She made a horrible face at him that he wouldn’t be able to see. “After this pep talk, I’ll be paralyzed.”
His laugh was deep and rich. “You’ll get the hang of it.”
During the short drive back to town, he suggested they go out to dinner. Emily tentatively offered to cook, but he turned his head to smile at her.
“Nope, you deserve an outing. We can do fancy, if you want, or grab a pizza or burger and fries. Whatever appeals to you.”
Compared to the idea of going home and shutting herself in again, anything sounded good.
“I need to shower first.”
She saw him take a cautious sniff of his underarm.
“Yeah, good idea.” He turned into his driveway. “I’ll walk you home first.”
Emily opened her mouth to tell him he didn’t need to, but closed it. The sidewalk was reasonably well-lit, but her yard was very dark. Especially, she saw, since she’d forgotten to turn on her porch light. So all she did was say meekly, “Thank you.”
As they walked the short distance, she felt a burst of thankfulness to know he wasn’t just leaving her. Part of the sense of security he gave her was physical – he was so big, his shoulders so broad. But she was also very aware of his readiness – his head turning as he unceasingly scanned their surroundings, his body balanced in a way that would allow him to move fast.
It was more than that, though, she knew. It was just him. His need to protect ran deep. Confidence was a big part of him, but it wasn’t the shallow cockiness that defined so many men. The fact that he cared so intensely about victims and doing his job well was what felt like a balm to Emily.
The way he had of laying his hand on her back…was not soothing, although she found herself wanting to lean into it.
She’d unlocked her front door and tapped in her passcode to turn off the security system when she glanced past Sean to see Louella Shoop hurrying across the street.
“Mrs. Drake!” she called. “Yoo-hoo! Mrs. Drake!”
Sean had already spotted her and shifted just enough to put himself in front of Emily.
She poked his wide, rock-hard back. “It’s just Mrs. Shoop.”
She actually wasn’t sure whether there had ever been a Mr. Shoop, but that’s what everyone called her.
“Just?” he muttered, but stepped to one side and laid a hand on the small of her back as they went to meet her elderly neighbor.
“Mrs. Drake. Detective.”
They both greeted her.
“Is something wrong, Mrs. Shoop?” she asked politely.
“I’m a little slower than I used to be, but I can’t complain,” she said. “I see as well as ever now that I’ve had those cataracts taken care of. And good thing, too.” She sounded energized. “I was watching for you, because I saw something earlier.”
Louella Shoop was the nosiest woman in town. Emily had let the shrubs along the front of her yard grow thick and tall in part to prevent Louella from watching her every move. Now…God. She’d been thinking about tearing them out.
Beside her, Sean stiffened. “Something?”
“First I thought it was a dog,” she said, “but I grabbed my binoculars real quick and got a better look after he jumped your fence into Mr. Vandehee’s yard.”
Sean’s house was on one side of Emily’s, Robert Vandehee’s on the other. Emily scarcely knew him. He was the general manager of the Safeway store, unmarried, and, while pleasant enough when Emily had spoken to him over their common fence, otherwise kept to himself. He must be a constant source of frustration to Louella, who liked to know all.
And why was she thinking about Louella?
Because she didn’t want to think about who he was that had jumped her fence.
“I still couldn’t see him very well.” Louella sounded regretful. “He had to be wearing all black, and maybe a hat, too?” There was a doubtful note in her voice. “He disappeared behind that big old rhododendron in Mr. Vandehee’s yard, but a minute later I saw someone on a bicycle riding away fast, right down the street.”
“When you first saw movement, where was it?”
She nodded toward the gap between Emily’s house and Sean’s. “You don’t have a gate on the other side, do you?”
Emily shook her head.
“I wouldn’t have seen him if I hadn’t been watching closely, but I’m quite sure he crossed in front of your house.” Satisfaction tinged her voice. “It’s only neighborly to keep an eye out for each other. After what happened last week, I thought you should know someone was lurking.”
