Complete Mia Kazmaroff Romantic Suspense Series, 1-4
Page 61
“No, you’re not late,” Vernetta said. “And dinner’s nearly ready.”
Vernetta put her arms around Mia and hugged her.
“How’s your Mama?” Vernetta asked. “You tell her I asked about her, hear?”
“Yes, ma’am,” Mia said.
“I’ve got somebody I want you to meet,” Vernetta said, stepping out of the doorway to usher them inside. “In the kitchen.”
Jack kept his hand on Mia’s back and guided her toward the kitchen. Music was playing and a very large man with a shaved head and a teenage girl were in the kitchen. It looked like the teen was attempting to teach the man how to dance.
“No, Daddy, listen to the music before you move your hips. You look like one of them dashboard dancing hula dolls.” The man erupted into laughter, which died on his face when he saw Jack and Mia entering the kitchen. Immediately he went to Jack and jerked out a hand.
“I’m sorry about the Piggly Wiggly,” he said. Mia watched him clench his jaw, making a muscle twitch in his face. This wasn’t easy for him to do. “I shouldn’t ought to have done that. And I’m sorry.”
Jack shook his hand. “Not a problem.”
“I’m Eugene,” the man said, nodding toward Twyla. “Twyla’s daddy. And I’m grateful for everything you did for my girl.”
Mia saw Jack swallow past the lump in his throat. He’d loved that girl in theory for a very long time. Letting go was hard.
“I’m glad I could help, Eugene,” Jack said, smiling at Twyla.
The girl smiled back at him briefly and then grabbed her father’s hand and pulled him away. “Come on, Daddy. Grannie said we could set up the ice cream maker outside.”
Eugene gave Jack a shrug and allowed himself to be pulled out of the room. Mia listened to the girl’s chatter until it faded away.
“Guess I shouldn’t be surprised,” Jack said, staring after the two.
Vernetta stepped into the kitchen and went to the stove, where a large pot of chili was cooking.
“You mean because Sandy told you he was a bastard and you believed it? I did too. And I knew Eugene.”
“So he never cared about the DNA test? Or the money?” Mia asked, sitting at the kitchen table.
“Nope,” Vernetta said. “He just wanted custody of his baby girl. He makes a decent living. Not…”—Vernetta waved a wooden spoon to encompass the splendor of the kitchen they were in—“…but decent.”
The doorbell rang and Vernetta turned to Jack. “Mind getting that, Jack? I got me some chili to burn in here.”
Jack leaned over and kissed Mia and went to answer the door.
“Jack says you and Twyla are leaving Atlanta?” Mia asked.
“We are,” Vernetta said. “No point in staying. Valdosta is home. Besides, Twyla will be living with her daddy now.”
Jack returned with a teenage boy who looked like he’d pissed off Mike Tyson on a bad day.
“Hey, Miz Hobson,” the boy said.
“Ethan,” Vernetta said, nodding to him. “Twyla and her daddy are outside.”
Ethan tucked his head and hurried across the kitchen, exiting through the side door. Mia heard a basketball bouncing outside.
“What happened to him?” Mia asked.
“Jay happened to him,” Jack said. “Jealousy.”
“Were Twyla and the bodyguard—?” Mia asked.
“Bite your tongue,” Vernetta said. “The man’s a sociopath, is all. Seeing something where there wasn’t nothing.”
“I’ve been meaning to ask you, Vernetta,” Jack said. “Was Jay from Atlanta? Because the whole kidnapping was set up like he knew the town real well.”
“He’s a Valdosta boy,” Vernetta said, laying the wooden spoon down and crossing her arms. “His daddy was transferred to Atlanta after his folks split up. He came up here when he was in middle school and came back home a couple years later. His mama’s a good friend of Sandy’s. When we came into money, Jay’s mama asked if Sandy would give him a job. Said he was getting into trouble.”
“Boy,” Mia said, “little did she know.”
Jack nudged her under the table with his foot and frowned.
“What?” Mia said. “What did I say?”
“Don’t fret, Jack,” Vernetta said. “I ain’t saying what Sandy did blots out every good thing she ever did, but I ain’t turning away from the truth, either.”
“When’s the trial?” Jack asked.
“I don’t know. Not for a while.”
“Sandy staying in custody meantime?”
“I reckon that’s probably best for everyone,” Vernetta said briskly. “Now, Mia girl, your mama says you can’t cook and I told her I didn’t believe that. You and me, we’re going to make cornbread. What do you say to that?”
Mia placed her hands on the table and stood up. “I’m game if you are.”
“Translation,” Jack said dryly, watching Mia with a grin as Vernetta tied an apron around Mia’s waist, “someone better put the CDC on speed dial.”
Breathless
Copyright 2014
San Marco Press • Atlanta, GA
HEARTLESS
A Mia Kazmaroff Suspense
Book 4
Susan Kiernan-Lewis
Copyright 2015
San Marco Press • Atlanta, GA
When a beautiful young woman is brutally murdered, the police turn their attention to the victims of the online dating service scam she was running. Mia and Jack opt to go in a different direction to find the woman’s killer—and when they do, a dark and sinister path opens up that nobody could have seen coming.
