by Amy Vastine
His gaze flicked to her and he put his hand on top of hers. “I will not let anyone hurt you.”
“Sending me stuff was one thing. Going into my apartment, my home? That’s a different level of wrong.”
“I will find him,” Donovan said without any doubt.
Kelly let his words ease some of the anxiety, which was why she wanted to stay with him. If there was one thing she knew about him, it was that he never did anything halfway. Donovan took care of business. If he said he was going to find the stalker, Kelly believed him.
When they got to the house, it was after nine. The hope was Avery was in bed, so they would only have to explain the situation to Graham. Thankfully, the house was dark except for the light on in Graham’s room.
“We should call Captain Bonner.”
Kelly dreaded this call because it meant she would also have to call her mother, who would most definitely be in the car on her way to Nashville to bring Kelly back to Knoxville thirty seconds after she heard the news.
“Can we tell him in the morning?”
Donovan’s thumb hovered over the contact number on his phone. “I won’t have a job in the morning if I wait to tell him something this important.”
“How about I call my mom and you call my uncle?” She wasn’t looking forward to either call, but it was best if her mom heard what was happening from her rather than Uncle Hal. She dialed her mom and waited for her to pick up.
“Kelly Renee, since when do you call your mother two weeks in a row?”
Kelly inhaled slowly to try to keep her voice from cracking. “Hey, Mom.”
“What’s wrong?”
All her plans to hold it together crumbled with that one simple question. The tears were back and Kelly fell apart as she explained what had happened. All the fear and the anxiety poured out.
“Oh, sweetheart. Are you with Hal and Laura?”
Kelly sniffled. “I’m staying with a friend. It feels safer to stay somewhere no one would think to look for me.”
“Your uncle is a police captain. There is nowhere safer than under his roof.”
Of course her mother would disagree. Kelly kicked off her shoes and sat down on Donovan’s couch. “I feel safe where I am, Mom. My friend is a detective in Uncle Hal’s department.”
She took a second and then said, “Fine. Do you want me to come to Nashville? I have some days I could take off.”
“No, don’t waste your vacation days on me. I’ll be fine. I just needed to let all of my emotions out. I feel better now.”
“I’m going to call Hal and see what he thinks.”
Kelly didn’t know why she bothered having an opinion. It wasn’t as if it mattered.
“He’s on the phone with Donovan.” Kelly looked over her shoulder at Donovan pacing back and forth in the foyer as he filled Hal in on what happened.
“Donovan? That’s the detective?” When Kelly confirmed, she continued, “And his wife is okay with you staying there?”
Not very subtle. “There’s no wife, Mom, but he is the legal guardian of his niece and nephew. This is where I feel the safest. You and Uncle Hal are not going to change my mind.” She looked back at her host. Hopefully, Uncle Hal wouldn’t be able to change Donovan’s.
Thankfully, her mom didn’t try to sway her again. They said their goodbyes and Kelly promised to call her in the morning. After hanging up, Kelly noticed Donovan was missing. He wasn’t in the foyer or the kitchen.
She got off the couch and went looking for him, hoping she could stay there. She found him in the upstairs hall whispering with Graham and holding a pillow and some bedding.
“Hey, are you okay?” Graham asked. “I can’t believe what happened.”
“I’m totally fine. I’m sorry if you heard me falling apart down there. I didn’t mean to let my emotions get the best of me like that.”
Graham stepped around Donovan and gave her a hug. “I’m glad you’re here. Uncle Donovan won’t let anything happen to you.”
She loved that he had so much confidence in his uncle. Graham could give Donovan a hard time, but he knew his uncle was a good man.
“I put your bag in my room,” Donovan said. “Let me change the sheets and then I’ll be out of your way.”
“No way,” Kelly said, putting her foot down. “I am not taking your room. I’m sleeping on the couch. Don’t even try to fight me for it.”
“I’m not going to fight you, but I’m also not letting you sleep on the couch.”
“And I’m not letting you let me sleep in your bed.” Before he could argue, she ran back downstairs and claimed the couch.
* * *
THERE WAS STUBBORN and there was Kelly Bonner. She was stubborn on steroids. Donovan followed her downstairs and found her lying on the couch looking at her phone. He placed the pillow and a blanket on the floor in front of her.
“I know you think you’re not imposing by doing this, but you’re actually making this more difficult for me by refusing to sleep where I planned for you to sleep.”
Kelly sat up. “I don’t want to sleep in your bed. I know you think that it’s the polite thing to do for a guest, but it will make me uncomfortable to be in your room. Especially since I am here because some creep was in my room.”
Donovan dropped into the chair across from her. He scrubbed his face with his hand. It had been a long day. He understood it had been a long, hard day for her, as well. “I get that. I just want you to be comfortable.”
“I’ll be most comfortable right here.” Kelly pulled the hair tie out of her hair and shook it out. “I really appreciate that you’re letting me stay here. I’m sure my uncle had other ideas. Do I need to call him?”