“He…he might have been someone looking for a dog, or…” Emily trailed off, knowing how idiotic that sounded.
Two sets of eyes regarded her with pity. It was Louella who sniffed and then said, “Then you’d think he would have been calling for it.”
She bit her lip hard. “Yes.”
“I would have dialled 911, but he was gone so fast and you know how long it would have taken one of those officers to get here.” She sniffed. “I’ve complained to Chief Colburn several times about the response time.”
All those happy endorphins had gone over a cliff like lemmings, leaving Emily feeling hollow. “Thank you for telling me, Mrs. Shoop. And…and watching out for me.”
“It’s simply not in my nature to do anything less,” she declared. “I’m so glad we have a police officer living right here on our block now.”
Sean thanked her as well and said, “If you’ll excuse us now, Mrs. Shoop, I believe this has been a shock to Ms. Drake.”
With clear reluctance, she retreated.
Emily wasn’t sure she’d have moved on her own, but Sean propelled her gently back to her house and pushed her in.
“Let me walk through quick.” He did, leaving her with her back to the front door. When he returned he said, “Take your shower, and we’ll talk about this over dinner.”
His voice was so gentle, she would have been fooled if she hadn’t looked up at his face to see rage that, oddly, reassured her.
She nodded like a child. “Okay.”
“Damn, Emily.” Taking her utterly by surprise, he slid a hand beneath her braid and kissed her. Briefly, but hard, conveying a depth of emotion that stunned her. Then he turned and bounded down the porch steps, only stopping then to say, “Lock up. Security system.”
Lips tingling, she nodded again and closed the door. She had no doubt at all that Sean waited until he heard the beep of her system resetting itself.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Sean wasn’t sleeping anyway when his phone rang at 6:24 a.m.
He’d wanted Emily to move back into his spare bedroom, and hadn’t liked her refusal.
“If…if he still has his eye on me, he may have just been confirming that I really have a security system. You know, you can buy stickers that claim you do. Businesses have them, too. But if he looked in any of my windows, he might have been able to see one of the window sensors, so now he knows.”
Sean had ground his molars together. He didn’t say, Why is he back? What does he want so bad? She was scared enough already, and she had no more answers than he did.
Not long after he’d left her locked in her house, he had heard the hum of her sewing machine. Her living room light never had gone out last night. Either she hadn’t gone to bed at all, or she’d felt safer with her house brightly lit. Maybe the light was a decoy. I’m awake, so don’t think you can sneak up on me.
She wasn’t the only one who hadn’t slept worth shit. His mind reached new creative heights with harrowing nightmares.
The minute he picked up the phone and saw the caller’s name, his edgy disquiet hardened into dread. He’d only added Rey Mendoza to his contacts list last week.
“Holbeck,” he said.
“You were right.” Mendoza’s voice was hushed, as if he didn’t want to be overheard. “The guy has struck again.”
Feeling sick, Sean braced himself. “Who’s the victim?”
Mendoza sighed. “Charles Tranor.”
; Tranor was the presiding judge of the local circuit court. He was famous – or was it infamous? – for a conservative, tough-on-crime stance that made him popular among a segment of the law enforcement community. Sean considered him too rigid and preferred the other circuit court judge, a woman.
“At least he ties to Frank Lowe,” he said.
“Yeah, not much help there. How many thousand times has Lowe appeared before Judge Tranor?”
“But if we can draw a line between Tranor and Darryl Roff…”
“That would help. Uh…I only have a minute. I stepped outside. Chief Lundy is in the house, probably contaminating my crime scene, so I’ll talk fast. Tranor lives alone, but it turns out he had a lady friend. She’s distraught, but because she’s an attorney, she’s also worrying about whether we’ll be willing or able to keep her presence quiet.”
Fat chance of that. Then Sean’s eyes narrowed. “Not Sandra Graafstra.”
“That would have been convenient, but no.” Mendoza hesitated, but finally said, “Janet Taylor.”
