Harlequin Romantic Suspense March 2021

by Anna J. Stewart

  She shook her head. “I didn’t mean to suggest you needed an engineering degree. I’m just saying that all the building you did as a kid showed you had a vision of making something.”

  “Not everyone thought it was inevitable that I would start a company. Or thought it would succeed when I did.”

  She lifted her chin. “Well, you proved them wrong, didn’t you?”

  “I guess so.”

  “They have to be proud of you.”

  “You would think.”

  Frank Colton’s face appeared in his son’s thoughts then, always supplying just enough apprehension to make Travis doubt himself.

  Tatiana squinted as if his comment confused her.

  “What parent wouldn’t be bragging about what you’ve accomplished? CP is not just surviving. It’s thriving. I did my research. I would never have agreed to join the company if it hadn’t been in a good position.”

  Her thoughts must have drifted in the same direction as his then, as she swallowed visibly and turned to stare out the wall of windows into the darkness beyond.

  “I hope it stays that way,” she said after several seconds.

  “CP will weather all this fine,” he said. “We all will.”

  He wished she would look at him, so that he could give her an emphatic nod, sure enough to convince them both.

  “Do you think they’ll ever leave me alone to be able to raise my baby?”

  She pointed into the darkness and then this time met his gaze. He couldn’t allow himself to feel hurt that she hadn’t included him in the question. She just didn’t know yet how determined he was to be involved in his child’s life, and he could be stubborn when he wanted something.

  “Do you mean the police or the media?” he asked, stalling for time until he could come up with a better answer.

  “Both.”

  “Honestly, I don’t know. Until they locate your dad, I don’t think so.”

  She pointed to the window.

  “Do you think the police are out there watching us now?”

  “After all the trouble we went through to get you here? I don’t think—”

  He stopped himself since they had no way of knowing. Even if Desiree had said she wouldn’t inform the others that Tatiana was staying there. Would she keep her word?

  “One way to find out.” He marched into the foyer, switched into his boots, and pulled on the parka he only wore when he used the snow blower on the driveway. “Would you mind staying with Danny a few minutes?”

  “That’s fine.” She picked up the boy and held him close to her until he squirmed to get down. “Be careful out there.”

  “It’ll be fine. We’re probably just getting spooked.” He knew he was.

  He flipped off the outside lights and then darkened the foyer as well. This was silly. He was a Colton, even if he was a square peg trying to squeeze in the round holes on their family tree. The GGPD wouldn’t waste time tracking his whereabouts or even those of his houseguest. They had to have better leads on Len Davison than that.

  Still, rethinking his first idea, he jogged down the stairs to the lower level. Without turning on any lights, he enabled the security system and exited through the sliding door. He moved as quietly as possible across the small backyard, trying to recall the obstacles he needed to avoid, all hidden beneath the eight inches of snow that had collected within the perimeter of the privacy fence. At the back of his property, he carefully unlatched the gate, hoping the squeak he’d battled with in the fall hadn’t returned. Thankfully, it hadn’t.

  He kept one hand on the wood as he crossed behind his property and the next. As he neared the edge of his neighbor’s fence, he held his breath and then peeked around the corner.

  He spied a patrol car parked on the side street. Its headlights and taillights were turned off, but its engine was running. Also, he would have recognized the dull light of the laptop mounted in the dash anywhere. He backed away from the corner, whirled around and retraced his steps to his property. After rounding the corner, he carefully slid along the fence toward the street, hoping none of his neighbors picked this moment to get nosy.

  Just like on the other side, another patrol car was parked in front of the next building. He had to force himself not to move too quickly, but he needed to get back to Tatiana. Was it because he wanted to shield her again? He wasn’t sure.

  Once inside, he paused to disable the alarm but sensed he wasn’t alone. As his eyes adjusted to the near absence of light, he recognized the outline of Tatiana, who sat on the steps.

  “Hi,” she whispered.

  He flipped on a floor lamp, and the rest of the picture filled in. She cradled a sleeping Danny in her arms. He’d imagined a similar scene earlier, though that baby had been theirs. If he hadn’t already felt protective over her and their unborn child, this image would have awakened that instinct, but now it magnified that need into something visceral. He had to protect her, and something told him it was from far more than only police working a murder investigation.

  “How’d you get him to sleep?”

  She held her finger to her lips and then spoke in low tones. “One minute he was sitting by me, knocking down more towers, and the next, he was curled up on the floor by the couch. Guess he ran out of gas.”

  He nodded, relieved that his baby cousin, and the woman holding him, were safe.

  “I checked outside,” he began. He dreaded having to share what felt like a betrayal. Not of his family. Of her.

  Her lips lifted, but her smile was a sad one.

  “You don’t have to tell me. I know they’re out there. You were right. They’re never going to leave me alone.”

  He yanked his cell phone from his back pocket, scrolled through the contacts, and clicked on one to dial. The recipient of his call answered on the second ring.

  “What’s up, Travis?”

  “Hey, Melissa. You know exactly what’s up. I thought it was time for you to come over for a little brother-sister chat.”

