“Hey, man, you need any help?”
The question came from a tall man wearing a ripped T-shirt that barely covered his rippling muscles. It was his next-door neighbor and apparently a bodybuilder.
“No,” Nick assured him, “I’ve got it covered.” For the first time, he looked down at his assailant. Recognition was immediate. Linda’s brother, Sean.
The man was swearing at him, his voice a croaking sound, his face a beet-red because of the pressure against his throat. His eyes were fiery as he glared up at Nick.
“Let me up, Brannigan,” Sean rasped. “Let me up so I can kill you,” he cried. “The way you killed Linda.”
Some of the neighbors around him looked at Nick warily, as if they weren’t a hundred percent sure that the man on the floor was lying.
Swallowing a curse, Nick dug into his back pocket. He pulled out his wallet and held it open above his head, turning it first in one direction, then another so that everyone around him could see.
“I’m an FBI agent,” he told them. “This man is dangerous and deranged.”
The information seemed to erase the doubts amid some in the crowd.
“Who is he?” someone asked.
“Nobody you need to worry about,” Nick answered. By the sound of the siren, the police were almost here.
“Let me up!” Sean demanded.
In response, Nick twisted the man’s hand a little harder. Dixon whimpered.
“Not today,” Nick told him.
The squad car pulled up a foot away from the cluster of people. Two policemen got out, their guns drawn and aimed at Nick. Nick headed them off quickly, holding up his badge again.
“I’m a federal agent,” he told the two officers, “and this man’s been stalking me.”
And hopefully, he added silently, it’s all over.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
“HE’S GETTING MARRIED, Mama.”
Charley’s words seemed to make no more of an impression on her mother than the warm rays of the sun shining through the window. Claire Dow’s expression was vacant, as if no one had spoken. As if she were alone in the small bedroom of the psychiatric hospital, her home for so many years.
A sliver of frustration pricked at Charley. Coming here was like willfully banging her head against the wall. But she couldn’t stop. Couldn’t just give up the way her father had. Because maybe, just maybe, the next time she did it, there’d be a dent. A breakthrough. A sign of recognition, no matter how small.
Charley took her mother’s small, pale hand in hers. There was no quickening grasp. No response at all. Claire Dow ate and slept, sat and walked, all while existing in a shadowy land where no one else could enter.
Suppressing a sigh, Charley pressed her lips together. She’d stopped by the hospital after work even though she would have liked to have gone straight home. The investigation wasn’t progressing very well. No one seemed to have seen the man Wally had identified as leaving the victim’s house. She was beginning to wonder if perhaps it was just the fabrication of an overactive mind.
But David’s wedding was on Sunday, only a couple of days away and she wanted to make sure that her mother was aware of it. She kept hoping that somehow, her mother stored the words in the recesses of her mind, to be accessed at a later date.
That Claire Dow would never be well again never crossed her mind. Just as she believed that someday, she was going to catch her sister’s killer.
Charley knelt beside her mother’s chair, taking her hand again. Despite the fact that she was sitting in the sun, Claire’s hand felt cool. It was as if her mother’s entire body was just an empty shell, waiting for her return.
Charley tried to infuse enthusiasm into her voice, to talk to her mother as if they were on the telephone and she’d just called to give an update.
“I met her. The three of us went out to dinner. David, Lisa and me. You’d like her, Mama. She’s pretty and smart and she makes David laugh. He needs to laugh after all the things he’s been through.” She looked at her mother’s face. Her pale eyes seemed to stare right through her. She could remember when her mother’s eyes were warm, expressive. Was it really only six years ago? Or a lifetime? “We all do.
“Lisa’s a captain’s daughter. That’s how they met. She’s about your height, slender, with medium brown hair and brown eyes. I think David said she’s twenty-five, I’m not sure. But he’s crazy about her.” She paused, watching the smooth, impassive face. Her mother had always looked younger than her age.
A lot of good that did her now, Charley thought ruefully.
“I wish you could be there, at the wedding,” she added. “So does David.” She tried to keep the condemnation out of her voice. “Dad’s probably not coming, but then, David didn’t really expect him to. Dad was never exactly that much a part of the family, was he?” Charley forced a smile, wondering if her mother even saw it. “Not like you.”
Charley sighed. These meetings took a great deal out of her. But she couldn’t think of her own discomfort, couldn’t give up. Her mother was going to be well again someday. Medicine continued to make great strides, and maybe there’d be a breakthrough that would bring her mother around by this time, next year. Or maybe a spare miracle would somehow find its way down to her mother.
You never know, Charley thought. It was going to turn out all right. As long as she didn’t give up on her mother.
Charley rose to her feet, bumping against her mother’s chair. There was only the slightest reaction, a bracing of the shoulders. But Claire didn’t look her way.
Maybe next time, Charley hoped.
“I’ve got to get going, Mama. It’s been another long day. When I come back, I’ll tell you all about the wedding,” she promised.
Leaning over, Charley brushed her lips across her mother’s cheek. She thought she heard just the slightest sigh escape her mother’s lips, but that was probably only her imagination.
