by Loye, Trish
She must feel responsible somehow.
“You were there?”
It took longer, but she gave another nod. The way she raised her chin after let him know she wasn’t willing to talk about it. He almost growled. He wanted to be the one she trusted, that she talked to. But she wasn’t ready yet. He had to make sure she was talking to someone, though, even if it wasn’t him.
“Are you in a support group?”
“Like I told you before, I’m seeing the department shrink,” she said.
He sighed. “It’s not the same as finding people who are experiencing the same things you are.”
“How do you know?”
He gave a small, humorless laugh. “You don’t last in our business without support, Alyssa.”
She stared at him, her gray eyes searing him, and suddenly he thought of the kiss on her street. He wanted to get closer, but that wasn’t what was best for her. He was so tired of doing what was best for others, but he forced himself to lean back. “You can talk to me if you need to.”
Her head tilted as she studied him. “Your nickname is Doc. You take care of everyone around you, don’t you?”
His stomach muscles automatically tightened, as if expecting a punch. He tried not to let his wariness show at her question. “I do what anyone else would do.”
She shook her head. “No. You can’t help but take care of others.”
It took every effort not to react to her words. He gripped the steering wheel. Hard. He knew what had made him like that, but he’d never had someone accuse him as if what he did was a bad thing.
She raised her eyebrows. “So who takes care of you?”
He blinked and his hands loosened from the wheel with surprise. Who took care of him? No one. He took care of himself, and had since he was ten.
She took a deep breath, as if bracing herself. “You keep telling me I should let others help me, but I’m thinking you’ve never actually let anyone help you, have you? So stop trying to fix me. I’m used to taking care of myself, just like you. Give me the same respect you demand from others. Now, let’s go track down our bomber.”
She was out of the car before he could say anything. He frowned and sat for a moment, his emotions reeling. Did he take care of others too much? His mind pulled up memory after memory of him looking after his friends, his brother, his mother. Was she right? Did he need to back off?
He forced himself to let go of the steering wheel and followed her, mulling over what she’d said. She strode away from him, but she wasn’t getting out of the conversation that easily. He would bide his time to continue their talk.
He dodged a few pedestrians to catch up to Alyssa and stood beside her when she knocked on the glass door of the Harbor Lights Men’s Shelter. The room looked to be a classic soup kitchen, with long tables lining it and a counter at the far end.
A pale, blonde woman with a broom looked up from where she swept inside. She took a step back before shaking her head at them until Alyssa showed her badge. The woman unlocked the door.
“What can I do for you, officers?” She stood about the same height as Alyssa and pushed thick-framed glasses up on her nose, but kept her gaze mostly down with only a few quick glances in Zach’s direction. Worried he intimidated her with his size, he stepped aside so Alyssa could take the lead.
“Are you the manager here?” Alyssa asked.
The woman shook her head. “I can get him for you.” She scurried off to a door behind the counter and brought back a man whose dark olive skin and brown eyes suggested a Middle Eastern or Mediterranean background. The woman squeezed the man’s hand and then went back to sweeping the floor.
Zach made a mental note of their relationship.
The manager smiled warmly at them. “I’m Frank Costa,” he said. “Beth tells me you have some questions.”
Alyssa introduced them both and got right to the point. “Do you have a man named Tony who stays here?”
“Tony? We have a couple of Tonys,” Frank said. “Why?”
“Our main suspect in a suicide bombing this morning was said to be a man named Tony, who often resides here.”
Beth’s sweeping slowed, but she didn’t interrupt them.
“Oh, no,” the manager said. “I can’t imagine any of our guys doing something like that. They’re all good men, just down on their luck, you know?”
“Tony would be about six feet tall, long brown hair and mid-thirties.”
The manager’s eyes widened. “That Tony? Tony Merchant?” He shook his head. “No. I don’t believe it.” He sighed. “I have a file on him. I’ll go get it for you.”
When Frank left, Beth straightened up, all pretense of sweeping gone. “I knew Tony,” she whispered, looking to where Frank had gone.
“And?” Zach prompted.
She swallowed. “He could get violent sometimes. Frank is a kind man. He teaches languages at night school. It’s where we met. He likes to see the good in all of us. But…I could believe something like this of Tony.”
She went back to sweeping as Frank came back with a file. Zach thanked him and handed over his card. “In case you remember anything else.”
He turned to see Alyssa handing her card to Beth.
“Let’s go, partner,” he said.
Beth smiled at Alyssa and then Zach.
As soon as she stepped outside the door, Alyssa started flipping through the very sparse file. She stopped on a page. “It says here that he was a veteran,” she said. “Unfortunately, it doesn’t say much else.”
Zach stepped close and looked over her shoulder. He tried to ignore the fact that she stiffened. A part of him mourned the loss of the easiness between them from that morning.
“Look,” Zach said. “We’ve got his last name and birthdate. We’ll figure out everything about him with that.”
She glanced at him. Memories of the kiss swamped him. She was entirely too close, and he made himself step back.
“You have access to military records?” she asked.
“Of course.” He walked to the car.
