Her Lawman Protector

by Patricia Johns

  “I’m not suing you!” she retorted. “So quit playing games. How does Serena feel about you handing over those first editions?”

  “She’s not the hateful woman you think she is,” Evan said quietly. “She’s fine with it.”

  Liv glanced back toward Jack and found his gaze still locked on her, his granite expression unchanged. She smiled weakly.

  “You could ship them,” Liv said at last.

  “I’ll figure it out,” Evan replied. “Just so you know, I’ll make sure you get them.”

  “Thank you. I appreciate it.” She didn’t like being in this position with Evan—it wasn’t comfortable. He always managed to make her feel like he was the one pulling strings.

  “And I was wondering if you might be willing to pick up some papers from someone. He’s an older guy and can’t figure out how to send documents securely,” he added.

  “Evan, I’m not your wife.”

  “I know, but you’re there, and I’m here, and...I was hoping for old time’s sake you might not mind.”

  His voice was still so soft, so tempting, and she had to admit that she was leaning toward agreeing. He was giving her those first editions, after all. But when she looked up, she saw Jack watching her, and it jolted her back into the present.

  “No,” she said more firmly. “Drive out and pick them up yourself if you’re so concerned, but we’re not married anymore, and I’m not your assistant.”

  Evan sighed. “Think about it.”

  She licked her lips. “Final answer, Evan. Goodbye.”

  Liv hung up, looking down at her cell phone. Why was she always so eager to please that man, even after their divorce? He’d been able to get her to do just about anything over the years with that one line—Think about it. Never accepting her no and always patiently waiting for her to come around. She was tired of playing these games.

  “What was that?” Jack asked, pulling her out of her thoughts.

  “I don’t think you have to worry about Evan,” she said quietly. “Whatever hard feelings he had toward me seem to be in the past.”

  “How do you know?”

  Liv tucked her phone into her pocket. “His grandmother left some valuable first-edition books to me in her will. She passed away about the same time Evan left me for Officer Hot Pants, and considering they were from his side of the family, I really didn’t think he’d part with them.”

  “He thought you’d sue him?” Jack asked with a slight frown.

  “I guess.” She shook her head. “I’m just moving on with my life. I wasn’t going to pick new fights with my ex. Anyway, he’s going to send them to me. I’m...shocked.”

  “Yeah...” Jack chewed the side of his cheek.

  “What?” she asked.

  “He asked you to do something,” he said.

  “A personal favor,” she said with a shake of her head. “And I’m not doing it.”

  “What kind of favor?” he pressed.

  “Picking up some documents and FedExing them out to him,” she said. “I used to do that sort of thing for him all the time when we were married. It looks like Serena isn’t up to speed on how he likes things. But I’m not doing it. I’m sick of this.”

  “What documents, exactly?” Jack’s gaze had turned laser-focused.

  “I don’t know.” She shrugged. “It doesn’t matter, does it? Sometimes he buys some pieces of property and sells them again when property values rise.”

  “Is this one of those sales?” he asked.

  “I don’t know!” She was getting irritated now.

  “So why would he suddenly part with these valuable books now?” Jack asked.

  “You know as much as I do,” she replied, then pulled her hand through her hair. “I have to admit, he was remarkably...sweet.”

  “Softening you up,” Jack confirmed.

  “There are rumors that his marriage has a few cracks already,” Liv admitted ruefully. “Maybe he’s appreciating what he had.”

  “Maybe.”

  Liv sucked in a breath. She’d imagined the day Evan realized all he’d lost when he left her—imagined it over and over again. What woman didn’t want her cheating ex to feel the sting of everything he’d missed out on when he’d tossed her aside? And now that day had come—or so it seemed—and it was a whole lot less satisfying than she’d thought. In her fantasies, Liv would come back at him with a great insult, crushing him in his vulnerable state, just as he deserved. But hearing Evan sound so much like he used to back when he’d loved her...that had slipped underneath her defenses.

