He was spending way too much time with Sean.
“All right.” She straightened and tossed the pick back into the bucket. “We’ll try a couple of weeks, but no promises.”
And to think he’d come down here under the assumption he was doing her a favor. “Thank you. If you like, you can stay in the rooms you’re in now, and we can discuss your responsibilities over the next couple of days. Let’s just go with what Danny agreed to pay you. Sound OK?”
“Yes. That’s fine.” Beth untied the rope and tugged the horse toward the pasture gate a few yards away. The horse followed her docilely as Jack tried not to stare at her ass.
“You’ll need to call your neighbor and let him know,” she called over her shoulder.
“My neighbor?” He concentrated on an image of his grandmother in his head, picturing her in church, praying the rosary, lighting a candle. Not working. His brain had developed picture-in-picture capability, running his personal porn flick right alongside the saintly image.
He was so going to hell for this one.
Beth gave him a quizzical glance. “Jeff Stevens? He was in the barn when we got down here this morning.”
The vision of his weird neighbor was a definite boner-shrinker.
“Oh. Yeah. Him. I’ll call Jeff this afternoon. I’m sorry. I haven’t lived here very long either.” Jack nodded toward at the children. “You know, the kids don’t need to work. I don’t expect them to do anything. They’re just kids.”
“Thank you, but they wanted to help. They like animals.”
“As long as they know they don’t have to do it, it’s OK with me. Speaking of animals, did Henry give you any trouble?”
“None. He keeps his distance from the horses, though. I think he’s afraid of them.” Beth laughed.
“I can’t say I blame him, but Henry is the most cowardly ex-police dog I have ever known.” Jack paused for a minute, watching her face soften with a smile for the first time. Humor danced in her eyes for only a few seconds, but the image imprinted in his head. He wanted to see it again.
Beth unlatched the gate and released the horse into the pasture. As she fastened the gate, she jumped. “Ow.”
Blood dripped down her forearm. Jack swung forward on his crutch. “What happened?”
“I caught my hand on something.” She twisted her arm trying to look at the outside of her palm.
“Let me see.” Jack reached out and closed his hand around her slender wrist. He’d barely felt the throb of her pulse against his thumb when she started and snatched her hand away. The blood drained from her face.
“Whoa.” He released her and took a step back.
Wild-eyed and pale, she trembled in front of him. “It’s nothing. Just a scratch.” Even her voice shook. A shove from a half-ton animal had no effect on her, but the touch of his hand sent her off the deep end.
“OK. But come on up to the house and clean it out.” Jack smoothed any recognition of her fear from his voice as he watched her shove her shaking hands into the front pockets of her jeans. She raised her chin and squared her shoulders, almost defying her body’s visceral reaction. Something inside his chest shifted as she struggled to regain control. It wasn’t just her body that he admired. Her courage was damned attractive. “It’s past lunchtime anyway. There are plenty of leftovers from brunch. I think the heat is getting to you.”
She nodded and cleared her throat. “We’ll be along in a few minutes.”
As Beth walked toward her children, Jack turned and headed for the golf cart parked next to the barn.
Why were they all so afraid of him? They hadn’t backed away from Mrs. Harris this morning. Guilt? Nah. If she’d been conning Danny, she probably would have taken off last night. Unless she was considering playing him. Somehow that didn’t feel right. Not the way she’d reacted when he’d touched her.
That hadn’t been guilt he’d seen in her eyes.
Beth had been terrified.
On the patio, Beth and the children removed their muddy shoes before entering the house. The air-conditioning that enveloped Beth’s body as she walked inside was pure bliss.
“There you are,” Mrs. Harris greeted them. “I was about to come looking for you. It’s past lunchtime.”
“Wash your hands,” Beth instructed the kids as she herded them toward the sink. “Lots of soap.”
Soap stung the inch-long gash on her palm as she scrubbed her hands, making sure to get all the dirt out from under her nails. Stepping back from the sink, she looked down at her legs, then glanced at the children. All three of them were streaked with mud, cobwebs, and straw.
