“Stupid?” Darling asked, voice pitching high.
“Yes, stupid.” He put his hands out wide, exasperated. “How am I supposed to protect you if you don’t give me all the facts?”
In the back of her mind, Darling knew it was concern that made his tact disappear, but it triggered the deep-rooted pain Oliver Quinn had left all those years ago in her heart. Their camaraderie from the night before vanished.
“Protect me?” She laughed. “News flash—I don’t need you to protect me, Oliver. I’ve taken care of myself for the last eight years just fine. Thank you for coming over here, but I realize now that it was a mistake.” Once she said it, she felt a twinge of regret, but her pride wouldn’t let her back down. “So, if you don’t mind, go back to work and protect the person who actually wants it.”
She walked to the broken door and held it open for him. The sound of a car door shutting derailed whatever he was about to say. They both looked out to see Derrick walking toward them.
“Darling, I—” Oliver started.
“Please, just leave.”
“But I wanted—”
Darling heard the strain in her voice as she pleaded one last time with him. “Oliver, you owe me that much.”
The bodyguard’s brow creased, but he didn’t have time to answer.
“I have some words for you,” Derrick called, coming closer. He looked exhausted.
“Oh, I know,” Darling said, trying to sound annoyed rather than wounded. “Mr. Quinn was just leaving. He has to go back to work now.”
“Yeah, I guess I was,” the bodyguard said, not meeting Darling’s gaze. Instead he looked to the deputy. “But first, can I grab a quick word with you?”
Derrick must have liked Oliver, because he didn’t give him any snark about the request, but Darling was done with the fair-haired man. She excused herself to the bathroom and took a long look at herself in the mirror.
How could one man make her feel so crazy?
* * *
THE SKY WAS dark by the time Oliver decided he couldn’t take it anymore. His shift had ended an hour earlier, but he had stayed on the house grounds, going over Elizabeth Marks’s itinerary. She was set to be in town in two days, which meant Oliver and his team would have to scout out routes and try to foresee any vulnerabilities that their trip to pick her up might cause.
Vulnerable.
What Darling had looked like when she had told him to leave.
He balled his fist.
He didn’t want to leave her side, but she had been right. It wasn’t his job to keep her safe. He had given up that privilege eight years ago when he’d left her without so much as a backward glance.
The idea that someone had been watching, following and threatening Darling put fire through his veins. Despite their past and her present wants, Oliver wouldn’t have left her side had Derrick not convinced him she’d be safe.
“Listen, we’re at a point in this case where we’re waiting on results and information to come in,” Derrick had said when Oliver had pulled him to the side at Acuity. “Whoever is messing with Darling won’t get away with it. I’ll make sure of it.”
Derrick had promised he’d keep an escort outside her house that afternoon and through the night. Until they caught the culprit, he wasn’t going to let her be alone. Oliver might have been wary of the deputy when he’d first come to Mulligan, but now he was grateful for his presence. It was true they weren’t currently dating, but that didn’t stop Derrick from being zealous about keeping his friend safe.
Still, Oliver couldn’t ignore the worry that ate at him. He would at least check in with Derrick, even if Darling didn’t want his concern.
The temperature had dropped considerably since the sun had gone down. He wondered how he would handle Mulligan’s true winter. Just the thought of the massive amount of snow made him turn the heat on high. By the time he pulled up outside of the old house, he was downright toasty.
It was a feeling that didn’t last long.
All lights were off in Darling’s apartment, from what he could tell. In fact, the entire building was dark save for the foyer light, which could be seen through the front windows of the common area. It was there on the front steps, in the faint glow of that light, that Oliver saw the outline of a body.
He swung his car into the parking lot between a police cruiser and Darling’s car, all feeling of warmth gone from his body. For the second time that day, he grabbed his gun from his console. This time, though he didn’t pretend to not have it.
No one sprung from the cruiser as Oliver hurried from his rental, gun in clear view. But he wasn’t expecting anyone to. If they hadn’t seen the body from this close, chances were no one was in the car.
The body belonged to a man lying on the top step and porch. He was on his side, face away from the parking lot. Oliver pulled out his phone and used the flashlight to see that the man was Derrick.
Blood was caked on the back of his head, and his left leg was bent at a weird angle. Oliver checked for a pulse. It was weak.
Adrenaline began to pump through him. Dialing 9-1-1, he ran through the entryway and took the steps two at a time to Darling’s door. It was shut but not locked.
“Darling?” Oliver called into the apartment. He didn’t bother knocking, and he didn’t worry about her privacy when no one responded. He quickly searched each room, gun raised. There was no sign of struggle inside.
Oliver ran a hand through his hair and went back to the front door.
“What’s the nature of your emergency?” the operator finally answered.
“Deputy Derrick Arrington was attacked and needs immediate medical attention,” Oliver bit out. He was angry at himself. “And private investigator Darling Smith has been kidnapped.”
“What is your location?”