“Whenever you’re ready to come out,” she whispered to her mother, “I’ll be here, waiting.”
Charley walked out of the room and then hurried down the long hallway, out of the building. She blinked back tears as she went, refusing to allow them to be shed in public.
Federal agents weren’t supposed to cry.
WHEN CHARLEY HEARD the knock on her door, she didn’t bother pretending to be busy. She yanked it open. Never one to fuss, it had taken her all of fifteen minutes to get dressed and do her hair. She’d been ready for the past forty-five minutes, during which time she’d been desperately trying to occupy herself. Wondering all the while if Nick would come and how she’d feel if he did—or didn’t.
“I wasn’t sure if you were coming,” she confessed.
It took her a second to catch her breath. Not because she’d run to the door, but because Nick had managed to steal it from her. He was wearing a light gray suit, a white shirt and a blue tie. And he looked incredible, as if he’d just stepped out of the pages of a men’s fashion magazine. Picture perfect.
For his part, Nick was giving her a long once-over. He hadn’t meant to be so obvious, but it was hard not to stare. Her dress was tight. Strapless, aqua, it brushed against her thighs and made his palms itch.
It took him a second to discover where he’d put his voice. “Why? Am I that unreliable?” He grinned, his eyes sweeping over her again. “Man, but you clean up well, Special Agent Dow.”
Charley didn’t bother playing coy. She allowed the pleased smile to blossom on her lips.
“Thank you.” And then, because she wanted to keep this light, to disguise the fact that her pulse was only now settling down, she murmured, “Right back at you.”
Most women he knew would have wanted to milk the moment, to draw out a few more compliments. Just when he thought of her as the personification of womanhood, she turned into a guy on him. Always full of surprises, he thought.
Nick held out the crook of his arm to her. “Ready?”
Charley grabbed the clutch purse she’d left on the
kitchen table. “Ready,” she declared, slipping her arm through his. Outside, she paused to lock her door, then slipped her key into her purse.
Nick escorted her to his car, then held the door open. Flashing a smile at him, she got in.
There were butterflies in her stomach, Charley realized as she buckled up. Butterflies for David, and butterflies for herself. The latter were bigger than the former. That had to do with the fact that Nick was sitting so close to her.
She was being stupid. She and Nick were partners. He rode around with her in one vehicle or another all the time. There was no reason to be entertaining flying insects the size of Learjets inside her stomach just because it was happening again. Maybe he didn’t normally look as handsome as he did now, but under no circumstances had he ever had features that could have been rented out to haunt a house.
Maybe a woman, but not a house.
Taking a breath, pretending to settle in as she stared straight ahead, Charley said, “Thanks for doing this for me.”
“My pleasure.” Backing out of the guest parking space, Nick drove from the lot. She’d given him the location of the ceremony and he’d plotted it out for himself. He didn’t particularly want to look like a fool and nothing did that faster than getting lost. “You saved me from unpacking.”
She didn’t follow him. “Unpacking?”
He nodded, making a right at the corner, beating out another car by a fraction. “My stuff.”
Charley still didn’t understand. She glanced down at her hands and saw that she was holding on to her clutch purse too tightly. One of her knuckles was turning white. She loosened her grip. “You moved again?”
“No,” he said mildly, “the boxes are from the original move.”
“That was over a month ago.”
He shrugged, coming to a stop as a light started turning red. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw her shift restlessly in her seat. If she’d been at the wheel, he knew they would have flown through the light. “Some things take me more time than others.”
“I’ll say. There’s taking your time,” she pointed out, “and then there’s utter procrastination.” The light turned green. She leaned forward ever so slightly, as if that would give him the momentum to make it through the next light. You missed one, you missed them all, usually. “Need help?” she offered.
“I can manage.”
Curiosity nudged at her. “How long does it usually take you to unpack when you move?”
He thought about giving her an answer, then decided to be honest. “I don’t know. This is the first time I’ve made a move without having my family around somewhere.” He spared her a glance, telling her before she could ask, “My mother and sister are very good at unpacking.”
She smiled. “And you’re not.”
Nick merely shrugged. “I’m better at other things.”
SHE DIDN’T ASK him to specify just what other things he was referring to. Nonetheless, she got her answer some time later. He might not be good at unpacking, but dancing was another story.
During the reception, after the bride and groom had had their customary dance and the floor opened up to everyone, Charley decided to coax Nick out. At first, he’d demurred, but then agreed. She was surprised it had only taken her two requests to get him on the dance floor.
And more surprised once he was there.
Nick blew her away with the way he moved to the beat of the band. As if the music began inside his body. As if he was one with it. She barely kept up.
By the end of the number, she could only stare at him as she tried to get her breath back. “Special Agent Brannigan, you have hidden talents.”
He looked at her for a long moment. A slow song began. He took her into his arms, tucking her hand against his chest as he held her close with the other. They began to sway to the melody.
“You’d be surprised,” he told her.