“He wanted to come get you, but I convinced him that it might be best to stay here tonight and we could talk about things in the morning.” He had a few other things to say, but Kelly didn’t need to hear it. After hearing her on the phone with her mom, crying about what had happened, he wanted to protect her from anything that would make her upset.
“So I have a reprieve until the morning?” She bent over and picked up the pillow and blanket. “Is it weird that I feel exhausted and yet totally wired at the same time?”
“It’s weird but understandable. Your body is still experiencing some of the flight-or-fight aftereffects.” He was suffering from the same thing. Part of the reason he wanted her upstairs was because he knew he couldn’t sleep. His mind was whirling and all he wanted to do was find the person who had broken into Kelly’s place and made her feel this way.
“Thank you again for taking me in. I truly don’t think I would have felt safe anywhere else.”
Donovan felt his heart clench. He was glad to be there for her but sorry the situation called for it. He stood up, needing to move. “I’ll run up and get your bag. You can sleep down here for tonight. Tomorrow is another story, though.”
“My feelings about taking over your space are not going to change overnight,” she replied as he headed for the stairs.
“Oh, I’m not talking about my room. If you stay another night, Avery’s going to insist on a sleepover in her room, and you know by now, when Avery really wants something, she usually gets it.”
Kelly’s head dropped in defeat. She had to know there was no telling Avery thanks but no thanks. Tomorrow, if Captain Bonner thought it was best for her to stay here, Kelly could be rooming with Avery until her stalker was arrested.
* * *
THE NEXT MORNING, Donovan awoke to the smell of bacon and the sound of his smoke detector going off. He leaped out of bed and found Graham and Avery rubbing the sleep from their eyes in the hallway. He ran downstairs. Kelly stood under the detector with a dish towel, waving the towel like mad.
“I’m so sorry. I don’t know what happened. I thought you’d be so impressed if I made something on my own and, of course, I mess
ed up.”
Donovan opened the window above the kitchen sink in an attempt at getting some fresh air in the place. A large pan of bacon and another pan of scrambled eggs sat on the stove. There was a plate of some cooked bacon on the counter, but what was in the pan was “extra crispy.”
He grabbed another towel and helped her fan the detector until it stopped beeping. Kelly looked so defeated. She sat down at the kitchen table with tears in her eyes.
“Hey, it happens to the best of us. Bacon is not easy. It looks like you did great with the first batch,” he said, trying to cheer her up.
“Kelly! How did you get here?” Avery said, running over to her and hugging her tight.
“I bet it’s going to taste good,” Graham said, sitting down next to her.
Kelly took a napkin from the holder on the table and dabbed her eyes. She had the whole table set for breakfast. “I was trying to do something nice for you guys for letting me stay here. I knew I would mess it up.”
“You stayed here?” Avery was rightly confused.
“Kelly had to stay at our house last night. She can’t stay at her apartment for a few days,” Donovan explained.
“You can stay in my room! I have two beds.” Avery had a trundle bed, so there was another twin mattress for Kelly to sleep on. Donovan had warned her that Avery would be all over that when she found out she was here.
“That’s very sweet of you, Avery.” Kelly gave the little girl another squeeze.
Donovan checked on the food one more time. “I think plenty of this is salvageable. Who wants some bacon and eggs?”
Both kids raised their hands and said, “Me!”
“You guys don’t have to eat it. It’s probably terrible. I should have run out and got doughnuts instead.”
“I love doughnuts,” Avery said unable to turn off her honesty.
“These eggs are going to be great,” Donovan said, bringing the eggs over and spooning some on each plate. “Maybe we’ll get doughnuts tomorrow morning. Doughnuts taste best on the weekend.”
Graham got up and brought over the bacon that wasn’t burnt. “Does anyone want some orange juice?” he asked, being more helpful than Donovan had expected.
“I do!” Avery said, peeling herself off Kelly and taking the seat next to her.
Everyone got settled in and breakfast was served. Donovan quickly made some toast. The kids tried very hard to be complimentary. The eggs were a tad overdone but still palatable. The bacon that wasn’t burned was just right. All in all, it was a perfectly acceptable meal.
“Thanks for breakfast, Kelly,” Graham said, standing up but swiping one more slice of buttered toast. “I’m gonna get ready for school.”
Kelly smiled. It was good to see her relaxed. “You’re welcome.”
“I can clean up if you want to use my bathroom to get ready,” Donovan offered to Kelly.
She pushed her chair back from the table and started to get up. “I should clean up. I made this mess.”
“No,” he insisted. “Please let me take care of it.”
Avery and Kelly went upstairs together, leaving Donovan alone to do something with the mess. He hadn’t gotten a lot of sleep last night. He had gone over everything they knew about Kelly’s stalker and came up with some questions to ask her about who might have had access to her apartment. The guy needed to be found and needed to be found now.
Graham came back downstairs and dropped his backpack on the kitchen table.
“I haven’t wiped that down yet,” Donovan warned.
Graham picked it back up and set it at his feet. “Is there any way the guy stalking Kelly could find her here? Would he come here to get her?”
