Harlequin Superromance May 2016 Box Set

by Janice Kay Johnson

  “No, but—” He shook his head. Probably he should remove his hand, but he couldn’t make himself. The next movement was more subtle, something passing beneath the surface of the water. His awareness that this was a baby, his baby, made the sensation incredible. “How do you sleep?”

  “She does get active when I’m relaxed. I think my walking around rocks her, so she goes to sleep. I’m told sleep for me gets to be more of a challenge the bigger she gets. Eventually, she’ll be punching and kicking me. I haven’t felt hiccups yet, either, which happens.”

  “You have three more months.”

  “Not quite.” She paused. “Unlike most people, I know exactly when I got pregnant.”

  Yeah, she did.

  “I keep track. Tomorrow, I’ll be at exactly twenty-seven weeks. So I do have ten or eleven weeks to go, if I make it full term.”

  Jolted, he said, “You might not?”

  “Well...if my blood pressure becomes a real issue, the doctor might decide at some point to induce labor.” While he was still reeling from that, she gave him a small lecture on pregnancy and what was still to come. He was blown away to learn that the fetus was already fourteen or fifteen inches long.

  “She probably only weighs a couple of pounds, though. Maybe a little more.” Lina looked ruefully down at herself. “She takes up more space than she should.”

  Since he hadn’t felt any more movement, Bran reluctantly removed his hand. Lina immediately tugged her shirt down and lifted the throw back up to her chin.

  “Thank you,” he said huskily.

  “Yes, well...” She drew the last word out as she sneaked a glance at him, her shyness resurfacing.

  That bothered him until he reminded himself how very intimate they’d become on one level, while having spent so little time together. She’d only come back into his life...five days ago? Was that all?

  “Well?” he prompted. Probably he should go back to his chair, but he liked sitting close enough to see the fine texture of her skin, the way her lashes curled, the striations of color in her eyes.

  “I was leading into an invitation,” she said.

  He sat back. Was she actually...

  “I don’t know if you’re interested or...or can get away, but I have a doctor’s appointment on Wednesday at ten. You could hear the baby’s heartbeat.”

  Ah. A doctor’s appointment.

  “You’re not driving yourself,” he reminded her, ignoring the flare of mutiny on her face. “But I’d like to come anyway.” He stared halfway down the fleece throw to where he decided the swell of her pregnancy had to be. A heartbeat. Damn. “How often do you go?”

  “Monthly, at this stage. I think weekly the last month, at least.”

  “Okay.” And he’d be at every one of them with her.

  “I’ll be taking childbirth classes, too. The session lasts six weeks, and they have evening classes.”

  Was that an invitation, too? “Are they just for mothers?”

  She shook her head. “We’re encouraged to bring a partner to be a coach. The father, or...or a friend. I’d asked Maya, but—” Her voice broke. “If you do it, you’d have to stay for the birth. If you think—”

  “Yeah.” God, now he sounded hoarse. “Of course I want to do it. You couldn’t keep me away.”

  “Well, good. I mean, we haven’t talked about how involved you’ll want to be once she’s born, but—”

  Bran didn’t let her finish. “Very. This is my child. Did you think I’d just write checks?”

  She scrutinized him as if this was the first time she’d ever had the chance. Maybe, in a way, it was. Finally, slowly, Lina shook her head.

  “No, you’d never turn your back on your own child. From the minute you asked me to trust you, I suppose I knew.”

  “Knew?”

  “You’d...take responsibility.” She offered a small, crooked smile. “Look at how far you’ve gone to keep me safe, just because of the baby. It’s not as if we’re—”

  Abruptly pissed, he cut her off. “We are, Lina. I told you, I’d have called you right away if you hadn’t run out on me. Every time since I’ve seen a woman with hair close to the color of yours, or who walks like you do, I looked. I’d catch a voice, and turn. Don’t pretend we’re strangers.”

  Her eyes widened before she ducked her head. “Okay.”

