him, but he held himself in check, trying to formulate a plan.

  “Look, Joey, the locals are on to you,” Wiley said in a low voice. “Hell, I figured out what you were doing myself and already spoke with the sheriff.”

  “You’re bluffing,” DeLito snarled. “You’ve been too busy making your dumb commercials to know what’s going on.”

  “That’s not true,” Hannah said. “Dad suspected something was amiss. He asked me to check your paperwork because he didn’t trust you.”

  Terror rippled through Jake. What the hell was Hannah doing, trying to get herself killed?

  DeLito’s jaw snapped tight as he pressed the gun to Hannah’s chin. “I think you’d better shut up, Dr. Hartwell.”

  Wiley threw a hand up. “Don’t hurt her,” Wiley said. “She’s right, though. I already alerted the sheriff. He’s on his way to question you.”

  “No!” Joey’s fingers tightened around the gun handle.

  “Look, Joey, leave Hannah out of this. Take me with you,” Wiley said, his voice blustering out. “I’ll be your hostage until you escape. I have clout in the town, people will listen if I tell them to let us through. You can take one of our cars.”

  DeLito yanked Hannah in front of him and pressed the gun to her throat. “I’ll take both of you.” His other hand skimmed down Hannah’s side. “I think I’ve been seeing the wrong sister anyway.”

  A pained expressed crossed Hannah’s face, disgust in her eyes as Joey’s hands slid down to pat her bottom. Jake saw red. His life spinning in front of him, being blown to smithereens. He couldn’t let DeLito hurt the woman he loved.

  Loved?

  Did he really love Hannah? Of course he did.

  But he didn’t have time to contemplate his revelation. He had to act now.

  Slipping away from the crack, he decided to use his advantage—the element of surprise. He gestured to Muldoon that DeLito was inside. Muldoon nodded.

  Jake pushed open the door and aimed his gun at DeLito. “Drop it, man. The game’s over.”

  The three of them all swung toward him, startled. Wiley jerked Hannah behind him and Jake rushed Joey. They scuffled on the floor. Within seconds, Jake had confiscated DeLito’s gun and had the man pinned to the floor and handcuffed. DeLito’s dark-skinned face paled as he snarled back an expletive.

  Jake breathed a sigh of relief when he saw Hannah safely huddled in Wiley’s arms. “Are you okay?”

  She nodded, her eyes huge in her pale face.

  Wiley gave him a half-hearted relieved smile. “Thank you, son.”

  Jake nodded grimly, knowing Wiley wouldn’t thank him when he’d heard the whole story. Especially when he realized he’d slept with his daughter.

  Chapter Twenty

  The next hour flashed by in a buzz of activity. Hannah felt dizzy from watching. The local sheriff arrived along with Jake’s partner and his superior to take statements from her and her father. Reporters and the local news team had arrived on the scene, snapping pictures and dragging out camera equipment, trying to interview everyone in sight. Jake had staunchly ordered them in the background, then advised her dad to wait for his attorney before answering the police’s questions.

  Her father had agreed, although he insisted he had nothing to hide. The local sheriff vouched for Wiley, informing them that Wiley had come to him with suspicions. Jake already had a search warrant for DeLito’s home and had discovered a connection between him and an ex-con who’d been swiping the cars in south Georgia and shipping them to the warehouse to be repainted.

  Hannah sipped a cup of coffee. She’d seen a different side of Jake, a calm, cool, in-control detective who issued orders he expected others to follow. A man who stood alone and liked it that way, a man who would walk away and never look back. Just like her mother.

  In her heart, she knew her dad would be cleared.

  But would her heart ever be free of Jake?

  All she knew was that it was breaking right now. And with every passing impersonal look from Jake, the tender area cracked a little bit more. Even if Jake really loved her, could she live with a cop when she wanted a safe orderly life? Life with Jake would never be safe….

  “If you’re through questioning my daughter, I’d like to take her home,” Wiley said in a curt voice.

  “All right. We may have more questions later, so just make yourself available, Dr. Hartwell,” the sheriff said.

  Hannah nodded.

  Reporters jutted forward, but Wiley pushed them aside. “My daughter is not speaking to the press. I’ll issue a statement shortly.”

