Reunion Under Fire

by Geri Krotow

  “You are a good granddaughter to come here and help Ezzie out.” Kit wore a frown, but Annie knew the sad look was for Ezzie’s predicament, and saw the warmth in Kit’s eyes that conveyed her admiration for Annie’s choice. Annie wanted to ask, to know, where and how exactly this young woman had come to the States but again, the fear of scaring Kit off stopped her.

  “Are you staying in her apartment upstairs?” Kit’s question seemed casual, but Annie knew better. This might be the olive branch that Kit sought.

  “Yes. It’s the easiest solution as it keeps the place occupied, and I’m used to a smaller place in New York, so it’s like a real vacation for me.” Minus the emotional baggage.

  “I’ll take three of these.” Kit picked out three tonal shades of blue. Annie thought the hue matched Kit’s countenance. The woman was struggling with despair, if her training was putting the cues together correctly. But something else about Kit seemed to be triggering a memory in Annie.

  Why else was Kit sending alarm bells through her?

  Kit held a sky-colored hank to her cheek, sighing dreamily. And leaned a little over to the left, exposing a sliver of her neck above the mock turtleneck she wore. On a blistering summer day the top was out of place, but not for a woman like Kit. All at once Annie knew why Kit had set her police psychologist sirens wailing, beyond the bruises. She reminded her of a witness the DA had asked her to vet. Another woman with a Russian accent whose husband had a penchant for harming her. Her testimony had helped put the abuser behind bars.

  Annie made out another mark, this one a definite deep reddish-purple bruise that peeked above Kit’s collar. It looked as if it had a fuzzy filter over it, and the beige-toned stain on the turtleneck’s fabric confirmed it was concealer. If Kit were a teenager, it’d be easy to think the mark was a hickey. But combined with the other bruises, how Kit was dressed, her skittish behavior and the fact that she had wanted to talk to Ezzie, Annie knew that she was dealing with an abused woman. Ezzie was known for helping women out of tight spots and had in fact made it her life’s purpose since she’d fled her first husband after being battered by him in a drunken rage. Ezzie had been lucky—she’d met Annie’s grandfather after that and enjoyed a long, happy marriage. But Ezzie never forgot her ordeal.

  “So you and my grandmother are friends?” She kept her demeanor purposefully chipper, casual. Annie made a show of reaching into the drawer of the antique table and pulling out skeins to replace the yarn Kit was purchasing, displaying them in perfect symmetry.

  “Yes. She is my friend.” Quietly, with certainty.

  “I’ll see you ladies later. Don’t you dare miss tonight, Kit!” Ginny gave them a wave as she gathered up her bags and walked out of the shop, the large front door opening and closing with the familiar sound of the squeaky wood that surrounded the stained-glass window.

  “That doorjamb needs to be trimmed. It’s swelled every summer since I can remember.” Annie looked at Kit, who’d taken her skeins to the counter and still looked like a rabbit ready to bolt into the nearest bush.

  “I love the old feel of this place.” Kit’s words were softly spoken, wishful.

  “You strike me as the contemporary type. Your sense of style is beautiful.” Annie referenced Kit’s chic urban style, from her sleeveless silky turtleneck, long linen cardigan and flared crops. Her stacked sandals revealed perfectly manicured toes, and her designer bag cost more than Annie’s New York City rent.

  “Thank you. I do like modern things, but there’s nothing like the comfort of the familiar.” Kit gazed at the balustrade that followed the stairs behind the counter up to a peekaboo corridor above the built-in bookcases that led to Ezzie’s apartment.

  “You know, Kit, if you ever need anything, you can stop in, or call me. I’m not my grandmother, and you don’t know me yet, but you can trust me.” Annie rang up Kit’s order and added her personal cell phone number to the back of the shop’s frequent-buyer card that she handed to the woman. It was far less incriminating than if she gave Kit her NYPD business card and her abuser found it. “My number’s on the back. You’re one skein away from a free one.”