  CHAPTER 7

  After his doorbell rang for the second time in thirty minutes, Travis sneaked a peek at Tatiana, who’d been pacing since they’d returned upstairs. More so since Desiree had picked up her son. Maybe he should have run the idea of Melissa’s visit past his houseguest before he called in the chief of police.

  “You okay?”

  Tatiana nodded, though it was clear she wasn’t. He resisted the temptation to rush over to comfort her. There was already one woman on her way over, who’d be furious when she arrived.

  He crossed to the entry and pulled open the door.

  “Hello, brother. Thanks for the nice invitation.”

  Melissa stood on the porch with her puffer jacket unzipped over a Michigan State sweatshirt, her hair shoved up in a messy ponytail. The cuffs of her jeans were half in and half out of her boots. She pressed by him without waiting to be invited in. A big sister’s prerogative, he supposed, though he would have preferred that she at least take off her footwear.

  “I saw Desiree leaving here with Danny.”

  “You weren’t in one of those stakeout cars, were you?”

  She rolled her blue eyes, the one trait that she had in common with all three of her brothers. “It’s not really a stakeout if the cars are marked. But, no, I wasn’t in one of the surveillance vehicles.”

  “I still can’t believe Desiree left me here taking care of her son while she went into the station to report on my houseguest. And what are you doing about the leak at the GGPD? The press knew Troy and Bryce would be questioning Tatiana today, and you haven’t even made a public announcement about the serial killer theory.”

  “Desiree didn’t tell us,” she said, addressing his earlier comment first. “We already knew Tatiana was here, little brother. It was an easy guess after you were protecting her like a Doberman at the office.”
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  “I wasn’t—”

  Melissa lifted a hand to interrupt him. “And I’ll handle the leak if there’s one in my department.

  “Anyway, I can’t believe you summoned me over here when I was in my comfy pj’s.” She tapped her collarbone over her coat. “I’m the chief of police.”

  “Sorry I didn’t follow your chain of command, but you’re the only sister I have at the police department.”

  “I don’t know what you were thinking when you allowed—”

  “You mean invited?”

  She dismissed Travis as only an older sister could. Then she stepped over to Tatiana. “Miss Davison, I’m Chief Melissa Colton. I wish we’d met under better circumstances.”

  Tatiana stared at her outstretched hand for several seconds before gripping it. “Thanks for that. It’s Tatiana.”

  Travis stepped between them. “Now that we’re all friends, you can tell us why you’re tracking her like she’s a suspect.”

  “Well, she—” Melissa paused and focused on Tatiana “—you weren’t a cooperative witness this morning, so...”

  “You tracked us here, hoping your suspect would show up in town and take his daughter out to dinner?”

  “Something like that,” his sister admitted. “Now we all know that Ms. Davison is a guest in your home. What we don’t know is why she’s staying?”

  “I’ll tell you why,” Travis began and then cleared his throat. “She needed protection from both the police and the media, and she wasn’t going to get that in an extended-stay hotel.”

  “And you’re going to take responsibility for protecting her from these perceived threats?”

  Melissa’s expression showed just what she thought of the idea and his assumptions about the police.

  “I have a security system, and I’ll make sure she isn’t alone. Those are at least two things I can do for her. She is my co-CEO, after all.”

  The last part he added too late. This time his sister stared at him, not buying anything he’d said.

  Tatiana rolled her lips and couldn’t have appeared more uncomfortable if she’d made it her life’s work.

  “I do appreciate having a safe place to stay, at least until I find something more permanent.”

  Melissa shook her head. “Well, I wanted to let you know there have been some developments in the case since this afternoon.”

  Tatiana’s posture straightened, her eyes widening. “Was it like before? Has the evidence against my dad been proven inconclusive? Or was it somehow lost?”

  “Those items had help getting ‘lost’ the first time, but, no, this is different.”

  “In all the accusations made against my father, no one has even suggested that he had a motive. He had no reason to commit these crimes.”

  “Remember that not all details in the case have been released publicly.” Melissa glanced at her watch. “It’s ten o’clock. You can at least learn more if you turn on the news.”

  “Why don’t you just tell—” Travis began, but he stopped himself. Even before she’d climbed the ranks of the Grave Gulch Police Department, his sister had been one of the most stubborn people he’d ever met. Once she made up her mind about something, no one could change it.

  Travis walked across the great room and grabbed the remote. The spray-tanned blonde news anchor who appeared on the screen was a familiar one. Delilah West, if he remembered correctly. The image that appeared in a cameo at the lower right corner of the screen, though, was the one he’d dreaded.

  “Questions abound in the investigation of two Grave Gulch Park murders, but tonight new developments may have changed the narrative completely,” Delilah said. “We’ll have Val Cornish on the scene right after this.”

  Tatiana rushed over to stand behind the sofa, her hands curling into the overstuffed back cushion as the broadcast went to commercial after the teaser. His sister hung back, watching. At least one of them knew what was about to be said.

