by Tatum, Clare
The crashing in the bushes behind her stopped and changed directions, running away. Thank God.
She slashed through the final bushes that separated her from the road, stepping onto the warm asphalt.
“Lainey,” a voice called. Registering that it was Brice, she ran toward it. His powerful frame stood out in the night and she’d never been so happy to see such a big man.
As he ran toward her, he held his gun in both hands, pointed away toward the ground.
He stepped around her, putting himself between her and danger.
He pointed the gun toward the dense underbrush, at the same time backing away, pushing her with him. Finally, when they’d reached his car, he took her by the arm, walking around to put the car between them and the brushy darkness.
He turned, his expression on high alert but calm, reassuring, his gun still directed at the woods.
“What happened?”
She could barely hear his words over the blood pounding in her ears. “Someone was chasing me,” she gasped out between strangled breaths. She looked all around, registering every blade of grass and every tree branch, emblazoning them into the registry of her senses, noting anywhere that a man could hide.
“Why were you in the woods?” He grasped her by the shoulder, to get her attention.
She almost couldn’t understand his words, so intent was she on everything around them, all senses focused on danger and possible threats.
“What happened?” he said loudly and clearly, his voice becoming even deeper as if to impress itself into her mind.
“A cop’s hurt.” She pointed down the path, remembering what had originally taken her into the dark woods. “Then, a man came out of nowhere. He chased me.”
Brice immediately pulled a radio from his belt, and called for backup. “Officer down, officer down,” he said distinctly into the device.
Lainey knew from experience that nothing got police moving faster than those two words.
“What’s your exact location?” dispatch answered back.
Brice described the location and asked for an ambulance, though that was a given in his initial call. As well as Lainey’s call.
“We have to go help the officer,” she said.
Brice nodded. She’d never seen him so intent, so dangerous. Masculinity oozed out of him, with a sense of purpose that had insured the survival of the species for thousands of years.
“Get in your car and go home,” he said, turning his eyes on her for just one second. But in that second, those eyes speared into her soul with a commanding and forceful gaze, his cop expression. A man used to ordering people around.
But it wasn’t gonna work this time. She wasn’t leaving him alone out here. There wouldn’t be a second cop lying on that dirty path, the blood oozing out of him.
“Do you have a second gun?” she said clearly.
“Get outta here,” he said.
She shook her head. “Do you have a second gun?”
He mumbled a curse but leaned down to his ankle and pulled out a gun. “Do you know how to use it?”
She glanced at it. “Yep. And I’m fully motivated to use it, too.”
A dark grin crossed his face. “Just don’t shoot me.” Then, a blue light rounded the corner, siren blazing, and another flew around the opposite corner.
“Back up. The most wonderful words in the police lexicon,” he said.
The police cars bathed the street in blue light, painting the block with safety. “Big men with guns,” she said.
“Big, little, man, woman. I don’t care. Just so they’re on our side of the badge.”
More sirens could be heard getting closer. Within minutes, the area was awash with cops. Lainey’s heart rate struggled to stabilize.
But, the memory of the injured cop and the terror in his eyes combined with her own fear as she was chased through the woods said it would be a long time until she felt normal again.
* * *
Hours later, the police had just about wrapped up the initial investigation. Other detectives had arrived, interrogating Lainey as well as walking the path and the surrounding area.
Police had searched the woods and dogs were scheduled to arrive soon to look for trails out of the woods. But the chance of the dogs hitting on a scent had slimmed down as cops had poured into the woods in the initial heat of the search and investigation.
There was nothing like one of their own being injured to get cops’ blood going. A frenzied pack mentality surged through them and they pulsed through the woods looking for the guy who’d clubbed their colleague and threatened an assistant district attorney.
There was a reason people became cops. A driving sense of justice sent these men and women in blue out onto the streets where they faced danger every day.
As the lead detective walked away from Lainey, after telling her she could go home and shower and get on with her day, Brice walked toward her.
Thank God, he’d shown up when he did.
She’d always known she would die one day but that concept had never seemed more real than when a man was chasing her through the woods. If Brice hadn’t shown up…
“Thank you,” she said.
His eyes flashed with such intensity that she knew he got the immense sentiment behind her words. “You’re welcome.”
Thank you, such simple words. Thank you for saving my life, for keeping that monster from dragging me into the woods and raping or killing me.
Thank you. It wasn’t big enough.
She extended her hand. He took it and pulled her forward. She turned it into a professional half hug, with their hands clasped in a shake in front of them and her hand coming up to pat him on the back.
But it felt anything but professional as her whole body ached to push up against him, to be pulled into a full body contact embrace.
But professional was all it could be. Their paths were so entwined on the job, in the Simone investigation, in a million other ways professionally that she couldn’t risk screwing up the relationship.
She pulled back, not meeting his eyes, yet feeling his gaze on her.
She slid her hand away and slowly he released it.
Her phone vibrated in her pocket, and then a trilling ring followed. Thankful for the distraction, she pulled it out.
