P.S. I Spook You

by S. E. Harmon

  Silence. Yup. Sounds about right. I tossed the mug in the sink. “Ethan!” When I turned, I bumped into something solid. Hands held my shoulders and balanced me. I looked up into Danny’s impassive face.

  When I would have moved he stilled me effortlessly with those big hands. Struggling would only make me seem guiltier, so I hung in his grip. Sometimes it was easy to forget how much bigger than me he was. I tried for a smile. “Sorry. Didn’t see you there.”

  “Obviously.” He finally released me in no particular hurry. “You about ready?”

  “Sure. Just let me get my stuff.”

  I ignored Danny’s stare and packed my MacBook and a few other files into my attaché case. The kitchen was quiet as I gathered my things. Really quiet. Too fucking quiet. When I ran the zipper up the track, I could actually hear the teeth coming together.

  Finally I couldn’t take it anymore. “What?”

  “I just want to make sure you’re okay enough to do this.”

  “Questioning people about a missing girl? I think I can handle that.”

  “Just want to make sure you’re all right.”

  “Well, I am.” I sent him a pointed look. “And before you ask, I’m not high either.” Much. Hey, I have to have a goodbye period, don’t I?

  “Good for you.”

  I wasn’t fooled in the slightest. Some people happened into a job because of life’s circumstances. Some people discovered themselves along the way through other professions. Danny? I think he’s a detective because someone in his family tree was part bloodhound.

  “So… who were you talking to earlier?” he finally asked.

  “Myself.”

  “Oh.” He nodded as though that made perfect sense. “You call yourself Ethan now?”

  “It’s my middle name.”

  “You don’t have a middle name.”

  No, I did not. Rainstorm only went with so much, thank God. My parents had offered to amend the oversight, but I declined. Mostly because my mother was overly fond of the name Moonbeam, and two wrongs do not make a right. They just make one very irritated Dr. Rainstorm Moonbeam Christiansen marching to the courthouse with name-change forms.

  “I can’t help but notice you’re not answering my question,” he broke into my random train of thought.

  No, I wasn’t, was I? I bit my lip. “Rutabaga.”

  Danny eyed me balefully. “So this rutabaga thing… I never asked, but is there a limit to how many you can call?”

  “No. And you’re not allowed to question the rutabaga.”

  He nodded, as though that made perfect sense. “Fine.”

  It wasn’t fine. I knew it wasn’t fine. Danny didn’t know how to cease fire. He just put a silencer on his weapon and kept on shooting.

  “Sometimes it’s better if you don’t know,” I muttered. “You just have to trust me on that.”

  “Trust you?” Danny scoffed. “That’s rich. I don’t even really know you. You won’t let me.”

  “I’m an open book.”

  “Yeah, but that book is fairly incomprehensible.”

  “Because you tell me everything? Like about Anna? Your father? Where you would go once a month on a long weekend trip to Wilton’s Pass?” I bit my lip as his eyes dropped. His strong cheekbones went dark peach, and color spread across his face like a waning, rouge-colored moon.

  Damn. What was with me lately? Rehashing ancient history. I scratched my head and felt more than a little embarrassed. There was no point in putting Danny on the spot. We both knew, especially as members of law enforcement, that there was only one real thing up at Wilton’s Pass. A maximum-security correctional facility.

  “So you knew.” Danny’s voice was flat. “That I visit my father.”

  “Yes, I knew. I didn’t know why until you told me the story about Anna, but I knew where you were going.” At his disbelieving look, I held up my hands. “Honest. I figured you would tell me eventually. Besides, I wouldn’t abuse agency resources like that.” To play online games, get free coffee, and bum the occasional ride in the bureau jet, yes. But to spy on my then-boyfriend? There were some lines even I wouldn’t cross.

  Danny sent me an unreadable look. “Is that why you left?”

  Whoa, whoa, whoa. Where the hell did that come from? That pitch wasn’t from left field. That was from slam out of the fucking parking lot. “I left for a job,” I said in measured tones. “And apparently you don’t have a map to DC.”

  “Is that what you wanted me to do? Follow you?”