Oliver repeated the address as he checked the door. It wasn’t broken, and there were no scratch marks to suggest someone had tried to pick the lock. He kicked the bottom of the door. Pain exploded in his foot, but he didn’t care. He shouldn’t have left Darling in the first place. He pulled his fist back this time, ready to let the door know the anger and regret flowing through his blood when he noticed a piece of paper sticking out from under the doormat.
He moved it out of the way, careful not to touch the actual paper. Its neat red writing made Oliver growl in absolute anger.
One more strike and you’re out, Darling.
Chapter Twelve
Cold.
Seeping, slithering, unrelenting cold.
It didn’t just push against her body. It invaded. Twisting and turning around every inch of her skin. Darling repeated her first waking thought.
“Oh, my God.”
She was sitting outside in what was a clearing, as best she could tell. Whether it was night or early morning didn’t matter. She couldn’t see a thing. Darkness and the freezing air had combined and were currently conquering her. In the back of her mind, she calculated the normal temperature after the sun went down. It could drop to anywhere between forty to fifteen degrees. She certainly felt as if it was more like fifteen.
And that’s when she realized why she felt the chill so acutely.
She was naked.
Fear, panic and slight hysteria rose up into a small scream that bubbled from her lips. With shaking hands, she clamped her mouth shut, afraid that whoever had put her here was still around. That’s when the pain around her neck registered. Between deep breaths, she recalled her last memory of walking out of her apartment.
And then strong hands wrapping around her neck and squeezing until darkness came.
Before she could even replay the memory again, she had to entertain a new, terrifying one first. Tenderly she got to her feet and focused on the lower parts of her body. She nearly cried with relief when
she found there was no pain or soreness south of her waistline. Whoever had tossed her into the freezing unknown without a stitch on had at least not taken advantage of her in such a horrible way.
It was enough of a silver lining to put a little light back into her dark situation.
A breeze picked up, and Darling wrapped her arms around her chest. Closing her eyes, she listened.
Deafening silence.
No noise from the town. No cars. Nothing.
A picture of a territorial moose or bear happening upon her made Darling’s eyelids flutter back open. She prayed right then and there that her demise wouldn’t be by some hungry animal. Though dying of exposure also wasn’t fun. Before her mind could fill up with images and stories of lost hikers and stranded civilians who couldn’t outlast the cold, Darling put one foot forward.
Standing still wasn’t going to save her.
She walked in small strides, feeling dead grass and dirt between her toes before putting her weight down. Mulligan was a small town surrounded by enough rural land that she could have been anywhere within the town’s limits. That included a stretch of land south of the town center that was reserved for hunting. Just as Darling didn’t want to be eaten, she didn’t want to stumble across an old hunting trap.
What if she was no longer even in Mulligan?
Minutes crept by and nothing seemed to change. Just grass and dirt—no trees or asphalt—pressing against feet she was slowly losing feeling in at each new step. Worry and panic, which Darling had decided to push clear out of her head when she took her first step forward, were using a battering ram to get back in.
Someone had knocked on her door. Thinking it was Oliver, she had flung it open, ready to fight. Yet no one had been there. Curious, she had moved down the stairs and out to the front porch. That’s when she had seen Derrick.
Darling’s heart squeezed as she remembered him sprawled on the steps. Had there been blood or any obvious wounds? She hadn’t found out before someone had decided to choke her out.
Darling let out a humorless chuckle.
With its battering ram taking another charge, panic got one step closer to getting in.
What felt like ages later—though realistically she bet it had been only an hour at best since she had awoken—Darling’s steps faltered. Her body ached and shook from the cold. Her mind had become blank. Slowly she angled her gaze down to question the change in her walking. A cloud must have finally passed by, because the blessed moonlight broke through and created a hazy glow around her. For the first time since she had opened her eyes, she could see. Pale skin stretched downward—too pale—and a dark spot that looked suspiciously like blood covered the grass next to her left foot.
Panic hadn’t given up. She felt it hoist its battering ram back up for one last attempt to break down her emotional barrier.
Darling bent to investigate but lost her balance and toppled over. She repositioned herself into a better position and felt a thrill of happiness that she could still feel anything in her almost-numb limbs. Pain meant she was still alive. The moment she couldn’t feel at all was the moment she would lose it.
The blood—because it was blood and not her imagination—was coming from her foot. Her left one, to be exact. She wiped at the cut on her sole, but more blood replaced what was now smeared across her hand. There was nothing in the cut and nothing in her immediate area that looked sharp. Yet as she wiped another layer of blood off, the wound kept bleeding at a good clip.
How could she not feel the large gash in her foot?
The answer didn’t matter. Panic took three steps back before rushing the door that was made to keep her sane and rammed it clear off its hinges.
Darling Smith finally hung her head and let out a sob. It shook her body more than the cold.
* * *
“WE’LL FIND HER. I promise you that,” the chief said.