  The field reporter, who’d probably been one of those milling outside Colton Plastics all afternoon, stood in that same parking lot now. The new headquarters Travis had been so proud to open a few years back was behind her, outlined in nighttime safety lights.

  “Thanks, Delilah,” the reporter said. “Grave Gulch Police questioned Tatiana Davison, new Colton Plastics CEO and daughter of at-large murder suspect Len Davison, earlier today at Colton Plastics company headquarters. But tonight, new developments have investigators reeling. Len Davison is wanted in connection with the murder of Jonathan Manelli last month at Grave Gulch Park.”

  The reporter went off on a history lesson about Davison’s arrest for the earlier murder of Vincent Gully, so something told Travis that she was holding back on the most important part of her story. That Tatiana continued to stare at the screen, her fingers probably digging holes in the sofa cushion, told him she recognized it, too.

  “Are they ever going to tell what happened?” Travis said.

  “Wait for it.” Melissa pointed to the screen, still carefully observing Tatiana instead.

  Then the image switched to some grainy security-video footage.

  “Len Davison was spotted today in New York City and was pursued by police, though the trail quickly went cold,” the reporter said, finally getting to the meat of the story. “In this video, obtained exclusively by WOGG News, Davison is seen dashing into the Grand Central subway station.”

  The video showed an older man who looked eerily like the suspect’s photo that had been published in the local newspaper and flashed on the screen of several TV new stations.

  “Is it him?” Travis asked, though he had no doubt it was.

  “He’s in New York?” Tatiana asked at the same time.

  “You really didn’t know?” Melissa added a third question to the mix.

  Tatiana blinked several times and then focused on the police chief. “No, I didn’t know where my father was. I kept telling the police officer and the FBI agent that, but no one would believe me.”

  She slid around the couch and slumped into its cushions, planting her elbows on her thighs, and propping up her head.

  “You’ll want to see the rest,” Melissa said in a low voice.

  “You’re hearing it here first,” Val’s voice called out from the TV again. “WOGG has confirmed that there has been a third murder in Grave Gulch Park. Police were called to the scene tonight after joggers discovered a body near the main walking trail. The victim has not yet been identified.”

  “Another murder?” Travis called out. The reporter had buried the lead, all right.

  But Tatiana only continued to stare at the screen.

  A taped segment showed Melissa in her dark blue uniform as she talked to reporters outside police headquarters. The almost purple sky in the background suggested that the impromptu press conference had been recent. Travis didn’t know why she’d bothered to take questions at all. She’d confirmed only two details: someone had found a body in the park, and the death was being investigated as a homicide.

  “I cannot comment on that as the GGPD is involved in an active investigation,” she repeated for the fourth time.

  The reporter must have given up on getting any more details as she spoke directly to the camera.

  “Is there a serial killer in Grave Gulch? Or just a copycat whose fascination has been transformed into murder? We’ll be following this story, and we’ll bring you the answers when they’re available. This is WOGG. We’re on your side.”

  Travis gestured toward the television. “You taped that interview tonight?”

  “About an hour ago,” Melissa said. “I’d just gotten home and changed when you called.”

  Tatiana leaped up from the couch and stepped between them.

  “You saw the proof. My dad was in New York today. Nowhere near Grave Gulch or the park. That has to mean he’s no lon
ger a suspect.”

  Travis exchanged a look with his sister. Had Tatiana missed the reporter’s conjecture about a copycat criminal?

  “He can’t be, right?” Tatiana pressed.

  The hope in her eyes squeezed Travis’s heart. Did she still want to believe her dad was innocent?

  Finally, Melissa answered for them both.

  “My department is unable to release any details on the incident at the park today, other than the information given at the press conference. But even if date and time of death would rule your father out as a person of interest in that case, he would still remain the prime suspect in two other murder investigations, one with DNA evidence placing him at the crime scene.”

  Tatiana nodded, her shoulders curling forward.

  “Everything’s going to be all right,” Travis blurted.

  Melissa frowned at him, though he already knew he shouldn’t have been promising Tatiana that. Nothing could fix the broken pieces of her family.

  “I’m sorry,” Melissa said stiffly. “I know how difficult all this must be.”

  Tatiana had been staring at the floor, but now she looked up at her.

  “You have no idea,” she spat. “Just wait until your father is the one accused of murder, and there’s not a thing you can do to help him.”

  Travis expected his sister to get in Tatiana’s face over that, but de-escalation training all cops had to undergo must have been effective. Melissa only nodded.

  “You’re right about part of that. I shouldn’t have said that because I don’t know. I can’t even imagine what it’s like to have something like this shake your whole foundation. But you’re wrong about the second part. There is something you can do for your father.”

  “You mean, turn him in?” Tatiana shook her head.

  “Not exactly. You could get him to turn himself in. If he’s guilty of these acts of violence, and we believe he is, your father needs help.”

  “And you think he’ll get that help in prison?”

  Melissa licked her lips and didn’t answer the question. They all knew that the correctional system and the rehabilitation it promised often were mutually exclusive. “At least if you convince him to come in, you can keep him alive.”