“Maybe we should eat outside. I didn’t realize how filthy we all were.” Beth turned to herd the children back outside.
“Relax. This isn’t a museum. You look like you could use some cool air. Iced tea, Beth?” Mrs. Harris opened the refrigerator and poured two glasses of milk. “Those children need to eat. Not an ounce of fat on either one of them. Do you like ham?” She directed the last question toward Ben and Katie.
“Yes, ma’am.” Ben slid into a chair at the table. Katie sat next to him.
“I can get it. You don’t have to wait on us.” Beth hurried to help. “I don’t want to add to your workload.”
“Nonsense. I’m glad you’re all going to be moving in with us. But you can set the table if you like.”
Beth retrieved silverware from the drawer.
“This place is too quiet.” Mrs. Harris set a platter of sliced ham on the table. “I’m used to it, because Danny was practically a hermit the last few years. But Jack needs the company. He was a policeman for a long time, and he’s not used to having a lot of free time.”
Beth dropped the handful of utensils on the table with a clatter. Mental head smack. Jack had said that Henry had been a police dog. Her taxed brain just hadn’t connected the dots.
Great. She’d given a false identity to a cop. Was that a felony or a misdemeanor?
“Are you all right, dear?” Mrs. Harris inquired. “You look ill. You have to be careful working outside in this kind of heat. I’ll bet you didn’t even take water with you. Sit down and drink this.” She gently pushed Beth into a chair and handed her a cold glass of iced tea.
Rolls, potato salad, deviled eggs, and a plate of cookies joined the ham. The kids dug in. Clearly no one would go hungry as long as Mrs. Harris was in charge of the kitchen. And she was definitely in charge.
Unfortunately Beth’s appetite had gone out the window when Mrs. Harris made her revelation about Jack—who might easily have seen a missing person’s report with her face on it sometime in the last year. Acid rose in Beth’s throat at the thought of Jack contacting Richard. One phone call. That’s all it would take. Her gaze shifted to her children. Would he kill them, too? They were loose ends, and nothing was beyond Richard’s cruelty. Or maybe he had other plans for them. Her chest constricted as she contemplated her options, their fate.
Wait. Jack had shown no sign he’d recognized her. He could have been a cop anywhere. She’d dyed her hair black and let it grow out. Thanks to the Stress Diet, she’d lost weight, so her face was thinner. Then there was the corpse-like thing she had going on with her complexion. She reconsidered.
“Aren’t you going to eat, dear?”
“I’ll get something as soon as I cool off a bit.” Beth forced a smile and kept her voice light. “You said Jack was a cop?”
“Yes. Until his accident a few months ago.”
She sipped her tea. “Did he see his uncle often?”
“No. He worked about two hours from here, in South Bend. That’s a suburb of Philadelphia. When he was younger, Jack spent a lot of time up here, but after he made detective, not so much.” Mrs. Harris frowned as she refilled Beth’s glass with iced tea.
“Thank you.”
Jack hadn’t worked in the same jurisdiction where Richard lived. But cripes, it was close.
Mrs. Harris pulled out a chair and sat down. She picked up a cookie and to
ok a bite. “You’re still pale. You need to get some food into you after working hard all morning.”
Although her belly cramped at the mere idea of eating, Beth forked some ham and potato salad onto her plate. Mrs. Harris was right. Beth needed to eat to sustain her energy. Missing a meal wasn’t advisable when she might have to run at any time. If only she had somewhere to go.
Jack hobbled into the kitchen and pulled out a chair across from Beth and the kids. Ben held his ground, but even with the table as a barrier between them, Katie cringed as Jack sat. Beth looked like she was about to throw up.
Under the table, Jack’s knee throbbed with every beat of his pulse. Either someone had stuffed shards of glass under his kneecap or he’d spent way too much time on his feet this morning. He must’ve looked as bad as he felt, because Mrs. Harris went immediately to the freezer and pulled out a large bag of crushed ice.