She saw the name on caller id. “Mrs. Maxey.”
“Hey, Sweetie, you okay? Me and Julie saw you on the morning news.”
“She is obsessed with watching for me whenever I don’t get back in time to take her to school,” Lainey said with a laugh.
“I know!” Mrs. Maxey laughed knowingly. Of course she knew.
“That girl watches way too much news, knows way too much about the criminal underbelly of Atlanta,” Lainey conceded what she knew Mrs. Maxey was thinking.
The live trucks and reporters and photographers were set up just across the street, documenting every moment of the investigation into the attack on a cop and assistant DA. It was a made for TV story. She hoped Julie hadn’t figured out that Lainey was subject of the news story. Usually, Lainey gave sound bites about crimes that happened to other people. It felt so odd to actually be the story.
“So, you got her off to school?” Lainey tried to steer the conversation back to a normal subject.
“Actually, the mayor’s daughter and her driver came and picked her up and took her to school.”
“Oh, okay.” That was unusual. It was more normal for Julie to catch a ride home or over to the mayor’s house after school. “Did they say why they wanted to go together this morning?”
“Yeah, there’s supposedly a little pep rally before school that Tiana wanted Julie to go to with her.”
“Oh, that’s cute.” Julie had made such a great group of friends at the private school, had been accepted into the inner echelon of popularity when the mayor’s daughter had made it known that Julie was her best friend.
Julie deserved a great childhood, the best that Lainey could provide, despite the fact that
she was essentially an orphan, with no real parents.
Thank God for the mayor’s interest in them. Julie could always count on an invitation to any event that a preteen could want to attend, be it a concert or a pool party at the mayor’s house.
“Okay, thanks again Mrs. Maxey for all you do.”
The older woman twittered, “You’re welcome,” and hung up. Lainey could feel her smile all the way through the phone line.
“Your kid?” Brice’s eyes assessed her.
She didn’t like to explain her personal life to coworkers and other colleagues. “My little sister,” she finally said.
“Nice,” he said simply without any other questions. He nodded toward the media trucks. “You gonna give them a comment?”
She glanced at him. “How much should I tell them?”
“The public’s not gonna feel real secure with this crime wave we got going on. If even cops are victims…” He arched an eyebrow.
His way of telling her not to say too much?
“Yeah, but don’t people need to know what’s going on so they can take all the proper precautions?”
“Emm.” He lifted a shoulder in a half shrug. That shoulder movement sent sensations coursing through her body. There was such an ever-present sexual pull between them.
How much longer could she fight it, the female hormones in her body asked?
On the other side of the street a flurry of activity commenced. Live truck masts began deflating. Camera men began taking down their cameras and tripods, reeling up the cables to the live trucks.
One cameraman jumped into his truck and peeled out, laying rubber in his haste to get somewhere.
“Guess they got a better story.” Brice half laughed. “Hope they don’t get a ticket getting there.”
Lainey turned and started walking toward her car. Brice walked along beside her.
“What could be better than this?” Lainey murmured. “Seems like nothing is a bigger story to the press than an injured cop.”
“Maybe this one already saw its news cycle expire since nobody died.”
John Canton ran across the road in front of them, heading back to his cameraman’s SUV.
“What’s the big story?” Brice called to him.
“The mayor’s daughter’s gone missing.”
Missing?
Julie was supposed to be with the mayor’s daughter. “What do you mean missing?” Lainey yelled.
Canton looked back, surprise written all over his face at how she’d almost shrieked the words.
“Mayor got a call from a man who said he has her daughter.”
And also had Julie?
Chapter Eight
A bolt of terror arced through Lainey. She twisted toward Brice, grabbing him by his upper arms. His eyes connected with hers.
“Tell me,” he said.
“My sister’s with the mayor’s daughter.”
His eyes opened wider. “Where were they?”
“The mayor’s driver picked both of them up, to take them to a pep rally before school. Oh God, not Julie!” Mindless panic squeezed all thought out of her except that one pleading prayer.
She turned and ran toward her car. But, Brice was right behind her, and grabbed her arm before she could get in.
“Where are you going?”
Where should she go? If someone had kidnapped Julie, they could be anywhere by now.
She yanked her cell phone out. Maybe Julie wasn’t actually with Tiana when she’d been taken. She hit the button for Julie’s cell phone and waited while it dialed, listened to the phone ringing as if someone on the other end of the line would provide her next breath.
As she waited for Julie to pick up, she closed her eyes to shut out a world where a twelve year old girl could be anyone’s victim.
Please pick up, Julie. Please pick up.
The phone finally went to voice mail. “Julie, it’s Lainey. Call me. I need to hear from you right away. Now!”
She hung up and was tempted to dial again. But, the feeling that Julie might never answer that phone again suddenly gripped her. A scream of desperation formed in her throat, begging to be let out, as if that would expel some of her terror.
