by Pamela Clare
She didn’t move, but Quigg felt her withdrawal as surely as if she’d physically stepped back. It was as though she’d pulled her very aura back, drawing it close so it wouldn’t brush his.
Whoops. Guess he should have broken the news that he knew about the dead floral offering a little more tactfully.
“You have been following me.” She intoned the words as though she still couldn’t quite believe it.
“Hey, it’s not what you think –”
“Spying on me!” She was looking at him now as though he were some kind of particularly disgusting insect.
“You have to call the cops, Suzannah.”
Her mouth tightened. “Forget it.”
She turned on her very elegant, very high heel and started toward her car, her strides long and brisk. Quigg hurried to catch up. She stopped and whirled so quickly, he had to throw on the brakes to avoid colliding with her.
“One more thing, Detective. You stay the hell away from me or I’ll have your ass in court before your head stops spinning.”
He almost smiled at that. “Thought you weren’t going to call the police?”
“Just stay away from me.”
She started off again. Again, he followed, this time at a more discreet distance. He didn’t feel like smiling anymore.
“Suzannah, listen, you have to call this in. There’s some whack-job out there trying to … hell, I don’t know. At the very least, he’s trying to scare you.”
She’d reached her car and was fishing in her purse again for the keys. Unconscious habit. The Beemer wasn’t going anywhere, not sitting as it was with all four rims biting into flattened tires. Realizing the futility of her search, she turned on him.
“You are the whack-job, Detective. You’re the one who’s been sneaking around, following me, watching me –” Her words stumbled to a stop. “The flowers … oh, Lord, was it you? You were there that day, weren’t you? You were the one watching me, in the courtroom.”
The blaze of light spilling from the mansion’s huge windows didn’t reach this far down the driveway, so he couldn’t read her expression, but he didn’t need the visual clues. He could hear the fear-tinged fury in her voice.
“Yes, it was me.”
She took a step backward, pressing herself into the car’s fender.
He swore, shoving a hand through his hair.
“In the courtroom, dammit. It was me in the courtroom. But I sure as hell didn’t put that abomination in your car. I’m telling you, it wasn’t a cop did that. And what’s more, I think you know it.”
He heard her draw a hissing breath. “What exactly do you mean by that?”
“Red roses? Dead ones? Slashed tires? That kind of rage strikes me as pretty personal, the kind of thing a spurned lover might do.”
“No.”
“Listen, you probably think you’re doing the right thing by staying quiet, but it’ll come back to bite you, Suzannah. I’m sure he says he loves you, but I’m telling you, men like this –”
She made a frustrated groan. “I don’t believe it! You think I know this fruitcake?” Her voice rose on the question. “You think I’m protecting him?”
“Why else would you sit on something like this? It’s obviously not the first time it’s happened. You didn’t even crack the wrapping paper on that posy because you knew exactly what was inside it.”
“Omigod, you picked it out of the dumpster, didn’t you?”
“Dammit, you looked scared when I approached you in the parking lot that day. I kinda got the idea it was something in the car made you squirrely, something you didn’t especially want me to see.”
“Of course. And you followed me in the hopes of getting some dirt on me, something to de-fang the tiger.” She thumped her purse down on the hood of the car and leaned back against the Beemer’s paint job. A shaft of yellow light from the building struck her face. “You are a piece of work, Detective.”
He could have set her straight on why he’d followed her, why he’d been there at the courthouse in the first place.
He could also offer his jugular for the slashing, but he wasn’t about to do that, either.
“You’re evading the question. If this isn’t a domestic deal, why haven’t you reported it? In my professional opinion, that little floral tribute carries a menacing message. And don’t tell me it was a cop. A slashed tire maybe, but not this.”
“Detective, this has been a fact of life for me since I started practice. Someone slashes a tire here, keys my paint job there, places hang-up calls from a number with blocked caller ID.” She shifted so her face was lost in shadows again. “And flowers turn up. Sometimes they’re dead roses, sometimes they’re beautiful live roses.”
