Most Wanted Woman

by Maggie Price

  His mood darkened as the reminder of the past month threw a mental switch, rerouting his thoughts. The bitterness over having been accused of planting evidence in a rapist’s apartment was still there, simmering with a foul taste he’d almost grown used to. What he would never get used to was how his nearly losing his badge and the job that defined him had hurt his family. A law enforcement family, in which cops were the majority and wearing a uniform was a matter of pride.

  He respected the badge and the law. He had just found it sometimes necessary, while coming up through the ranks, to circumvent the letter of the law in order to get what he needed to take down a guilty bad guy. No harm, no foul…until he’d been at the right place at the wrong time, and his reputation for stretching the rules had gone far in having a hell of a lot of cops suspect the worst of him.

  And, yeah, he had looked guilty—who knew better than a sex crimes detective what evidence was needed to score a slam-dunk conviction on a rape? The whole squad had known he’d spent uncountable off-duty hours trying to track down the vicious six-time rapist. And stretching the rules innumerable ways just to get the bastard’s scent wasn’t something he’d shy away from—but crossing the line wasn’t one of those ways. The finger-pointing in Josh’s direction, the insinuation that he’d planted evidence had him close to quitting the force in a rage. And then he’d thought about his family and what the badge meant to him. So he’d swallowed back that rage and in the end managed to clear himself.

  Now that he was back in the department’s good graces, he intended to toe the line a little closer when he reported back to duty.

  Another mile down the road Josh steered into the drive of what he’d considered his second home for his entire life. The three-story structure was an architectural masterpiece. Built on a sloped, heavily wooded lot and made entirely of cedar and glass, it had a broad wraparound porch and a wide chimney built of local rock that had been weathered to a soft gray. Beyond the lush back lawn lay Paradise Lake, its rambling shoreline coiling like a snake across the Oklahoma-Texas border.

  Josh climbed out of the car. Instead of heading for the house, he strode across the drive and skirted the hedge that separated McCall and Truelove property.

  Although only a single porch light glowed beside Etta’s front door, Josh knew from memory that the two-story house was painted a pale blue with white shutters. A wooden swing suspended on chains dangled from the porch’s ceiling.

  The air around him sparked with fireflies as he headed up the walk lined by plants that formed shadowy shapes in the night. By the time he reached the porch, the front door had swung open.

  “Joshua McCall, if you aren’t a sight for sore eyes.”

  The woman standing behind the patched screen door, soft light glowing behind her, was tall and lean with a helmet of iron-gray curls framing a square-jawed face. She wore a short-sleeved yellow cotton dress that hit her midcalf.

  “So are you.” Frowning at the snow-white cast on her right leg, he jogged up the porch steps, gripped the screen she held half open and dropped a kiss on her forehead. He couldn’t remember when he’d actually met the gregarious tavern owner and her late husband. They had just always been permanent fixtures during his summers at the lake. As had their two sons who had wreaked havoc with the McCall brothers.

  “How’s your foot, Etta?”

  “Healing too slow for my liking.” Her scowl emphasized the network of lines around her eyes and mouth. “Come in and sit, Joshua. I can use the company.”

  “You’re sure it’s not too late?”

  “Not for this night owl.” Leaning on a cane, she limped across the living room filled with furniture positioned on an earth-toned rug. Colorful candles and crocheted throws added to the room’s sense of comfort.

  “Who’s this?” Josh asked, pausing to stroke a finger over the jet-black kitten curled on the recliner.

  “Anthracite. She’s a stray who wouldn’t leave.”

  “Especially after you fed her, I bet.”

  “What else was I supposed to do? Poor thing was starving.”

  Josh scratched behind one furry ear, and was rewarded with a purr. “You named her after coal?”

  “Scotty did,” Etta said, referring to her youngest grandson. “When he saw the kitten, he decided she looked like the coal he’d learned about in science class.”

  “Good call.” Leaving the kitten sharpening its claws on the recliner, Josh followed Etta along a hallway. When they neared the kitchen, he raised his chin. “Do I smell apple pie?”

