Her eyes narrowed slightly, but the dimple in her cheek didn’t go away. “Would it work?”
“We’ll never know. I told you that I haven’t heard from her in years. There’s nothing helpful—”
A phone rang at the information desk, and the kid sitting there startled so badly he knocked his book on the floor. He picked it up and answered the phone.
“—I can tell you,” Grant insisted. He lifted his hand. “Scout’s honor.”
“Were you a Boy Scout?”
“Um, Ali?” the young officer asked, turning red. “Sergeant Gowler says for me to tell you when you’re finished flirting, to get your bu—ah, get yourself into his office.”
“Great,” she muttered, grimacing. “Thanks, Timmy.” Then she looked up at Grant. “Sorry.”
He was the one who was sorry. Gowler struck him as a jerk, but Grant was the one who’d delayed her.
“Lunch sounds good,” he said, moving away from her. “Where?”
Surprise brightened her expression, but it didn’t make the dark circles under her eyes disappear. “There’s a coffee shop a couple blocks down from here. Josephine’s. There’s no sign but the name’s painted on the front window. North side of the street.” She pushed open the solid door next to the window. “My lunch break is at one o’clock.”
“One o’clock it is. You can tell me more about Layla.” He hadn’t expected to say those words. But he’d said ’em. Maybe the baby was his sister’s. Maybe she wasn’t. But he knew what it was like being the kid that nobody wanted. “And the foster family she’s with.”
Timmy—of course, the kid would have a kid’s name—looked up from his book. Amazingly, it wasn’t a children’s book, but had a glossy cover that was way too familiar to Grant. It was a few years old. From when his pseudonym wasn’t featured as prominently on the front cover as the title. When there wasn’t a photograph of Grant on the back. “Didn’t your mom have Layla with her when she came in?” With every word, Timmy’s face turned redder.
Ali, though, just looked pained. She let the door to the police department close again.
To her credit, her gaze didn’t shy away from Grant’s.
“Quite a little detail you left out,” he said evenly. He wasn’t sure exactly what he felt, knowing that he’d been within touching distance of what was supposedly Karen’s baby. “Your mother is fostering Layla?”
“No. My sister is. Mom was babysitting.”
“A regular family affair.”
“Look, I wasn’t trying to hide it. But as you’ve said, we’re only speculating that Dai—that Karen is Layla’s mother. Which means you may or may not be the baby’s uncle. And her—”
He lifted his hand. “Save it.” Through the long window, he could see Gowler stomping around the desks, heading their way.
Her eyebrows drew together. “But—”
“You can explain at lunch.”
She nodded quickly. “Yeah. Of course.”
The door opened behind her. “Dammit to hell, Templeton! When I say jump, you say how high!”
Grant’s jaw felt tight. “She was assisting me.”
Pure suspicion filled Gowler’s beady eyes, which looked him up and down. “And who are you?”
Ali took a step between them. As if to protect him. “This is Grant Cooper,” she said quickly. “He’s the citizen I told you about who helped us clear the highway last night.”
Grant had survived a lot worse than small-town police sergeants puffed up on their own power. Ignoring Gowler was easy. A helluva lot easier than ignoring the odd sensation of having a pint-size police officer trying to protect him. “Josephine’s at one,” he said, then turned and headed back down the hall.
Chapter Five
Ali yanked open the door to the coffee shop and rushed inside. She was thirty minutes late and she half expected Grant to have given up.
But there he sat, in the far booth by the corner window.
Yesterday’s snow had given way to clear skies and a winter sun that cast its unforgiving glare across the table. Combined with the sparkling snow outside, it was almost blindingly bright. There were no plates on the table. Just two sturdy white coffee cups, one sitting upside down on a saucer. Grant’s long fingers were curled around the other.
Fortunately, she was starting to get used to the jolt she felt whenever she saw him. She figured the reaction would subside soon enough. Pulling off her coat, she crossed the nearly vacant coffee shop and slid onto the padded bench opposite him. “Sorry.”
His aqua gaze flicked over her face. “For lying about who has my sister’s kid, or for being late?”
She pulled off her scarf and piled it on top of the coat beside her. So much for the niceties. “Then you know your sister had a baby named Layla? You admit she’s your niece?”
He spread his fingers. “You tell me, Officer Ali.”
She swallowed a sigh. She didn’t want to be back at square one with him, but it was her own fault if they were.
“You want more coffee?” She didn’t wait for an answer, but slid out of the booth again and went over to the counter. From the pass-through between the kitchen and the front, she could see Josephine working at the grill, so Ali grabbed the coffee carafe from the burner and carried it back to the table. She filled his cup before turning up the second one and splashing coffee into it, too. “You need any cream or sugar?”
He gave her a look. “What do you do? Moonlight here, too?”
“Just habit.” She took his nonanswer to mean he liked his coffee black, the same as she did, so she didn’t bother to fetch the milk. She returned the carafe to the machine behind the counter and grabbed a basket of fresh rolls before coming back to the booth. “Josephine’s rolls are great.” She’d been looking forward to them ever since suggesting the coffee shop.
