He did need to walk away. But first, he needed to satisfy himself that she was all right. Needed to feel the life that beat within her and confirm that all his dark fears, the ones that had loomed so large on the drive to her home, hadn’t come true.
So he pushed all he felt into the kiss. As if he could convince her how much he cared and brand her at the same time. Because after this, he had to walk away.
She was in his blood now and it was something he never expected. Or needed. Or wanted.
With one final press of his lips to hers, Troy pulled back.
He didn’t miss the empty look in Evangeline’s eyes. He figured it was a match for how she likely looked this morning when she’d woken and he was gone.
He wanted things to be different. But they couldn’t be. And because of that simple fact, he leaned into the job and used it as a shield to protect his heart.
“Now. Let’s walk through this one from the beginning and figure out what’s going on.”
* * *
The morning incident at Evangeline’s had put him behind but Troy wasn’t quite ready to let it go. Her upstairs neighbor had protested, but Troy had seen Evangeline’s call log. He’d taken down the number and the time of the call and hoped it would be enough for Ellie to work her tech magic. If not, Evangeline had agreed to come into the precinct to let Ellie look at her phone.
Which had circled Troy right back to where he’d begun his morning: Randall Bowe.
“Still no luck finding the brother?” Brett asked around a mouthful of sandwich. One of the two he’d picked up on his way back to the precinct from Evangeline’s.
“No. I can’t find any record of a Baldwin Bowe and I’ve done some serious searching.” Troy took a bite of his meatball sub and considered all the effort he’d put into this case. As he chewed he remembered Brett’s offer a few days before.
“How did I forget?” Even as he asked the question, Troy knew exactly how he’d forgotten. Evangeline. She’d been at the forefront of his thoughts, crowding out the work. His cases.
Everything.
Pushing it aside, he refocused on Brett. “You offered to ask your friend. The US marshal who has an inside line to the witness protection program?”
Brett shook his head and grinned. “You haven’t gotten to your email yet. Oren got back to us and nothing popped on WitSec.”
Troy wiped his hands and turned to his computer, scrolling until he saw the name Oren Margulies. “You spoke well of him.” Troy scanned the man’s email, the reason for Brett’s solid endorsement evident in the crisp, clear words and the genuine offer of help. “I can see why. He’s thorough. And doesn’t have any detail on a Baldwin Bowe or any hints the man was even considered for protection.”
“Another dead end.” Brett balled up the wrapper from his sandwich. “There is another angle, though. Would you want to be close to Randall Bowe? The guy’s a worm, from everyone’s recounting. It’s entirely possible Baldwin just doesn’t want anything to do with his family.”
“True.”
Much as he hated thinking of any angle as a dead end, Troy knew Brett was right. The Coltons might be tightly woven and all up in one another’s business, but that didn’t mean every family was the same.
What also didn’t translate was why Baldwin Bowe was so damn hard to find. Everyone had a digital footprint. It was so standard at this point that Bowe’s lack of one was a red flag in and of itself. It had become so odd that it might be worth putting Ellie on it to see if she could come up with something.
Which made the woman’s arrival at his office door less than thirty seconds later both odd and reassuring. “Troy. Brett. The people I want to see.”
She barreled into the office, her trusty laptop in hand as she took the guest chair next to Brett. “Wait’ll you see what I found.” She angled her laptop so they could both see the screen and tabbed through a few of the apps she had open.
“The number you gave me this morning. It was shockingly easy to track.” She eyed Troy directly. “Like, stupid easy.”
“What do you mean?”
“The number that called Evangeline’s mobile line? It’s the number registered to her upstairs neighbor, Ella Fields. The woman didn’t even call from a different phone or try to hide what she was doing.”
“Someone could have spoofed the number,” Brett interjected, but Troy could see his attention was caught on Ellie’s screen.
“They could but based on the logs I pulled from the phone company—” Ellie toggled to a new screen “—there was a call made from that number through those stodgy old phone lines that crisscross Grave Gulch. The girl didn’t even use an untraceable cell phone.”
“And it was made to Evangeline’s cell.”
Ellie nodded. “At nine thirty-two this morning.”
Which made sense, because Evangeline’s call to him had come in four minutes later.
Ellie shook her head as she closed her laptop. “Someone’s gaslighting her. That’s all there is to it.”
Which was the final tumbler in the lock, Troy realized.
He’d questioned the idea and, while not impossible, it had seemed like an awfully complicated way to hurt someone.
But in Ellie’s words, Troy knew the truth.
The incredibly simple, obvious, truth.
Someone was purposely taunting Evangeline, attacking and undermining her credibility.
As the cloud of confusion lifted, a layer of guilt took its place.
He hadn’t believed her. Not fully, anyway. A big part of him might have tried, but there had always been something holding him back, so he’d never fully given Evangeline his trust.
“You mean making her think there’s danger when there really isn’t?” Brett clarified.
“Yep. Like that old movie. The one with Ingrid Bergman. The creepy husband keeps trying to make her think she’s seeing things.” Ellie added, “They actually made us watch it in the academy along with one of our domestic abuse workshops.”
