Saving Rose Red

by Maggie Dallen

  Andie gave him a lopsided grin. “She grew up in a different time, I guess. And in the suburbs.” As if that explained everything. Sometimes she had no idea why her mother did the things she did, but she was growing to like her nonetheless. She was a character and Andie had always loved characters.

  Like this guy, for example. He was so unlike most men she met—in looks, attitude…everything. He seemed so hard on the outside but his eyes were kind and filled with humor. She’d give anything to get inside that head.

  And his bed.

  She stifled a laugh at that completely unbidden and inappropriate thought.

  Dagger, however, was definitely not laughing. “That camera could have fallen into anyone’s hands.”

  She nodded. It was true. And as a rule she generally didn’t advertise her home address. “Well then I guess I should consider myself lucky it fell into your hands.”

  He rubbed a hand across his eyes as he sighed. “You barely know me.”

  “I don’t have to.”

  He raised a brow in question but she didn’t need to explain herself to this man—a relative stranger who still hadn’t answered her questions. “So you came to give me my camera.”

  He nodded, his gaze flickered to the camera in question and then back. It wasn’t the first time she’d seen him casting a sidelong look at the camera, as if wary of letting it out of his sight. Huh. What was so interesting about that camera?

  Crossing her arms in front of her chest, she watched him carefully—the way he favored his left leg, even though he’d sworn that his wound was just a scratch.

  “How did you say you hurt your leg again?”

  His gaze met hers. “I didn’t.”

  Okaaay. “And why did you feel the need to bring the camera to me when I was already planning on coming to your shop later this week?”

  She resisted the urge to add something nice like, not that I’m not grateful. Nope. Nice time was over. For now, at least. She might not be afraid of this man, but that didn’t mean she trusted him completely. Or at all, really.

  He didn’t answer for a moment and she refused to back down or fill the silence with chatter. Granted she had to literally bite her tongue to keep the nervous babbling at bay, but she managed a cool silence.

  He caved first, his stiff posture relaxing. For a moment her heart went out to him—he looked so weary and tired. But she still stayed silent, giving herself a mental fist bump for her patience. She was strong. Made of iron. She would be a silent, unflappable epitome of cool until this man was honest with her.

  “I, uh…I need a place to crash.”

  Her resolve crumbled in the face of his honesty. And he was being honest—her Spidey senses never lied. “Why didn’t you say so right away? Of course you can crash here.”

  His eyes narrowed on her like she’d just started speaking in a foreign tongue. “Are you serious? You don’t even know why. Or for how long.” He sounded so exasperated, it was almost funny.

  “Margaret has two guest bedrooms in addition to her room. You can have the smaller one.” She started leading the way but stopped when she realized he wasn’t following.

  “Don’t you want to know why I need a place to stay?”

  She tilted her head to the side. “Do you want to tell me?”

  His scowl intensified and she pressed her lips together to keep from smiling. That, she supposed, was her answer. “I’m assuming you’re in some kind of trouble….”

  His silence was a yes.

  “With the law?”

  “Something like that.”

  That voice. If he wasn’t such a talented tattoo artist she’d try to convince him to become a voice actor or something. She’d pay to listen to him read the phone book. But to have that voice read one of her favorite romance novels? Yes, please.

  Once she got over the sound of his voice, the words registered. Something like that. What did that mean? She opened her mouth to ask and then thought better of it. If this guy wanted to tell her, he would. She’d worked with enough troubled teens to know that silence was usually a better way to get people to open up than pestering them with questions.

  As someone who’d grown up in the foster care system, she’d tried her best to give back to kids who were in her situation so she volunteered at a local group home. She’d been trying to get Spencer, her former foster brother and best friend, to go with her but he refused. He was a borderline recluse and didn’t leave his apartment unless it was absolutely necessary and volunteer work did not qualify.

  But thoughts of Spencer brought her back to the topic at hand in a roundabout way. He worked with the police as a tech consultant. One thing she knew from talking about his work…there were some things she didn’t want to know. Knowing meant having a dilemma over whether to report someone.

  So it was decided. She wouldn’t push it. Her gut said he was a decent guy and that was what mattered. The rest was just backstory. She turned back to the hallway that led to the guest bedroom. “Like I said, you can have the smaller room.”

  It was official—the angel of Brooklyn was certifiable. Insanity was the only explanation. No one was that naive, that trusting, that…nice. He’d all but admitted to being a criminal, yet here he was, nice and snug in the spare bedroom. The “small” bedroom, which was roughly the same size as his studio apartment.

  He heard her bedroom door close and waited nearly an hour before making his move. He found the camera quickly enough—it was exactly where she’d left it earlier in the night. Now he just needed the cable and a laptop so he could send it to Eddie.

  For a large man, he prided himself on being stealthy. But either he wasn’t stealthy enough or Andie was the lightest sleeper on the planet. He heard her bedroom door open and close and seconds later she walked into the kitchen and flipped on the light.

  She spotted him instantly. He’d had enough time to slip the camera behind his back but he was still standing in the middle of her living room in the dark.

  Yeah, that wasn’t odd.