Chief Sanderson was a tall, thin man in his fifties with cropped gray-white hair and a clean-shaven face. His badge and gun were visible on his belt, but it was his demeanor that spoke of authority. He and Oliver stood outside Acuity’s office, retracing Darling’s steps for the second time. Looking for anything that might lead them to who was behind her disappearance.
Her phone was off—all calls going straight to her voicemail—and no one from her building or the strip mall claimed to have heard or seen anything out of the ordinary.
Oliver wanted to believe the chief was right—needed to believe him—but it had been hours since he’d found the empty apartment and the injured officer. Derrick had been alive but hadn’t woken up before his surgery. Chief Sanderson had said that even though he temporarily was out of the woods, they wouldn’t know the extent of the damage from his head injury until he was conscious. They didn’t know if the same hammer that had killed Jane Doe had been used, but they did know the same method had been.
Hit from behind to knock them out of commission.
Though it looked as if Derrick hadn’t gone down without a fight. His leg had been broken in two places, and his knuckles had been bloodied.
Oliver hoped Darling was putting up a better fight.
“This case...it’s all theory and no conclusive, hard evidence. This note writer, a possible affair and now our own kidnapped private investigator,” the chief ground out. “We’re missing something big here.”
“Whatever it is, I think Darling must have gotten close to it.”
“It’s time we get closer. Excuse me.” The chief stepped away to answer his phone.
Oliver had been surprised when the chief had personally accompanied him in an attempt to find out what had happened. He could have sent other deputies but hadn’t hesitated in getting his hands dirty. Oliver was finding he liked Sanderson just as he liked Derrick. Both men were fond of Darling and, instead of seeing her as a nuisance because of her profession, seemed to respect her. Sanderson wanted her to be found. It helped that the popular opinion had changed about the connection between Derrick’s attacker and Darling’s note writer.
Which also meant the chances were high that the mystery person was directly connected to Jane Doe’s murder.
Oliver’s stomach dropped as his mind jumped to the worst possible outcome for Darling. He needed to find her. Whoever was behind this couldn’t have been this careful. There had to be a trail he could follow somewhere.
Like water to the face, Oliver knew for certain there was one person who knew more than they did.
Nigel.
Pulling out his phone, he scrolled through his contacts and went straight to the number of Orion’s senior technical analyst, Rachel Delvough. Although he’d brought Grant and Thomas up to speed on the situation, he hadn’t yet made a call to Nikki. As far as he was concerned, they were still doing their job correctly with the other two members still protecting the client.
The client he was about to target.
“Hello?” Rachel answered after a few rings. It was almost ten in Dallas, but she didn’t sound as if he had woken her. Though he wouldn’t have cared if he had. Darling’s life was more important than being polite.
“Rachel, it’s Oliver.”
“What’s wrong?” Orion operated with a handful of people. Everyone knew everyone else. Rachel was more connected at times than the rest, considering she handled all the behind-the-scenes affairs of each agent.
“I need a favor,” he said, turning his back on the chief. “And I really need you to do it, Rachel.” He wasn’t as close to the quiet analyst as he was to Nikki, but he liked to think she’d help him out. Even if what he wanted was illegal.
“Okay...what is it?”
“Can you remotely look through someone’s phone?” Nikki had hinted that Rachel’s technical background might not have been wholly on the up-and-up. She hadn’t used the word hacker, but he was taking a shot in the dar
k.
“Look through? Anything specific?”
“The incoming and outgoing call logs.”
Nigel was lying about not knowing Jane Doe. If Oliver could see the numbers he had called or been called from, maybe he could find out who Jane Doe was. And if Nigel had hired someone to kill her and take Darling.
“Yeah, I can do that. But Oliver, it’s illegal.”
Oliver’s fist balled. He wasn’t angry at Rachel but at himself.
“Listen, I wouldn’t ask unless it was absolutely important,” he said.
There was hesitation. “Do you need it tracked, too?”
“No.” He knew Nigel was still at his house.
“Whose phone?”
“Nigel Marks’s.”
More hesitation. Rachel knew exactly who Nigel was. She knew he was Orion’s ticket to keeping afloat.
“Does Nikki know about it?”
“No,” he admitted. “Listen, I wouldn’t ask unless it was necessary. Please, Rachel.”
He could hear movement on the other end of the phone.
“I’ll have to head back to the office. I’m assuming you need this now?”
He let out a breath of relief. “As soon as humanly possible.”
“I can do it. And Oliver? I won’t lie to Nikki.” Her voice was resolute. He didn’t blame her. Everyone at Orion respected their boss. “But I won’t bring it up to her unless you do.”
“Deal.”
The called ended, and Oliver was left feeling helpless. His job was to protect people, and yet he was invading the privacy of the client he had been hired to guard and had let down the only woman he had ever loved.
Oliver blinked.
Was that true?
And did he love her still?
Chapter Thirteen
Debrah and Andrew Smith had both come from money, but that didn’t stop them from wanting more. They took to the business world, becoming a force many respected. Debrah and Andrew were inspiring. The perfect role models for a child with a growing mind like Darling.
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