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
About the Author
Chapter 1
The wind sliced across the pasture. Mia sat tall in the saddle, arms held out to each side, eyes closed.
“Just feel the horse,” she said. “Feel the sun on your face, the line between your heel, your hip and your shoulder.”
“I am one with the horse,” Jack said.
She opened her eyes and looked at him. He was digging his cellphone out of his jeans pocket.
“Stop that,” she said. “You’re supposed to be connecting with the horse.”
“My ass is in the saddle,” he said. “How much more connected can I be?”
Mia closed her legs around her horse and moved alongside Jack.
“You’re not taking this seriously.”
“You mean like you were yesterday when you got the giggles at the gun range?” He narrowed his eyes at her but there was a hint of amusement in them, too.
“Payback?”
“Not at all. What’s your mother’s new number?” He pushed a button on his phone and listened, holding up a finger to her.
“The very thought of bringing electronics into this world is a jarring imposition to the soul,” Mia said, frowning.
“Hey, Jessie,” Jack said into the phone, “we still on for tonight?” He nodded and gave Mia a thumbs up signal. She sighed and turned her horse back toward the barn. She hadn’t had high hopes Jack would take to horseback riding.
But it would have been so nice to share this with him.
He trotted his horse up behind her. “Sorry. I just wanted to know if we could bring anything.”
“Jack,” she said, reining to let him catch up with her, “it’s fine. I accept you as you are, as I know you struggle to do with me on a daily basis.”
“Hourly.”
“Fine.” She grinned and he leaned across his saddle to kiss her. Mia’s horse instantly kicked at Jack
’s horse’s flank, nearly unseating Jack, who was leaning too far off his horse for the kiss.
“Whoa, partner,” Mia said, laughing. “First rule of equine safety: keep the kisses safely back in the tack room.”
“I was just going for a chaste peck,” Jack said, holding onto his reins with both hands.
“Your ‘chaste pecks’ inevitably lead to more involved aerobics,” Mia said. “My horse was right to shy.” Mia patted her horse on the neck as if congratulating him.
When they reached the gate separating the pasture from the barn, Mia swung out of her saddle and unlatched the gate, then held it open while Jack walked through.
“Sorry, darlin’, I know you wanted me to love it but I’m afraid you’re stuck with Ned for the nonhuman variety of riding from now on.” A committed equestrian, Ned was happy to ride any day of the week Mia was free.
Mia took Jack’s reins and led both horses into the tack room, where their halters and lead ropes were hanging against the near wall.
“Don’t worry about it,” she said as he jumped down. “I’m sure it disappoints you that I’m not more interested in spending time in the kitchen.”
“There you go.”
“The appropriate answer, Jack, is ‘why, not at all, pumpkin.’” She tied both horses to their wall rings.
“You want me to start calling you pumpkin?”
“Not what I was saying.”
“Coz I think I’d put you more in the eggplant category.” He put his hands on her hips and pulled her to him. Mia leaned into his kiss, feeling the warmth that always welled up between her legs and spread through her chest when he touched her.
“No time for this,” she murmured into his neck as his hands cupped her bottom through her snug riding breeches.
“I can’t help it. I get hard watching you brush your teeth.”
“You say the sweetest things.” She laughed, kissing him on the lips before turning to the feed bin. She scooped grain into two large plastic buckets. “Grab one of these, will you?”
“You’re not too shabby with the sweet talk, yourself,” he said, reaching for one of the buckets.
“Hey, don’t think you’re out of hot water over that eggplant comment.”
Thirty minutes later, the horses fed and released back into the pasture, they drove the twenty miles into the Atlanta suburb where Mia’s mother, Jess, lived.
“I think they’re going to make an announcement tonight,” Mia said. Her mother had been dating Bill Maxwell, the chief of Atlanta Major Crimes, for almost a year. Their relationship had escalated and lately the chief spent more nights at Jessie’s post-war ranch in Doraville than he did his Buckhead condo.
“You mean like an engagement announcement?” Jack said.
“Yup.”
“How do you feel about that?”
“It’s not like he’s going to be my daddy. Mom adores him and he’s crazy about her.”
“Doesn’t he have a daughter?”
“He does. So it looks like I get my own wicked stepsister in the bargain.”
“You’ve met her?”
“Unfortunately, yes. She’s a bitch.”
“I see. And did you come to this assessment by physically slapping hands on her?”
Mia’s ability to accurately read a person by touch was a gift she shared with her mother.
“I didn’t have to.” She gave him a crooked smile. “Even you could have read her feelings, Jack. But it doesn’t matter. We don’t have to like each other. I’m not out to steal her father.”
“No, but she might think your mom is.”
“Mindy is a grown woman. Married, even. With a kid.”
“Doesn’t matter.”
“I’ll take your word for it. Don’t we have to stop and get wine? You know all Mom has is Blue Nun.”
A look of sudden seriousness came over Jack’s face as he course-corrected to the nearest liquor store on Peachtree Industrial Parkway.