“Have you decided what you want?” She pulled one of the laminated menus from where they stood next to the salt and pepper shakers. “I’ve had everything on it. Well, everything except the liver and onions. Personally, I can’t abide the stuff, but for those who can, it’s supposed to be just as good as everything else. Which is very good, I mean.” Good grief, Ali. Just shut your mouth.
She set down the menu on the table and grabbed her coffee, scalding her tongue when she took too fast a sip.
What was wrong with her? Greer and Maddie may have gotten the brains out of their trio, but Ali had gotten their mother’s easy way with people. Old. Young. Female. Male. Okay, particularly male. And she’d never felt tongue-tied around a man. It was just...Grant.
And those damn aqua eyes.
She blew out a breath. “I didn’t lie.”
He didn’t miss a beat. “You didn’t present all the facts.”
Yep. That was true. No denying it. “Layla is living with my sister Maddie and her husband, Linc.”
“Lincoln Swift.”
“Yes.” She chewed the inside of her cheek. She strongly doubted that Grant would have had a reason to meet Linc, but stranger things did happen. Linc was unquestionably the richest guy in town and Grant was clearly in a different economic bracket—broke, like her. Probably worse than her, because she could use her credit card without it being declined. But none of the triplets had many nickels to rub together, primarily because they’d been feeding all of them into the house they’d bought.
They all loved the Victorian. But it was, unquestionably, a complete money pit.
And yet the wealthy Linc was now married to Ali’s social-worker sister. “Do you know him? Lincoln?”
She caught Grant’s quick, faint frown. “No.”
“You’ve heard of him, though.”
“Swift Oil. Hard not to.”
“Right.” She nibbled her cheek again. “The house where Layla was left belongs to Linc.”
“Thought you said it belonged to Jaxon
.”
“Well, it does. They’re brothers. They both live there. Inherited it from their grandmother. Ernestine Swift. It’s a big place.” It was Braden’s very own mansion that Ali’s mother had once cleaned for Ernestine, but that was beside the point.
“Linc’s the one who discovered Layla on the doorstep. Jax was out of town. He knew nothing about the baby being left there. Maddie’s a social worker and she ended up on the case. Rather than shuffle the baby around in the system, she got the judge to agree to leave the baby in their care while we try to determine exactly what happened.” The entire situation hadn’t been quite that simple, but that, too, was beside the point. “Except for a few nights, Layla has been with them from the time she was abandoned.” The coffee might have scorched her tongue, but the hot cup nevertheless felt good against her palms as she cradled it. She watched him for a moment and wondered what he was thinking, because his eyes weren’t giving away a thing.
But they were causing fresh jolts in her stomach whenever he trained his gaze on her.
“You’re our closest connection to your sister, Grant. If you’re willing, a DNA test would prove a lot. At the very least, whether Karen’s just a person of interest, or that she’s Layla’s mother for certain. It’s a simple test, but it would have to be done in Weaver at the hospital.”
“No.”
She hesitated. “You refuse?” She wondered if her brother, Archer—also an attorney with a good relationship with Judge Stokes—could get the judge to compel the test. Sometimes DNA testing was court-ordered, though it was usually to prove paternity.
“I’m not refusing. I’m just telling you there’s no point to it.” He suddenly flipped the menu around so that it was facing him. “Both Karen and I were adopted. There’s no common DNA to be found between her and me, much less between me and the baby. Who, by the way, looks nothing like Karen. She’s got red hair and green eyes. That kid your mother was holding? Blonde and blue-eyed.”
Ali felt like the stuffing was leaking right out of her.
She reached for one of the rolls and started shredding it to pieces. “I didn’t even consider the possibility you weren’t natural siblings,” she muttered.
It was no wonder Chief Kessler kept turning down her request to apply for one of the two detective slots in the department. He recognized her lack of investigative ability.
Josephine had come out from the kitchen and stopped next to their table to get their orders. “Hey, Ali. What’ll it be today?”
She had been starving, but finding themselves at another dead end where Layla was concerned put a damper on her appetite. “Just the coffee for me, Josephine.” She looked at Grant. “You order whatever you want, though. I meant it when I said lunch was my treat.”
“Patty melt,” he said, setting aside the menu.
Ali nodded her approval. “Good choice.”
He looked at Josephine. “She’ll have one, too.”
She opened her mouth to protest.
“Double fries and two side salads,” Grant added. “What kind of salad dressing you want?”
“She likes the vinaigrette,” Josephine told him before Ali could voice her objections.
“Make it happen.”
“I like him,” Josephine said with a wink before heading back to the kitchen.
Ali looked at him. “I’m not hungry.”
“Give it a chance. When’d you eat last? I’m betting it was sometime yesterday.”
She narrowed her eyes. It had been, but there was no reason he should know that.
“And don’t worry. I went to the bank. I’ve got cash. I paid my parking ticket to young Timmy while you were probably still getting dressed down by your sergeant, and despite the credit-card business, I’m not quite destitute. I can pay for my own lunch.”
Considering the state of his truck and his house, she wasn’t sure she believed him. But pride was something she definitely understood, having more than a small helping of it herself. “I told you before, it’s on me. As a thank-you for your help last night.”
