Shielded In The Shadows (Where Secrets Are Safe Book 17)

by Tara Taylor Quinn

  She would not let herself be controlled by urges, by drama inducing emotions...

  Hot shards of desire shot through her anyway, her entire system on high alert, flooding her with adrenaline. Could she do this?

  Was it possible to allow all parts of herself to live and breathe a little bit?

  Parking, she got out of her car and, satchel over her shoulder, met up with Jayden at the door of the restaurant. She looked at him, her nerve endings sizzling with awareness.

  He requested a table for two, sounding so...professional, she was embarrassed as hell by her earlier thoughts. Just because she had the hots for the guy didn’t mean he’d want to have meaningless sex with her.

  How could she even have thought that?

  Been about to do that?

  How had Ms. Shadow fully escaped without Emma knowing? She could generally shut her down.

  Life wasn’t going to be good if she couldn’t trust herself to remain in control.

  Longing for the single glass of wine she allowed herself when she was driving—most particularly after coming off weeks of no alcohol while she waited for the insemination results—Emma chose iced tea. Jayden did, too.

  They decided to share a veggie appetizer while waiting for their dinner to arrive; that made split checks awkward and she told herself that if he grabbed up the check, she’d just pay him her half when the bill came.

  At a high-top table, they’d sat perpendicular to each other. When her knee bumped his, the wave of heat jolted inside her again.

  What was it about this man?

  “Why did you need a second chance?” What about him was she reacting to so strongly? She couldn’t control what she didn’t know. She justified asking while Ms. Shadow popped up eagerly to listen.

  “Why aren’t you seeing anybody?” he shot back quickly.

  “How long has it been since you’ve been in a relationship?” she countered.

  “You want to have sex?”

  Her entire body burned. Head to toe, bone to skin. She was the first to look away. “You said you have that location app on your phone?”

  “I figure the clients who allow me to track them, when they aren’t required to do so, are asking for my help. I keep a pretty close watch.”

  He was looking her in the eye again. Not flirting. Not coming on at all. She turned on anyway. His open intelligence, the way he made her feel like she was the only person in the world when he talked to her...

  She was lonely. That had to be it. She’d been battling it for months. Needed the family she was in the process of starting.

  “Then maybe we should look at it. Did you bring in the list of dates I gave you?” Had she seen him carry in a file? “Forget that, sorry. I have them here, in my email...” She grabbed her phone out of the satchel she’d hung on the back of her chair. There were files in there, too, just not Bill Heber’s. She hadn’t planned to work on the Heber case tonight.

  With a hand on top of hers, he stopped her. “Would it be all right with you if we don’t work through dinner? I’ve promised to go check the Heber dates tonight, and I will. I’d just like to eat my food without a rock in my gut.”

  “Oh. Yeah. Sure!” She put her phone away. Folded her hands in her lap while she tried to erase the memory of the warmth of his touch. Like some silly teenager who was discovering her sexuality for the first time. Not sure what to do with it.

  The man was gorgeous. A temptation. She wasn’t a schoolgirl. She was a mature adult; a woman who knew the ropes, and then some. A woman who knew that no matter how great he seemed on the surface, there’d be a shadow side to him, too.

  Everyone had them. She wasn’t the only one.

  She was a woman planning to be a mother.

  And he was a man on his second chance. Meaning that he’d blown his first one and had learned from it?

  Did that blown chance have anything to do with why he was single? Had he been married, too? Maybe been unfaithful? Was that why someone as tempting as him was alone and a workaholic?

  “Have you ever been married?” she asked, testing her theory. Needing answers.

  “No. Have you?”

  She should have seen that coming. “Yes.”

  His brows rose.

  She’d surprised him. It felt good—surprising him.

  “You don’t have to look so shocked that a guy would actually want to marry me!”

  “It’s not that. It’s just...you’re like... I thought we were two of a kind. You know, married to our work, so to speak...”

  So he’d felt it, too, then, like she’d first thought? This whatever-it-was that was drawing them together? A sense of sameness between them?

  “I am. Now.” She felt compelled to give him that.

  He nodded. Sipped from his iced tea. Toyed with the straw wrapper. “So...how long were you married?”

  “Two years.”

  “Recently?”

  “No. I married him fresh out of law school. He was in my graduating class.”

  “What happened?”

  She shrugged. Not that she wanted Jayden to find her irresistible—even if her darker side was pushing for it—but Emma didn’t relish him knowing that she didn’t have what it took to keep her man, either.

  Of course she knew that Drake’s issues weren’t about her. That she could have been a porn star or a centerfold and he’d still have strayed. Knowing didn’t seem to take the sting away.

  “Work get in the way?” he asked when she didn’t find any words that satisfied her.

  She finally just put it out there. “Other women did.”

  Drake had been a Harley-riding wild man, the one in their class who bucked the laws and found a way to argue himself out of every single predicament he got into. He’d been the star of their moot court team. Ms. Shadow had adored him. With all of her big, open, emotional heart.