He swore, fluently. “Okay, okay, you thought it was us. It isn’t. Let’s go report it. Right now.”
“No.”
“No? I’m telling you it wasn’t cops.”
“Okay, I believe you.”
“Then let’s go.”
“I’m not going to report anything, John.”
He was John again, not Detective. That much penetrated his exasperation. “Why the hell not?”
“This is low-level harassment. I haven’t had a single direct threat. No one’s actually approached me, contacted me or menaced me. There’s no way I’m going to go running to you guys, crying about something the investigator will figure I brought down on myself.”
“That’s crazy.”
A big flatbed geared down on Woodstock Road, slowing to turn into the driveway. Her hook had arrived.
“Crazy?” She lifted her chin another fraction. “Crazy would be making a complaint. I have to work inside this system, John. I don’t need you guys to like me, but I do need you to respect me.”
“Like we wouldn’t respect you if you reported this psycho?” Damn, that’s exactly what she thought. “You think this is brinkmanship? You can’t let us see you blink?”
“Look, if you must know, I did report it, the first time it happened. Suffice to say, after that experience, I don’t think I’ll be doing it again soon. Especially when I can easily afford to replace a few tires.”
“But –”
“But nothing.” Her voice hardened. “I spend my days poking holes in your cases until they bleed daylight. There’s no way I’m going to go to you guys again with something like this. I don’t need some fresh-faced young constable telling me I’m overwrought or that I have a persecution complex. And I sure don’t need to be reminded that you’re busy taking care of the real victims my clients leave behind.” She pushed away from the car’s fender and raised a hand to flag down the tow truck driver. “Thank you for your concern, Detective, but I can take it from here.”
Damn her stubbornness.
Despite his clear dismissal, for the next five minutes, Quigg stood back and fumed while the disabled vehicle was loaded on the back of the flatbed. As the driver checked the security of his load, Suzannah turned her attention back to him.
“You’re still here.”
He gritted his teeth. “You’ll need a drive home.”
“Thanks, but the tow guy says he’ll give me a lift.”
Stubborn wasn’t the word. His lips thinned. “That so? In that case, guess I’ll stick around for the show.”
That eyebrow again, arching in elegant inquiry.
“Show?”
“Yeah, the show. If you’re planning to climb way up into that rig wearing that dress, this is something I gotta see.”
She lifted her chin. “A cab, then.”
His irritation escaped. “Dammit, Suzannah, why can’t you accept my help? Someone slashed your tires tonight. That’s not something you do with nail clippers or a straightened paperclip. That’s something you do with a knife. And for all you know, your slash-happy friend could be watching right now, ready to follow you home.”
As though unable to resist the impulse, she scanned the parking lot, her eyes searching the parked cars, the shadowed shrubbery, the pool
s of darkness beyond the street lights on Woodstock Road. When she turned back to him, her expression betrayed a tinge of fear, and considerably more than a tinge of anger.
“Scare tactics, Detective?”
“You should be scared. You should be sitting in a squad car right now giving your story to a uniform. But since you aren’t, the least I can do is make sure you get home safe.”
Still she hesitated. What was he doing here, trying to help a hard-headed woman who clearly didn’t want his help?
“Hell, Suzannah, I won’t tell anyone, if that’s what you’re worried about.”
He’d been half joking, but her expression told him he’d hit the nail on the head. She really thought she’d somehow lose face if she sought police help. He bit back his impatience.
“Cross my heart,” he said. “I won’t breathe a word.”
“That’s what all the boys say,” she murmured, but he could see she was considering it. “Okay,” she announced after a few seconds’ pause. “You can drive me home. I’ll just go tell the tow truck driver.”
You can drive me home, in that perfect diction, with that cool-as-a-cucumber, crazy-making tone of hers, as though she were bestowing some frigging prize on him. She turned to dispatch the driver, and Quigg resisted the urge to grind his teeth again.