  She blinked a few times at the jarring bright light, her face screwed up adorably in sleep-addled confusion. “Dagger? What are you doing?”

  The sound of his fake name had guilt rippling through him. He had the sudden and intense desire to hear that sweet, sleepy voice say his real name. If he was being honest with himself, he’d been just a little disappointed that she hadn’t interrogated him on why he was here and who he really was. A little part of him wanted her to know.

  But knowing anything about him was dangerous and she was in enough danger thanks to that lucky picture.

  “I couldn’t sleep.” Well, that was a partial truth, at least. He nodded toward her laptop which was on the dining room table nearby. “Would you mind if I got on your laptop? I just want to check in with some friends. Let them know that I’m okay.”

  Her eyes widened with surprise—at the fact that he had friends, no doubt. But she nodded quickly. “Yeah, of course. Let me get it open for you.”

  The guilt was nearly overwhelming as she typed in her password and handed over the device. After so many years of working undercover, he should have been used to deceiving people. But it was one thing to be lying to criminals, or people associated with that world. It was something else entirely to be taking advantage of a sweet, trusting innocent.

  “Thanks.” He thought she might head back to her room, but instead she crossed her arms over her chest. She was wearing an oversized T-shirt that fell just past her thighs. Not remotely revealing or even sexy by most standards. But she made the boxy tee look like the sexiest outfit he’d ever seen. And when she crossed her arms, it only helped reveal more of the figure that was hidden underneath.

  He bit back a groan. The worst part was, she clearly had no idea what she was doing to him. If she did she would have turned around and run back to her bedroom and locked the door.

  Instead she took a step toward him, her bare feet padding softly on the carpet. Then she took another step and now he was co
mpletely surrounded by that delicious, addictive scent. One more step and she was so close he could touch her.

  Her voice was slightly breathy. “Dagger?”

  He couldn’t take it much longer. If he didn’t have her in his arms soon, he might explode. She felt it too—she had to. He leaned down. He couldn’t stop himself. Her eyes were still crinkled up in confusion and her lips…oh, those lips…

  “Dagger, what are you doing with my camera?”

  He came back to his senses with a jolt. Her eyes were narrowed all right, but all confusion was gone and instead she looked like a gorgeous but dangerous boxer. With a dip and a weave she deftly launched herself around him and snatched the camera right out of his hands.

  She moved back quickly so she was out of his reach and she wore a small smile. “Did you really think I wouldn’t notice you holding it behind your back? I mean, I’m not blind.”

  He didn’t know whether to laugh or curse. She’d played him with that breathy voice and the helpless, sleepy little girl routine.

  “I need it.” That was all he could think to say.

  She raised one brow. “Yeah, I got that. But why?”

  The way Cole saw it, he had two options. He could be honest…or not. “I wanted to take another look at those rose pictures. I couldn’t sleep and wanted to do some sketching.”

  “Ehhh.” She made a loud, nasally buzzer noise. “Wrong answer. Try again. And make it the truth this time.”

  She was freakin’ adorable even when she was a pest. Where had that thought come from? Now was not the time to be getting stupid over a girl—not when so many lives hung in the balance. Including his.

  More importantly, hers.

  But she was staring him down and there was no sign that she was about to budge. He let out a loud exhale. Maybe it was time for some truth. “When you came into my shop earlier, I recognized someone in one of the photos. Or I thought I did. I wanted to take another look and see if I could figure out if it’s who I think it is.”

  Her lips pursed as she processed that. “That seems closer to the truth, but you’re not being totally honest.” She tilted her head to the side in a gesture he was starting to recognize. It meant she was reading him. “You’re not a very good liar, has anyone ever told you that?”

  He let out a sound that was somewhere between a choked laugh and a grunt of disbelief. She had to be kidding. He lied for a living.

  “I like it when you laugh,” she said, her face lighting up with one of those brilliant smiles.

  He lost the ability to breathe.

  “I’d love to hear what your real laugh sounds like,” she continued, seemingly unaware that she was currently rocking his world off its axis. “So far I’ve heard you let out these little sounds of amusement but I want to hear a belly laugh. Like, a real, gut-busting laugh.”

  He wasn’t sure if she was talking to herself or to him. Was he supposed to respond? If so, he had no idea what to say. No one had ever talked to him the way she was at this moment. No one had ever looked at him like she was looking at him right now. Like she saw him. Every part of him, including the parts he wasn’t proud of.

  It was more than that. She didn’t just see those parts of him—she accepted them.

  For one insane moment he felt like all of his sins had been washed away. All of the dirty deeds he’d done all in the name of “the ends justify the means” was water under the bridge. He could start fresh because this beautiful creature saw it all and pardoned him.

  He nearly groaned aloud at his own stupidity. What was happening to him? He was a world-weary, been-there-done-that, seen-it-all cop, for crying out loud. He did not do feelings.

  Whatever she saw right now, it was enough to make her back off a bit. She dropped her arms to her side and some of the tension seeped out of her. “Okay, look. You don’t have to tell me all your secrets. But because this camera and its pictures belong to me, I think I have a right to know why you want them.”

