by Jillian Hart
“Doesn’t matter. I’m not leaving.” The bad guys who’d trashed her apartment might think she had the key in her purse, or in a pocket. He wasn’t taking any chances—much to her relief.
Amusement entered her green eyes. “You are a stubborn man.”
One side of his mouth cocked upward. “So I’ve been told.” She left the doorway and returned a moment later dragging the desk chair behind her. “Here. At least sit.”
Her thoughtfulness touched him deeply, making him want to pull her into his arms and kiss her.
He stepped back in surprise. Whoa! Not a good idea. Keep it professional. She needed his protection, not his advances.
Though standing guard wasn’t exactly part of his job description. A fact he chose to ignore.
“Thank you.” He positioned the chair to the left of the door.
He straightened and turned back toward the open door, expecting her to still be standing in the doorway. But she’d moved and stood just inches from him. She slipped her arms around his waist and laid her cheek against his chest. Stunned, yet thrilled by her gesture, he wrapped his arms around her, savoring the moment.
This definitely wasn’t professional. Kristin felt way too good in his arms, too right. It had been a long time since he’d wanted to hold a woman close, not just physically but emotionally. He was in way over his head. The smart thing would be to arrange for a uniformed officer to replace him. The smart thing to do would be to let Paul take the lead on this. The smart thing to do would be to back off, right now.
But sometimes he wasn’t so smart.
She leaned her head back, her eyes wide and full of tenderness. “You are a good man, Detective Andy Howell.” Her words were a soothing balm to his weary soul and a bucket of reality to his sanity.
He kissed her forehead and then steered her back to the room. “Goodnight,” he said and firmly shut the door to her room.
And his heart.
Chapter Twelve
A scream jolted Kristin awake.
She bolted upright, scrambled to a sitting position against the headboard and clutched the covers to her chest. Her heart thudded in her ears. Sweat covered her skin. Her gaze searched the dark hotel room for danger. Shadows from the city lights danced at the edge of the curtains.
The scream echoed inside her head.
Sharp pounding at the door sent her stomach plunging with fear.
“Kristin!”
More banging.
Andy.
Desperate to see him, she jumped from the bed and ran for the door. Her fingers scrabbled with the lock until it finally gave way. She yanked the door open.
Tears sprang to her eyes. “Andy.”
“Are you okay?” His frantic gaze swept the darkened room beyond her shoulder. “You screamed.”
It had been her that had screamed. “Bad dream.”
He pulled her to him, his strong arms enveloping her. Tension left her body in a swoosh, leaving her legs wobbly. She clung to him like a lifeline in a storm.
He lifted her face with his hands. His gaze searched her face. “You’re sure you’re okay?”
Feeling foolish for alarming him, she tried for a smile. Her lips quivered. “I’m sorry. Ever since Sue’s murder I keep dreaming about Charlie coming after me.”
He smoothed a hand over her hair. “He can’t hurt you. I’m not going to let anyone hurt you.”
She wanted to believe that. Needed to believe that. “You can’t make that promise. That’s not something you can control.”
His eyebrows drew together in a frown. “I can do everything humanly possible.”
“True.” She reached up to cup his jaw. “But only God is in control. We have none.”
A fact that agitated her stomach to no end.
“Then we’ll have to pray for His help.”
She dropped her gaze to the front of his wrinkled white shirt and red-striped tie. “I know that, but sometimes, it’s so hard to...remember and trust.”
Confessing that out loud lifted a weight off her shoulders. She hadn’t realized how much she needed someone in her life she could talk to without feeling she’d be judged. Andy wouldn’t judge her. She was sure of it.
One corner of his mouth lifted in a wry smile. “Believe me, I understand.”
She hurt for him, for the pain he carried because of what had happened to his sister. Kristin cupped his jaw in her hand. “We’re quite a pair.”
He turned his head to place a kiss in her palm.
Delicious shivers shimmered down her arm to tickle her heart. She met his gaze. The intensity in his dark eyes sent her pulse racing and made her breath stall.
Was Andy as attracted to her as she was to him?
His gaze lowered to her lips. “You should try to get some sleep,” he said, his voice low and husky. Good advice. But probably not doable. Not when all she wanted was for him to kiss her. To kiss her fear away.
But that would bring its own danger. Time to retreat. “Goodnight. Again.”
Once Kristin had relocked the door, she pressed her hand to the solid wood as if she could touch him through the obstacle standing in the way.
Earlier today she’d told him she liked him. But her feelings went beyond like to a deeper caring that scared her.
Did she really have enough faith to trust God to keep him safe?
Chapter Thirteen
Andy had expected Kristin’s store to be full of girly froufrou stuff, and though there was some, she had a very nice men’s section with some trendy as well as classic pieces. A nice surprise.
When he had the time, he planned on taking Kristin up on the offer to outfit him. He looked around, eyeing the selections and their price tags. If he could afford it.
She joined him in front of a display where a navy, Italian designer-brand suit hung from a wooden hanger. “That would look divine on you.”
