Most Wanted Woman

by Maggie Price

  Since the deputy who’d transported her from the convenience store and booked her into the county jail had confiscated her watch, she had no idea how long she’d sat alone in the small, gray-walled interrogation room before Decker arrived. No idea how long he’d spent questioning her.

  It seemed like an eternity had passed since Decker told her Josh had survived the trip to a Dallas E.R. Was he still in surgery? Out of surgery and resting in ICU? Was he even alive?

  She shifted her gaze to the dark-haired man leaning against the far wall who’d arrived with Decker. Dressed in chinos and a hunter-green shirt, Nate McCall was tall and rangy with black hair and a complexion swarthier than his brother’s. But the dark eyes watching her were so much like Josh’s she wanted to weep.

  Decker tapped his pen against the legal pad he’d filled with notes. “That recording doesn’t cancel the murder warrants. There’s a lot of legalese and red tape that has to be dealt with. So I have to keep you in custody until things get worked out with the New Orleans PD.”

  Nate’s cell phone chimed, and both she and Decker jerked their heads his way. Barely breathing, Regan watched him shift to face the wall while he conversed with the caller.

  When Nate finally ended the call he hesitated, then turned. “That was Bran,” he said. “Josh made it out of surgery. His condition’s guarded, but he’s expected to recover.”

  “Thank God,” Regan managed in a thick, trembling whisper.

  “Damn good to hear.” Decker gathered up his pen and legal pad, then rose. He paused to study the scrapes and bruises marring Regan’s left cheek. “You’re pretty banged up. I’m going to have you put in the infirmary instead of a cell.”

  She nodded, dangerously close to tears. “Thank you.”

  “Being the acting sheriff has its perks.” Decker turned to Nate. “You coming?”

  “I’ve got some things to say to Miss Kincaid,” Nate said, moving to the table. “Mind if we use your room awhile longer?”

  “Take as long as you need,” Decker said before walking out.

  Nate placed his palms on the table and leaned toward her. What Regan saw in his eyes wasn’t a cop’s stony hardness, but a brother’s torment.

  “When Josh first told me about you, I thought I should come to Sundown and haul you to jail.”

  She kept her gaze locked with his. “I wish you had. I wish…” She struggled to keep her tears at bay. “That bullet should have hit me. Not Josh. It should have been me.”

  Nate closed his eyes, opened them, then he eased away from the table. “The doctor told Bran if you hadn’t treated Josh’s wound right after he was shot, he would have died before he made it to the E.R.”

  Nate swiped a hand across the back of his neck. “You knew the police were on the way, knew you still had two murder warrants out on you. You could have left my brother bleeding in the dirt and kept running.”

  “No, I couldn’t.” Regan scrubbed away a tear. “I couldn’t leave him.”

  She saw a change in Nate’s eyes. A softening. “All along I’ve questioned whether you were good for my little brother.”

  Regan stared at her reflection in the one-way glass set into the wall. “Believe me, so have I.”

  “The thing is, Josh never questioned that. So while the rest of the McCalls hang at the hospital, Bran and I are hopping a plane to New Orleans. We’re going to firmly insist that the NOPD Internal Affairs boys take another look into Creath’s activities. And we’re going to make sure they do it right this time.”

  When Regan didn’t comment, Nate angled his chin. “If things work out like I think they will and you’re cleared, what happens between you and Josh?”

  She closed her eyes. All along, Josh had asked only one thing of her: to put her trust in him. Trust him enough to stand and fight instead of run.

  But that’s just what she’d done. She’d run. Peel all the layers away, it wouldn’t matter why. All that mattered was that she’d run.

  And when Josh caught up with her at the convenience store he’d been furious. Beyond that fury had been hurt. He’d risked his career for her, his life.

  He’d physically shielded her from Creath and she’d risked nothing for him. Given him nothing.

  She met Nate’s gaze. “What happens will be up to Josh.”

  Chapter 16

  Music drifted through the open door of the nurses’ station as Regan moved soundlessly along the dim hallway that was ripe with a sterile scent. While a paramedic, she’d learned a few tricks about sneaking in to see a patient after visiting hours.