  “He got to you,” Jack said, and he looked mildly surprised. Liv realized that her eyes had misted, and she blinked it back. This was one of those times she wished she was alone to deal with her grief.

  “It’s complicated in the usual divorce kinds of ways,” she admitted. “I’m used to hating him, and then he turns around and does something downright decent. It reminds me of the way he used to be, back when things were good between us.”

  A whole lot had happened in the last few days, and Evan’s call had been poorly timed. Liv straightened a pile of coupons she’d set aside to give away with purchases, and she felt a lump closing off her throat. Her eyes welled with unshed tears in spite of her best efforts to blink them back. Of all the days for Evan to call, it had to be this one...

  “Hey.” Jack got to his feet and crossed the store. He put a warm hand over hers. It was a comforting gesture, and when she glanced up at him, she saw worry in his eyes. “He really did get to you...”

  “I didn’t ever feel ugly,” she said, her voice tight. “Growing up, I had some self-esteem issues, but by the time I got married, I felt beautiful. I figured I had a lot to offer a man. I mean, I tried to lose some weight, but that wasn’t about feeling unattractive. It was just...habit, I guess. I liked my shape, I just wanted to bring it down a dress size. I don’t expect you to understand that.” She pulled her hand out from under Jack’s. “I really liked who I was and how I looked until Evan left me. That was the first day I looked in the mirror and wondered if I’d been delusional all that time.”

  “Not delusional at all,” Jack said gruffly. “You’re gorgeous.”

  “I’m sniffly. You have to say that,” she said, snatching up a tissue and dabbing it under her eyes lest her makeup run.

  “I don’t say anything I don’t want to,” he replied, his voice soft and low. “I always did think you were beautiful. You can draw every eye in a room. There’s just something about you... And Evan was the lucky one. You are better than him. You always were.”

  Liv looked up at Jack again, her breath caught in her throat. He looked utterly truthful, his dark eyes locked on her, and for once, that granite expression had softened. She was inclined to believe him...

  The bell above the door tinkled, and Liv looked over to see three local women coming inside.

  “You’re finally open!” one of them chirped. “At long last.”

  “I am,” Liv said, forcing a smile to her lips and straightening her shoulders. “Come on in. Have a look around.”

  The women’s conversation turned toward one another as they headed for the bookshelves, and Liv shot Jack a grateful look.

  “I have a meeting at the station,” Jack said with an apologetic smile. “But don’t worry—there will be officers patrolling this street.”

  “Okay.”

  He lifted his cell phone. “Call me if you need me, okay? Meeting or not, you’re the priority.”

  “Will do. But I’m sure I’ll be fine.” Optimism seemed prudent right now. Her life had to keep moving forward, and whoever was trying to scare her couldn’t stop that from happening.

  Jack turned and headed for the door, and she watched him go. He was built like a tank, but he moved with lithe confidence. She was reluctantly disappointed to see him go, and it wasn’
t only because he was the one standing between her and an unstable threat. She was getting used to him being around...and starting to like it.

  What could she say—she was still a woman, and Jack Talbott was a ruggedly handsome man who’d been sleeping on her couch...

  “Excuse me, do you have the newest Julia London series?” one of the women asked, drawing her attention away from the door as Jack disappeared.

  “I do,” Liv said with a smile. “I have her older series, too. She’s great, isn’t she?”

  Back to work.

  * * *

  JACK GLANCED AT his watch as he walked into the Eagle’s Rest Police Department. He was on time, and the chief would be waiting for him. He nodded to the receptionist, flashing his badge, as he headed past her desk and into the bull pen. He was relieved to have gotten out of Liv’s store. Spending so much time with her lately, he was getting blinded to the case, and he hated that. He’d started opening up to her, too...and just now in the store, her emotional reaction to her ex-husband’s call had sparked that natural protective instinct inside him. He was slipping in too close—he knew it. Jack was also seeing her at her most vulnerable, and that was doing a number on him. Whatever feelings he’d developed from afar before her divorce were back. Liv wasn’t the kind of woman a guy could wipe out of his mind that easily.