  “I don’t keep these cards.” Kit frowned at the punch card. Silver Valley was like any other American town in that the local business owners did everything financially possible to reward repeat customers. Annie wasn’t surprised that Kit didn’t save them. Abused women learned to leave no trace of where they’d been, what they’d done. It made fewer waves at home from a prying husband who wanted to control their every move.

  “Oh, well, I didn’t know. I’m still getting to know all of the regular customers.” Ezzie would have known, and she’d know why Kit didn’t keep the cards. It was probably because she didn’t want her husband to know where she shopped, in case he went through her wallet. Annie had heard every breach of personal boundaries in her career with NYPD.

  “No, you didn’t. But I feel you do. Know.” Kit’s eyes dropped all previous defenses, and for a long moment she stood at the counter, emotionally naked to Annie, who saw fear, trepidation and an unexpected emotion. Determination. Kit was going to fight whoever was hurting her.

  Annie handed Kit her bag of yarn. “I’m here.”

  Kit’s hands shook as she took the bag. Without another word she turned and walked out of the shop.

  Annie might not have expected to bring her law-enforcement therapy skills to bear this soon into her stint at Silver Threads Yarn Shop, but having a sense of purpose related to something she knew allowed a sliver of light to slant through the veil of doom she’d carried here from New York.

  * * *

  Joshua Avery walked through the Silver Valley Police Department, trying to remember that for the time being he was Officer Avery again and not Detective Avery. He’d asked for a temporary demotion so that he could be around more for his younger sister.

  The building was unusually quiet, especially for a Friday morning. Everyone was either off, out on patrol or attending a law-enforcement conference in the next town over. He had to admit he was a little disappointed no one was around to see him back in his working blues. As a detective he hadn’t worn his Silver Valley PD uniform in more than a year, and he was grateful it still fit. He’d gotten used to his civilian clothes while he served as an SVPD detective, but had to admit that being back in uniform felt good.

  “Morning, Josh.” SVPD Chief Colt Todd motioned to him to enter his office. “Don’t get too comfortable in that uniform, Josh. As soon as you get your sister settled, I’ll need you back as a full-time detective.” Tall with graying hair, Colt still looked like a man in his prime, fitness-wise.

  “Yes, sir.” Josh, along with the rest of SVPD, would follow their leader through fire because of exactly this—Colt’s ability to be compassionate while still letting an employee know he thought the person was the only one for the job. Without hesitation, he’d given Josh a reprieve from the near-24/7 routine of detective work. Josh’s younger sister, a disabled adult, needed to be placed in a full-time care community, and Josh needed time to pick the right place for Becky. But Josh couldn’t afford extended leave, so going back in uniform was a good compromise for both him and SVPD.

  “As for this weekend, I’ll need you to man the fort while most of the department is in Carlisle for the ROC strategy session.” Colt referred to the Russian Organized Crime deterrent conference, run this weekend at the county seat.

  Josh nodded and listened as Colt ran down the issues he wanted him to keep his finger on. Since ROC had come to Silver Valley, the entire department had been putting in extra hours, scouring the community for any evidence that the criminals had sent yet another group of trafficked underage girls to the area. ROC had initiated a shipment to Silver Valley a couple of months ago, and SVPD had played a role in saving the girls, freeing them from the degrading work, legal and illegal, they’d been enslaved to before they ever touched American soil. Like the flow
of ROC heroin into the area, the sex trafficking trade was relentless.

  “You’re also going to be the top guy here while I’m at the conference all weekend. I’ll be back on Monday morning to check in, and of course call me with anything you need to.”

  “Copy that, Chief.” He hoped the station would stay quiet so that he could go home for dinner with Becky. And to continue his search for an apartment for her, as much as he didn’t want to think about it.

  “Look, Josh, I know you’d rather be in the thick of the ROC problem with everyone else right now. And I’d love to have you there. It hurts like hell to lose you as a detective, even if it’s only for a few weeks or so. I’m sorry about the setback with your sister. You’ll be working as a detective again soon.” Colt looked at him. “It’ll be no longer than a few weeks, right?”