His words rippled along her skin, leaving her with a promise of things to come. A promise that had very little to do with their joint venture as partners and everything to do with the woman inside her.
He felt her stiffen ever so slightly and drew back his head. “What?”
“Nothing,” she murmured, then decided to tell him. “Did you ever see someone you thought you knew, but you couldn’t remember where you had seen them? Or even if you knew them enough to speak to?”
He laughed. “I know exactly what you mean. Why, who do you think you see?”
She looked toward the bar, but the person she thought she saw was gone, and with him, that wispy thread of recognition. “Nobody. Just my imagination, working overtime.”
“You need to learn how to relax,” he told her.
Not while you’re holding me like this. “I’ll work on it,” she promised.
SHE’D ALMOST SEEN HIM. He was going to have to be more careful.
The tall, willowy waiter picked up a tray, going through the motions he knew were expected of him by anyone looking his way. He’d paused to look at the couple. To look at her.
Very slowly, his back to the couple, he began to pick up empty glasses. Behind him, the small reception, attended by mostly Marine personnel, was becoming boisterous. He didn’t hear. His mind was on the couple he’d been watching. On the blonde.
His lips all but disappeared as his frown deepened.
He’d thought she was different. Would have bet his life on it. But apparently, he would have lost that bet. Because she wasn’t different.
The thought telegraphed itself across his brain with an urgency he couldn’t shut away. She was just like the others, but he was going to have to save her. Save her immortal soul before it slipped into the ravages of hell for all eternity. Good thing he’d been watching out for her, for a long time now. Even as he saved the others, he’d always get back to her. To make sure she was all right, that she remained pure.
But she wasn’t pure. He could sense it. Smell it. Even from across the room with all those other bodies in the way.
Oh, she wasn’t as bad as her sister, but she still needed saving. And he was going to be the one to do it.
Even if it wound up killing them both.
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
“YOU’RE A REALLY, really good sport,” Charley said as Nick drove her back to her apartment.
The reception had run longer than they’d anticipated. The sun had gone down and evening shadows stretched out before them as they drove north along Bristol. The profusion of lights illuminated buildings that had emptied out hours ago. The shoppers had gone home and the city was preparing to take a little catnap before starting the process all over again.
“I’ve got to do something to pay you back,” Charley told him.
Nick tried very hard to keep a straight face. “Just what did you have in mind?”
She thought of their earlier conversation, the one they’d had while heading toward the church in Newport. “Unpacking.”
“Excuse me?” He slowed down for a light, then looked at her. “Is that some kind of euphemism?”
“Don’t see how it might be,” she answered innocently, then her mouth curved in what he could only describe as a sexy smile, “unless you consider unpacking the boxes in your apartment symbolic of something.”
His apartment and its boxes were the furthest things from his mind as he glanced at her. Exploring her had his attention, front and center.
A deep, appreciative smile curved his mouth. Watching it, Charley could almost feel the smile on her own lips. Feel it against her own lips. Heat flashed through her.
Careful. Charley, don’t get carried away. He’s going to get the wrong idea. Or maybe the right one.
In either case, she was not about to let Brannigan see what she was thinking. Or how he was affecting her. Most likely, it was just the alcohol, nothing more. They were partners, just partners, that’s all. And partners covered each other’s backs. He’d covered hers by doing her a favor. A pretty big favor, she had to admit. By coming with her to her brother’s we
dding today Brannigan had taken away her stigma about being a fifth wheel. Nothing she hated more than standing out for the wrong reasons.
“I don’t need help unpacking,” he told her. He pulled into a parking space several spaces closer than he’d parked in earlier today. After shutting off the engine, he turned to her. He didn’t want the evening to end, not just yet. He’d seen a side to her today that he wanted to investigate. “But you can invite me in for a nightcap.”
Not a good idea, her own personal version of Jiminy Cricket whispered in her brain. But she couldn’t very well turn him out after he’d come through for her.
“Okay,” Charley agreed, getting out. “But just one,” she cautioned, then added, “I don’t want you on my conscience.”
Once he got out, he closed his door, then pressed the security lock, never taking his eyes off her. Making her skin warm. “Meaning?”
“If you get into an accident…” She let her voice trail off, not bothering to finish the sentence. He was bright enough to know where she was headed with this, she thought. It didn’t diminish her meaning.
“I can always call a cab if I’ve had too much to drink,” he told her. “Not that I intend to.” And then his smile softened. “But thanks for worrying.”
“You’re my partner,” Charley replied, taking out her key. “I’m supposed to worry about you.”
His eyes washed over her again. And there was no way that she could guess his thoughts.
“Maybe you should, at that,” he allowed.
His voice was low, seductive, creating goose bumps in its wake. She struggled to keep presence of mind. Not easy when her mind was attempting to jump ship.
Charley cleared her throat and tried to sound unaffected as she slipped her key into the lock. “What do you mean?”
Nick didn’t bother answering her with words. Most notably because none were forming in his brain. Instead, he tilted her head back ever so slightly and lightly brushed his lips against hers.
A fatal mistake.
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