“Okay,” he finally said. His gaze came to rest on her face. It was just shy of spine-tingling. “Thanks.”
Ali actually felt shaky.
He wrapped his hand around his coffee cup again and she moistened her lips, fussing with the coat and scarf on the seat beside her, waiting for the shakiness to pass.
It didn’t.
And she decided that maybe she did need some food.
She took a pinch of the shredded roll and sucked it off her fingers.
Across from her, Grant suddenly shifted and his knee bumped hers beneath the table. “Sorry.”
She immediately moved her legs to one side to give him more legroom. Josephine’s booths had never struck her as too small, but that’s how it felt now. She could feel herself blushing and she never blushed. “No worries.”
“Why does your sergeant have it in for you, anyway? Is he like that with everyone, or does he just have a problem with female cops?”
“It doesn’t have anything to do with anything.”
“You like getting picked on then? Just judging from what I saw, the guy’s skirting pretty close to harassment. And these days, that don’t fly.”
The conversation was totally slipping off the rails. “He’s not harassing me.”
“All sorts of harassment, Officer. I’m sure I don’t have to tell you that. What’s his boss think about it?”
“Chief Kessler believes in the chain of command.”
“Gowler ride the other officers like he does you?”
She pinched the bridge of her nose for a moment, and then started shredding the second half of her roll. “If I tell you, will you drop it?”
“I guess that depends.”
“I can fight my own battles.” She couldn’t understand why he even cared.
“So you admit it’s a battle.”
She sighed noisily. “Fine. Gowler was perfectly normal with me—as normal as he ever is, anyway—until I started dating his son. When I stopped dating Keith, the sergeant took it personally.” She made a face. “It’s silly and going to sound conceited, but he blames me for breaking Keith’s heart.”
“Did you?”
“No! We only saw each other for a few weeks! That’s it. We weren’t even serious. I mean we never even—” She managed to put a cork in that admission, but Grant’s eyes were suddenly glinting.
“At least I wasn’t that serious,” she said, more or less evenly. The truth was, she hadn’t been that involved with anyone for nearly five years. Not since she’d been with Jack. And that was something she definitely wasn’t going to share. “But Keith is Gowler’s only child. Raised him on his own after Gowler’s wife left them when Keith was a baby. Gowler’s hard on everyone.” She revised that. “Everyone except Keith.” The guy was two years younger than her and spoiled as all get out.
“You’re making excuses for your sergeant.”
“No, I’m just explaining the situation. Sooner or later, Keith will find someone new and Gowler will get over his snit.” She made a face. “Admittedly, that snit has been going on for months.” A sudden thought occurred to her.
“I think I should be afraid,” Grant drawled. “I can see the wheels turning in your head.”
She smiled faintly. “Keith’s not all bad. I mean, I don’t think he has a dishonest bone in his body.” Unlike Jack. “Even if he is a defense lawyer. He just wasn’t exactly my cup of tea.” She spread her hands, dropping her voice conspiratorially. “But, I could find someone to set him up with. Help him along in his search for his one true love.”
Grant gave her a look. “Sounds like a movie-of-the-week plot. And there’s no such thing as one true love.”
“I don’t know about that.” She grinned. “And there’s a reason why they make those movies. People like them. Same way p
eople like shoot-’em-ups and romantic comedies and military thrillers where the good guy whips the bad guy’s butt.”
Grant waited a beat, then shook his head as if she was more than a little nuts. “And if this unsuspecting female you find also breaks Keith’s tender heart? Gowler’s not going to blame you for that, too?”
“How could he if he doesn’t know I set it up?”
His lips twitched. “I think I’m sorry I asked.”
She sat up straighter, feeling restored to her usual keel.
“What’s the judge’s plan for Layla?”
And...right back into the fire. “Well,” she admitted slowly, “that’s kind of a sticky area.”
“Because—”
“Because, technically, the department’s not supposed to discuss details about any minor under protective services except with those who have an official need to know. And there’s no actual proof that you’re Layla’s uncle.”
He grimaced. “Damn bureaucracy.”
“It’s for the child’s protection—”
He cut her off. “I get it. Doesn’t mean I have to like it.”
She started to shift in her seat, remembered his long legs, and stayed put. “I’m not the, um, the official investigator on the case, either.” Truth be told, she was lucky that Gowler hadn’t barred her from any involvement at all.
“Who is?”
“Detective Draper. He’s the senior investigator with the department.”
“Can he tell me anything that you can’t?”
“No.” She pressed her lips together for a moment. “He’s been out of the office for a while with the flu.” It was Ali, sneaking department resources when Gowler wasn’t looking, who’d managed to create a rough map of Grant’s sister’s movements after she’d quit working for Jax. It was Ali who’d tracked down people who remembered Daisy. She’d worked with them for a few weeks, or crashed on their couch for a few nights. They’d all talked about her nearly obsessive habit of mailing postcards to her sweet Grant.
At first, Ali had thought he was a boyfriend. Lover. Maybe even Layla’s father. But the administrator of a shelter in Oregon where Daisy had spent a few nights told Ali that she believed Grant was Daisy’s brother.
Show Me a Hero Page 6