  “Morning, Jack,” Chief Simpson said as Jack tapped on the open office door.

  “Good morning,” Jack replied. The chief nodded him in, and he closed the door behind him.

  “Have a seat. Do you want coffee?”

  “No, I’m fine,” Jack said, easing into the too-tight chair. “Thanks, though.”

  “How is the investigation going?” the chief asked, fixing those glittering blue eyes on Jack. “Any progress?”

  “Look, if I’m going be undercover with this woman, I need better support from the PD,” Jack replied. “McDonald was in position at the coffee shop yesterday when I was doing a sweep of Liv’s apartment, and I got a text from him saying she was gone a full ten minutes after she’d come back to her apartment. I was counting on him. I’m not going to be effective if—”

  “McDonald feels terrible,” the chief interrupted. “And yes, he dropped the ball. But he also discovered something useful to our investigation. The cousin that your suspect was having coffee with has been in frequent contact with Evan Kornekewsky.”

  “What?” Jack snapped. “The cousin—Tanya. Big brown eyes and a camera.”

  “That’s the one. She’s the one who’s been receiving phone calls from Evan twice a week for the last eight months. They seem downright chummy. If not something even more intimate.”

  “Kornekewsky doesn’t exactly shy away from infidelity,” Jack muttered.

  “Exactly. He may have something going on with Tanya. He seems to like that family... We might be able to use this. If you’re supposed to be dating Liv, then maybe you could position yourself to be...useful to their circle.”

  “One hitch there,” Jack replied. “Liv told her cousin our secondary cover—that I’m only posing as her boyfriend in order to protect her.”

  “So soon?” Chief Simpson asked with a shake of his head. “How did you find that out?”

  “She told me,” Jack replied. “She also told her mother.”

  “So much for keeping secrets,” the chief replied.

  “Or she’s more calculating than we’re giving her credit for,” Jack replied. “The cousin could be her decoy to keep suspicion away from her...” Not that he actually believed that right now. Or was she playing him? “I wanted to go with her to the coffee shop—she insisted that it would be weird. She wanted some personal space. Considering my cover, I couldn’t exactly declare the cousin wildly dangerous, now could I? So I used the opportunity to sweep the apartment.”

  “Did you find anything?”

  “Nothing incriminating. She keeps a diary, so she likely has others stored away somewhere. They might hold the evidence we’re looking for.”

  “Hmm.” Chief Simpson made a note on a piece of paper.

  “She got a call from Evan this morning,” Jack added. “She seemed surprised to hear from him, a little shaken by it. He asked her to do him a favor and pick up some documents from an old guy.”

  “Nice!” The chief cheered up. “And?”

  “She turned him down, but since her cousin knows who I am, I think we can assume that Evan does now, too,” Jack went on. “So that was either a ploy to make her look guilty to draw us away from him, or it was a message of some kind.”

  “But so far, she still thinks you’re here because someone is threatening her,” the chief added. “But you’re right—our time is limited.”

  Liv could raise all of his suspicions when she talked about her love of chess strategy, and her guilt suddenly wasn’t so unbelievable. If Liv was as guilty as they thought, and if her cousin with whom she wanted privacy to meet was in contact with Evan, well, then it was possible that the welling tears and spontaneous personal revelations were simple manipulation. And he’d fallen for it.

  “Since we have to assume that our cover story has gone all the way back to Denver, we’ll have to make sure that everyone in the Denver PD believes you’ve been transferred out here,” the chief added.

  Jack grimaced. “No offense, sir, but that’s going to be seen as a demotion.”

  “Agreed.” The chief chuckled sardonically. “So the Denver chief is already passing along the rumor that you’re being quietly disciplined for an attitude problem.”

  “Great.” Jack rubbed a hand over his short-cropped hair. There was nothing quite so reassuring as a blow to his personal reputation. “Taking one for the team, am I?”

