Deathwatch

by Dana Marton

  “The house came furnished. Doug said it was okay to use the furniture. I just moved things around. I didn’t remove anything.”

  “I meant my clothes.”

  “There are boxes downstairs. I don’t rent the basement.”

  His mouth tightened as he put his hand on the doorknob, ready to slog through the snow and sleep in the freezing garage.

  She couldn’t wait to lock the door behind him, but she couldn’t ignore the fact that he was a soldier back from war, injured. He looked too tired to harm her, and she could lock the bedroom door. She had her gun.

  “Wait,” she called after him as he stepped outside, letting in a blast of cold air. She wrapped her arms around herself. “Why don’t you sleep on the couch?”

  Establishing some goodwill between them might help her with their negotiations in the morning.

  He stepped back in and closed the door. “Are you sure?”

  “Not really, but I'm going to go with it anyway. I can trust you, right?”

  “You have my word.” His frank, straight gaze held hers. “I’m an officer of the law here, by the way, when I’m not overseas.”

  “I heard you talking with Captain Bing.” She picked up her gun from the counter. “Okay. I’ll talk to you in the morning.” Then she turned and hurried back to her room, locked the door and went straight to bed, leaving the loaded weapon within easy reach on the bedside table.

  A cop-soldier-surprise-landlord. Really? She needed him like she needed a fork in the eye.

  She had the night to figure out how to get him to let her stay. Between now and morning, she had to come up with a foolproof plan to make him go away.

  * * *

  Kate woke to the sounds of someone moving around in the kitchen and had her gun in hand by the time she remembered the man she was suddenly sharing a house with. She set the weapon onto the nightstand, dropped back onto her pillow, closed her eyes and allowed herself a heartfelt groan.

  Murphy Dolan.

  He was a local police officer returning from the Army Reserves to kick her out on the street. Great. Just her luck. Because being hunted by a hit man wasn’t stressful enough.

  She looked up at the ceiling. The only people she liked less than social workers were police officers. She hadn’t trusted them as a kid, and she didn’t trust them now. They’d never protected her.

  Back when she’d lived with her birth mother, if the neighbors had heard screams or seen her beaten up, they called the cops. The cops called the social workers and handed her over. The police never held her mother long enough. She’d get out of jail, pretend to turn her life around, and then the social workers would give Kate right back to her, and the beatings would start all over again.

  She drew a deep breath and shook off the lingering anger and sadness. No sense reliving old trouble from the past. The past wasn’t going to define her. She refused to allow it. Her life would be whatever she made it, as soon as Asael was caught, and she could go back home.

  She looked toward the window. The morning light streaming in wasn't much at 7:30 in the middle of winter, the sky still mostly dark. She’d meant to use the night to come up with a brilliant plan. That didn't happen. She’d been dead on her feet after a double shift at the diner. Angie’s daughter had a fever so Angie couldn’t come in. Eight hours of running around and serving meals was tough, sixteen was murder.

  Kate slipped out of bed and went to the bathroom, washed her face, brushed her teeth, pulled her hair into a tight ponytail. After she’d gone into hiding, she’d picked a dark auburn color with a fair amount of red and let her hair grow below her shoulders, the opposite of the beach blond pixie cut of her previous life.

  She’d changed her clothing, too, her style. Her colorful California shorts and tank tops had given way to neutral colors and denim, suburban housewife capris in the summer. She shaped her eyebrows to change their angle, used eyeliner to change the shape of her eyes. She’d put on a pound or two and wouldn’t have minded a few more, just enough to change her body shape a little.

  Her gaze dropped from her face to her torso in the mirror.

  Oh. She winced. Had she walked around in front of Murphy Dolan like this last night?

  Her nightgown had been selected because it was small and light-weight, a convenience for packing since she moved a lot. She hadn’t planned on anyone seeing her in it.

  The thin material showed a clear outline of her body.

  Maybe he hadn’t noticed.

  And if he had…she closed her eyes for a second. She had bigger things to worry about right now.

  Forget last night. Get dressed. Get to work.