“That leg needs to be put up.” She gave him her fiercest do-not-mess-with-me face.
Jack didn’t argue as he lifted his leg onto the chair she pushed under it. His knee was roughly the size of a basketball. If he didn’t get that swelling down overnight, his physical therapist was going to have a shit fit tomorrow.
He sat back, swallowing the ibuprofen Mrs. Harris set in his palm with the iced tea she put on the table in front of him. “Thank you.”
To draw his attention away from the pain, he focused on the other people in the room. The kids were chowing down. Beth, however, only picked at her ham. She needed a good ten pounds on her if she wasn’t going to blow away in a stiff breeze. Had she eaten anything at all today?
Henry sat at Katie’s feet, giving the child his starving dog routine. Brown eyes tracked the movement of her fork from plate to mouth like a spectator at a tennis match. A string of drool dripped from his black muzzle to the floor. Jack pretended not to see Katie slip him a piece of ham under the table.
They were all filthy and emitted the distinct odor of horse. Sweat glued their hair to their foreheads. It was too hot for anyone to work outside. He hoped Beth didn’t intend to return to the barn this afternoon, because he’d have to veto that idea.
“Can you guys swim?”
“Yes, sir.” Ben kept his head down as he answered.
“You can call me Jack.” Sir sounded old. “Well, there’s a pool out there. You can use it whenever you want, as long as there’s an adult with you. Sure hot enough today. Down at the lake, there used to be a beach, too. I’d like to get it and the dock and boathouse repaired.” He glanced at Beth. “We should make a list, and since you’re going to be staying a while, you could bring in the rest of your stuff.” Jack gritted his teeth. He should be getting up and hauling their stuff into the house for them. But no, he was sitting in a chair like a freaking old man.
Both children stopped eating to stare at their mother.
“We’re going to try it for a couple of weeks,” Beth explained.
With a grin that made Jack smile, Ben jumped up from the table and flew out the door, calling out, “I’ll get our stuff.”
At least one of them was happy about the arrangement.
Without her brother’s body to shield her, a panicked look crossed Katie’s face. Her gaze darted to Beth as if contemplating shifting over a seat, but moving closer to her mother would mean moving closer to Jack. Clearly that wasn’t an option. Katie wouldn’t even look at him.
Jack had to do something. There was no reason for her to be afraid of him. And, yeah, damn it, it bugged him.
“Katie, I would like to ask you for a favor.” Jack made it a point not to even lean in her direction. He kept his voice low and even. Still, her face paled and her fingers trembled at the sound of his voice. It made Jack’s chest ache just to watch her, but he continued. “It’s about Henry.”
At the mention of his name, the dog hauled his furry butt off the floor and rested his head in Jack’s lap. Jack scratched Henry’s head. Despite having zero work ethic and the attention span of a gnat, Henry was a good soul. The big dope was simply more of a lover than a fighter.
“Henry is a highly trained police dog, you see.” Sort of. He wasn’t exactly lying. Henry had been trained extensively. The fact that none of that training had stuck was another issue. “With my injury, I can’t practice with him every day. He might forget everything. That would be a real shame.”
Henry’s eyes glazed over as Jack rubbed just the right spot behind his ear. Jack focused on the dog, keeping Katie in his peripheral vision. The little girl’s eyes were still wide as saucers, but she no longer looked like she was going to lose her lunch.
“Do you think you could take over his practice? It’s a pretty big responsibility.”
The child’s nod was almost imperceptible.
“Can you read?” How the hell old was she anyway? Five or six? A really small seven?
She nodded again.
“OK then. I’ll write down all his basic commands for you.” Jack picked a small piece of ham off the plate. “You give him a command, like down.” The dog didn’t move. “And you give him the treat if he does it.”
Still standing, Henry’s whole butt wagged.
“Only if he does it.” Jack showed him the ham. Henry drooled. “As you can see, he’s already forgotten a lot.”
The dog sighed and sank to the floor with a protesting groan. Jack gave him the treat. “That was a little slow, buddy.”