  She had spent nearly four days in the county jail before being released—cleared of all charges—earlier that evening. Since Decker had arranged to have her Mustang waiting for her there, she’d driven straight to the Dallas hospital.

  And because it had been too unsettling to think about facing members of the McCall clan when she wasn’t sure that one particular member—the most important member—would welcome her presence, Regan had waited past the time all visitors would have been shooed out by the nurses before making her move.

  Not that she hadn’t met plenty of McCalls already. She hadn’t seen Nate since her first day in jail, but the McCall sisters had dropped by the jail’s infirmary at various times. Morgan, Carrie and Grace had each been friendly. Kind. Yet they were all cops, and Regan hadn’t missed the sharp assessment in their eyes.

  Scoping out the woman who’d nearly gotten their youngest brother killed.

  They were right, and Regan felt horribly responsible. She’d gotten little sleep over the past days and nights since every time she closed her eyes she saw Josh lying on the ground, bleeding. She couldn’t think about how close he’d come to dying without her heart wrenching. And she thought about that every other minute. If she was ever going to find any peace, it would be after she faced him and told him how sorry she was.

  For everything. And to thank him for believing in her. For risking everything for her when she’d risked nothing for him.

  The fact that none of his sisters had delivered any sort of message to her from Josh was a message in itself. One that Regan clearly understood. Why would a man want a woman who’d given him nothing when he’d given her everything? A woman who’d spent most of her time trying to push him away?

  Reaching the end of the dim hallway, Regan sidestepped an empty gurney then did a quick check of the sign that listed the direction of patient rooms. She turned right into another dimly lit hallway.

  The silver lining to the McCall sisters’ visits was they’d kept her apprised of Josh’s condition. He’d been moved the previous morning out of the ICU. If he continued his rapid improvement, he would be home in a couple of days.

  Home, Regan figured was Oklahoma City. Considering how angry, how hurt, Josh had been when he caught up with her at the convenience store, she wasn’t expecting an invitation to visit.

  Still, she was determined to see him this one last time. And after she made her peace with him, she would decide what to do with the life that suddenly stretched before her. She wasn’t the same woman she’d been a year ago. Would never be her again. Her future was a blank slate, and she had no idea which way to turn.

  She paused outside Josh’s room, took a steadying breath, then slid soundlessly inside. And saw he was asleep. Her heart clenching at the sight of him, she moved across the room, the weak light over the small sink tucked into a built-in vanity illuminating her way.

  His head was turned slightly toward the door; from what she could tell, his skin tone looked normal. His dark hair was close to the shaggy stage; several days worth of stubble shadowed his jaw. She noted the IV in his left forearm, then raised a brow when she realized the chest drainage instrument on the far side of the bed was sitting idle, with no tube running under Josh’s hospital gown. His being unhooked from that told her he was well on his way to recovery.

  Thank God.

  Because she needed to touch him, to touch him and know he was whole and safe, she brushed unste
ady fingertips across his brow. Only now, seeing him, being able to judge his condition for herself, did she feel a slight easing of the tension that had held her in its grip since that horrible day.

  Although his eyes were closed, Josh wasn’t asleep. He’d been lying there, concentrating on building up his strength so he could get out of the damn hospital and deal with a vital piece of business. He’d known the instant that piece of business stepped into the room, even before she brushed her fingers across his skin.

  You’re finally here, he thought, then opened his eyes and met her gaze.

  Regan jerked her hand back as if she’d been stung. “I…didn’t mean to wake you.” Her eyes softened and she lowered her voice. “How are you?”

  “Doing okay.” One of the last clear images he had of that day was of Creath smashing the back of his hand against her cheek. A cheek that, even through the dim light, he could see was scraped and sported a bruise in healing shades of yellow-gray and green. Josh clenched his jaw, wishing he could kill the bastard all over again. “How about you?”

  “I’m fine.” The fingers of one of her hands played over the strap of her purse. “Decker sprang me a couple of hours ago.”

