by Julie Miller
But was his tender concern for her really about her and not a fear that she’d reveal he was working undercover?
Despite her confused feelings, she wanted Tom to be here. Except for the undercover medical examiner, whom she didn’t think she should talk to, she felt alone right now. And ever since Tom had barged into her life, become her friend and forced her into an alliance that could get them both killed, the one thing she hadn’t felt was alone.
“Melanie, dear?” She startled at the arm around her shoulder. Aunt Abby’s hug lasted about as long as it took Melanie to identify the older woman. “My goodness, your clothes are still wet.” Abby rested the back of her knuckles against Melanie’s cheek in a display of maternal concern. “You’d better come back to the main house with me so you can change out of these things before you catch cold.”
She probably did look like a drowned rat with her soggy clothes and hair that kinked and expanded as it dried in the humid air. But a shower and dry clothes and her aunt’s momentary compassion weren’t going to make the unsettling fact that there’d been a murder in their little utopia go away. “I have to stay. I found the body. The sheriff said he may have more questions for me.”
“Sterling will wait if your uncle asks him to.”
No doubt. “I’d rather get it over with.”
“I understand you were out here last night with Duff. Awfully late, from what I hear.” Melanie couldn’t help but slide her gaze up to the parking lot where Roy and Deanna were parked. One or both of them had tattled. Probably to divert attention from their own late-night return. “Where’s your new boyfriend this morning? I’m sure Sterling will want to interview him, too.”
“Boy—” Melanie clamped her mouth shut to stifle her protest. A couple? Lovers? Was that the story Tom expected her to tell to anyone who asked? The dock rocking beneath her feet wasn’t the only thing throwing her a little off-kilter this morning. “I’m a grown-up. I don’t have to account for where I spend my time. Or who I spend it with.”
“Being a grown-up and understanding what a man wants from a woman are two different things.”
Melanie bristled at what sounded like the beginning of a birds-and-the-bees lecture. “I understand Tom well enough. He likes being out in nature. And I like being with him.” That wasn’t a lie. She could do this. “He enjoys the quiet of the night.”
“Last night was anything but quiet.”
In more ways than one. Melanie swayed as the wake from a Conservation Department powerboat searching the area rolled to the shore beneath them. “We couldn’t exactly plan the weather, now, could we?”
“That explains why you were at the lake last night.” Abby squeezed Melanie’s forearm, practically tutting her tongue against her teeth in an expression of pity and concern. “But where has Duff gotten off to now? Leaving you to deal with this unfortunate mess all on your own. If he really cared about you, he’d be here to support you.”
So the sheriff’s questions could wait, but not her aunt’s? Melanie took a couple of steps toward the edge of the dock to watch Tom’s brother and the deputy carry the body bag up the stairs to the parking lot. “Look at all these people. He hates crowds.”
But Abby wouldn’t let her subtle accusations against Tom drop. “You don’t find it strange that he ducked out on you like this? Do you know where he is right now? How do you know he didn’t kill that man?”
She whirled around on her aunt. “Because that man has been dead a lot longer than the time Tom, er, Duff, has been here.”
“You don’t have to defend me, sweetheart. I’m right here.” The deep, growly voice behind her was like music to her ears. Tom wrapped a big flannel shirt around her and briefly clasped his hands over her shoulders. “I couldn’t find a jacket so I grabbed this out of my bag. Hope it doesn’t make you too hot.”
“Thanks.” Fighting the urge to fall back against his chest and let him deal with her aunt’s sniping, Melanie summoned the remnants of her own strength. Although flannel wouldn’t have been her first choice for something dry to cover up with, she was pleased that he’d thought of her discomfort. Or maybe coming back with one of his big shirts was just the excuse he was using to cover his absence. She discovered the motive didn’t matter. After rolling up the long sleeves, she snuggled into the oversize shirt. The brushed cotton smelled like Tom, and she found its warmth and scent as reassuring as the brush of his hands on her shoulders had been. Masquerade or not, she breathed a tiny sigh of relief, knowing she was no longer alone with a gathering full of potential enemies.