  She hurried back to the bedroom and yanked on her uniform: tan skirt, white top, then checked the FBI’s home page on her tablet, her usual morning ritual.

  She stared at Rauch Asael’s image on the Most Wanted page for a second, at the grainy photo taken by a hidden camera at her funeral service. They hadn’t caught him yet. If they had, he’d be off the list. She swallowed her disappointment and shut the tablet down.

  She lived for the day when his picture would be gone, the man finally in custody, so she could go home to her family at last. She wanted to cook with her mother again, tease her father about not letting anyone else ride the lawnmower, and listen as Emma shared her secrets about boys with all the drama of a teenager.

  Of course, Emma was no longer a teen. She was almost twenty one now. Kate blinked.

  With everything she was, she wanted to return. But since that day wasn’t today, she had to figure out a way to get Murphy Dolan to let her keep her lease. Arguing with him wasn’t going to work. He wasn’t going to be intimidated by her. He hadn’t been intimidated when she’d held a gun on him. And, in any case, you caught more flies with sugar than vinegar.

  Except, she wasn’t looking to influence flies. She was looking to influence a cop. Doughnuts? She didn’t have that, but she could certainly make him breakfast. She unlocked the bedroom door, stepped out into the hallway and hurried forward, putting on a confident smile. “Hey.”

  Murph was sitting at the kitchen table, staring bleary-eyed at a cup of coffee, wearing camouflage cargo pants and a standard-issue army T-shirt. The overhead lights glinted off his biceps and chiseled forearms.

  Okay. Wow. Now that it wasn’t the middle of the night and she wasn’t scared to death, she could acknowledge that her landlord was amazingly hot.

  “Good morning.” She widened her smile. “I hope you slept well. How about I make you something to eat?” She flitted into the kitchen, full of take-charge energy, snuck a square of caramel dark chocolate from the utensil drawer and popped it into her mouth.

  He turned a bleary eye on her and grunted.

  Great. He was in a bad mood. He couldn’t be in a bad mood when they were about to have a discussion that would have a huge effect on her life.

  Cheer him up. Quick. She kept the smile as she turned on the radio, tuned to her favorite pop rock station. He might have grunted again. She couldn’t hear it over the music. She wanted another square of chocolate. Resisted.

  His bicep flexed as he lifted the mug to his mouth. The olive drab T-shirt stretched pretty impressively over his wide shoulders. The 24-hour shadow emphasized his masculine jaw and....

  She caught herself. She was so not going to get distracted here. “How about bacon and eggs?” She hurried to the fridge. “With pancakes.”

  She had to be able to stay. Finding a rental that didn’t require a credit check and references wasn’t something she could do on short notice.

  “Orange juice?” She poured a tall glass even as she asked. She set it on the table in front of him, then went around him to the cupboard for flour, accidentally brushing against his shoulder in the small space.

  She swallowed as an electric charge ran up her arm.

  She stepped away too hastily and stubbed her toe on a chair, saw stars. She gritted her teeth without letting her smile slip.

  She was going to smile if it
killed her. She glanced toward the window, out into the dreary winter morning. “I think we’re going to have a beautiful day.”

  * * *

  “Mah,” Murph grunted as he stared at Miss Chirpy's bare feet. Her toes, tipped with orange polish, looked like ladybugs marching on his dark slate kitchen tile as she walked and talked.

  If she didn’t quit, they were going to have to discuss duct tape. A man needed time to fully wake up before being confronted with that kind of happy-peppy energy.

  He tuned her out as he raised his gaze. Her skirt hid precious little of her long legs. The way her soft cotton shirt outlined her breasts…okay, that eased his pain a little.

  The basic male, caveman-Murph wanted nothing more than to roll back into his bed with her and celebrate his homecoming long and hard.

  “Want chocolate chips in your pancakes?” She danced by him, smiling like a demented pep-rally queen.

  Okay, nobody was that cheerful. What was wrong with her?

  “No, thanks.” He couldn’t afford to fall into a sugar coma. He had a busy day ahead of him—first item on his list being getting her out of his house.