  “That’s it? Okay?”

  She looked up again. “Isn’t that enough?”

  No. It wouldn’t be enough until she agreed to marry him, but he knew she wouldn’t believe he really wanted her and not only the baby if he asked this soon. And...was that even the truth?

  Bran was shaken by his lack of doubt. There was a reason he’d been celibate for six long months, and counting. Until that night six months ago, when Lina had stepped into his arms as if it were the most natural place in the world for her, Bran hadn’t understood the punch Zach had felt the first time he set eyes on Tess. Not that he was inclined to slap a label on how he’d felt. Whatever love was, he didn’t want to feel it, not after witnessing firsthand the damage love had done to his father.

  Lina...felt right, that’s all. They fit. Sooner or later, she’d see that. And, although he didn’t like the threat to her, this proximity was a fortunate side benefit. Because he voted for sooner rather than later.

  He really wanted her in his bed.

  Prudently, he withdrew to the recliner. “I’ll stick around in the morning until the artist shows. I can make calls without going in. Novinski dodged me today, which I don’t appreciate.” Annoyance killed some of the sexual tension. “We’re doing most of the legwork, and she can’t even keep me informed?”

  “She might have had the day off,” Lina suggested.

  “In the middle of an investigation like this?”

  “She may always be in the middle of this kind of investigation. A bank robbery is a rarity for us, but it’s probably not for her.”

  “You’re right.” In fact, Novinski was a specialist in bank robbery. He let his irritation subside, if reluctantly. “Still. They’re looking at footage at Snoqualmie Community Bank. One of those two had to pay it a visit. Hard to get through two sets of doors without looking straight ahead into a camera.”

  “I’ve been praying you’d find a clear picture of his face. Of either of their faces,” she corrected herself.

  “It would take the pressure off you,” he agreed. “Although not until we find a way to let them know we have it.”

  “Which would mean publishing it.”

  Bran moved restlessly. “Maybe.”

  Lina didn’t call him on the equivocation, assuming she recognized it as such. She only nodded. “What time did you say the artist will be here?”

  “She’s coming from north Seattle, aiming for nine thirty or ten, depending on traffic.”

  “Oh, in that case, I think I’ll go to bed now.” She sounded elaborately casual. “Or at least read in bed for a while.” She slid forward, putting her stocking feet on the floor.

  He would be better entertainment than her book. Take her to the heights, let her down softly. Rock her to sleep.

  His fingers bit into the upholstered arms of the recliner. “Good night, then. I’ll need to use the bathroom once you’re out.”

  She nodded, for no real reason. This was inevitably an awkward moment. Their toothbrushes now sat side by side in a ceramic holder. She’d made apologies, but some of her toiletries cluttered the counter. He had assured her he didn’t mind. In the morning, after she’d showered, her much smaller feet left an imprint on his bath mat. The bathroom had taken to smelling like her, as if he brushed against mint leaves every time he stepped in. The bedroom...well...he still had to go in there in the mornings to collect clean clothes.

  He hadn’t lived with anyone else for a long
time. Paige had spent the night occasionally, or he had gone to her apartment, but not often because of their working schedules. Of course he’d had roommates in college and after. Living with Lina did not feel the same.

  She admitted to needing a book to settle down once she went to bed. He’d be staring at a dark ceiling for hours—and not only because the damn sofa wasn’t quite long enough.

  They said their good-nights. Bran listened grimly to the quiet sounds she made brushing her teeth, braiding her hair and doing whatever else it was women did getting ready for bed.

  Could it be she was waiting for him to make a move? He stifled a groan. He wished. Five days, he reminded himself. The next time he took her to bed, it would really mean something, and they both knew it. Let her know you, he thought, and wanted it to happen faster.

  He heard the soft sound of the bedroom door closing and sighed, rising to gather his bedding from the small linen closet where he stuffed it every morning.