“It all makes sense. Every bit of it.” Troy tried to remain calm, but he couldn’t deny the slamming of his heart against his ribs and the rising anger. All at himself.
He’d doubted her. Even when it was clear she was desperate to have someone believe her, he’d held back.
“First the incident in the alley. The weird stuff in her house and the sense of being watched. The bloody shirt. Now the neighbor.”
“But who’s doing it?” Brett pressed the question. “A woman, and one this soon after his last kill, is a serious break in pattern for Len Davison. And Randall Bowe has no reason to come after her.”
Troy was already on his feet. Now that he knew what he was looking for, he had an entirely new approach to keeping Evangeline safe. And it started with the lying upstairs neighbor.
“I don’t know. But we’re going to find out.”
* * *
Evangeline tried to focus on the positive call she’d had with Arielle Parks and her boss’s agreement that it was time for her to come back to the DA’s office and not on the weird incident with the upstairs neighbor.
What was going on with Ella?
The call had been real but so had the sleepy eyes and disdain for being woken up. But it was also strange the woman had called her. It wasn’t like they’d exchanged phone numbers, yet somehow Ella had hers? They’d met the day Ella moved into the condo complex and were cordial to one another when they passed in the parking lot and that was it.
Yet Evangeline was the first one she called?
The ping of a text pulled her away from the puzzle and she couldn’t stop the smile as Troy’s name lit up the face of her phone. It was a wholly unnecessary reaction, especially given her current situation and the reason he was texting her, but it made her smile all the same.
Got a lead on your neighbor. Can you meet me? The diner just past
the edge of town?
She texted back that she could and quickly cleaned up her breakfast dishes. In a matter of minutes, she’d left the house, locking the door behind her. The sense of action felt good. Better than good, she admitted to herself as she navigated her way toward the diner Troy had noted.
She felt more like herself than she had in months. Like she had purpose again.
“That was fast,” Troy said as she climbed out of the car. “Things are coming together. Including the fact that your silly young neighbor did call you this morning from her home, just above you.”
“That was her number?” Evangeline stared at Troy across the expanse of the hood of her car. Of all the things she expected him to say, that wasn’t it. A hello would have been nice, too, but she ignored that spurt of disappointment. “Why would she do that and then pretend she didn’t?”
“That’s what we’re going to find out. Ellie did some quick work on her social media pages and found she works here. She’s going to meet us.”
Evangeline glanced around the parking lot. “There—” She pointed to a small red compact car. “That’s her car.”
“I’d normally do this alone but I want her to look at you when I ask her questions.”
It was a tactic Evangeline recognized and it made a lot of sense. As of yet, the woman had behaved suspiciously, but they needed to know more. Her presence might be the key they needed to get Ella talking.
“Thanks for bringing me into this. I’d really like to understand what’s going on.”
“What’s going on is that we think you’re being gaslighted.”
“What?” Evangeline stilled as images of her father’s tactics on her mother rushed through her mind. “Why do you think that?”
“Ellie had the idea and it’s the only one that fits. You are a strong, competent woman. And all these things that keep happening to you and then vanishing? They’re setups.”
The wash of relief was palpable, even as the memories of her father’s behavior left an oily residue in her midsection. “I’m not imagining things.”
He came around the car then to stand in front of her. The hard lines of his face, set in place ever since that last, lingering kiss in her home, finally faded. In its place, his mouth creased into a small smile. “No, you’re not. You never were. But someone wants you to think you are.” She’d heard of that behavior. She’d even seen it a time or two over her career. Sadistic, psychotic behavior, perpetrated on innocent people to make them feel less-than. And while she was happy to finally have answers, she was angry, too.
How dare they?
Whoever “they” was.
Just like that morning, when she woke with the express desire to call Arielle and get on with her life, that same feeling filled her now. On a nod, Evangeline pointed toward the glass front door, determination straightening her spine with steel. “Let’s go get this done.”
She walked beside Troy into the diner, her gaze sweeping the room for Ella. Although the diner was large, the post-lunch crowd had thinned out and it wasn’t hard to find Ella as she moved around, cleaning off tables and pocketing tips.
“Miss Fields?” Troy approached her, casual and easy. Evangeline had spent enough time with him now to recognize the act and how the smile didn’t quite meet those hard cop’s eyes.
But anyone sitting around listening wouldn’t have known that.
“May we have a few minutes of your time?”
“Um. Well. I’m not due for a break for another half hour.”
Troy kept that smile firmly in place, even as his tone remained unbending. “I’m sure your manager won’t mind but I can clear it if I need to.”
“No, no. The lunch crowd has died down. I’m sure it’ll be fine.”
Evangeline didn’t miss how the young woman’s eyes kept darting her way but kept her own smile firmly in place.
Troy led them to a quiet corner of the diner, in a seat Ellie had already grabbed when she came in.
“Who’s this?” Ella asked, that cornered look growing more pronounced in her eyes.