  “I hope not, Chief. The more regular hours on patrols and at the desk are better for Becky and me as we adjust to our new reality. It’s coming together. We were spoiled when she went to school every day, and then all the day camps she was eligible for in the summer. Since she graduated from high school, her requirements have changed. I’m close to finding her a more permanent living arrangement.” It killed him to say it, but he forced the words through his teeth. Becky didn’t need him as much anymore, didn’t want him as much. It was time to let her become as independent as any mentally challenged young woman could. She’d drawn a sucky hand with being deprived oxygen at birth, giving her lifelong mental difficulties that were umbrellaed under the description of Pervasive Developmental Disorder, PDD. They included developmental delays, attention deficit disorder and anxiety. To make matters worse, she’d been dealt another horrible hand when their parents had been killed in a car crash a decade ago. But she’d made the best of it and was happy, as happy as a nine-year-old in a nineteen-year-old body could be. Josh couldn’t ask for more. Except for a promise that nothing bad would ever happen to her, which he knew was impossible.

  “For what it’s worth, I’m proud of you, Josh. You’ve done a fine job of raising your sister, and your parents would be pleased.”

  “Thanks, Chief.” Josh stood up. He didn’t like it when people complimented him on what he’d done. It was what any other brother would do, and he never felt worthy of the praise. He did his job—he took care of his sister. “Is there anything else?”

  “No, Josh. Only the usual—let’s keep it rolling and do what we can to make Silver Valley the safest place possible.” Colt dismissed him in his usual easy yet professional manner.

  “Yes, sir.” Josh thought that Silver Valley’s days of suburban serenity might be over, shattered by the opioid epidemic and now ROC’s entry into the area, but he kept those thoughts to himself. And he hoped against hope that he was wrong. If it were up to him, Silver Valley would again be the low-crime-rate town it’d been when he was a kid.

  After a few hours of administrative work, Josh headed for the small break area. He sent up a silent thanks for the full pot of coffee on the heating plate, and he noted the plate of cookies someone had dropped off. There wasn’t enough coffee to keep him going today. Chief Todd wasn’t someone he’d want to whine to about how the paperwork for Becky’s needs had plowed him under these past months. He’d been up all night working out the finances for Becky to be able to leave home and live in her own apartment. It’d be possible in a community with other mentally challenged adults, and he was pretty sure he’d found the perfect one for her. She’d have supervision with autonomy. It was a fine line for his nineteen-year-old sister, who still asked about their parents, long dead. Becky knew they were gone and understood that part, but she didn’t understand why she had to still feel sad about it. Lifelong sorrow was too adult an emotion for Becky. Her pain crushed him.

  Josh had been at the Jersey Shore on a spring break beach getaway when he’d received the phone call that had changed both of their lives forever in that split second. There were no adults named to take guardianship of Becky, so he stepped up to the plate. Instead of continuing the scholarship to Penn State, he’d transferred to a local private school for criminal justice, allowing him to take care of Becky once she was released from the hospital. She’d miraculously survived the accident that had taken their parents. Fortunately the college had given him a hardship scholarship, and their parents had left enough to help them survive. Becky received state and federal aid, too.

  Becky had suffered developmental delays almost immediately and still had emotional difficulties from time to time, but her motor skills were intact. Becky functioned completely normally, for a nine-or ten-year-old girl, socially ahead of her mental capacity, which was closer to seven years of age. She’d never grow older, emotionally. Mentally, she grasped just about everything, but lacked the practical judgment to be able to live completely on her own. As he poured a large mug of the steaming coffee, he acknowledged that it was a blessing he’d found a local program. Upward Homes would handle her disabilities, emphasize her abilities, give her a job, friends to spend time with and a chance to enjoy whatever further education she was capable of. He sipped the coffee and told himself he didn’t need the cookies. The younger officers would appreciate them more, and they wouldn’t take an extra fifteen minutes to burn off in PT as they would for him.