How many times had she appeared before by-the-book Judge Tranor? Plus, there was a significant age gap. Yeah, their affair would be a major scandal by Burris County standards.
“Same deal as at the Lowe’s, except Ms. Taylor never woke up at all until her alarm went off. She had it set for five, planned to shower and be out of there before the neighbors stirred and anybody saw her. She was surprised Charles was already up, went in the bathroom and found him.”
“BCD?”
“Nope. This time it says DD.”
“Dishonorable discharge,” Sean said slowly. Had to be. Question answered.
“That’s my guess. A bad conduct discharge means you did something crummy, but a dishonorable one is a lot worse.”
“That’s not subtle. He hates Tranor more than the previous victims.”
Mendoza grunted his agreement.
“You know we’ve kept the messages out of the news. It would be good if we can keep it that way.”
“I’ll talk to my chief,” the other detective said. Sean heard voices in the background. Mendoza muttered, “Shit, got to go,” and the call was over.
Another murder.
If I’d done my job better… Sean grappled with the unreasoning belief that he had to be better at his job than anyone else, have X-ray vision that cut through walls, be able to leap two-story buildings as if they were no higher than the hurdles on the high school track. Fortunately, common sense won. He had done every damn thing he could think of to figure out who murdered Frank Lowe. Even so, he’d missed something. What?
Consternation would sweep through the legal community once this got out. Human nature being what it was, people had wanted to assume Frank had been killed for some reason unrelated to his job, but now they’d all start picturing targets on their own backs.
And maybe, Sean thought, some of them really were wearing them.
So who would be next? A prosecutor? A cop? A juror?
His hunting instinct latched onto the last possibility. What if Darryl Roff had done jury duty? Or had been a witness in a particular trial?
Sean showered, got dressed and drank his first cup of coffee before starting to make calls, Lieutenant Wylcynski first, Colburn next. Wilcynski sounded wide awake, but it was Colburn’s fiancé who answered his mobile phone.
“He’s in the shower,” she told him. “I’ll tell him to call you.”
“Sorry if I woke you up.”
“Oh, I was awake.” A certain note in her voice told him why she was awake. He wished like hell he’d been lucky enough to wake up with a pretty woman cuddled up to him.
Not just any pretty woman. Emily.
Was she finally sleeping? he wondered. With daylight, it was harder to tell which lights were still on in her house behind those blinds. If she finally had conked out, he didn’t want to awaken her, but he knew he wouldn’t be able to concentrate on anything else until he saw her.
For the first time ever, he was glad Louella Shoop lived across the street. He had a feeling her binoculars would be trained on Emily’s house as close to twenty-four/seven as she could manage from here on out. This was the opportunity of a lifetime for a woman who, with her energy and ambition, really should be an army general. His mouth quirked. Or a police detective.
Not that the creep would go after Emily in daylight hours, Sean reflected, not if he had any brains. It would have been different if all the near neighbors were working people, but as it happened, several were retirees, including the owners of two houses right across the street. Anyone watching Emily would have noticed.
Sean wished he felt reassured.
He took his time eating breakfast, locked up and went to her front door where he rang the bell.
She appeared quick enough, she couldn’t have been in bed. While she tapped in her alarm code, Sean was distracted by the thin knit pants she wore with an equally thin tank top – and nothing under either. The sight of her face looking hollow-eyed almost quelled his lust. Strands of dark hair had escaped from last night’s braid, curving over her cheek and clinging to her long, pale throat.
“You didn’t sleep,” he said.
She made a face. “Not much.”
She would have slept fine in his spare bedroom, he knew, but he also understood her stubbornness. Going home with him would mean she was succumbing to fear and allowing herself to be driven out of her house.
He could suggest she go spend a couple weeks with her grandparents, but tracking her down wouldn’t be hard for someone who was determined. And Nanna and Grandad probably didn’t have a home security system.