“Will they be obtained legally?”
He laughed and didn’t look back. “Let’s get to work.”
* * *
By the time they made it to the office, it was after lunch.
Alyssa pulled off her jacket. It still smelled like smoke from the bomb site. She sat at her desk and shook her head. What the hell was the world coming to?
“Harrison,” Agent Masters called from across the room.
She jumped up and headed for the conference room he’d yelled from. He’d taken it over as his office. Zach already waited inside, his brows knitted together and his jaw clenched.
“What happened to you this morning?” Masters asked.
“What do you mean?”
Masters crossed his arms. “Don’t try to fool me, Detective. It looked like you froze at the bomb site. Do you have a problem I need to know about?”
She glanced at Zach. He shook his head the tiniest bit. She almost sighed in relief.
“No, sir,” she said. “Everything’s fine.”
His lips compressed. “See that it stays that way. I have to be able to count on you. If you can’t handle this, then for god’s sake let me get another man in here to do your job. Finding Al Shabah is our priority. I need 110 percent from everyone; if you can’t give me that, I need to replace you. Innocent people are depending on us.”
For the first time, she saw the humanity in Masters. Stress creased lines into his forehead. He really felt the weight of those innocent lives. Guilt made her open her mouth to explain her actions, but Zach again gave a small shake of his head. He knew that she wanted to confess and was clearly telling her not to.
“I’m fine.” Even if she found herself sympathizing with him, she still didn’t respect him enough to call him sir.
Masters ran a hand through his thinning hair. “Then tell me about the bomber.”
She gave him all the details she was sure Zach had alre
ady told him.
“We just came back from the shelter that he usually went to, according to the barista,” she finished.
“And?” he said impatiently.
She fought her natural instinct to snap back at him. They were all doing their best. A deep calming breath eased the edge from her voice. “Frank Costa is the shelter’s manager. I’ll have Drew and Riley look into him and the other employees.”
“Find me the reason why Tony Merchant did this. And his connection to Al Shabah,” Masters said. “The higher-ups want answers. And they want them yesterday. Get me those answers.”
“On it,” she said before walking out.
At her desk, she tracked down as much of Tony’s life as she could. Zach came by an hour later with the bomber’s service record, but he shook his head as he handed it over.
“There’s not much to read. The guy did one tour in the Gulf War in ’91, got honorably discharged in ’93, and dropped off the map a year later.”
She sighed. “I’ve got his medical records. He went into rehab for alcohol in ’94 and then his files stop. I’m calling all the shelters to see if he stayed anywhere else, or who he hung out with.”
They spent the rest of the day on the phone or in front of their screens, trying to piece together the bomber’s life and whereabouts that morning. Alyssa’s head began to ache by mid-afternoon, and by end of shift it throbbed with its own heartbeat. Her body felt beaten and abused, like she’d been wrestling a perp hopped up on drugs.
“I’m going to take you home now,” Zach said.
She snapped her gaze to his. “What?”
He shook his head. “You’re exhausted and you’ve got a headache. You’re probably feeling the effects of this morning. You should go home to rest.”
She sat back in her chair. “How do you know I’ve got a headache?”
“You’ve been rubbing your temples for the last hour.” He stood up. “Come on. Let me take you home. The feds are still working. We can come back early. No one wants to catch this guy as much as I do, but being exhausted this early in the game won’t do us any good. Al Shabah has only just started.”
She nodded. It was seven o’clock, and she really was exhausted. Her stomach rumbled. Zach grinned. “Maybe we should eat, too.”
Zach walked with her to her car. He held out his hand for her keys. She glared at him.
“You’ve had a rough night and day,” he said. “Just let me get you home safe.”
She handed over the keys, secretly grateful that she could just close her eyes, lean her head back, and let someone else deal with traffic.
She woke when Zach opened her door. “We’re here.”
She blinked. She must have been more tired than she’d thought.
Zach stood on the sidewalk in front of her apartment. How had he managed to find parking right in front of her building? She scrubbed her face with her hands. The tension of the last few days had taken more out of her than she’d realized.
“Thanks for driving,” she said, getting out of the car. “I’ll see you in the morning.”
Zach shook his head. “Sorry, but I owe it to Jake to see that you’re okay.”
“What does that mean?” she asked, grabbing her messenger bag from the backseat.
“You need food and a safe place to sleep. You don’t have either in that apartment.”
She opened her mouth to argue, but he just kept talking. “I’m going to that corner store to grab some things for dinner. I’ll cook. You’ll eat. Your door is busted. I’m staying on your couch as a precaution. We still don’t know who broke in or what they wanted.”
She’d forgotten about that with everything else that had been going on. Still, she shook her head. “I don’t need protection, Zach.”
“I know,” he said quietly. “I know you can take care of yourself, but you’re not at a hundred percent. So let a partner help you out.”
She rolled her eyes. “You’re making me regret I called you that.”
“Firecracker, I’m offering to cook you a meal as a friend. Nothing more.”
“And sleep over.”
He shrugged. “No one’s going to know.”
