Yup, closets rated right up there with clowns. Her psychologist back then had called it auchloclaustrophobia, derived from the fear of small places and the fear of the dark. She’d been so relieved to have a name for what bothered her that she’d learned to spell it at the ripe young age of six.
But from where the actual fear derived was a mystery. Oh, she told the doc and her parents about the nightmare. “Just a bad dream,” they had all said.
And she’d believed them. Or at least she’d convinced herself she had. She’d moved on, lived her life with just a few hang-ups. But all that changed when less than three weeks ago she saw her picture on the television show. That was the day when she knew she had to find the truth, even if the truth wasn’t pretty. That was the day she’d made her plan to come to Texas. After all, according to her birth certificate, she’d been born here.
“Just a dream, my ass!” she muttered, thinking about the phone calls, and had to push back the residual anger at her parents again. All those years. All those lies.
Stepping into the living room, she hung the shirt on the doorknob before facing him.
He stood just outside the kitchen, staring at her. She felt the awkward sensation return, but not because she stood too close to him this time. No, this time it was probably because she was trying so hard not to look at his chest.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
“Fine,” she said, knowing it was a lie but saying it anyway.
A slight smile pulled his lips to the right. Do I make you nervous?”
“A little,” she answered, and then wished she hadn’t.
His smile widened. “Is it because I’m not wearing a shirt?”
Embarrassment prickled. Just because it was the truth didn’t mean she had to admit it. Her gaze caught on his gun on the table. “Probably has more to do with the fact that you pointed a gun at me.”
The humor in his eyes faded. His gaze shifted back to the kitchen table. “You do know I didn’t do it, right?”
Confusion stirred in her chest. “Do what?”
He frowned. “I saw what you were reading,” he said, and she saw something, too.
She saw something that looked like pain in his eyes. She could only guess how much it had hurt to be accused and to be found guilty of something so ugly. Had people he cared about turned their backs on him? Maybe even his family? If so, that had to hurt. Her own parents had never turned their backs on her, but their dishonesty felt like a betrayal.
“I don’t… I don’t wash shirts for people I think are killers.” She tried to make light of it, but the humor seemed to fall flat.
He glanced back at the computer screen as if thinking. He didn’t look happy.
“You Googled me,” she said.
“I know.” He gazed back at her. “I don’t care. I just didn’t want you to think…”
“I don’t… think anything.” Her gaze fell to his chest. “I’m not nervous because I’m afraid of you.”
He continued to stare at her, and when her eyes betrayed her and lowered to his chest again, the humor returned to his eyes. “Is my missing shirt making you nervous?”
She rolled her eyes. “Please, I’ve seen tons of naked guys.” Did I really just say that?
His grin widened. “I’m not naked.”
“Okay, I’ve seen tons of half-naked guys.” She really needed to just shut up.
“Tons?” His grin widened. “Lucky guys.”
“Oh, I didn’t mean…” Time to shut up. She concentrated on not blushing. Then she realized what she should be talking about instead of half-naked guys. He’d come here for a reason and not to stand around and flirt with her. “What is it you have to show me?”
He nodded. “Let me get it.”
When the door closed, she moved to the kitchen table and closed her computer. Okay, she was so going to get hold of herself now. Act her age. What was it about this guy that made her feel like a giddy thirteen-year-old girl? Probably pure lust. Then again, maybe it wasn’t only the attraction. Maybe it was partly because he was the first person she’d ever confessed her Bradford story to.
Yeah, she felt better attributing some of her anxiety to that. Heading to the kitchen, she grabbed supplies and got busy cleaning up the mess on the hall floor.
She was almost finished when he walked in. He didn’t knock, not that it mattered. She just noticed it, and for some reason it seemed to mean something—as if they had moved past the stranger stage and on to a new stage. But new stages could be dangerous.
He had a book in his hands.
“Here, let me help you.” He dropped the book on the table and came over and held the dustpan while she swept the last of the mess into the pan.
“There,” she said. “I can mop later.” She looked toward the table and grabbed the trash can. “Show me what you brought.”
He took the trash from her and started walking down the hall beside her. His bare shoulder brushed against hers, and she pretended not to notice.
He moved into the kitchen area and set the trash can next to the refrigerator. She sat at the table and pulled the book over. She ran her thumb over the gold emblem on the front cover of what looked like an old high school yearbook.
“Have you seen any pictures of Nancy Bradford?” He pulled out a chair and sat beside her.
She looked over at him. “She died.”
“I know,” he said. “I’m sorry.”
Why was he apologizing? Had he changed his mind and now believed her?
She told him the little she knew. “One article I read said she didn’t care much for all the press that came with being married to a millionaire. The only picture I found of her was from her obituary in the newspaper, and it wasn’t very clear.” She glanced back at the book. “Is this her high school yearbook?”
“It’s her high school. Not her book.” He picked up the book and started flipping through the pages.
Zoe’s heart raced as she watched him leaf through the book. The next thing she knew, tears filled her eyes and her lips began to tremble. “Does she look like me? Is that why you brought this?”