When she turned to truly thank him, she realized he was wearing a different T-shirt. His jeans were dry, too. “You changed.”
“The clothes I had on when I fished John Doe out of the lake were pretty gross. I talked to one of the guys with the coroner’s van and gave the stuff to him.” His brother, Niall, she assumed. So part of the delay in returning to her had been about him being a cop doing his job. “I thought they’d want to bag it since there might be some evidence from the corpse on it, too.”
“Bag it? Gross? Corpse?” Abby hugged her arms around her waist. “You two may have hearts of stone, but I can’t deal with this. Especially if he turns out to be Richard. Whatever will we tell SueAnn?” She turned to the three men still conversing on the dock beside the boat. “Henry, dear, could you drive me back to the house?”
“I’ll do it, sir,” Silas volunteered. He pushed past the sheriff, touching his injured hand to Abby’s elbow, no doubt anxious to get as far from the water as he could.
“I’ll take care of my wife, Silas,” Henry declared, motioning the big man to stay put. He handed the sheriff a paper evidence bag that a civilian probably shouldn’t have been holding in the first place and moved between Silas and Abby. “You and Sterling make all this go away. Understand? Dead bodies are bad for business.”
“Yes, sir.”
Henry’s gaze bounced off Melanie and centered on the top of the hill. He leaned back and snapped another order at Silas. “Tell Roy to report to my office as soon as the sheriff is done with him. And make sure my daughter gets safely home.”
“We’ll take Deanna home with us,” Abby announced.
Resigned to being their messenger boy for the time being, Silas latched on to the nearest post as the dock shifted with Henry and Abby’s departure. But Melanie was less amused by his anxiety as she focused in on the plastic window in the bag Sheriff Cobb was holding. She could see the stiff, mutilated belt that had been tied around the victim’s body. She wondered if he’d given any thought to the odd piece of evidence. “Sheriff, did you look at that belt?” She pointed to the distorted leather than had been sawed through. “Don’t you find it strange that the body was tied up with it?”
Sheriff Cobb shrugged. “Tool of opportunity, I imagine.”
“But why remove the buckle?”
“Maybe this is a robbery gone bad. I remember that shiny silver thing Richard used to wear.”
“So you think it’s Richard, too.” She found her courage enhanced by Tom’s presence behind her. “We don’t know that yet, do we?”
Silas muttered something under his breath. “Maybe the buckle just got in the killer’s way. It’s probably down at the bottom of Lake Hanover.”
“What did the buckle look like?” Tom asked.
“Why do you want to know? Are you investigating this case?”
Tom shrugged, refusing to be baited. “I want to know so I can keep a lookout for it on my patrols. In case it washes up somewhere. Maybe there’ll be fingerprints on it that could tell you who killed him, Sheriff.”
“I appreciate having another set of eyes out here.” Sterling Cobb seemed unaware of the tension between the two men. “Richard wore a unique belt buckle. So maybe you’re right, Mr. Maynard. It could help identify that this is him. If we can match it to the belt.” The sheriff r
ested his elbow on the butt of his gun as he sorted through his memories. “That buckle was silver. Had some gold or brass on it. Made him look like he was some kind of rodeo cowboy.”
Melanie turned to the sound of footsteps hurrying across the dock behind her. Daryl Renick wasn’t smiling as he joined them. He pointed to the carved silver buckle with a brass spur emblazoned on it at his own waist. “It looked just like this. Minus the notches for each of his kills.”
“Kills?” Tom and Melanie echoed together.
“He had a list of animals he wanted to hunt. Every time he bagged one on his list, he carved an X on his buckle.”
Sheriff Cobb chuckled. “That boy always was a cocky son of a gun, wasn’t he?”
“Could I take a picture of that, Daryl?” Tom pulled out his phone, and Melanie’s concern flared for an instant. Would Silas or Sheriff Cobb see the dozens of pictures Tom had been taking around the lake and farm?