  Josh knew the exact time she’d walked out of jail because Decker had called to let him know. Since then, the uncertainty of whether she would come to him had kept his gut in knots. Good thing she had, because he didn’t think he could have managed to check himself out of the hospital and go after her. Not yet, anyway.

  Regan slid her tongue over her bottom lip. She’d practiced endlessly what she would say, but now that she was facing him, she felt her courage waver. “Look, you’re probably ready to go to sleep. I can come back in the morning.”

  “All I’ve done since I got here is sleep,” he said, snagging her wrist. No way was he letting her get away again. He punched a button on the bed’s remote; a quiet hum sounded as the upper half of the mattress eased him into a sitting position. “Sleep, and get updates,” he amended. “From Decker, and Nate’s called a couple of times each day.” Josh shifted, hid a wince when he felt the pull of the stitches in his chest. “He and Bran are flying back from New Orleans tomorrow.”

  “Decker didn’t tell me what the police there found. He just told me I was free to go.”

  “Have a seat and I’ll fill you in.”

  When she glanced at the chair at the side of the bed, Josh tightened his fingers on her wrist. “I won’t have to strain to look at you if you sit on the bed.”

  Even after she set her purse aside and slid a hip onto the mattress, he kept his hand locked on her.

  “Nate said that after the NOPD cops heard the recording you made, they got a warrant and tore Creath’s house apart,” Josh began. “That took an entire day and they didn’t come up with anything incriminating. They did find a set of keys that no one could figure out what they went to. Nate was vague on details, but someone finally got a lead on a storage facility Creath rented under an alias. The unit had a concrete floor, but one section looked newer than the rest. They dug it up, and found the body of Creath’s fiancée.”

  Regan shoved a hand through her hair. “Poor woman.”

  “That applies to any female the bastard set his sights on,” Josh said while stroking his thumb against the soft pulse-point on her wrist. “The cops found Langley’s laptop there, too. And a stash of fentanyl from the same batch that killed Steven. The search also turned up ammo the identical caliber as that used to kill Bobby Ivers. The NOPD cops used the murder weapon to do some test fires. That ammo showed the exact same markings as the slug the M.E. took out of Bobby.”

  “I’m not sure I understand how Creath managed to pawn the gun in my name.”

  “Since he’s not alive to explain, it’s mostly theory. But everyone agrees Creath was a whiz at computers. Once he locked onto Langley and figured out his connection to you, he killed him, got his laptop and found his e-mails to you. It probably didn’t take Creath long to zero in on Sundown. And a guy who gets away with as much as he did isn’t the type to rush in without a plan. In his twisted mind, he perceived you’d rejected him because of both Steven and Bobby. He’d already set you up for Steven’s murder. He would have also wanted you to pay for slighting him because of Bobby. What better way than to have you pawn the murder weapon that killed your coworker?”

  “When you pawn something, don’t you have to show an ID that matches the name you put on the pawn slip?”

  “Yes.” Josh continued the soft strokes of her wrist while he studied her. Her face was about as pale as the white blouse she wore, and fatigue shadowed her eyes. She was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen.

  “Nate said the Sundown Sentinel’s Web site was accessed on Langley’s laptop the same day he was murdered,” Josh continued. “You have to figure Creath is the one who accessed it. Once he knew you were in Sundown, it would be in his best interest to research the town. A good place to start would be the local newspaper. So he pulled up a few editions and presto, there’s a picture of you using your paramedic skills plastered on the front page.”

  “The story Burns Yost wrote identified me as Regan Ford, the night bartender at Truelove’s Tavern. That’s the address Creath used on the pawn slip.”

  “Right. So Creath, like every cop in the universe, knows the lowlifes in his city who churn out phony IDs. The ID guy Creath went to probably snagged your picture off the Sentinel’s Web site, then made up what looked like a legal Texas driver’s license. At that point, Creath called his lieutenant, said he had urgent personal business to take care of and needed some time off. That left Creath free to head to Sundown.”