  Was it? No. I wasn’t that person. I didn’t pull away to make him prove how much he wanted to be together. How much he could handle before he called it quits. Counting on him to close the gap. I didn’t. At least, I didn’t think I did.

  “No.” I finally shook my head. “You didn’t want to move to DC and long-distance relationships rarely work. That’s why we broke up.”

  Danny’s snort set my teeth on edge. His words even more so. “That’s not why we broke up.”

  “Yeah. What’s your take on it?” The ensuing silence wasn’t unexpected, but it irritated me, nonetheless. “Exactly. So why don’t you just stop pretending I’m doing something wrong by not telling you my every thought.”

  “Every thought?” Incredulous blue eyes met mine. “I would settle for the top three.”

  “Okaaay.” I pretended to think. “Number one. Stop being such an asshole. Number two. Stop being such an asshole. Number three—”

  Danny put a hand over my mouth. “Number three and note to self—next time, request a K-9 unit instead of a profiler. They’re quieter, cheaper, and more observant.”

  I narrowed my eyes. I didn’t enjoy being muzzled like a nippy dachshund. My tongue flickered out and licked a heated swath of skin on the offending hand. I was gratified by Danny’s sharp intake of breath as he snatched his hand away—and by the heated look that followed.

  “Well.” He exhaled strongly. “Then there’s that.”

  “There is that,” I agreed.

  A quick fuck would go a long way in restoring the morning. It wasn’t like we hadn’t done it before. On that very kitchen island, in fact. Cool marble against my cheek, the counter biting into my quivering stomach, his hand on the flat of my back as he worked me over with his dick. Just remembering made my breath go shaky.

  Danny stared at me so long that I thought I might get my wish. But then he exhaled a shaky breath and jingled his keys. “We should get going.”

  We were out of Cheerios. Out of coffee. And now, no morning fuck on the kitchen island. The day was going to hell in a very rickety handbasket. I sighed and shouldered my attaché case. “Fine by me.”

  Chapter 13

  MY FIRST impression of John Travis was a pair of legs—a pair of legs encased in ragged, worn jeans, sticking out from under the sink. Clinking sounds and muttering resounded from the small, dank space. Cursing, mostly. I cleared my throat after one heartfelt “motherfucker” blistered the air.

  “Mr. Travis?”

  The sounds immediately stopped, and the legs stilled. “Who wants to know?”

  “SSA Christiansen. And this is Detective McKenna.”

  He scooted out from under the sink and his knees creaked a bit on the way up as he stood. He grabbed a rag from the countertop, wiped his hands, and eyed our credentials warily. “What can I do for you gentlemen?”

  “We wanted to talk to you about your daughter, Amy Greene?”

  His wary expression hardened. “Look, I agreed to speak to you, but let’s not get ahead of ourselves. I don’t know if that girl was my daughter or not. She was after me to take one of those home DNA tests, but I was still making up my mind.”

  “But you were involved with her mother, Dinah Greene? At some point?”

  “Sure I was. But that was a long time ago.” He tossed the rag on the countertop and crossed his arms. “I moved on. We went our separate ways. Didn’t know anything about a baby until this girl pops up.”

  “How many times did
she come to see you?”

  “Three or four. After the fourth time, I told her it probably wasn’t a good idea for her to keep coming around.” He looked at me confidentially. “I have a family, you know.”

  I didn’t look Danny’s way, but I could almost feel his smug satisfaction about digging up family that should’ve remained buried. I cleared my throat. “I don’t suppose she mentioned these meetings to her mother?”

  “I don’t know.” He shook his head. “Look, I’m not really sure what you’re expecting to find here. The kid shows up after god knows how many years, telling me I’m her father and all that. What am I supposed to do?” He gave me a bewildered look. “I have a family.”

  Second time he’d used that term. He still didn’t seem to realize that she was part of that family. I looked at his jovial countenance and felt more betrayed than ever. It was like finding Santa’s workshop and busting in on him fucking Rudolph.

  Something in my expression must have clued him to my disgust, and he tried a different tack. “I gave her money. Okay? Gave her money to use for school or for college or whatever.”