“I don’t care, but make it fast.” Daryl’s dark eyes barely acknowledged the click of Tom’s phone as he turned to the sheriff. “I want a look at that body. Word is it’s Richard. I want to see him for myself.”
“You’re not going to be able to identify him by looking at him. He was in the water a long time,” the sheriff warned.
“I knew him better than anybody here. I know what clothes he was wearing when he disappeared. If there’s anything in his pockets, I could identify it. Please.” Daryl’s scruffy face was lined with worry, and Melanie reached over to squeeze his hand. He said, “My wife can’t take much more of not knowing what happened to her brother. Even if the news is bad, if I can tell her that Richard’s been found...”
“Is SueAnn all right?” Melanie asked.
“She woke up having those fake contractions again. They stopped. But this...” Daryl’s fingers pumped around hers. “Maybe you’d better come check on her when you get done here.”
“I will. As soon as I can.”
Sheriff Cobb seemed to understand the urgency of the situation. “We’d best get up the hill and talk to the coroner before he leaves, then. They want to take the body to Kansas City ’cause we don’t have the proper facilities here. I don’t mind them takin’ a dead body off my hands. But if you want to see it... Silas.” He nodded to the farm’s security chief before tipping his hat to Melanie. “Miss Fiske. I’ll call if I need anything else from you.”
Daryl hurried up the steps to the parking lot, and Sheriff Cobb followed more slowly after him. Melanie’s concern shifted from SueAnn to Tom. The lines beside his eyes had narrowed into a frown. He stared at the image on his phone as if he’d seen a ghost.
Before she could ask what was wrong, though, Silas’s mocking voice reminded her Baldy was still there. “Something eatin’ at you, Sergeant?”
“Tom?” He had gone quiet. Too quiet. Had he just pieced together something about his case? No matter what, she wasn’t about to let Silas goad him into revealing something he shouldn’t. She could buy Tom a few seconds of distraction while he cleared his thoughts and remembered he wasn’t supposed to look as though he was playing detective. Since she was already in medic mode, she turned to Silas and nodded toward his injured hand. “Do you want me to take a look at that cut? Looks like the bandage hasn’t been changed for a while.”
“I’m fine.” Silas pulled his hand away from the post, flexing his fingers. “You didn’t answer my question, Sergeant Loser.”
She, on the other hand, had been playing detective for months now, and felt right at home pointing out suspicious details. “How did you cut yourself? Is that why you had gloves on the other day? To hide that wound?”
Silas blinked, and when he opened his dark eyes again, they were focused squarely on her. “A working man wears gloves to protect his hands.” No farmer she’d met wore black leather driving gloves to toss a hay bale or fix a barn roof. Not that she’d ever seen Silas do either of those jobs. Before she could challenge him on evading the question, he snagged her by the wrist with that same bandaged hand. “I’ll pick you up tonight for the dance.”
“I told you I’m not—”
“No, you won’t.” Tom was back with her. His phone was back in his pocket as he pried Silas’s hand off her. While Silas shook the feeling back into his hand, Tom slid his arm around her shoulders. “She’s going with me.”
Silas grinned. “You’ve got patrol duty tonight.”
“Not until ten o’clock. She’s with me until then. Afterward, too, if she wants.” When Silas opened his mouth to argue, Tom poked his finger into the middle of the bald man’s chest. “And if you put your hand on her like that again, I’ll break it.”
Chapter Twelve
Melanie curled her toes into an eyelet-trimmed pillow, stretching herself awake on the love seat where she’d dozed off. She blinked the bent page of her book into focus in the dim light seeping through the curtains and frowned.
After a rain-soaked night without sleep, she’d been anxious to get into a hot shower and fall into bed for a long nap. But finding a dead body, imagining her father suffering a similar fate, and discovering just how much she wanted Detective Thomas Watson Jr. to be more than a friend and coinvestigator, had all crept into her head, haunting her dreams and forcing her out of bed to find a story she knew had a happy ending. Not that it helped much. Asleep or awake, those images and worries and wishes were still with her.