  “You do. I decided to bake tonight and just took the last of the pies out of the oven. Could be I had a premonition you’d show up, looking too thin for your own good.”

  Blame that on his suspension, he thought.

  He followed her into the kitchen, painted in soft yellow, its white-tiled countertops sparkling beneath the bright overhead light. “Have I told you I’m crazy about you?”

  “Every time you want pie.” She waved him to the small metal table. “Have a seat and I’ll cut us some.”

  “You sit.” Placing a hand on her bony shoulder, he nudged her to a chair. “Everything still in the same place?”

  “Nothing’s changed.” Etta shifted a stack of mail to one corner of the table. “There’s tea in the refrigerator.”

  Minutes later, he had slices of pie and glasses of iced tea on the table. Josh settled into the chair across from hers, lifted his fork and dug in. The warm pie tasted like heaven.

  “How’s the family?” Etta asked before taking her first bite.

  “Mom and Dad are rocking along. Everybody’s married now, except Nate and myself. He’s fallen for a gorgeous ex-cop from Dallas. He and Paige just moved in together.” Feeling a tug on his sock, Josh looked down in time to see Anthracite attack his shoe. Chuckling, he scooped her up, settled her onto his lap and went back to his pie. “I figure it’s only a matter of time before Nate calls and tells me to rent a wedding tux.”

  Etta regarded him over the rim of her glass. “Think it’s time you found a girl of your own?”

  “I got tons of ’em,” he drawled.

  “You’ll settle down when you find the right woman.”

  “She’ll have to find me because I’m not looking for her.” The simple fact was his life had always run more efficiently solo. After Nate moved out of the house they’d shared, Josh had discovered how much he savored living alone. Made things less complicated. Just like women whose idea of the perfect relationship was a good time, a fast ride and a friendly parting.

  As he popped the last bite of pie into his mouth, his gaze settled on the stack of mail on the corner of the table. “Is that a digital recorder?” he asked, plucking up the long silver piece of metal that sat on top of the stack.

  “Michael bought me that gadget,” Etta said, referring to her eldest son. “I use it to record reminders. Like when to take my medicine. I call it my memory box.”

  “Smart.”

  “The thing tends to startle me when my own voice comes out of the blue, telling me to take my pills. There’s already enough going on around Sundown to make a person nervous.”

  Josh set the recorder aside. “I heard about the prowler.”

  “Whoever it is has been peeping in windows for months now. Chief Decker hasn’t had any luck catching him.”

  Josh frowned. From working sex crimes, he knew that prowlers sometimes turned out to be Peeping Toms, who had the potential of escalating to indecent exposure, then more serious sex crimes. Like rape. His own career problems had been due to one man’s zeal to take down the six-time rapist.

  “How were things at my tavern tonight?”

  Etta’s question diverted his thoughts. “The place was packed.” Leaning back, he watched the kitten climb up his chest, wincing when her razor-sharp claws stabbed through his shirt. “Howie’s burgers are still gold. Deni’s as big a flirt as ever. Your new bartender is…interesting.”

  “Regan’s a pretty little thing, isn’t she?
All that dark hair and those big brown eyes.”

  Cat’s eyes, he thought again. Watching and waiting. For what?

  “I baked an extra pie for her,” Etta added, sliding her plate aside. “The girl’s way too thin. She hardly ever sits still and she eats like a bird.”

  “And brings to mind a raw nerve.”

  “How so?”

  “Cops get used to people getting fidgety around them—goes with the job. But what I do for a living didn’t come up, so it wasn’t that.” He sipped his tea. “I can’t put my finger on why I made Regan nervous. Yet.”

  Chuckling, Etta patted his hand. “Joshua, men who are all rakish charm and promise of trouble to come have given women the jitters since the beginning of time. You’re no exception.”

  “You think that’s it? My charm made Regan itchy?”

  “What else could it be?”

  “Yeah, what else?” He thought about how effectively she had evaded his questions, divulging next to nothing about herself. “Does Regan have a last name?”

  “Doesn’t everyone? Hers is Ford.”

  “Regan Ford,” he said, trying it out. Regan Ford, hailing from no particular place, yet sounding to him more like the deep South than anywhere else. “I take it you checked her employment record and references before you hired her?”