That wasn’t even his first objection, Sean admitted privately. The truth was, he would go crazy if he couldn’t watch out for her. A daily phone call wouldn’t cut it.
He was freaking obsessed.
“Try to nap today,” he said quietly.
She forced a smile. “I will.” Her forehead creased. “You’re up early.”
He barely hesitated. He could trust her not to talk. “We have another murder. This one is in North Fork, so it’s not my jurisdiction, but we’re all working together. It should give us some new avenues to investigate.”
She gripped the doorframe. “Can you tell me who?”
“A judge. Charles Tranor.”
Did she look relieved? “I’ve seen his name in the newspaper, but I’m sure I don’t know him. Oh, but you must.”
“I’ve testified in his courtroom. That doesn’t make for a very personal relationship.”
“No.” Her eyes widened, the color so extraordinary, he couldn’t look away. “There aren’t that many detectives around here, are there? What if…” Her voice faltered. “What if he wants to kill you?”
The odds were against it. Was a cop on the to-do list? Maybe. Sean kept in mind, though, that whatever grudge the killer held might just as well have to do with a misdemeanor crime, civil case or a custody hearing as a major criminal trial.
“If Roff had been a juror or witness in a trial where I testified, I’d remember him,” he said. “I’m good with faces and names.”
“Oh.” She relaxed. “Okay.”
He couldn’t help himself. He lifted his hand to stroke the silky skin of her cheek with his knuckles, then gently tuck one of those wayward locks of hair behind her ear.
Her eyes darkened. “Sean…”
He shook his head and made himself back up. “Dinner? I’d suggest a run, but it’s supposed to rain.”
She looked past him at the sky and nodded, expression wary but also… He wasn’t sure.
“I’d be happy to cook again,” she offered.
What could she say after he’d put her on the spot? But he’d take what he could get anyway. “If you mean it.”
“I mean it.”
“Six? If it looks like I’ll be late, I’ll call.”
As he walked back to his own driveway, he discovered he’d paid more attention to the lush shape of her breasts and hips beneath the thi
n fabric than he’d realized. His hands tingled with awareness of how her breasts and the firm, round globes of her butt would feel cupped in them. And damned if he wasn’t getting aroused.
It was probably a good thing his drive would take twenty minutes or more.
*****
An hour later, Emily’s doorbell rang. Her hand jerked, spilling coffee hot enough to make her gasp.
Living in a state of fear could not be good for her blood pressure, she thought, going to one of the windows to peek between blinds before she dared open the door.
To her astonishment, it was Sophie Thomsen who stood on her porch. What did the police chief’s fiancé want with her?
Glad she’d showered and gotten dressed right after Sean left, Emily unlocked and opened the door. “Sophie! It’s been ages.”
Blonde hair bundled on the back of her head, Sophie was maybe five foot five or six, which meant she was several inches shorter than Emily. She was fine-boned, but not so petite as to make Emily feel like the Hulk, as she had so often in school, when she towered over all the other girls and most of the boys.
“I know you work at home and, even if it’s Saturday, I’m probably interrupting you, but I was hoping you could take a break for coffee. Daniel keeps worrying about your break-in. I thought maybe it would help to talk to someone who’s been there.”
Emily stepped back. “I was actually sitting at the kitchen table brooding over a cup of coffee, so your timing is perfect.”
It took them awhile to reach the kitchen, since Sophie stopped to ooh and aah over half-completed quilts, including the one in the frame.
“This is stunning,” she said. “I love the really modern quilts, but I have to admit to especially coveting the traditional ones.” Her fingertips trailed over the curves of a hand-pieced wedding ring as she studied the quilt still in the frame. “I don’t suppose it will be for sale.”
Emily didn’t remember seeing the diamond ring on Sophie’s left hand the last time they’d met. She smiled. “I think it might be a wedding gift, if the bride doesn’t mind not being surprised.”
She lifted her head. “You mean… Oh, you can’t be serious. The work in this boggles my mind! You could surely sell it for a ton, and it is your livelihood.”
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