“Melanie?” A sharp knock on her door startled her and she leaped to her feet, realizing an earlier knock had wakened her in the first place.
Smoothing the crumpled page of Jane Eyre back into place, she closed the book and hurried to the door. “What’s the emergency—”
The door swung open before she could reach it, and she jumped back at the sight of Tom filling her doorway. “Damn it, woman, why don’t you answer...? Are you okay?”
Melanie nodded, retreating a step as he closed the door behind him.
The anger that had narrowed his eyes dissipated at her unblinking stare. This wasn’t soldier Tom or loner Tom or sexy Tom... Well, okay, to her way of thinking he was always sexy Tom. But this was a new version of the man she was getting to know. He’d shaved, revealing all kinds of interesting angles along his carved cheeks and rugged jawline. And he’d put on a white button-down shirt that hugged his shoulders and arms as nicely as a T-shirt. Plus, he’d removed the shoulder holster he always wore. This was date-night Tom.
Date-night Tom?
“Aren’t you ready?”
Melanie snapped her gaping mouth shut. “You were serious about going to the dance?”
“As a heart attack.” He plucked the book from her hands and set it on the table beside the lamp. “This shindig started five minutes ago. Now throw on something pretty and let’s go.”
She stumbled along in front of him as he scooted her toward her bedroom. “I thought you said that to put Silas off about hounding me to go with him. I thought we were going to do some investigating while everyone was out at the barn.”
“You’re right on both counts.” He grabbed her hand and pulled her into the bedroom when she apparently wasn’t moving fast enough. The momentary shock of having a grown, sexy, date-night man in her bedroom for the first time heated her skin with excitement. But she didn’t get much time to blush. For one thing, he was still wearing his gun, although he’d tucked it into a holster at the back of his waist, reminding her of their undercover charade. Secondly, Tom released her and walked straight to her closet and opened it. He thumbed through the meager selection of blouses and jeans, looking for a fancy dress that didn’t exist. Maybe she shouldn’t have begged out of that shopping expedition with her aunt and Deanna. “We can’t sneak out of a social event unless we put in an appearance first. And if we don’t show at all, your aunt or uncle will send someone to look for us. That’s the last thing we want.” He pulled out the sleeveless turq
uoise cotton dress that she’d worn for her graduation from Metropolitan College four years earlier. “Here. Do this one.”
He was no more a fashionista than she was. But Melanie understood the pressure of time. She snatched the hanger from his hand, pushed him out the door and changed. She slipped on a pair of flip-flops and hurried into the bathroom next door, frowning at the smashed bed-head look she’d accomplished when she’d fallen asleep on the couch with wet hair. After running a brush through it without much success, she braided the curls into a long plait.
She was dabbing on some lip gloss when she realized Tall, Dark and Date-Night was watching her work. Tom leaned his shoulder against the door frame while his gaze took a leisurely stroll from the top of her head down to her toes and back. “You’ve got legs, Doc.”
She capped the lip gloss and dropped it back into a drawer, facing him with a wry smile. “Two of them, as a matter of fact.”
Even as he laughed, he reached out to capture the end of her braid between his fingers and tugged her toward him. She stopped herself from tripping by bracing her hands against his chest. She marveled at his masculine shape, then moved her fingers across the crisp cotton covering his sturdy muscles and warm skin. He trembled when she flicked her fingertips over his taut nipple. Or maybe she trembled at the knowledge she could induce that helpless reaction from him. His voice dropped to that growly rumble she loved. “You are built like nobody’s business.”
“That’s good?”
“That is so good.” When his mouth touched hers, her lips were already parting, hungry for his kiss. She might not have a long track record with this kind of thing, but he was an excellent teacher, and she’d always been an eager student. He nipped at her bottom lip, then eased the excited nerve endings with the raspy stroke of his tongue. She mimicked the same nibble and stroke on his firm mouth and he groaned. “I’m the one who said we had to make an appearance, right?”