  “I didn’t need to. My instincts told me to take a chance on her. She’s living in the apartment over the tavern.”

  With the kitten now propped on his shoulder, Josh crossed his forearms on the table. “You gave her a job and a place to live without running a background check? That’s not wise, Etta.”

  “My late husband had a philosophy about the tavern business. Never water down the whiskey and, when it comes to employees, follow your heart.” She raised a shoulder. “I had a good feeling about Regan, so I offered her the job. The apartment over the tavern was empty, so why not let her live there?”

  “Why not check her out first?”

  “Like I said, I had a good feeling about her. Anyway, I had her work the same shift I did the first month she was here. Time has proven me right about Regan. She works like a trooper. The register has never come up short on her shift. Now that I’m stove up, Regan adds up all the receipts, makes the bank deposits and balances the books. She handles the ordering. You think either Howie or Deni, or any of my day workers could do that without making a mess of things?”

  “I doubt it.” Like most cops, he had a healthy distrust of all mankind. Knowing that Etta had turned over her bank account to a woman she hadn’t checked out didn’t sit well. At all.

  “Regan’s got a caring soul,” Etta continued. “The day cook makes me lunch and Regan brings it here. She takes the time to sit with me on the porch and visit. She runs the vacuum and dusts. Does my marketing. And cooks dinner for A.C. and me here every Sunday on her night off.”

  “You ever ask Mystery Woman where she’s from? Where she’s worked?”

  “No.”

  He settled his hand on Etta’s. “You’re letting a woman you know nothing about handle your money and basically run your business. Who’s to say she won’t empty your bank account and disappear? Let me look into her background. Check her references. I can call Nate, have him run her through the national crime database.”

  Etta’s blue eyes met his squarely. “Joshua McCall, do you own a part interest in my tavern?”

  He sighed. “No, ma’am.”

  “Then leave my business to me. I may not know everything about Regan, but I know what matters.”

  It was all Josh could do not to remind Etta of the drifter she’d trusted a few years ago. The guy had tended bar only a week before he cleaned out the safe then disappeared.

  Etta pointed a long, sturdy finger his way. “While we’re on the subject, I want you to understand that I’m fond of Regan. I don’t expect she needs to get all stirred up over a man who goes through women like water.”

  “I don’t plan on doing any stirring in that area.” He glanced at the pies cooling on the counter. “I forgot to stop by the mini-mart, so I need to drive back into town. How about I drop off Regan’s pie while I’m at it?”

  “Sounds good.”

  He set Anthracite on the floor, gathered up the plates and carried them to the sink. What he did intend to do was look after Etta’s best interests. Which meant finding out all there was to know about Regan Ford.

  Chapter 2

  “C’mon, Regan. Let’s you ’n me go upstairs to your place ’n have some fun.”

  “Not interested.” Regan stood at the tavern’s front door, staring up into Seamus O’Toole’s bloodshot eyes. The beefy Dallas used-car dealership owner’s breath smelled like a brewery.

  He leaned in. “There’s lots of women mighty glad they said yes to old Seamus.”

  “Not interested, Mr. O’Toole. At all.”

  When Regan shifted to open the door, he lunged, thrusting a finger in her face. “Whas’ wrong with you? Don’cha like men? You one of them flamin’…”

  As quick as a snake, her hand lashed out, grabbed his outstretched thumb, and forced it back into his wrist.

  Howling, O’Toole dropped to his knees.

  Behind her, Regan heard the kitchen door swing open.

  “Need some help?”

  Keeping a grip on O’Toole’s thumb, she glanced across her shoulder. Howie Lyons stood with the door propped open, a metal mop bucket behind him. After six months of working together, Truelove’s night cook knew Regan could hold her own with an obnoxious drunk.

  “I’ve got this covered.” She looked down at O’Toole. His face was beet-red, his forehead beaded with sweat. “I said no. Got it?”

  “Yeah. Sweet Jesus, I hear ya.”

  She let go of his thumb and stepped back two paces.

  With his knees creaking in protest, he lurched to his feet. “Ya’ crazy broad! You tried ta’ break my thumb.”