  “He told me he waited outside the tavern, thinking I’d go upstairs to my apartment after we closed. Instead, I drove to your house.” Regan fisted her hands against her thighs, suppressing a shudder. For the rest of her life she would regret going to Josh that night. “He saw us on the porch, kissing. That’s why he shot you. Because he saw us together.”

  “He shot me because he was a sick, evil bastard,” Josh reminded her, wishing he could brush away the lines of worry on her face. “From what Creath saw that night, he knew you had a job and a personal life in Sundown. You showed no sign you were about to take off in the next twelve hours, so he checked into the Sundown Inn for the night. The next morning he drove to Dallas.

  “My guess is he hired some hooker to put on a black wig and dark sunglasses, then pawn the gun using the phony ID, which by law the pawnbroker would have had to make a copy of. About an hour later, the Dallas PD got an anonymous phone tip that a gun used in a New Orleans homicide was at that pawnshop. The cops picked up the copy of the ID and gun, test fired the weapon and entered the results into the FBI’s Drug-fire firearm database. A hit came back and Creath’s partner at the NOPD was notified.”

  “Your brothers learned all this for me?” she asked.

  Josh nodded, his fingers still circling her wrist, holding her to him. “The partner called Creath to tell him about the hit and that they had a lead on your location. Creath’s response was he just happened to be within driving distance of Sundown so he’d pick you up and transport you back to New Orleans. Since Creath’s partner had talked to Nate already about your prints, he called Nate to let him know they’d located you. That was just in case you’d been pegged as a suspect in any crime in Oklahoma City since they last talked. Then Nate called me about Creath, which is the phone call you heard over my answering machine.”

  Regan closed her eyes, opened them. “Looking back, it all seems like such a nightmare.”

  “It was a nightmare.”

  “One you took on willingly.” She met Josh’s dark gaze. “You saved my life.”

  His brain had locked in the hazy image of her kneeling over him, a ruthless determination in her eyes while she worked to keep him alive. “I’d say it was the other way around.”

  “No.” She struggled to keep her voice steady. “The minute you walked into my life, you saved me. You believed what I t
old you about Creath. You knew I was wanted for murder, but you didn’t take me to jail even though it might have cost you your badge. That day outside the convenience store, you were so angry with me for running. So hurt. Still, you shielded me from Creath.” Her voice had turned rough with emotion, but she forced herself to continue. “You took a bullet because of me.”

  “I took a bullet because an obsessed cop shot me. You’re not responsible for what Creath did.”

  “He was obsessed with me. He shot you because of me and you almost died. You risked everything for me, and I gave you nothing. Risked nothing.”

  She couldn’t have looked more guilty if she’d shot him herself, Josh thought. If they were going to get anywhere, he was going to have to nudge her past the self-recrimination.

  “Seems to me your taking off to purposely lure a homicidal cop to come after you is plenty risky. But it’s clear you and I could debate that issue into eternity and never agree.” He studied her face, her shadowed eyes, the emotion in them. “So, you walked out of jail tonight. You could have driven to Sundown. To Etta. There’s the million-dollar trust fund Steven set up, waiting for you in New Orleans. But you came here. Why?”

  I followed my heart, she wanted to say, but held back. “To apologize for almost getting you killed. For everything.”

  “Frankly, Regan, I’m not interested in hearing your apologies.”

  That brought her chin up with a jerk and a quick sheen of tears to her eyes. “Oh. Well, then, I’ll go.”

  When she started to pull away, he tightened his fingers on her wrist and gave her a pointed look. “Because I’ve found more interesting things to listen to over the past couple of days. Things you said.”

  Her forehead furrowed. “I’ve been in jail the past couple of days. Maybe your sisters mentioned they came to visit me?”

  “Yeah, they mentioned it.” They couldn’t wait to scope Regan out after he told them he intended to make her a permanent part of his life. “Decker dropped by to see me and brought Etta’s recorder with him. Since I was mostly out of commission after Creath showed up, I wanted to hear exactly what went on.”