  He got up with his mug in hand, the Broslin P.D. logo comfortingly familiar and sane, walked over to the radio and turned it off. “I thought maybe we could talk.”

  She kept the smile on, but she had to work at it.

  He refilled his coffee. “So you waitress at the diner? Bing mentioned it.”

  She nodded as she put strips of bacon into the skillet. “I’ll make toast.” She grabbed the bag of bread on the counter and headed for the toaster.

  “What brings you to Broslin?”

  She dropped the toast in, smacked the lever down, then hurried to the fridge. “How many eggs? Scrambled? Sometimes I make them poached. It’s no trouble.”

  Those little ladybugs were ready to fly away as she zipped around his kitchen. He sipped his coffee as he watched her, then set his mug down on the butcher-block counter of the kitchen island. “How about you tell me how much money you paid Doug? I can refund it. I’ll even help you pack. Obviously, now that I’m home, the house is no longer available.”

  Her hand jerked as she cracked the egg, spilling some on the side of the bowl. She kept smiling, but her muscles were tight around her eyes, her shoulders drawn in a defensive pose.

  She was acting like a woman scared, and he didn’t think she was scared of him in particular. At first, yes, but not now.

  When she wasn’t putting on the happy-peppy show for him, her sparkling blue eyes turned into sad angel eyes the color of the winter sky. Her shirt hid most of her scars on her chest and upper arms, but he hadn’t forgotten them from last night.

  Her forced smile widened. “Are you sure there’s no way I could stay? Doug promised four months. I still have almost three left. I was really counting on this. Mr. Dolan-”

  “Call me Murph.” He noted the air of desperation about her. “I can help you find another place. Bing owns a couple of rentals. He’s a friend of mine. I can call him for you.”

  “No!” She nearly dropped the fork she was using to beat the eggs into oblivion. “No,” she repeated a shade calmer, caught herself and set down the fork. “Thanks.”

  Scared of the police? He watched her, his curiosity piqued. Was she running from the law? Or was she running from someone else? That dark sedan from last night popped into his mind.

  He finished his coffee and set the empty mug in the stainless steel sink next to her. “What did you say, where did you move here from?”

  She turned the bacon in the skillet. “How many pancakes do you think you’ll eat?”

  “No pancakes. Bacon and eggs will be fine.”

  She avoided personal questions—a scared woman with secrets. He was willing to bet there was a man in the picture somewhere. He had to be a real gem.

  Murph rolled his shoulders. He had a special contempt for men who would beat up a woman. He hoped that wasn't her story.

  But then what? As much as he was looking forward to getting her out of his house, he wouldn’t have minded having time to figure out the beautiful puzzle that was Kate Concord.

  He could see no sense, however, in being drawn to her. As willing as his body would be, an affair with a mysterious stranger wasn’t in his immediate plans. He needed to focus on getting his life back together, and quit wondering about where she’d come from and what made her tick.

  “I’ll go take a shower while you get breakfast ready.” He walked away from her and could swear he could sense her deflate behind him as the tension left her body.

  He walked down the hallway that cut the three-bedroom fixer upper in half. The run-down Victorian was the best he could afford on his cop salary. He’d planned on renovating it little by little, had finished the most important parts, but then he’d gotten called up to active duty.

  Right now the only working shower in the semi-renovated house was in the master bath, which was only accessible through the master bedroom. The house was only half livable.

  Nobody in their right mind would rent a place like this. Nobody, unless they were desperate.

  He opened his closet and stared at Kate’s skimpy selection of women’s clothing before he remembered where his clothes were now. He plodded back down the hallway to the basement door. He was going to have to have a talk with his little brother and soon.

  The key was, predictably, on the top of the door frame. He shook his head as he turned on the light and drummed down the steps, then took in the haphazard pile of his belongings. The boxes had seen better days. Looked like Doug had rescued them from the liquor store dumpster.