  That certainly explained all the extra cash she’d been squirreling away. “Real big of you. Two grand? That ought to get her at least three minutes of tuition.”

  “Try five grand,” he snapped. “I’ve given her at least that much.”

  “Let me just shine up your Father of the Year award.”

  “Fuck you. Okay? My thing with Dinah was a long time ago. In the past. A time when we drank a lot and argued even more. The bad old days. I have a new life that doesn’t include any of that mess. And like it or not, Amy is part of that past.”

  “Don’t you just hate it when kids won’t go away? It’s like you gave them life or something.”

  He stepped toward me, clearly out of patience. Danny growled, a low, menacing sound that made everyone freeze in their tracks. When he spoke, his voice was quiet and lethal and sent a chill down even my spine. “I wouldn’t.”

  I could take care of myself. Travis might be bigger and taller, but with my training, I knew I could probably drop him with little trouble. None of that stopped my neck from warming. I couldn’t look at Danny and tried not to show exactly how touched I was. That no matter what we said, he had my back.

  Travis stared at me. His jaw worked as he bunched his fists by his sides. He appeared like he wanted to punch me in the face. I just looked at him implacably. “You were saying?”

  He glared but didn’t move an inch. “If anyone did something to her, it was that guy she brought with her. Looked kind of rough around the edges. Brick? Brian?”

  “Brock?”

  “Maybe.” He shrugged. “Last time she came to see me, I had to take her to the emergency room, she was so beat up. He’s the one you should be hassling.” When my expression cooled even further, he threw up his hands. “Fine. Suit yourself. I agreed to talk to you guys of my own free will, but I’ve gotta make a living. You want to find Amy, maybe you should talk to someone who knew her a little better than I did.”

  Like the mailman? A friendly cashier? Anyone she would’ve come in contact with would’ve known her better than that man. I bit back any acerbic comments. They really wouldn’t be helpful and would be just for my own satisfaction. Besides, if we had to talk to Travis again, I wanted it to be voluntarily, not by court order.

  I nodded curtly as he dropped back under the sink. “We’ll do that.”

  It had been five years. It was time to find out whether Brock still had an alibi.

  “HE’S NOT here.”

  I raised an eyebrow at the short, portly woman giving me attitude on her porch. She wore a bathrobe and curlers in the middle of the day, which was a tad strange. “Do you know when he’ll be back?”

  “No, I don’t.” She squinted, her pale blue eyes suspicious and irritated at the same time. “Haven’t seen Brock in over a year. And before you ask, I don’t know where he went, and he didn’t have anything to do with that girl disappearing.”

  I couldn’t help but feel a little deflated, even though her response was what I expected. Clearly someone had overnighted her a copy of Stock Answers for Suspicious People. “Do you know where he works? Any little detail would be helpful—”

  “No, I don’t.”

  Well, that took care of that. I pulled out my card and held it out with a winning smile. “If you hear from him, will you—”

  The door slammed in my face. I was lucky it didn’t catch my fingers. My winning smile obviously needed work.

  I sighed, tucked my card in the doorjamb, headed back to the car, and slid in to find Danny thumbing through his phone. He glanced up. “You get anything?”

  “His mother said he took off over a year ago. Hasn’t seen him since.”

  “You believe her?”

  I made an impatient sound. “I’m assuming that’s rhetorical. We should have someone stake out the place. Sooner or later she’s going to contact him. If nothing else to tell him that the police are asking about him.”

  “We’ll get someone out here.” Danny started up the car. “I just talked to Chevy. She has records of Brock getting paychecks from a local McDonald’s.”

  “Nice.” I wasn’t the least bit surprised Brock’s mother had lied to my face. “Hiding from the police? That’s a double check mark for him on our ‘persons of interest’ list.”

  “I still like Amy’s mom for this.”

  “Why? Because she let her cat lick the coffee spoon?” I chuckled. “No, that’s just why you say no to coffee in random strangers’ houses. Besides, there are better suspects to be had. Brock pretty much abused her during their entire relationship.”

  At least that’s what I took “he just got so angry” to mean. I tilted my head thoughtfully. “Maybe we should check out some hospitals and clinics and see if they ever saw them.”