Henry swallowed the ham and closed his eyes.
“Do you think you can do that?”
She gave him another minuscule nod and looked at him for the first time. Baby steps.
Ben came through the door wheeling a large suitcase, a couple small duffels slung over his shoulder. Katie slipped off her chair to follow him down the hall.
Beth cleared her throat as she stood up to follow the kids. “Thank you.” Were her eyes actually misty?
Jack had a moment of satisfaction after Beth disappeared through the doorway before Mrs. Harris burst his Good Samaritan bubble. “Does this mean you’re through feeling sorry for yourself?”
He winced. “Was I that bad?”
Mrs. Harris gave him a pointed stare.
“Sorry.”
“You’re entitled to be angry, even depressed about your injury, Jack. But you’re going to have to move on. Why do you think your uncle wanted you to live here? It wasn’t like he got a kick out of controlling people. You know he wasn’t like that.”
Jack shrugged. She had a point. Danny had never tried to interfere with his life. He’d merely kept in touch and invited him to spend the occasional weekend at the estate.
“If you ask the attorney, you’ll find out he wrote that stipulation into his will about a month after your accident—after Quinn told him he thought your knee was shot.”
Jack’s mouth dropped open.
“Danny said you needed to come home. You just didn’t know it.” Mrs. Harris’s gaze moved to the glass door. “And I think, somehow, he knew he was going to die.”
“I’m going to miss him. I should have visited more often.”
“Probably.” Mrs. Harris didn’t pull any punches. “He worried about you, Jack. Sean and Quinn have families to keep them on track. Danny thought you needed roots, too.”
“Maybe he was right.” Jack adjusted the ice pack. “So, what do you think of our new houseguests?”
“Something’s not right with them.” Mrs. Harris stepped to the fridge and pulled out a bottle of Coors Light. She handed it to him and he twisted the cap off for her. “Do you think they’re in some sort of trouble?”
“Who knows?” Jack shook his head. “But keep your eyes open. Just in case.”
“Don’t you worry. Not much gets by me.” Mrs. Harris tipped the bottle back for a long swallow.
No shit.
CHAPTER FOUR
Sweat rolled down James Dieter’s back as he methodically wiped the kitchen surfaces with glass cleaner. He finished the cabinets and did a quick walk around, checking for any remai
ning sign of Beth or the kids. He’d disposed of everything that could possibly hold a print or be traced. The place was squeaky fucking clean.
At the other end of the small apartment the window air conditioner groaned. He crossed the worn carpet and switched it off. Summer in Virginia was a bitch, but the heat didn’t bother him much. Anybody who complained about the temperature or humidity should belly crawl through a jungle in ‘Nam in full combat gear.
Before leaving, he glanced out the window at the street below. Droplets of condensation obscured the view, but so far, so good. There was no sign of the slick, pony-tailed man yet, but he was on his way. Coming for Beth. James had envisioned him in vivid detail just this morning. And the hair on the back of his neck itched. A sure sign fate was ready to collect her due. Well, thanks to some funky wiring in his head, James was ready.
He slipped out the door and down the wooden stairs, letting himself back into the small neighborhood tavern he’d owned for more than a decade.
Ten minutes later, as he perched on a stool tallying the previous night’s receipts, the hair on his nape quivered as if the air were charged with a weak electric current. It was an alert system, rather than an indication of fear. His long-conditioned senses recognized when precognition and reality were about to collide. And he knew some major-league shit was about to hit the fan.
Outside, a car door closed.
Slick was here.
He swung his legs over the bar and ducked. The persistent itch felt like an old friend as he strained for a sound that would give away the intruder’s position.
Outside, the wooden staircase creaked. A shadow crossed the window as it ascended. James stepped closer and peered sideways through the mini-blind slats. Morning sunlight glinted off the barrel of the gun in Slick’s hand. The guy thought he was slick all right, sneaking up on an old man, a woman, and a couple of kids, but Slick had a surprise in store for him this morning.
She Can Run Page 4