  Murph grabbed the nearest box, the side advertising cheap whiskey, and found a jumble of underwear. Okay, that could come in handy. He set the box on the bottom stair, then kept looking until he found his T-shirts, and finally his jeans. Enough for now. He carried the boxes up with him.

  He took a quick shower, with soap that smelled like roses, and found one of his own gray towels in the back of the linen closet so he didn’t have to borrow any of hers. She didn't have that many either, only three.

  The glass shelf under the mirror wasn’t filled with tubs of creams. She had a small bottle of body lotion, a comb, toothbrush, toothpaste and not much beyond that. Like her clothes, her toiletries were sparse and nothing fancy, nothing that couldn’t be tossed into a suitcase at a moment’s notice, he noted.

  By the time he ambled back into the kitchen, wondering about her story, his breakfast was waiting.

  She refilled his juice. “Hey, ready to eat?”

  The mouth-watering aromas of bacon and fresh coffee floated on the air, the room bathed in the warm glow of the overhead lights, definitely a contrast to the gray winter morning outside. Kate stood in the middle of it all, smiling.

  Some unnamed emotion hit him in the chest, and he stared for a second. It was The Dream, wasn’t it? Most of them lonely bastards in the army wanted to come home to something like this: a beautiful woman in the kitchen cooking food for you with a smile on her face.

  Except none of this was real. She wasn’t here for him. And she wouldn’t stay. He had no idea why that thought suddenly made him feel grumpy.

  He frowned as he strode to his chair. “Thank you, Kate.”

  “No problem. I hope you’ll like it.” She hovered in the kitchen.

  “Aren’t you going to eat?”

  “I’ll have something at work.” She wrung her hands then caught herself, dropped them at her side and forced another chirpy smile. “If you could stay with your brother—”

  “That’s not an option,” he cut her off before she could run too far with that fantasy. Doug’s wife, Felicia, wasn’t a fan of visiting relatives. She wasn’t a fan of Doug, either, really. Doug crashed on the living room couch here pretty frequently.

  Kate glanced at the clock on the microwave. “I have to leave for work. Maybe we can talk when I come home later?”

  Stalling once again. Maybe she thought she could
drag it out and make him put off the decision long enough for her to stay out her lease.

  “You’re going to tell me what you’re so scared of?”

  Her shoulders immediately snapped straight, a tough-chick expression coming over her face—incredibly sexy, even if she was faking it. Or maybe because of that. He found the contrast in her, between the woman she really was and who she wanted him to think she was, intriguing.

  Her chin came up. “I’m not afraid of anything.”

  “Which is why you sleep with a loaded gun.”

  “It’s not much use unloaded.”

  Okay, he had to give her that. “If you’re in trouble, maybe I could help.”

  “Because you’re a cop?” Her tone turned derisive.

  “That and other reasons.”

  “No thanks. I’m a small town waitress who’s renting your house. End of story. If you’re looking for intrigue, go back to work.”

  All right, so she put him in his place. Fine, rescuing damsels in distress wasn’t in his short-term plans anyway. For all he knew, she was a bank robber on the lam. That brought a few interesting thoughts. He cut them off as she walked away from him.

  He didn’t want to be intrigued by her, dammit. He’d come home for peace and quiet. But while he sipped his coffee and looked through the steam, he had a strong premonition that ship had already sailed, been set on fire by pirates and sunk into the sea.

  * * *

  Kate dragged on socks and her white work sneakers, shrugged into her coat then grabbed her purse on her way out. Gaining time was good. The two of them having a talk this afternoon was better than him putting her stuff out on the front porch right now. She could think while she was at work today, come up with a winning strategy.

  She was safe here, in Broslin, for the moment. She needed to stay put until she found the next safe place.

  “Don’t worry about the dishes,” she called back from the door. “I’ll take care of that when I get back. Have a great day!”

  She wanted, desperately, for him to like her enough to let her keep the lease.

  She pulled her twelve-year-old green Chevy out of the double garage and drove away, so busy worrying about Murph, plus looking for chocolate in her coat pocket, that she didn’t notice the man in the dark sedan parked farther down the street.