  “After we’ve finished,” Jake said, glaring at the story-hungry journalists.

  Hannah and her father turned to leave, but Jake stepped in front of Hannah, blocking her way. “Hannah…I—I’m sorry.”

  Hannah remembered his hands and lips on her body, then the cold reality of learning he had cozied up to her for information. A shudder shook her to the core and her knees went weak again, but she refused to give in to the devastation. She still had to see Mimi.

  So she forced her chin up a notch. “I don’t want to hear any more of your lies.”

  Jake flinched as she tossed his own words back at him, but Hannah ignored his reaction as her father cleared the way through the throng of cameras and stalked from the room.

  Outside, she saw Jake haul a cursing Joey to the police car. She paused, her dad’s hand cupping her arm, as she watched the police car take off in a whir of lights and sirens. Jake climbed in his Jeep, his gaze locking with hers before he closed the door. His expression was unreadable, guarded, cold, as if he’d already distanced himself from her. Maybe he’d never cared at all.

  “I’ll drive you home,” her father murmured.

  Hannah shook her head and turned to her father, shutting the painful images from her mind. “No, I’m fine, Dad. But I want to stop and see Mimi. I’d rather her hear about this from me than see it on the news. That is, if she hasn’t already seen it.”

  He nodded. “I’d like to go—”

  Hannah pressed her hand along his jaw. “There’ll be time for that later, Dad. You have to stay here and gather all your records to show the police. Prove to them you’re the good guy your daughters know you to be.”

  He nodded, his heart in his eyes. Hannah felt tears pressing against her eyelids again and blinked them away. She might have been awed by Jake’s heroics when he’d burst into the room and saved their lives, but her father had tried to protect her also, had offered to become the hostage so she would be free. Then again, he’d been taking care of her his whole life, only she’d been too emotionally crippled from her mother’s desertion to realize it. It wasn’t her fault or her father’s that her mother had left—her mother simply hadn’t loved them enough to stay. But Wiley had; he’d been the stable one in her life.

  He was a real hero. And from now on, she intended to show him her gratitude and love.

  JAKE DROVE TOWARD the police station, an ache soul-deep pressing in his belly and spreading through his whole body. Hannah hated him.

  He didn’t blame her, but his heart was splitting wide open—because he loved her. He hadn’t realized how much until he’d seen Joey DeLito’s hands all over her, until the slime had shoved that gun to her throat.


  He followed along behind the police car, trying to forget the hurt he’d seen in her eyes. The betrayal. For the first time in his life, he’d let someone sneak under his skin, into his heart, and he couldn’t pry her out. Now he knew the reason he’d never let himself become involved with anyone before.

  Because it was too damn painful. And his job, the very reason that had brought them together in the first place, the only thing he’d ever been committed to in his life, had just torn them apart. And so had his lies.

  HANNAH KNOCKED on Mimi’s door, her hands trembling. To her surprise, Seth greeted her and walked her to the living room where Mimi sat on the sofa wearing a hot pink silk robe, her knees hugged to her chest, nursing a drink, something that looked like orange juice. The TV droned softly in the background, a weather report about an impending ice storm. But in her heart, the storm had already hit. And she had ice running in her veins.

  Seth crossed the room and sat down beside Mimi, gently patting her knee. Hannah was stunned to see Mimi clasp Seth’s hand and give it a squeeze. Seth really was a wonderful guy.

  She had to thank him.

  Before she had the chance, Seth approached her. “Are you all right?”

  “Yes, Seth. Thanks for being here.”

  “No problem. You know your family means a lot to me.” He reached out and gave her a hug. “And so does your friendship, Hannah.”

  Hannah’s eyes filled with tears. “You’re so great, Seth. I’m so sorry if I hurt you.”

  “Shh.” He pulled her into his arms and hugged her. “You just take care of yourself, okay?”

  When he pulled away, Hannah nodded. He kissed her cheek, said good-night and let himself out. Hannah went to talk to her sisters.

  Alison sat cross-legged on the floor in jeans and an FSU sweatshirt, her expression a mixture of bewilderment and shock. “I got your message and came on over.”

  Mimi looked up at Hannah through watery eyes. “Have a mimosa with me, sis?”