He raised his gaze and obviously saw her tears because his expression filled with empathy. “Yes.” He flipped a few more pages and then pushed the yearbook to her.
She had to blink to get the watery sheen from her eyes, but when she saw the picture, her eyes filled with more tears. Of course, she had suspected. She’d even worked on accepting it as the truth. But seeing the evidence with her own eyes made all the suppressed hurt and anger rain down on her like pitchforks. She pressed a hand over her lips. When the tears flowed harder, and she couldn’t seem to catch her breath, she pushed away from the table, brought her legs up on the chair, and rested her forehead on her bent knees.
After a few seconds, he asked, “Are you okay?”
She forced a shaky breath into her lungs, looked up, and swatted at her cheeks. “No, I’m not okay. I’m madder than hell right now! How could they have done this?”
“Who could have done what?”
“My parents. They lied to me. I told them about the nightmares about… about the things I remembered, and they always said I was imagining things. They sent me to a shrink and lied to him that I was just a confused kid. Other kids called me crazy because I saw a shrink. How could they have done that?” She gave her cheeks another swiping to get rid of the tears.
He started to say something, stopped, and then started again. “I don’t know.” He paused again. “I know how it looks right now, but it could still turn out to be some freak coincidence. We don’t know for certain if this means anything.”
“It’s not a coincidence. I know,” she said, sounding harsher than she intended. “There’s a part of me that has always known. But I believed my parents. I loved them. I loved them all my life, and now I don’t even know who they were. What kind of people kidnap a kid and lie to her?”
“I don’t know.” He sounded honestly concerned as he brushed a strand of hair f
rom her face. “But I’ll get to the bottom of this. I already told one of my partners that we’re taking your case.”
His words took a few laps around her addled brain, and she tried to figure out why it bothered her. She finally figured it out. “No. I can’t. I mean, I can’t pay you.”
“Then you’re lucky that we don’t charge for our services.”
She did one more wipe of her cheeks. “You don’t charge?” She arched a brow in disbelief. “That’s not good business sense.”
He grinned. “We charge for some cases, but we do a lot of pro bono work.” He nodded toward the laptop. “Let’s just say that, considering how the justice system screwed the three of us, we kind of like making sure it doesn’t screw over someone else.”
“But this doesn’t really involve the justice system.”
His brow tightened as if he hadn’t considered that point. “It’s close enough.”
She tried to wrap her mind around that and couldn’t. “I don’t like being a charity case.”
“Okay, we’ll bill you and you can pay as little as you want when you can.”
She considered his offer and couldn’t find a downside to it. Nodding, she lowered her feet to the floor. “I can live with that.” Too late she realized how close he was, and how close she was to him. Her legs came between his, her right knee brushing the inside of his lower thigh. The feeling of being “too close” swelled in her chest.
“Good.” His voice sounded deeper. His warm brown eyes met hers. He reached up and brushed another strand of hair that clung to her tear-dampened cheeks.
She wasn’t a hundred percent positive, but the moment felt like that part in the movies when romantic music started playing and someone was about to get kissed.
Something told her that giving in to that temptation wouldn’t be a good idea. And for more than one reason.
Vulnerability: She simply wasn’t in the best emotional place to start a relationship.
Geographical undesirability: She had to go home. In a few weeks she was back to ’Bama.
Trust issues: She had no problem believing that Tyler hadn’t killed anyone. But that didn’t mean someone who looked like him didn’t crush hearts. People hurt people. People lie. Even good people. Even people she loved. People like her parents. She blinked, and when she opened her eyes, his mouth was even closer.
She jumped up. Fast. Toppled over the chair in the process, too. It hit the frayed carpet with a thud.
Unsure what to say, she reached down to her knee and faked a moan. “Leg cramp.”
Doubt filled his eyes. Faking had never been her strong point.
Suddenly, she heard an odd kind of crack and then a strange clunk. The crack came again, only this time it was followed by some peculiar pings.
“Shit! Get down!” Tyler yelled.
The next thing she knew, he bolted from the chair and charged right at her. She landed, flat on her back, so hard that the impact knocked the wind out of her lungs. And when he landed on top of her, what little air she had left spilled out of her lips in a rush.
She tried to push him off.
“Stop! Someone is shooting at you!” he growled.
Another crack sounded, followed by more crunchlike noises. His words hadn’t completely sunk in when Zoe saw a puff of dusty white Sheetrock rain down from the wall, leaving a round hole in the drywall.
She stopped trying to get him off her. Not so much because he’d asked her to, or because it was the smart thing to do, but because sheer panic prevented her from moving. Someone was shooting at her. A scream lodged in her throat.
He adjusted his weight so that it didn’t feel so smothering. She managed to suck air into her lungs. “Shit!” The one word eked out.
“I already said that.” He looked back at the table. “I’m going for my gun. You stay down.”
“No!” She flung her arms around him, pulled his chest flush against hers, and even locked one leg around his waist. “I don’t like that idea. Come up with another one.”
He frowned. “You’re safe if you stay down.”
“But what about you?” She tightened her hold on him and flung her other leg around his waist, tightening her thighs around him.