  “He was unfaithful to you?” His voice rose an octave.

  She’d surprised him again. It was nice.

  “Multiple times.” He was so big on second chances, she wouldn’t want him to think her a woman who couldn’t give them.

  Or hadn’t given them. She wouldn’t be doing that again, giving a man a chance to be unfaithful to her. She had to be in a committed relationship for that to happen.

  “Wow. I’m sorry. I just...” He shook his head. “The man must have been blind.”

  “I don’t think it was his eyes he was using,” she said, wanting the subject to change.

  “Is he still practicing law?”

  “I have no idea. I assume so. Last I heard, he’d moved to Las Vegas.”

  “Was he your first love?”

  What was this? Twenty questions about her? She was about to not answer. And then saw that warm, caring look in his eyes again.

  No wonder he had such great results with his offenders, having the best success rate of any of Santa Raquel County’s probation officers. As a counselor, the man seemed to have what it took to get others to open up.

  “No, he was not,” she told him, figuring, since she wasn’t entering into a relationship, there was no harm in spilling her beans. They wouldn’t come back up on her. “That was Keith Scott.” And her worst mistake ever. The high school quarterback—a guy who had it all and knew it, who thought he was above the law. She’d been an idiot, drawn to his assurance that he could do whatever he wanted and all would be well. She’d done what he wanted, and all hadn’t been well at all.

  She’d been out of control. Had caused her parents so much stress, sneaking out to be with Keith. Lying to them. And then...when she’d needed Keith the most—when her entire being had been grappling with loss, he’d stopped answering her calls and had gone off to college.

  Her parents had tried to warn her. To tell her that he wasn’t a good guy. She’d thought she’d known better.

/>   “Was Keith before or after Drake?”

  Jayden’s words brought her back to the present. The tender smile on his face...she wanted to touch her lips to his. To lose herself in the promise she read there.

  He was a risk-taker. A charmer. And successful, too. That was all part of the excitement. Emma recognized the signs of her alter ego’s takeover.

  And knew that if her shadow side didn’t disappear, she might just ruin Emma’s life for good this time...

  * * *

  “Keith was before Drake,” Emma said, munching on the celery stick that had just been delivered, as though she didn’t have a care in the world.

  Or care any more about the previous relationships in her life.

  “Have you dated anyone?” He listened as Emma told him about the last serious relationship she’d been in. The guy had been faithful, kind, smart and funny. Everything she’d always wanted. And she just hadn’t been in love with him.

  “I broke his heart,” she said, her attempt at a smile failing as her eyes teared up. “I hate that about me. That I did that. I tried so hard to love him...”

  “I’m guessing that you did him a favor, letting him go,” he said.

  “Because he was too good for me?” she asked with a chuckle.

  That hadn’t been what he’d meant at all, but at least she was smiling again.

  “Because it freed him up to find the person who was meant to love him,” he said.

  Her smile faded as she looked at him. People moved around them. Other diners talked, laughed. Waiters and waitresses took orders, delivered food and drinks. A bus person cleaned the table just beyond them. Jayden was aware, and yet couldn’t really hear them. The silent communion between him and Emma held him captivated.

  “You really think there’s one person out there for everyone?” She broke the silence between them.

  “I think that if there is someone out there, being caught in the wrong relationship would be horrible. Criminal, even. Lord knows, there’s enough challenge finding happiness in this world without being trapped outside of the love you feel.”

  “Have you ever hurt a woman?”

  “Probably. But not that I’m aware of.”

  “You never broke a girl’s heart?”

  He’d once slept with a sorority girl who’d made her way around the frat house, something he wasn’t proud of, but he didn’t think she’d been hurt. To the contrary, she’d invited the attention, but he thought what they’d all done with her had been wrong. They’d used her, not respected her as a woman with feelings of her own. No one had hurt her. She’d come on to them, one at a time. But no one had bothered to ask her what she’d really wanted. Why she was doing what she was doing. Maybe she’d just wanted fun, and that was great. He wished he knew, and wondered for a second what had ever happened to her.

  “I don’t think I broke any hearts, no. I was too busy having a good time to slow down and commit to a relationship.”

  Until he’d been too busy finding a way to live with himself to be able to commit to a relationship.

  “You’ve never had a serious, committed relationship?” she probed.

  “Nope.”

  “How old are you?”

  “Thirty-one. How about you?” he returned.

  “Thirty-two.”

  They munched veggies. His mind filled up with questions he didn’t ask. He didn’t want to have to answer any more questions. They were getting dangerously close to things he didn’t want to talk about.

  “You ever see yourself getting married? Having kids?” she asked.

  “Nope.”

  “Seriously.”

  If that disappointed her, and he assumed it did, best to just get it right out there. “Seriously,” he repeated.

  “You have it bad growing up?”

  “No. To the contrary, I had a great childhood.” Loving parents. More money than he’d ever known. Opportunity. Fun. “I have casual relationships, just no desire for commitment or to have kids.”