“What about your friend Marc?”
“He’s at the CTB doing the night shift.”
She straightened, her mind back on the job. “Will he alert you if anything goes on?”
“Right away,” he said. He stood tall and straight. The streetlamp lit the angles of his face, highlighting his cheekbones.
A warmth started in her belly as she stared at him. She’d been fighting that warmth from the moment she’d laid eyes on him, but this time she paused. What was the point in denying the attraction between them? It had been a long time since she’d last had anyone to her bed. Zach Grayson could be a superb way to end her dry spell.
“Okay,” she said, heading for the building’s door. “It’s a tough call, but I’ll let you make me dinner.”
He followed her up the stairs and then went first into her apartment. She could see the landlord had started to fix her door—at least she hoped that’s what he was doing by removing her doorknob and leaving a two-inch circular hole for anyone to look through.
She knew everyone on her floor, and that she could defend herself in a fight, but it still unnerved her to have an unlocked door.
Zach did a quick sweep of the place before ending up in the living area with her, making the place feel smaller than it was. But she immediately felt lighter with him in it.
Safer, she realized. He made her feel safe. Busted door or not.
She watched him go through her cupboards.
“What do you normally eat for dinner?” he asked.
She shrugged. “There’s a Thai place one block over. Or I go the extra block to the grocery store and grab a pre-made salad.” He looked appalled so she grinned. “Sometimes it’s old reliable.”
“I almost hate to ask,” he said.
“PB and J, of course.”
He shook his head slowly as if she were hopeless. A burst of life went through her and she laughed. He smiled in response and her heart stuttered. God, the man was gorgeous. The short sleeves of his polo shirt revealed muscled forearms and biceps twice the size of hers, sculpted with not a trace of fat. She suddenly wanted to see if the rest of him lived up to those arms.
It had been too long since she’d had sex. And the encounters she’d had since Iraq had been dissatisfying and left her irritated more than anything. None of them had been able to touch the numbness inside her, and none of them had been able to make her laugh with a single expression the way Zach could.
She didn’t think a night with this soldier would be dissatisfying.
“Why are you smiling like that?” he asked.
She put on an innocent face, which wasn’t that innocent if she went by Zach’s narrowed eyes. “Nothing. I just think I’m going to enjoy having someone cook me dinner.”
He nodded slowly, as if he didn’t trust her. “Okay. In any case, I’ll be right back. I’m hitting the grocery store. Call me if you need me and I’ll be back here in under a minute.”
She knew he would, too. He took his job as protector very seriously.
Well, tonight she would take care of him.
12
Zach went to the grocery store for supplies. He reminded himself to call the locksmith the next day to get her door fixed. Even if he was there, he didn’t like her apartment being open during the day.
He realized he was in full ‘Doc’ mode, but couldn’t help it. Screw what Alyssa thought. Something about seeing her this morning, frozen and fighting a flashback, brought out all his protective instincts.
He entered her apartment and set the grocery bag on her counter. The water was running in the bathroom. She was having a shower? When her door was broken? Was the woman insane? He pounded on the bathroom door.
“You couldn’t have waited until I got back?”
“Why? Did you want to join me?”
Za
ch almost swallowed his tongue. His body hardened at the thought of her naked under streaming water. Join her? Hell yes, he wanted to join her. He stepped back, his fists clenched. She’d had a rough day. She probably didn’t mean what he thought she meant.
She was Jake’s sister, and he was here only to see that she stayed safe.
He cleared his throat. “I’m going to make dinner.”
He ignored her laughter and stalked back to the kitchen. He would make her dinner and take care of her whether she wanted him to or not. She was just trying to drive him away.
Or crazy.
As he pulled out the groceries he’d bought, he breathed deep and evenly, thinking about Jake the whole time. He could do this.
He wasn’t a master chef, but he knew his way around pasta. He had a basic homemade sauce simmering within minutes, with tomatoes, fresh basil, and garlic. He added some Kalamata olives for a bit of a salty flavor. The water boiled for pasta while the sauce simmered, garlic bread heated in the oven, and a bottle of red wine breathed.
“My apartment has never smelled so good.” Alyssa had come out of the bathroom. She wore a robe that ended mid-thigh, revealing her toned legs.
Zach swallowed hard. Her creamy skin glowed with heat and moisture from the shower. Water slicked her hair back, revealing the fine bone structure of her face. His cock twitched. She looked exquisite. And so very tempting.
He took a step toward her before he controlled himself. She needed caring, not seducing. He clenched his fists and stopped, turning back to the stove. Blindly, he picked up the spoon and stirred the sauce. “Dinner will be ready in about ten minutes.”
“Can it wait?” She sounded closer than before.
He didn’t turn around, not sure he could survive seeing her in just a robe again. “Of course. But not too long. You should hurry.”
“Well,” she said in a throaty voice. “If you insist.” A slight slither and thud of her robe hitting the ground made him freeze, though blood surged to his cock.
“What are you doing, Alyssa?” he asked without moving. He couldn’t be responsible for his actions if he saw what she offered.