Man, you shoulda just left this one alone.
*
He led her to a late model Ford sedan.
“There’s some stuff on the front seat. Better let me clear it away,” he said.
Unlocking the passenger door, he leaned into the interior. She heard him rummaging around. When he pulled back a moment later, she expected his hands to be full of discarded coffee cups and fast-food wrappers, the usual detritus of people who spent a lot of time in their cars. Instead he held newspapers. Lots of them. She recognized the local paper, as well as the Toronto Globe and Mail and several more she couldn’t identify.
“A news hound, I see.”
“Nah, that’s just for show. You know, so folks’ll think I’m semi-literate.”
Her gaze flew to his face. When had she said anything to imply he was less than literate? And what exactly was his problem, anyway? She’d agreed to this escort, hadn’t she?
“Gosh, and here I was expecting empty coffee cups and the dried-up remnants of jelly donuts.”
“Sorry to disappoint. I mucked the sty out just this morning.”
He stepped back to allow her to get in. Once she was settled, he closed her door and rounded the vehicle to slide behind the wheel. He started the car, and waited for her to adjust her seatbelt before he put it in gear. She said nothing as he pulled out onto Woodstock Road and headed east. In the confines of the car, the subtle scent of his aftershave reached out to her. His profile in the dim light cast by the dashboard lights looked somehow softer.
She switched her attention outward, concentrating on their route. He’d continued down Woodstock Road, right through the intersection to Brunswick. Tensing, she realized he hadn’t asked where she lived. All the way down Brunswick, under the underpass and onto Waterloo. Her heart thumped a little harder as he drove the length of Waterloo, then swung onto the Lincoln Road.
“You’re not even going to ask me for directions, are you?”
He glanced quickly at her, then back to the road. “Would you like me to?”
Of course he knew. He’d been watching her, following her, looking for dirt. “That’s an interesting way you have of convincing me you’re not the whack-job I should be worried about.”
This time when he turned toward her, she caught a definite grin in the shifting light of a street light as they passed under it.
“Nice place you got, but security needs work. Window locks are good, but you could use better on that front door. And you need an alarm system. You also have to change the lighting on the north side, by the garden gate. What you want is something on the ground that shines up at the house. Last thing the cops need when they’re responding to a call is to have to walk straight into a blinding light.”
“I can’t believe this. You cased my house.”
He glanced at her. “I prefer checked out. Cased has such negative connotations.”
She made an inelegant snort, not knowing whether to tear into him for invading her privacy or to admire his honesty. He could easily have pretended ignorance, asking directions, and she’d have been none the wiser.
Lord, was she actually looking for redeeming qualities in a man who’d been shadowing her for the last week? And all because his blunt, masculine physicality called out to some perverse part of her.
Oh, Suz, that’s pitiful. It had obviously been way too long. The minute she got to her office on Monday, she was going to find Gabe Courtney’s number on her Rolodex and call him. He’d made no secret of his interest when she’d attended the opening of his exhibit last week. She’d actually enjoyed flirting with him. All 6’ 5” of him. At least until John Quigley had turned up like a bad penny.
“Home again, home again,” he said, and she realized he was pulling into her driveway.
She fumbled in the darkness for her evening bag, which she’d made the mistake of putting down in the unfamiliar interior. Unexpectedly, the dome light came on, and she jerked her startled gaze up to meet his.
Mistake. In the warm, man-smelling confines of the car, a current of awareness arced between them. Quickly, she retrieved the tiny bag.
“Well, Detective, thank you for the lift.” Pulse thudding, she turned away and grappled for the door handle.
“Give me a sec and I’ll be right behind you.”