But, it wouldn’t. Action was what mattered now. “I’m gonna text her.” She began typing in a message.
“Which school do they go to?” Brice held his phone to his ear as he looked at her. She said the name of the school, and Brice repeated it into the phone. “Connect me.”
He was calling information for the school’s number, it seemed.
Brice gripped one of Lainey’s shoulders as she texted, kneading, as if trying to bring her back from the darkest, fear-ridden place to which anyone could go.
A place where the children in their lives could be hurt.
Then, Brice spoke into the phone and she listened as she pressed send on Julie’s message. “I’m Detective Brice with the Atlanta Police. Has Julie Thomas shown up there yet today? Can you check if she has, please? She was supposedly riding with the mayor’s daughter to school. And another question, are you having a pep rally this morning?”
His expression darkened, foreshadowing the answer on that question.
No, they weren’t having a rally? That thought rang through her head like a bullet. If Julie wasn’t at school, then she had to be with the mayor’s daughter and the mayor’s daughter was… missing.
What did that mean? How could she go missing when the mayor’s daughter was one of the most protected little girls in Atlanta?
Lainey had never thought twice about letting Julie go with Tiana.
Now, every family’s worse nightmare was happening.
“So, she hasn’t shown up there and neither has the mayor’s daughter.” His gaze connected with Lainey, willing her, it seemed, some of his strength.
But she didn’t feel strong. She’d seen the outcome of too many of these situations, the desperate families on TV begging for the safe return of their children and then she’d the aftermath, the totally destroyed wrecks of human beings for whom she’d had to try and seek justice.
She usually came in at the final stage of the disasters criminals wrought in people’s lives.
Now, she was at stage one of the disaster.
Please don’t let this play out like those other horrible situations. Please God, don’t let me lose Julie.
Julie was whirling away from her, ripped out of normalcy by a tornado that could kill her. By now, she could be anywhere.
Brice hung up the phone and dropped it in his pocket.
“We need to go look for Julie,” she said, panting, feeling as if she’d run a marathon, oxygen not seeming to make it into her lungs. She turned and looked up and down the street. “We need to find her.”
Brice took her by the shoulders and looked into her eyes. “We will.”
Where? Where should they look? The question kept playing over and over in her mind.
Then, Brice pulled her into him, and wrapped both arms around her. She wanted to fight back, to pull away and run to her car. And what, start driving randomly?
Yes! She had to do something.
But, the human contact of Brice’s arms around her felt so welcome, his body’s warmth seeping into the coldness that seemed to envelope her like a dense fog. The mist had moved in, shrouding the world, making it hard to discern what was true from what was shadowy fear.
“We’re gonna find her,” Brice said into her ear, his conviction almost making her believe this wouldn’t be like all those other people’s nightmares. Julie would come home.
Lainey pulled back to look into his eyes. “She’s all I’ve got. Julie’s my whole family.” A huge aching sob stuck in her throat. But she refused to let it come out. She would not give in to weakness.
She had to be strong for Julie.
“We’ll find her,” Brice repeated.
She sucked in a huge breath. “Yes, we will.”
Simone’s death photos flashed across her mind. And all the othe
r photos of murdered people that she’d seen in her years at the DA’s office. She willed them away.
If she allowed herself to imagine that could happen, she would be of no use to Julie.
Julie was all that mattered now. Those other victims had nothing to do with her. Julie was coming home safe.
“How did the news people know the mayor’s daughter was missing?” The words spurted from her without her even thinking them.
Brice’s gaze connected to hers. “How do they ever know anything? But good question. You’re on the hunt, Lainey Thomas. And God help the guy who took, or temporarily misplaced,” he corrected himself, “your little sister.”
“The mayor already knows her daughter’s missing. Let’s go there,” she said, pivoting and heading to her car.
“Let’s go in mine. I have a blue light.” Brice motioned her to his vehicle, and she turned that way. “You got your gun back, right?” he asked.
She patted her hip, underneath her jacket. “I’ve got it on a holster now.”
He nodded. “Keep it on you at all times.”
“You better believe I will. I’m ready.” Steel flowed through her bones, strengthening her spine. All she wanted to do was find the person who had Julie, then kick their ass.
“Not just ’cause of your sister.”
“What do you mean?” She jerked her attention to his face. He got in his side of the car and she did the same on the passenger side, then looked at him again.
“You need to be careful for your own safety,” he said, his words sharp and precise.
“You think I’m at risk?”
“Don’t know.” He half shrugged as he started the car. “Things are getting weirder by the minute. Somebody went after you on that path, now your sister’s gone missing. Seems weird.”
A cold wave washed through her. Was Julie a target because of her?
It was much more likely that someone had gone after the mayor’s daughter for a big paycheck from ransom. And Julie had just been collateral damage, taken along with Tiana. She’d prayed that Julie would escape unharmed but had almost forgotten about Tiana.
A jab of guilt cut her.
But, surely anyone’s concern would go straight to their own family member first.