  She had a point. Unfortunately the truth would only lead to more questions. Questions that he couldn’t answer. “Could you just trust me?” Even as he asked it, he knew it was a ridiculous thing to say. Who was he in her life that he could ask that? But to his surprise, it worked.

  Blowing out a long exhale, she flipped some pink hair over her shoulder and gazed up at him. Did she have any idea how beautiful she was?

  “Okay, here’s the deal,” she said. “I’ll trust you, but you have to trust me too.”

  What did that mean? He bit back the initial urge to refuse. He didn’t trust people as a rule. It had taken him years to trust Eddie and they worked together.

  She held up the camera. “I hold on to this, and tomorrow morning you and I will go through the pictures together.”

  Yeah right. Also, big time no. For the first time since she walked into his tattoo shop earlier that day, Cole started to come to his senses. Who did this woman think she was? She’d been either throwing him off his game or outright playing him all day. This woman was sweet and loveable, but that didn’t mean she could run this show. There was more on the line here than she realized.

  It was time he got the upper hand. He needed to man up now or be stuck watching her dangle the camera like a carrot until he played by her rules. No, thank you.

  With that in mind, he moved closer. Not enough to intimidate or scare, but enough to throw her off balance, just like she’d done to him. He was a trained detective—he knew how to read tells. He’d noticed how she’d blushed around him earlier. She might be able to turn him on with just a whiff of her shampoo, but he’d made her uncomfortable and he hoped it was because she felt an attraction too.

  There was one way to find out.

  He edged closer, leaning down slightly so he was in her space, just as she’d done to him. When he was close enough he could reach out and grab the camera, he closed the distance between them.

  It was a gamble. She could run screaming in the opposite direction, or even kick him out of her apartment. But when his lips met hers, she did neither of those things.

  The contact was brief but electric and her quiet gasp told him she felt it too. He hovered there—for one split second he forgot why exactly he’d decided to kiss her. He was too focused on the feel of her soft lips beneath his that he lost track of the fact that this was a game.

  She, on the other hand…

  “Nice try,” she whispered against his lips. As she spoke, she moved the camera behind her back and out of reach unless he wanted to terrify the girl and use brute strength to grab it from her hands.

  He might be desperate but he wasn’t willing to resort to scaring an innocent, albeit irritating, young woman.

  He watched his opportunity to snag the camera walk away from him as she padded barefoot back to her room, the camera swinging at her side. When she reached her bedroom door, she turned to flash him that brilliant smile. “We’ll take a look at these pictures in the morning, shall we?”

  She didn’t wait for him to answer. “Sweet dreams, Dagger.”

  There she went—the girl and his only lead.

  Chapter Four

  Andie snuck out of her apartment the next morning at a crazy early hour.

  Well, she didn’t sneak so much as walked out, and it only seemed crazy early because it was a Saturday and she didn’t have to get up for work. Regardless, she found herself at her best friend’s apartment on the Lower East Side bright and early, her hands filled with two steaming cups of coffee.

  Spencer threw open the door and smiled up at her from his wheelchair. “Ah, the prodigal foster sister returns.”

  Andie walked in to the tech-lover’s dream apartment and handed him his cup. “Very funny.”

  “I thought you’d abandoned us peons for the Upper East Side.” He still wore a smirk as he wheeled his chair around her and led the way to his living room. “To what do I owe the honor?”

  “First of all, I have come to visit you about ten times in the past few months since I’ve foun
d my birth parents so you can stop with the guilt trips. Besides, it’s not like you ever visit me at my place.”

  He gave a short laugh at that. Andie had to figure she was one of very few who could tease him about his reclusive ways and get away with it. She and Spencer had been taken in by the same foster family when he was eleven and she was ten. They’d clicked instantly and for the first time in her short life, she’d started to understand what it meant to have real family. Since then they’d been as good as siblings, if not better. But even she couldn’t save him from his tendency to stay cooped up in this apartment.

  She walked over to a desk that was filled with electronic gadgets and devices. Some he’d created and others he used…but for what, she didn’t know. She wasn’t entirely sure she wanted to know. Back when they were around twenty, Spencer had gotten in trouble with the law for hacking. Because he was young and it was his first offense, they let him off with a warning on the condition that he work with police as needed.

  He’d been working with law enforcement as a consultant ever since, in addition to his other work, which he never discussed. But it was that connection to the police that brought her to his apartment.

  “So, what do you need?” Spencer asked. He came to a stop in front of his desk with its multiple computer screens and turned to face her.

  “What makes you think I need anything?”

  “You only bring me presents when you’re up to something.” He ticked them off on his finger. “Let’s see, it was a box of donuts when you asked for my help breaking into the sealed adoption papers. A bottle of my favorite whiskey when you asked me to teach you how to send a phishing email. Then there was the year’s supply of bacon when—”

  “Okay, I get the point. I’m transparent.” Andie flopped down onto the leather couch beside his desk. “What does coffee buy me?”

  He smirked. “What is it you need?”

  “Information.”

  At his “no duh” expression, she continued. “Of the law enforcement variety.”