He didn’t need to look at the price tag to know it was out of his budget.
“I’ll bet you’re a forty-one long.” She pulled a coat from its hanger. “Here, try this on.”
Giving in to the urge to do as she instructed, he slipped off his houndstooth sport coat and put on the one she handed to him.
“Perfect,” she said. “Look.” She steered him to a mirror.
He had to admit the jacket fit like it had been made for him. He turned slightly to see the back. He really liked the coat. Maybe he could splurge just once.
“Hello?” Tony Guzman, one of New York’s finest walked into the store.
Embarrassed to be caught preening in front of the mirror, Andy shrugged out of the coat, handed it back to Kristin and took his own jacket back before going to greet the officer.
“Tony, thanks for coming.” Andy shook his hand and introduced Kristin.
She pulled Andy aside. “Are you sure this is necessary? Having a uniformed officer in the store might scare away the customers.”
“He’ll keep a low profile,” Andy assured her.
She looked unconvinced.
“Humor me, okay?”
After a moment she gave a slow nod.
“I’ll check in later,” Andy said before leaving the store.
He headed back to the station knowing Kristin was in good hands. When he arrived, Paul waved a paper in his face. “Here’s a list of all the establishments with safe deposit boxes within a fifty mile radius of Hyong’s apartment.”
“You rock. Let’s go.” Andy needed to find Sue Hyong’s safe deposit box. Because whatever she’d hidden was the key to her murder. And the key to keeping Kristin safe.
After countless banks, Paul and Andy finally found a bank manager of a small savings and loan in the Bowery who confirmed that Sue Hyong had a safe deposit box in their facility
.
The bank manager took Paul and Andy back to the vault, motioning to the one registered under Sue Hyong’s name. Andy inserted the key into the small lock and pulled out the long narrow box. He set it on the table and opened the lid.
“It’s empty,” he said, disbelief curling around his words.
“That’s odd,” Paul said. “Then the key had nothing to do with Hyong’s murder or Conrad’s break-in. What gives?”
Aggravation pulsed in Andy’s veins. “There had to be some reason Hyong secured this box.”
He inspected the box on all sides. Nothing. Frustrated, he gave the box a vicious shake. Something rattled inside the box.
Surprised anticipation rocketed through his system. He quickly righted the box. A small piece of plastic slid to a halt in the center of the box.
“Hey, this is what we’re looking for,” he exclaimed as excitement revved through him. He picked up the square piece of plastic. “It’s a memory card for a cell phone.”
“Let’s get it to the lab.” Paul led the way back to the car.
As Paul drove, Andy called Kristin at the store. She would want to know what they’d found.
The phone rang and rang, but there was no answer. Apprehension zinged across Andy’s flesh. He tightened his grip on the phone. Why wasn’t she answering? Where was the guard?
He snapped the phone closed. “Something’s wrong.”
Paul switched lanes, skidded into a U-turn and headed toward SoHo.
Chapter Fourteen
Thankful that the light of day had banished the nightmare from last night, Kristin stripped the mannequin in the front window display of her boutique and hummed a tune her parents had written. The lively tune brought back a memory of her childhood. She’d been thirteen, old enough to help set up equipment for the band.
For one moment, she’d stood on the stage staring out at the gathering crowd and excitement had zinged through her. As much as she’d resented the life her parents had chosen for them, she did understand the allure of that rush.
She’d felt that same excitement when she opened the store. And every day since.
Reaching for a new outfit to put on the mannequin, she let her gaze wander to the world outside. A typical summer afternoon. People passed by on the sidewalk, some hurrying with places to go and others meandering, out for a stroll along the trendy street making up the South of Houston area of Manhattan.
A young boy dawdling behind his mother stopped to stare at Kristin. She smiled at the kid. The boy stuck his tongue out.
With a laugh, Kristin turned her attention back to her display. She zipped up the animal-print skirt and was adjusting the hem of the matching top when the acrid smell of smoke assaulted her senses.
Alarm quickened her breath. She scrambled out of the display window, nearly knocking over the mannequin, and rushed into the body of the store.
“Hurry, we have to leave.” The young, fresh-faced officer who’d been assigned to stand guard rushed toward her. “The storage room is on fire.”
No! This store was her life and she wasn’t about to let everything she’d worked so hard for be burned to ash. She pushed past the officer and grabbed a fire extinguisher from behind the cashier’s counter.
“Call the fire department.” She sprinted to the storage room.
Tendrils of dark smoke curled upward from the space under the closed door like long, grasping black fingers. Adrenaline-laced fear made her fingers clumsy as she struggled to operate the extinguisher.
The officer grabbed the extinguisher from her. “You call 911. I’ll do this.” Urgency pounded in her blood. She scurried to the phone and fumbled to dial the emergency number. She barked out the necessary information to the too-calm operator.
Anxiety twisted in her gut as flame now licked at the storage room. She stumbled through the growing smoke to find the officer, but the welcome sight of a firefighter dressed in his turnout gear deterred her. He motioned her toward the front door.