*****
He would never tire of looking at her. To watch Mia laugh, pour a glass of wine, scrutinize the instructions on a microwave frozen peas package—all of it kept Jack in constantly captivated thrall. And it wasn’t just the sex, although watching her was usually just a step away from imagining her shedding whatever outfit she was currently wearing.
They’d worn each other out the last two months. As exquisite as he’d imagined it in the months before—and boy had he imagined it—the reality of it was a thousand times better.
There was no doubt in his mind he was in love with her. That was probably true even before they’d made love. No, he was all in, full stop and without question. But where was Mia in all this? She was an eager and enthusiastic lover—ready any time he was—but how much of that was because she’d never done it before?
And how much was because it was him?
“Yo, Earth to Jack,” Mia said, tapping the side of her wineglass. “The chief and I finally figured out how to open the stupid champagne; thanks a lot by the way.” She turned to her mother. “Jack’s an effing sommelier, for crap’s sake. Why were we struggling with this?”
“’Cause the man’s worn out,” Maxwell said, his face flushed pink with his own joke. “Probably hasn’t had a full night’s sleep since the two of you discovered how to make fire together.”
Jack grinned. It did not do to let your mind wander with this group. The ones who weren’t professional detectives had paranormal gifts that practically let them read your damn mind. His eyes went to Mia. Some, both at once.
Mia handed him a glass of champagne. “Want to make the toast?”
“Sure.” He lifted his glass to the couple on the couch in front of him. “To the best home cook I know.”
“That’s high praise coming from Jack,” Mia said to her mother. “Although slightly random given the occasion.”
Jessie laughed. She had Mia’s exotic dark looks, but her eyes were brown and unreadable, whereas Mia’s were clear blue and easily advertised every thought she was having.
“If I may continue,” Jack said, clearing his throat.
“Gosh,” Mia said to her mother. “Ever been reprimanded in a toast before?”
Jessie laughed again, then looked at Maxwell. Her eyes lit up as they fell on him and Jack couldn’t help thinking he wanted someone to look at him like that.
Correction. He wanted Mia to look at him like that.
“To an amazing woman and a man among men who, together, are the perfect match, and love’s ideal.”
“Ooh, that’s a good one, Jack,” Mia said, sipping from her glass.
“I’ll never know what I did to deserve this woman saying yes to me,” Maxwell said, his eyes glittering with emotion.
“We’re still talking about the proposal, right?” Mia said.
“Very funny, smartass,” Maxwell growled to laughter from Jack and Jessie.
“All right, Mia,” Jessie said, getting up from the couch and bestowing a kiss on Maxwell’s cheek. “Help me in the kitchen.”
“Hey, you’re not going to let her actually cook anything in there?” Jack said.
“I resemble that remark!” Mia said as Jessie pulled her toward the kitchen.
Jack sat down on the couch next to Maxwell.
“Pretty big step,” he said. Jack had worked under Maxwell for nearly thirteen years during his time as a detective for the Atlanta Police Department’s Major Crimes. They’d never been close but things had started to change in the last year.
“I’m the luckiest man in the world,” Maxwell said, draining his glass.
“Jess’s pretty lucky, too.”
A moment passed when the only sounds in the house were the soft clanging of pots and pans in the kitchen and the murmur of the voices of the women they loved.
“So,” Jack said. “Anything going on downtown?”
“Made an arrest today in the Internet Hussy case.”
“That was fast.” The newspapers had gotten playful with the city’s latest scandalous
murder, although Jack had to think the word “hussy” could’ve been updated.
A woman had been murdered in her Peachtree Corners condo—stabbed twenty-four times with a pair of scissors. The excitement from the case originated from the fact she appeared to be a dating service junkie. Evidence showed she’d contacted or dated over five hundred men in the Atlanta area in the last three years.
“Was it someone from the Internet dating service?”
“Yep. Turns out she was blackmailing him.”
“Over what?”
“Kiddie porn.”
“The having it or the doing it?”
“The latter.” Maxwell made a face of distaste.
“What was he doing with your vic?”
“He thought she was setting him up with underage twins.”
“Was she?”
“That part’s unclear.”
“So it was a scam?”
Maxwell set his champagne glass down. “She was a member of Atlanta Loves Online Dating Service, where she had a habit of trolling through likely candidates until she found someone to take the bait.”
“The bait being…”
“Twin fourteen year-olds.”
“I see.”
“Our vic went to an ATM with our suspect and got him to hand over a thousand dollars in cash, whereupon she took him to where the girls were, secretly photographed them together then, before anything sexual happened, took the guy’s money and told him if he notified the police she’d publish the photos.”
“And the suspect?”
Maxwell shrugged. “A weak alibi, a few priors for underage sex, and oh yeah, we have his shoe prints all over the crime scene.”
“Christmas came early for you. DNA match at the scene?”
“Not yet but we feel good.”
“Means, motive and opportunity. Sounds like the holy trinity to me.”
“You guys getting religious in here?” Mia came into the room carrying a steaming casserole and set it down on the dining room table.
“Something like that,” Jack said. He hopped up to assist. “Oh, did I mention we got a new case?”