  Not quite the truth, but true, just the same. Part of him had the desire. Deep down. He’d always thought he’d be like his folks, fall in love for life, raise a family. Maybe a bit different, too, in that he’d wanted more than the one child they’d opted for. Maybe if he’d had siblings, hadn’t had all of his parents’ attention focused so completely on him, he wouldn’t have been so full of himself...

  “Why not?” she queried.

  He could see her curiosity was killing her. Wanted it to be more than that. Wanted her to want to know about him.

  So maybe he should just tell her. The bigger he made it, the more it would bother her. The more she’d care about finding out.

  “Because I don’t intend to have what I robbed from someone else. My sense of fair play won’t allow it.”

  Chapter 8

  The choice to remain alone was unequivocal. So yeah, Jayden lived and breathed when Emory didn’t, but he was using his breath to give to others, not to better his own life. He lived to serve others, not to serve his own happiness.

  “What did you rob from someone else?”

  Their dinner had arrived: a barbecue chicken ranch salad for her, whiskey chicken breast with a baked potato and broccoli for him.

  “The chance to be happy,” he said, taking his time cutting his food.

  He waited for more questions. Would figure out how to answer them, how much to tell Emma, as they came. And reminded himself why he didn’t engage in casual relationships a lot, either. People wanted to know who they were involved with.

  Should know.

  And he should know better. Why was he there, eating with her? Why had he opened the door to begin with?

  Why was she such an enigma? She was just another coworker, not a big mystery to him.

  “You said you go for casual relationships, though.”

  “Occasionally.” He was a healthy man, whether he deserved to be or not.

  “Is that what this is?” she asked as she stabbed another bite.

  “That would be up to both of us, wouldn’t it?” he asked. The chicken wasn’t bad. And when he loaded up the potato, it was pretty good, too.

  “We’re both married to our work,” she pointed out.

  “True,” he agreed, trying to focus on being busy with his. They’d come together that afternoon for work.

  “We know the score.” She punctuated the sentence with stabs of her fork in midair. “Which means no one will get hurt.”

  He had a mouthful and so he nodded.

  “So, what do you say?” Her gaze seemed to grab his.

  “What do you say?” He was playing with her now and enjoying himself more than he probably should.

  But she seemed to need his attention as much as he wanted hers. He wasn’t going to snub her. It wasn’t his way.

  And when it ended, he’d feel a pang. That would be worse than the guilt he felt at getting what he wanted.

  “I’d say that by being who we are, and being here, we’ve both already said yes.”

  She’d swallowed the food in her mouth, was watching him. He leaned over and kissed her. Right there in the restaurant. His ribs be damned.

  Lips only. And only for a second.

  But the deal was sealed.

  * * *

  Emma wanted to think that she wouldn’t have slept with Jayden that night even if she’d had the chance. She wanted to think that, no matter what they ultimately did with each other, she’d at least have had the wherewithal, the good sense, to see him a few more times before falling into bed with him. But she never got the chance to find out.

  As it was, he’d gotten a call toward the end of dinner—a parolee of his had failed to come home from work and his wife was worried. After throwing money down on the table to pay for both of their dinners, he’d left his food unfinished and hight
ailed it out of there. She’d understood completely. Would have told him to hurry, if she’d been given the chance. And still felt...let down...as she sat there alone.

  More relieved than disappointed, she told herself, she took the time to finish her dinner and then, pocketing his cash, put the meal on her credit card. She’d asked him to dinner. She’d pay. And hand his cash back to him at the next opportune moment.

  Maybe they could have a casual fling. She knew she’d have one or two along the way. Was okay with that. Single parents weren’t all sexless. She’d just have to be circumspect.

  And she had to make certain that any sex she had didn’t interfere with her family life, didn’t involve her child’s life at all or affect her work. And she was fairly confident that as long as neither she nor Jayden had any expectations of one another, any fling between them would not affect the jobs they were doing together.

  On her way home from dinner, she called Sara Havens Edwin at The Lemonade Stand, to check on Suzie Heber. The woman was supposed to be attending daily counseling sessions but hadn’t shown Thursday afternoon. Sara told her that Chantel Harris Fairbanks, a detective on the High Risk team, had already done a wellness check and that Suzie was at home. She’d been alone and said she was fine. Emma did a drive-by, just in case. Like she’d know what to look for. Mostly just because she felt compelled to be close enough to the woman to somehow be able to save her life.

  She was taking this one personally. She knew she was. To the point that for a minute or two after turning off Suzie’s street, she actually thought she was being followed. A truck of some kind had made a couple of the same turns she’d made.

  And then it hadn’t. You’d think she was her little sister with the drama she was concocting.

  At home. Emma wished she could call Suzie herself. To question her. She’d been able to get through to Suzie four years before, when most people had failed, but didn’t know that the woman would trust her again. Suspected Suzie wouldn’t and didn’t blame her, since Bill Heber had gone to jail for another unrelated incident, instead of for the murder of their child.