“This is Ellie Bloomberg. She’s our queen of all technology at the GGPD and she found something interesting this morning with Ms. Whittaker’s phone.”
“I’m not sure what this has to do with—”
“It seems as if you made a call to Ms. Whittaker this morning,” Troy cut her off, pressing his advantage. “A call Ms. Bloomberg was able to confirm quite easily.”
Whatever reaction Evangeline was expecting—especially after the sleepy bravado routine this morning at Ella’s condo—wasn’t in evidence. Instead, her neighbor’s shoulders fell as she blurted out, “Damn. I forgot to use that cell phone he gave me.”
“Would you like to make a statement, Ms. Fields?”
The young woman’s head snapped up. “Am I under arrest?”
“You made a fake phone call with the express intent of harassing someone.”
Evangeline stepped in before Troy could add anything further. “I work for the district attorney’s office, Ella. I’m quite sure we can talk to Detective Colton’s chief as well as my boss and gain their leniency if you can help us with this.”
Ella nodded, her eyes filling with tears. “It was a quick hundred bucks, ya know? And it didn’t seem that bad at the time.”
“What didn’t seem so bad?” Troy’s voice had gentled and in his compassion Evangeline saw more of what she loved so much about him.
He recognized that the people he was sworn to protect didn’t always make the best decisions. But even when they erred, it didn’t mean he lost his compassion for them.
“All I had to do was call and rile her up a bit. It was just pretend. Acting, the guy told me.” Ella turned her tear-filled eyes to Evangeline. “I really didn’t mean to hurt you or upset you. I can see now how I did.”
“Do you have any other information?” Troy asked.
“Yes.” The waitress nodded, swiping at her eyes. “I have a note in my bag. Let me just go get it.”
Ella slid out of the booth to head toward the back of the restaurant. Evangeline figured there was no need to follow her since they knew where she lived. But it seemed odd, anticlimactic, even, to be sitting here waiting for a note.
“She got in over her head,” Evangeline started in, curious if Troy would agree. “I meant what I said. I see no reason why we can’t figure out a deal. I don’t want to press charges.”
“Don’t be too hasty.”
Troy barely had the words out when Ella came rushing back up to the table, a crumpled piece of paper in her hand. “Here. I knew I had the number. He said to call him if there were any problems.”
Troy glanced at the small slip of paper before passing it to Ellie, who began tapping on her oversize cell phone. In moments, she had what she was looking for. “It’s a local number.” With a glance for the young woman who’d helped them, she tapped the piece of paper. “I need to take this with me.”
“Go ahead.” Ella lifted her hands up, palms out. “I don’t want anything to do with it.”
They wrapped up quickly, getting the details of how Ella was approached and a description of the guy who’d paid her. Other than making the young woman even more scared than she already was, there was little to be gained after getting the details.
The waitress was obviously remorseful and while Troy might not be quite ready to let her off the hook, Evangeline had worked long enough in the DA’s office to recognize young and naive over criminal any day.
What still remained was what was going on with the person who put her neighbor up to this.
Ellie turned to them when they got into the parking lot. “I didn’t want to give her any more details, but that number appears to be tied to some of the back-end operations of a local restaurant. I got the type of business off of their tax filings.”
“What restaura
nt?” Troy demanded.
“I can’t see it on my mobile device. I need to dig into the computer back at the office. Shouldn’t take me long to get it for you.”
Ellie was already climbing into her car to head back to the precinct.
“I’ll let you go, then.” Evangeline dug her keys out of her purse. “Thank you for including me in this. And for your kindness to Ella.”
“She’s not out of the woods yet.”
“She should be. She did a stupid thing. She’s young and she saw the money and thought it was a phone call.”
“She committed a crime.”
Evangeline let out a hard sigh. That stony, stoic look had returned to his face and suddenly, she wasn’t able to face it any longer. They’d made love the night before and while she wasn’t expecting declarations of everlasting devotion, his lack of acknowledgment stung. Terribly.
“Please let me know what you find out about the phone number.”
He only nodded and it took everything inside of her to get in her car and keep the tears at bay.
The drive back to her condo passed in a blur of tears and sobs and the deep desire to climb into her bed and pull the covers over her head.
How had she been so stupid? Because as she drove the winding miles through Grave Gulch back home, she knew the truth. She’d fallen in love with Troy. Beyond her better sense or any modicum of reason, she had and there was nothing to be done for it.
Swiping at her eyes, she dashed away what was left of the tears. She was stronger than this. Hadn’t the past week shown her that? Hell, the past few months. She’d get past this and move on and someday she’d find a way to stop thinking about Troy Colton with every fiber of her being.
But that day wasn’t today, Evangeline admitted as she got out of the car and walked to her front door. She slipped the key in the lock and only barely registered the ease with which the door swung open, even before she turned the key.
If she weren’t distracted, maybe, she’d have reacted differently when a big, beefy hand clamped around her wrist and dragged her inside the house.
But she couldn’t even summon a scream as a second hand clamped over her mouth.
Harlequin Romantic Suspense July 2021 Box Set Page 39