  He knew thirty wasn’t old, but he also knew his limits. The paperwork for Becky’s application was daunting, and his protective urges were hard to let go of. But if he ever wanted to freely work as a detective again, he needed to know Becky was taken care of round-the-clock. Worrying about her being on her own at home, no matter that he had a neighborhood friend to check in on her, was stressful. For both of them.

  “Officer?” Cali, one of the SVPD’s receptionists, walked into the break room and stopped in front of him. How long had he been daydreaming about how to fix Becky’s problems?

  “Hey, Cali. How’s the weekend looking for you? Because I’m going to be right here at my desk.”

  She flashed a quick grin, nodded. “Been there. Hey, there’s a woman here who’s asked to talk to one of our detectives. Says she’s with NYPD and showed me a badge.”

  “What about?” Cookie temptation evaporated.

  “A possibility of domestic violence.”

  He quickly added some French vanilla creamer to his coffee, one indulgence his six-foot-four-inch frame could still handle. He was painfully aware that at thirty, his fast metabolism days were quickly fleeing.

  “Send her back to my desk.”

  “Will do.”

  He carried the navy ceramic mug with SVPD’s gold logo stamped on it. Before he sat down a tall, willowy redhead walked up to him. His body immediately recognized who his mind struggled to believe was standing before him. The woman he’d never expected to see again. The one who’d got away. The woman his eighteen-year-old self had thought was his one true love.

  Annie Fiero.

  Chapter 2

  Josh thanked his stars he had the seat to catch him because the sight of Annie after all these years sent him reeling. As soon as his ass hit the leather padding he shot back up, ingrained respect having nothing to do with it.

  Josh wanted to be on his feet for this reunion. “Annie.”

  He took her in, from the crown of her head still framed by her flaming-red hair, her catlike eyes luminous in her beautiful face and her lips—hell, her lips. He licked his own as he allowed his gaze to meander farther south, seeing how her formfitting white T-shirt under her open ivory cardigan clung to her breasts. He wished the sweater was off and he could tell if her nipples were hard, if she felt what he did. Her curves were nonstop, evidenced by how she filled out her dark, tight jeans. Pink polished toes in sandals underscored her femininity. And his reaction to it.

  Damnation. He needed to get Becky situated so that he could start dating properly again. Ever since he and Christina broke up, he’d been afraid to bring another woman home. It was too hard on Becky when
they left.

  “Josh?” The incredulity in Annie’s voice hit him in the solar plexus. Her tone, the soft quality of her speech, was the same. As were her startlingly blue eyes. “Josh.” It wasn’t a question as she said his name the second time. The pulse at the base of her throat danced under her smooth skin.

  Apparently he’d caught her by surprise, too.

  “Annie.” He took his time to look her over again. Since they’d once been best friends, she wouldn’t misconstrue it for unprofessional police behavior. And damn it if he didn’t check her left hand. Bare as his. Not that it meant anything, necessarily. It didn’t matter either way. He wasn’t available, and if Becky were already situated, Annie would be the last person he’d risk his ego with. “I didn’t recognize you at first.”

  She ran her fingers through her hair, flipped it lightly over her shoulder. A smile as she looked up at him. “Time marches on, right? You’ve grown at least a foot!”

  He couldn’t help it, his chest puffed up at that. Not that he was immune to a woman’s admiration, but this was Annie. Her opinion had meant so much to him in high school. And still did, to his surprise. And maybe a little bit of alarm.

  “Six inches is all. Had a spurt after we graduated.” He froze when he saw her eyes narrow. Oh hell... “Annie, we didn’t leave it on very good terms, did we?”

  “If you call telling each other we were done, never wanted to ever see one another again...” She leaned against the edge of his desk, her long, lean lines seeming to underscore how very aware of her each inch of him was. Too aware. He maintained eye contact, hoping like hell she would, too. That she didn’t notice what she was doing to him, because if she looked at his crotch she’d know. He hadn’t had his uniform on for a day yet, and already he wanted to shove it off, show Annie just how much he’d changed. How the years had taught him how to be a man who could give her more than he’d been capable of on their bungled prom night. Her eyes studied him, too, and he forced himself to mentally detach from his reactions.