Donovan could hear the worry in Graham’s voice. It wasn’t only worry for Kelly but for all of them. He tried to be reassuring. “It would be very difficult for someone to find her here unless they followed us, and I am very aware of who is around us at all times. No one is going to follow me without me knowing about it.”
Graham nodded his head. “I hope you find this guy before he finds her. You’re going to find him, right?”
His anxiety was palpable and Donovan was hit with a cold bucket of guilt. Graham and Avery were attached to Kelly and now Kelly was at risk. Surely, Graham was thinking worst-case scenario. If something was to happen to her, these kids would be devastated.
“Don’t worry. I have complete faith in the police. They are going to find him. It’s my job to make sure no one lays a hand on her, and I am very good at my job.”
Graham nodded again but didn’t seem fully convinced.
“The only thing you need to be thinking about is how to survive these last couple days of school. Finals are coming up. You have to stay focused.”
With eyes rolling, Graham let out a sigh. “I won’t worry about Kelly if you don’t worry about my finals, how about that?”
“I’ll worry about everything because I’m the adult in charge. You and your sister are my responsibility and protecting Kelly is my job. Your only job is school.”
Graham shoved his earbuds into his ears. “You can’t tell me not to care about what happens to her. I can’t just pretend it doesn’t matter.”
“I’m not telling you not to care. I’m telling you to trust me.”
Slinging his backpack over his shoulder, Graham turned his back on Donovan and headed for the front door. “I trusted the grown-ups to make my mom better and look at how that worked out for me.”
He’d been waiting for the kids to throw that back at him. Nothing had been harder when his sister was sick than trying to balance giving the kids hope with being realistic. Jessica had struggled with it, as well. She wanted to believe she could beat it but did everything she could to prepare Donovan for the possibility she wouldn’t.
After all that planning, Donovan still messed up. He was letting the kids get close to someone in danger. If anything happened to Kelly, not only would he be devastated but so would the kids.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
“I UNDERSTAND THAT it’s not my jurisdiction. All I am asking for is some information.” Uncle Hal was fired up. His face was red and his tone sharp. He looked like Kelly felt—tired, frustrated and ready for this to be over. “Yes, she has an off-duty detective from my division providing her with some personal security. You can relay anything to him that you think would be helpful for us to know.”
Kelly glanced over at Donovan, who had been quiet since breakfast. He was probably regretting being this deeply involved in someone else’s problem. She began to question if she should go to her uncle’s instead of bothering Donovan. He had a family to take care of and she, even when trying to be helpful, was just one more problem for him to fix.
Uncle Hal hung up the phone and pinched the bridge of his nose. “I have never been so frustrated with another house. These guys act like I’m trying to take over. All I want is some information. I want to know what they’ve found out, which by the way, is nothing.”
“I’m sure they need to ask Kelly some more questions. At this point, she’s the only one who could shed some light,” Donovan said.
Defensive, Kelly clasped her hands so they would stop shaking. “Ask me anything you want. I don’t know who this guy is. I have no idea how he could have gotten into my apartment.”
“Relax, sweetheart,” Uncle Hal said. “We don’t think you’re holding something back. It’s possible you know something without realizing it. You could have information that connects some of the dots.”
“Was there ever a time when you gave your house key or a spare key to a neighbor or a friend?” Donovan asked. “Anyone other than your uncle? Trey?”
“I don’t think so.” She racked her brain for an instance where she would have asked someone to go to her apartment for her. “Definitely not Trey.”
“Someone at work, another neighbor when yo
u went out of town, a friend who needed to borrow something,” Donovan said, trying to jar her memory. “Maybe you needed someone to grab something for you when you couldn’t. Maybe you forgot something at home and you had to be on the air.”
Finally, one of his suggestions struck a chord. “There was one time, but it was probably over a year ago. I was flying to Mexico right after my show and I forgot my passport. I asked our intern at the time to go get it for me.”
“Do you remember who that was?”
“His name was Lucas. I don’t remember his last name. Interns are only at the station for less than a year usually.”
“Do you remember Lucas having any interest in you beyond learning about being on the radio? Did he try to spend time with you?”
Kelly tried to remember what Lucas even looked like. She didn’t remember him being overly enamored with her. “I don’t remember anything like that. I just remember asking him if he could go get my passport and giving him my key fob to get in the building and my key to get in my apartment. He brought me the passport and I made my flight.”
Donovan jotted down a few notes. “Anyone else come to mind?”
Under pressure, Kelly couldn’t think of anyone else. She shook her head.
“This is a good start. If you think of anything or anyone who would have had access to your keys, let me know.”
“Are we sure they had keys?”
“There were no signs of forced entry. Nothing was damaged. I doubt you left your door unlocked,” Uncle Hal said.
That was somehow scarier than if someone had simply broken in. If they had a key, they were close enough to her to get it and they could have had access to her apartment for who knew how long. If it was Lucas, he could have had access for over a year.
“Are you sure you’re okay staying with Detective Walsh? You know there’s a place for you at my house,” her uncle asked.
Kelly glanced at Donovan for his reaction. His face was frozen in concentration as he wrote things down in his notebook. “I don’t want to be a bother to anyone. Should I get a hotel room?”