That pronouncement, delivered in a sexy, gravel-voiced tones brought her head whipping around again. “Hold it right there, Detective. Obviously, you haven’t been watching me very closely or very long, or you’d know I’m not in the habit of inviting men into my home even when I like them well enough to accept a first date. Ergo, hell would freeze over before I invite a pushy cop—a pushy cop who just coerced me into accepting a drive, I might add—into my house.”
A wide grin split his face, deepening the grooves on either side of his mouth and making a dimple flash on his left cheek. “Not to belittle your considerable charms, Ms. Phelps, but I was thinking more along the lines of a security check. You know, peer into closets, pull back shower curtains, check the windows.”
Her face burned. Damn him. “Thanks, but I can handle it.” With that, she shouldered her door open and climbed out of the car.
*
Quigg cursed under his breath. Damn stubborn woman. She was fumbling with the lock when he caught up with her. Her hand froze on the doorknob and she turned to face him, her pale face cool and impossibly lovely in the porch light.
“I distinctly remember saying thanks but no thanks to your offer to play the big, strong male to my helpless female.”
He suppressed a smile. Not very well, apparently, because her lips tightened in irritation.
“Maybe you would care to tell me, what part of No, thank you escaped your comprehension?”
There it was again, that haughty Queen of Sheeba tone. Could she get her nose any higher?
“Golly, Suzannah, you’re gonna have to use smaller words, maybe some of them there single syllable ones.”
She angled her head. “You know, Detective, you behavior is really starting to shade toward stalker.”
His face sobered. “You don’t believe that.”
Did she?
“Just go home, Detective. Or back to the party. I don’t need your help.”
He felt his jaw tighten. “That’s developing into something of a theme with you, refusing help.”
“As is your trying to make me accept it.” She straightened her spine, drawing herself up to her full height, which with those stilts she called shoes put her cool blue gaze just a hair higher than his. “I don’t appreciate being made to look like a weak, frightened woman.”
Frightened? Hah! She didn’t have the good sense to be frightened. Frightening, more l
ike it. Not to mention maddening, stubborn and just plain stupid. For a second, he was tempted to throw up his hands and walk away. Then he remembered the obscenity of the dead roses, the viciousness of her slashed tires, and bit back a sigh.
“Look, I just want to make sure the house is empty, do a perimeter check. After that, I’ll be on my way.”
She looked unconvinced.
“Someone slashed your tires tonight, sweetheart. Since you’re too stubborn to call in a complaint, you’re stuck with me. My conscience won’t let me walk away until you’re safely inside and locked down. If it makes you feel better, I’d do it for anyone.”
She held his gaze for a few beats, measuring him. “Okay,” she said at last. “If that’s what it will take to get rid of you, okay.”
Turning back to the door, she fumbled with the key some more. Did he make her nervous? The idea brought a rush of male satisfaction, until it occurred to him that she might actually fear him. The spurt of gratification died.
Finally, the lock submitted. She twisted the knob, wiggled her key free and stepped inside. Quigg followed, finding himself in a small entryway dimly lit by two tasteful bronzy-looking wall sconces. She dropped her keys on a gleaming mahogany table, then leaned against it as she slipped her shoes off. She was all grace, all fluid limbs and smooth skin. He caught a glimpse of her bare back in the mirror behind her as she bent to retrieve the ridiculously insubstantial sandals.
“Oh, God, that feels better,” she said, her voice conveying that universally female relief at shedding diabolically cruel, indescribably beautiful shoes.
And he was hard as a virgin on prom night.
“You shouldn’t do that.” His words emerged harsher than he intended.
“Oh, puhlease.” She rolled her eyes. “Who are you, now, Dr. Scholl? You’re going to lecture me on my choice of footwear? Recommend a sensible flat shoe?”
“Leave your keys on that side table, I meant.”
“Oh, that.” She nabbed the fat set of keys. “Don’t worry, I don’t make a habit of it. Now, don’t you have some checking to do? I’ll go change while you –”
“No. You’ll stay with me, at least until I’ve been through the house.”