  “If I intended to break it, you’d need a cast right now.” She didn’t add that due to her paramedic training, she could also apply that cast. “Did you drive or walk tonight, Mr. O’Toole?”

  “Can’t ’member,” he mumbled while massaging his bruised thumb.

  Regan shoved the door open. A gleaming silver Beemer sporting a dealer’s tag sat in the parking lot beneath one of the mercury vapor lamps.

  “You drove, but you’re walking home.” She held out a hand. “Give me your keys. I’ll put them behind the bar. You can pick the car up when you’re sober, like you did last week.”

  When he continued glaring at her, she wiggled her fingers. “Keys. You try to drive, you could wind up in a cell.”

  “Maybe.” Wobbling, he dug into a pocket of his khakis. Keys jangled as he slapped them into her palm. “Somebody oughta do something ’bout man-hatin’ women,” he sneered as he lurched out the door.

  “Idiot,” Regan said under her breath. After setting the lock, she wove her way around the tables, then stepped behind the bar. She dropped O’Toole’s keys inside a drawer, then hesitated.

  Still wearing his grease-smeared apron over his black T-shirt and jeans, Howie gave her a considering look while overturning chairs onto the tables on the far side of the dance floor. “Something wrong?”

  “What if that moron staggers in front of a car and gets mowed down?”

  “You nearly ripped off O’Toole’s thumb. Now you’re worried about him stepping in front of a car?”

  “I’m thinking about Etta. If O’Toole gets hurt, Truelove’s could get sued because he got drunk here.”

  “Right,” Howie said. “When I leave I’ll drive the route to his house. Make sure he hasn’t stumbled and hit his head.”

  “Thanks.”

  Since she had already washed the pitchers and glasses, re-stocked the cooler, wiped down the bar and locked the night’s receipts in the safe, Regan was free to head upstairs. Instead, she began overturning chairs onto the tables.

  “You don’t have to do that,” Howie reminded her. “My job.” />
  “I’ve got time,” she said, hefting another chair.

  Snagging an oversize broom, he began sweeping up peanut shells. “I guess neither of us have someone waitin’ at home,” he commented, his voice now harsh and bitter. “Regan, you ever know anyone who claimed to have found religion? Someone who went off the deep end, preaching fire and brimstone?”

  “No.” Etta had told her she suspected the night cook’s motive for taking on the tavern’s janitorial duties after his wife left him was to delay going home to an empty apartment.

  “It’s hard defending yourself when someone gets certain ideas into their head.” Howie shook his head. “There’s battles a person just can’t win.”

  Regan pulled her bottom lip between her teeth. She wasn’t trying to win a battle. She was trying to stay hidden.

  After a few minutes of their working in silence, Howie raised a shoulder as he wielded the broom. “I expect havin’ Josh McCall in town’ll make Etta happy, being they’re close.”

  Regan felt another stab of unease as she pictured McCall sitting at the bar, watching her just a bit too closely with those dark eyes. Eyes that had made her shiver as she fought their hypnotic pull. She had become so accustomed to the numb bleakness inside her that feeling even a slight attraction to any man unnerved her.

  With all the chairs overturned, she walked to the jukebox, its light painting her arm gold as she reached to flip off the power. “Do you know McCall?”

  “Sure. His family’s been coming to Sundown long as I can remember. Josh and Etta’s oldest boy were forever getting into mischief.” Howie nudged the mop bucket toward a corner. “Those two caught hell one summer when they raided the Camp Fire Girls overnight jamboree.” He chuckled as he put his back into mopping. “Now Etta’s oldest is a minister and Josh is a cop. Who’d have thought?”

  “I figured out the cop part on my own,” Regan muttered.

  “What’d you say?”

  “Nothing.” She slid the key to her apartment out of her jeans pocket. “I’m going upstairs. Lock up when you leave.”

  “Will do.”

  Giving the area a last check, she headed toward a door on the opposite side of the barroom. After dealing with the lock, she reached in and flipped on the light. The narrow staircase was as straight as a ruler, with no shadowy nooks or crannies in which someone could hide.