  “If that’s the case, it would probably be something in the surrounding counties. To avoid detection.”

  “I’ll have Chevy send us a list. We can split it up with the rest of the team.” I sent him a look. “Also I’d like to file a complaint that I am hungry, and as a human being, I require sustenance.”

  He shook his head at me but looked amused. “Duly noted.” I tolerated that little half smile on his sexy, stubbly, perfectly square jaw for a few more moments, and then I finally had to call him on it.

  “What?” I asked as I pressed Send on my phone. It made a swooshing sound as my notes whisked off to Chevy’s email.

  “It’s just… hard being with you.”

  Wow. I tried my best not to take offense as I slipped my phone back in my pocket. “You really don’t pull any punches, do you?”

  “That’s not what I meant. It’s just that being with you reminds me of… being with you. We were good together sometimes.”

  Damn, Danny was no Lord Byron, but he certainly knew his way around words. Determined to ignore the suspicious lump in my throat, I tried to lighten the mood. “Most of those times involved me on my knees or on my back, Irish.”

  He dissolved into a fit of laughter, and I watched him with a faint smile. I wanted to make him laugh all the time and see that mischievous glint in those usually serious eyes. It was then that I realized he was right.

  It was hard being with him too.

  Chapter 14

  OF COURSE I agreed that Brock needed to be questioned as soon as possible. Especially seeing as how he’d moved from “person of interest” to “genuine suspect” rather quickly. But when Danny had suggested someone take the first stakeout shift at Brock’s place, I’d just assumed he meant someone else. Someone who was not me.

  I had big plans for my night. Big plans that involved a hot shower, filching a couple of Danny’s Heinekens, and curling up in my bed with case notes. None of my big plans involved staking out Brock’s mother’s house and sweating my ass off in a car with Danny, but when he got his mind wrapped around something, that was that. The hike to Checkers for our dinner was only the grit
ty buttercream frosting on that awful cake.

  I huffed a little as I hustled down the sidewalk, two fast-food bags clutched in my hands. The Checkers had only been a few blocks away, but sweat still dotted my forehead. Even though it was dark, it was still hot.

  I tapped on the passenger-side window and waited for him to knuckle the locks. He took his slow, sweetass time. I was able to yank on the door handle three times before the locks finally popped.

  “Yanking on the handle at the same time I’m unlocking it is extremely counterproductive,” he informed me as I pulled open the door.

  “It’s hot out there,” I complained. I handed him the bag and drinks and then flopped in the seat. I sighed and mopped sweat off my face. Then I sat still for a moment and tested the air quality with a finger. “Fuck, it’s hot in here too.”

  “It’s South Florida. What do you expect?”

  “I expect not to be able to fry an egg over easy on my ass.” I fanned myself. “I got hot dogs. Yours are the loaded ones. Mine are the bacon ones. You see anything yet?”

  “All’s quiet.” He eyed my fanning motions with his mouth half-quirked, as though he couldn’t decide whether it was hilarious or pissing him off. “Yes. I’m sure the power of your hand alone is going to turn muggy, still air into a fresh spring breeze.”

  I continued to fan and fought a smile. “Shut up.”

  He pawed through the bag and separated food as the smell of greasy hotdog and fries filled the car. “Tab and Deck are going to relieve us in another two hours. Is this Pepsi?”

  “Yeah. Your favorite.”

  “I forgot to tell you that I don’t drink soda anymore.”

  I stared and paused my fanning. “You love Pepsi.”

  “Loved.” He shrugged. “But I don’t drink soda anymore. Pepsi is soda. Ergo… I don’t drink Pepsi. I’m starting to understand why you’re having so much trouble solving this case.”

  “Snarky little twit. When did you go on this soda ban?”

  “Last May or so.”

  I bit into my hot dog and chewed, feeling a little… well, disgruntled. And I didn’t know why. I had no reason to be. It shouldn’t bother me that I didn’t know his drink preferences. That’s what happened when time, and with it people, moved on. People picked up new favorites. Dropped old ones. Things changed.