  CHAPTER NINE

  “I THINK...THE HAIRLINE was higher.” Lina closed her eyes, trying to freeze that one instant when the bank robber and she had stared at each other. “It came to a sort of widow’s peak. He’s balding,” she realized. “That’s why he shaves his head.”

  She heard the soft sound of the artist brushing charcoal off the pad, subtly altering lines. When the artist showed her the change, she murmured, “Yes. Did I say there was an earring?”

  “Hoop or post?”

  “Post. I caught a glint, as if it was a stone, not just gold.”

  Hannah Austin had arrived at a little before ten, and within minutes had assembled her drawing board on the dining room table. It turned out she was pregnant, too. At not quite three months, undetectably so thus far. Her warmth and gentleness had made Lina more optimistic before they started.

  “I prefer to work alone with the witness,” Hannah had told Bran. He hadn’t replied, just looked implacable. That was something he did well.

  Apparently resigned, the artist settled for banishing Bran to someplace out of Lina’s sight, saying in a steely voice, “You will not intrude.”

  If he was impatient with Lina’s many hesitations and corrections, she thought thankfully, at least she couldn’t see him. And he had managed to keep his mouth shut.

  She studied the drawing again, still not satisfied. “The jaw doesn’t look quite right,” she decided. “Although I’m not sure why.”

  With a few lines, some blurring, the jaw in the portrait became square, which had her now decisively shaking her head. “No, the other way around, I think. Leaner, more—”

  The artist deftly made changes.

  Lina’s eyes widened as she took in the face, not just one detail at a time. Her heart raced and she felt like hyperventilating. “Oh, God. It’s him.”

  Hannah smiled. “Nothing you want to change?”

  “No. Oh, God,” she said again, stunned to see him looking back at her, and this time without thick glass between them.

  “Lina?” It was Bran, sounding closer than she’d realized he was, the very deepness of his voice calming to her.

  Shivering, she couldn’t tear her eyes from the picture. “I didn’t think it was possible, but...there he is.”

  His big hands closed over her shoulders. She could feel his heat at her back. There was silence as he studied the drawing.

  “Do you know him, Lina?”

  “Yes.” She shook her head. “No.”

  “Only from that day?”

  She expected him to be frustrated, but heard his understanding.

  “No,” she whispered. “No, I’ve seen him somewhere else. I can almost picture it...”

  The artist murmured, “Close your eyes, Lina. Tell me what he was wearing. A T-shirt, or one with a collar? A coat?”

  As if she was in a trance, she heard herself say, “Collar. Blue, like chambray, but dirty. There’s a smear of dirt on his face, too.” But she hit a wall. His surroundings eluded her. Had he been talking to someone else? What was he doing? What was she doing? Lina made a strangled sound that was almost a scream and shot to her feet, pushing the straight-backed chair aside.

  “Hey.” Bran tugged her back against him, until his entire body supported and reassured her. “It’ll come. Forcing...rarely works.”

  “No, but...it’s so close. Why do I have this snapshot that’s so...ungrounded?”

  “It’s more interesting that you remember him at all,” Bran commented. “If you’ve seen him before, there had to be a reason you concentrated on him, if only for a moment before you were distracted.”

  “It’s true,” Hannah put in. “I think the context will float into your mind at some unexpected moment. Worrying at it won’t make it come any faster.”

  Within minutes, Hannah had packed up and, after a last, comforting hug, was gone, taking the drawing with her. She still had work to do on it, she said, and had been promised the use of a room at the station. She would send a copy later today or tomorrow.

  Lina sank down on the sofa. “I’m sorry.”

  “Sorry?” Bran raised his eyebrows. “You and Hannah recreated his face. Even if we don’t go public with it right away, we’ll show it to bank employees, for starters. The FBI must have a whole pool of other potential witnesses from the previous robberies to show it to. And we’ll share it with other law-enforcement agencies. Somebody capable of shooting an innocent woman in cold blood can’t have been a saint before he took up bank robbery as a profession. What do you want to bet he has a record somewhere?”