  “When we catch him, we can set the record straight,” the chief replied.

  “A little added incentive,” Jack replied drily.

  “We need proof about what’s actually going on here,” the chief said.

  “Any idea on how I’d secure that proof?” Jack asked.

  “Don’t leave Liv Hylton’s side,” the chief replied with a small smile. “A couple of days ago, we went to a judge to get a court order for audio surveillance in her apartment.”

  “Audio surveillance?” Jack shook his head. “I don’t think that’s necessary. I can get the evidence—”

  “Talbott—” the chief interrupted. “Can I offer a word of advice?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “When you’re working in Internal Affairs, you’re investigating friends, colleagues, buddies. This is part of the job. When you know a suspect personally, it makes everything harder. But regardless, we need evidence that will stand up in court.”

  “I stand by what I said, sir,” Jack replied. “I’ll work more comfortably if I’m not being constantly recorded, too. I want to dig up all the evidence possible. I’m fully committed to this case, but I don’t want recordings in her home.”

  He knew he was being testy about this, but it felt wrong. What if he discovered that she was innocent? What if her words were twisted and used against her? She’d have no warning! If dirty cops could twist evidence, who was to say there weren’t any working in Internal Affairs?

  But this might be his own issues from his youth coming into his emotions, too. He’d seen a lot of dirty policing, from bribery to bullying, and Liv was either guilty or very vulnerable right now. His emotions were kicking into protective mode.

  “This isn’t your call, Talbott,” the chief replied.

  Jack clenched his teeth. “Understood, sir.”

  The chief sighed, then shook his head. “Internal Affairs is going to ask me for a reference before you’re offered any position. And I realize that getting your head around this stuff can be hard. That’s why IA needs the best of the best. It takes mental fortitude. I worked in IA for fifteen years before taking this position as chief of police, and it helps
to remember that bad cops ruin lives. You’re the check and the balance. No single person can wield that much power without answering for it.”

  As if Jack needed any reminders of that. He’d seen the catastrophic consequences of a pack of dirty cops firsthand. Not everyone wanted to testify against some drug dealer, but they were threatened into it by the local cops. It was cooperate or get set up for something they didn’t do. He could still remember his cousin’s anguished pleading: It wasn’t me! I didn’t do it! I’m not selling drugs! It wasn’t me! He’d sounded more like a kid than a teenager. And why target him? Jack still didn’t know—but some cop had benefited from it. Maybe it had been as simple as getting another arrest so the cop looked like he was doing his job.

  There were a lot of vulnerable people in this town, and if the police were right, Eagle’s Rest was ripe for the picking. Evan Kornekewsky had plans for Eagle’s Rest—although what he was going to do with all that land he pressured the vulnerable into selling at rock-bottom prices, Jack didn’t know. But one thing was certain, he couldn’t pull it off alone. Everything on paper, from joint accounts during their marriage to Liv’s direct involvement in getting signatures for sales, pointed to her guilt. But there was still a chance that she’d been duped, too. A very slim chance. Was she being set up like Berto had been? Was she part of the illusion? Or was she just as guilty as she looked?

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  LIV GRABBED A can of tomato soup out of the cupboard and pulled open the utensil drawer, rummaging around for the can opener. Outside the kitchen window, lightning lit up the evening sky in a blinding flash. Rain hammered against the glass in wild, whistling gusts. The day had been sunny enough, but by nightfall, clouds had started moving in, sailing over the moon, and a brisk wind had picked up. At least the storm had waited until closing time—Liv would take whatever luck she could get.

  But the inky clouds and the moaning wind felt ominous, especially with the prospect of a stalker out there. She shivered.

  “Just let me order us Chinese,” Jack said, and Liv glanced back at him.

  “In that downpour? Besides, I don’t feel like Chinese. I want tomato soup and grilled cheese.” She shot him a grin. “You’re welcome to order your own takeout and drag some poor delivery guy into the deluge, if you prefer that to good old-fashioned comfort food.”