He stared into her eyes. “Careful or I’m gonna think you like this position.”
She scowled at him. “Seriously? You can think about sex right now?”
“I guess I like the position, too.” He bounced off her and ran for the gun, just as more cracking noises filled the air.
Tyler heard the shots and got two steps away from his gun when something hit him. Not a damn bullet but a five-foot-five redhead. Some part of her made a direct hit on the back of his knee, and he fell. On his way down, he turned and grabbed her to get her away from the window. When he hit the floor, she came down on top of him. Hard.
“I told you to stay down!” he growled.
She raised her head and rested her chin on his chest. “And I told you I didn’t like that idea!” Her voice quavered, and she had tears in her eyes again.
It was the tears that took the edge off his anger. Growing up with three sisters, he should be immune to feminine tears, but something about hers cut right to his emotional quick.
“I need to get my gun,” he said.
“No,” she snapped. “Because then you’re gonna want to look out the window—and in the movies, that’s when someone always gets shot.”
“I’m not going to get shot,” he said calmly, recognizing the irrational fear in her wide-eyed gaze. He could feel her shaking, but she tightened her grip on him. As much as he wished he could patiently talk her down from the panic ledge, he didn’t have time. So he’d have to try another tactic to get her to release him.
“I like this position, too.” His words encouraged her to loosen her hold on him. But when he considered she might get up, he came up with Plan B. He rolled her over, closer to the table, and, while pinning her to the floor, he reached for his gun. Once he had it in his hands, he felt better.
Brushing a thick curtain of dark red hair from her eyes, he looked at her. “Now, stay down. It’s okay. You understand?”
She nodded. But when he went to move, she tightened her arms around him again. “Zoe, let go or I swear to God I’m going to kiss you.” He wasn’t exactly sure how he knew it would work, but the fact that she’d jumped halfway across the room and faked a leg cramp when he’d gotten close to her face probably clued him in.
She let go. He crawled over to the window and peered out. He didn’t see anyone. Seconds later, he figured out why. The screech of a car speeding off sounded nearby.
“Damn,” he muttered. By the time he got out front, they’d be gone. His best hope was that someone had seen the car.
On automatic, forgetting he’d taken off his shoulder holster, he tried to put away his gun. That’s when he saw the blood.
Blood?
He did a quick mental search for pain in his body and found none. He even pulled up his T-shirt to make sure. Nothing. It wasn’t his blood. “Shit.” He turned to Zoe.
CHAPTER NINE
ZOE LAY STILL, her eyes closed, her hand pressed over her arm. It was nothing more than a big scratch—she’d checked—but it burned like the dickens, and the thought that she’d been shot was enough to make her have a meltdown. Okay, another meltdown. She’d already lost it when she’d seen the picture of her… mom. This was turning out to be a pretty piss-poor, meltdown kind of day.
“Zoe. Talk to me.” She heard his voice at the same time she felt him lifting her shirt.
She grabbed her shirt to stop him from pulling it up over her bra—she hadn’t even worn her best one—and opened her eyes.
“Let me see!” he growled.
She had her mind on her bra, but she realized he meant her wound. At least she hoped he did. “It’s here.” She looked at her arm and saw the blood and put her hand over it.
He set the gun down on the floor and carefully moved her hand and peeled up her bloody sl
eeve. “I’ll get you to the hospital.”
“Hospital?” She lifted up on her elbow and looked at her arm. Maybe she had missed something. But nope. It was still just a scratch, not that it felt like it at this point.
“It wouldn’t even take a stitch.”
“You were shot.”
“I was scratched by a bullet. There’s a difference.” Hearing herself put it like that made her feel better. Her pulse seemed to inch down a notch, too.
“You’re bleeding,” he said.
“I think you bleed when you’re scratched by a bullet,” she said. “Seriously, it’s just a scratch.”
He stared at her arm and then back at her face as if debating whether to throw her over his shoulder and cart her out. Hoping to prove she was okay, she sat up.
“Are you afraid of doctors?” he asked.
“No, that’s not on my phobia list. Not that I don’t have a few… but at this moment, I’m afraid of my two-hundred-dollar deductible.”
He gave her one of those girls-are-so-dumb looks that would have been more appropriate on a young boy. “I’ll take care of it.”
“I don’t think so.” When he didn’t look convinced, she added, “I’m fine. It feels more like a burn than a scratch. I have some antibiotic cream and Band-Aids.” She looked at the window and her concern shifted. “Are they gone?”
“I think so.” He continued to stare at her arm. “But I believe you need to be checked by a doctor.”
“And I believe I’m fine. It’s only going to take one Band-Aid and not even the biggest one in the pack.”
“LeAnn,” he said.
“My name’s Zoe,” she countered.
“I know. LeAnn’s a nurse, and she can look at it and tell us if you need to be seen by a doctor.”
Before she could argue, he pulled out his phone and dialed. “Is LeAnn with you guys?”
Pause.
“Good.” Tyler kept it brief and told the barest of details. Address, bullets, her being shot, needing to be checked. “Tell her I’ll kiss her for it.”
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