  “I didn’t think of that.”

  He sat on the coffee table, his knees bumping hers, his craggy face lined with worry. “I hate to leave you. I know you must be bored out of your skull.”

  She wrinkled her nose. “To tell you the truth, I think I’ve had about as much excitement for one day as I can take. I know you won’t like this, but...is there any chance we could go to the pool this evening?”

  Lina could see the refusal forming, but then he blew out a breath.

  “Probably. If we’re careful. Maybe I’ll see if Zach and Tess want to come. He could provide some added security.”

  She had a mental picture of his Camaro sandwiched in a presidential-style convoy, but wasn’t about to argue if it meant she could swim her laps and let go of some of this seemingly unending tension. Which must be doing wonders for her blood pressure, still in the “watch and wait” category at her last doctor’s appointment.

  Of course, there might be another way...

  No. Sex would complicate everything unbearably. Whether she liked it or not, they were locked in a relationship that would last a lifetime. Sex now, for no better reason than because it would release stress, would be foolish.

  Bran had risen to his feet. In that way he had, he stood looking down at her for longer than was comfortable. His expression wasn’t quite a frown, but it was something near. She didn’t dare quite let her eyes meet his, in case he could tell what she’d been thinking. Or...in case he was thinking the same thing.

  “All right,” he said abruptly. “I’ll see you later. I can bring dinner again.”

  “Why don’t I cook?” she suggested. It would fill a little of her time. “You have chicken and hamburgers in the freezer, and most staples. I can come up with something.”

  “Call if you need me to pick up anything at the store,” he said promptly. How like a man.

  She smiled vaguely in his general direction and he left. She heard the dead bolt slide home, turned by a key from the outside. Whatever else Bran felt, he was very committed to keeping her safe.

  * * *

  “DID YOU TAKE a few days off?” he growled. Bran had had his feet stacked on his desk, but when Novinski actually answered her phone, he swung them to the floor and sat up.

  At the desk a
cross from him, Charlie set down his own phone in favor of eavesdropping.

  “I am working on other cases,” the agent told him.

  “More important than this one?”

  She sighed. “No. Listen, I’m forwarding you the best close-ups our tech came up with from what you provided. None of them are any better than what we already had.”

  Which was, to use Zach’s word, squat. Five previous robberies, and, in every case, both of those sons of bitches had managed to keep their faces from appearing on camera while visiting multiple banks on their way to choosing a target.

  “What did you find from Snoqualmie Community’s footage?” This was what had infuriated him most. He was supposed to share, but the FBI didn’t? His willingness to cooperate was leaking away.

  “Nothing,” she said, to his stupefaction. “Not a damn thing. I’d swear neither one of them set foot in that bank in advance.”

  To Charlie, waiting impatiently, Bran shook his head. Aloud, he said, “Crap,” although he was thinking something more profane.

  “I think it’s safe to say one or both of them was already familiar with Snoqualmie Community Bank,” the FBI agent said, which was exactly what Bran was thinking. “They waffled enough to check out a couple other possibilities in town, but went with their first choice.”

  “The artist met with Ms. Jurick this morning,” he said. “She’s confident they nailed his face. As soon as I get the final from Hannah, I’ll send it to you. Somebody, somewhere, knows this piece of scum.”

  “Ms. Jurick doesn’t?”

  “She’s convinced she’s seen him, but not that they’d ever met. He caught her eye, that’s all. But it suggests he is local, or at least has a connection that has brought him to Clear Creek before.”

  “She could easily be convincing herself she’s seen him before.”

  “The face was pretty damn vivid in her mind.”

  “Not surprising, given the circumstances in which she saw him.” When he stayed silent, she added, “It sounds as if you’ve got her locked down well, even if you’re right and I’m wrong.”

  “That’s not possible.” Teeth bared, he didn’t know whether to be glad Special Agent Novinski couldn’t see him, or wish she could. “I’m one man. She should have round-the-clock coverage.”