“This way,” the muffled voice said from inside the mask covering his face.
Relief eased some of the panic tightening her chest. Help had arrived. Impressed by the quick response to her emergency call, she hustled to the door. “There’s a police officer still inside.”
“We’ll get him,” the firefighter replied. He took her firmly by the arm and pulled her outside to the sidewalk.
Kristin glanced around as the firefighter rushed her toward the corner and away from the building. There was no fire truck or any emergency response vehicles parked in the street. But the distant cries of sirens drew closer.
Confusion rushed in, quickly chased by apprehension. She dug in her heels, unsuccessfully trying to stop their forward momentum. “Wait! Where are you taking me?”
Chapter Fifteen
The man dressed as a firefighter brutally tightened his fingers on Kristin’s arm with bruising force and dragged her to the street where a big black SUV waited. The back door flung open.
Alarm and fear exploded inside Kristin. She screamed, “Help! Help me!”
She twisted and yanked against her captor’s fierce grip, but he was too strong. He pushed her into the vehicle and someone roughly shoved a pungent smelling cloth against her face.
She clawed at the hands holding the rag. A wave of dizziness washed over her. Her limbs suddenly refused to move as she collapsed on the seat. Hands pushed and pulled until she was completely inside and the door was slammed shut, the sound echoing inside her head.
She tried to move to see who had her, but her body wouldn’t cooperate. The world narrowed to a pinprick of light that quickly vanished.
* * *
Paul brought the sedan to a screeching halt next to a fire truck. Andy’s heart raced with disbelief. Smoke billowed out of Kristin’s store.
Panic clawed at Andy’s insides like a caged cat. He jumped from the car and ran toward the front door. A firefighter grabbed him, preventing him from running into the dense smoke.
“Where’s Kristin?” Andy yelled. “The owner?”
The firefighter shook his head.
Fear, stark and breath-stealing, seized him and wouldn’t let go.
I can’t lose her, not when I’ve just found her. He wasn’t sure where that thought had come from, but there was no time to analyze his feelings. Only one thing mattered—Kristin. “Please, God, please, don’t let her be dead.”
With a fierce yank, Andy broke free of the firefighter’s restraining hands and rushed closer to where two paramedics worked on Tony, the officer assigned to protect Kristin.
Andy knelt down beside the sooty officer. “Kristin? Where is she?”
Tony grabbed at the oxygen mask covering his face and pulled it away to talk. “She got...out.”
Andy sagged back on his heels with relief. But he needed to see for himself that she was safe. He bolted, pushing through the crowd. “Kristin! Kristin Conrad!”
Where was she?
“Hey, Mister,” a raspy voice called to him. “You lookin’ for the shop lady?”
Andy’s gaze landed on a disheveled man hunched near the corner waving to him. Hungry for any information, he hurried over. Digging into his pocket for some change, he questioned the man. “Did you see her? Do you know where she is?”
Taking the change like precious gems, the homeless man nodded and pointed to the side street. “Firefighter stuffed her into a big black monster. It took off that way.” He pointed south.
Terror squeezed his lungs like a vice. “A firefighter? Are you sure?”
“Yep. He looked just like them others, only his hat was yeller instead of black.”
Unsure of the reliability of the man’s story, Andy swiftly moved to the firefighter giving orders. Andy flashed his badge. “Hey, any of your guys wearing a yellow
helmet?”
“No. Why?”
Gesturing to the homeless man, Andy said, “He saw the owner of the store being forced into a black vehicle by a firefighter with a yellow hat.”
“Not one of my guys,” the chief assured him.
Dread and panic closed around Andy’s throat.
Kristin had been kidnapped!
Chapter Sixteen
“Did you find her?” Paul asked.
Shaking his head, Andy choked out the details of Kristin’s abduction, though he clung to the hope that the homeless guy had been wrong.
Paul looked around and then pointed across the street on the corner to a bank building. “Let’s check if they have a video of the abduction.”
Moving in a fog of fear and alarm, Andy ran with Paul to the bank and burst through the double doors. They explained the situation to the startled security guard and were led to the security office.
“Do you have a video feed of the southwest corner?” Andy asked, urging the man to move fast. They were losing precious time. He had to find Kristin.
The officer manning the desk nodded. “Sure do.”
“Rewind the tape,” Paul instructed.
With a few clicks, the video monitor showed the activity on the street in reverse mode.
“There!” Andy pointed to the images on the screen. Terror slayed his soul as he watched Kristin being forced into a black SUV by a firefighter in turnout gear and a yellow helmet. A mask obscured the man’s face as he came around the front of the vehicle and got in on the passenger side. The SUV sped away. The license plate was conspicuously missing. Glare from the sun obscured the other occupants.
Rage cut off the air supply to Andy’s brain. Impotent fury aimed at himself for not keeping her safe roared in his ears. For a moment the room dimmed. He struck out at the wall with a fist.
