by Liz Johnson
“And you can’t stay here by yourself. It’s not safe.”
She wanted to argue. He didn’t have to tell her what to do. Except he was right.
She’d be a fool to stay at her house as long as Camilla’s whereabouts were unknown.
He slipped both of his hands around hers, holding them loosely between them, and she looked down to the point where his left thumb made loose circles on the back of her right hand. “I can help you find a secure place to stay.”
Could any man be so genuinely concerned for her well-being?
Suddenly the question popped out of her mouth. “What’s in this for you?” She pulled one of her hands out of his and slapped it over her mouth.
“For me?” He chewed on the corner of his lip for a long moment, his eyes angled toward the ceiling. “Well, there’s the exceptional company. And the dental plan.”
She shoved his shoulder, and he barely moved. “Be serious.”
“All right.” With a slow brush of his thumb across her cheek, he leaned in a fraction of an inch. “Seriously. I think you’re a pretty incredible woman. You don’t deserve this. And you could use a hand.” The tone of his voice dropped, so she lifted her gaze until she could watch his mouth form the words. “I’ve got some time on my hands and some skills that might be useful to you.”
He wrapped an arm around her waist, tugging her closer and splitting the distance between them again. And again.
How she’d ended up so fully in his embrace, she didn’t know. What she did know was she didn’t want to be anywhere else.
Her head began to spin, the tumult in her stomach anything but the fear she’d felt since reading the note. Like butterflies playing baseball, her insides fluttered.
His fingers combed the hair over her ears, and he rubbed a strand between his thumb and forefinger. She leaned into his touch, her skin tingling at the brief contact.
Slipping her hand up his arm, over his shoulder and into his loose curls, she gave him the same treatment. His eyes crinkled at the corners, even though the smile never reached his lips.
Oh, his lips. Suddenly she couldn’t see anything but his perfectly shaped mouth. And she couldn’t think of anything but how it would feel when he pressed them to hers. Her breath caught, but who needed oxygen when he was about to give her the kiss she hadn’t even realized she wanted?
He dipped his head, but his eyes were still open, waiting, asking if this was all right.
It wasn’t right.
But she didn’t care.
Squeezing her eyes closed, she held her breath and waited for the sparks.
Suddenly the telltale sirens of a police car broke the spell.
Mandy pulled away, and Luke’s hands dropped to the couch, leaving only cold where they’d been.
He shuffled across the carpet and opened the door before the officer could even knock.
Shaking the cobwebs from her mind, Mandy plastered a half smile into place and stumbled over to meet the grizzled officer. His white hair stood on end, but the concern in his deep brown eyes was genuine. “Ma’am, I’m Officer Wilson.” He shook her hand. “We had a report of a B and E. Are you the home owner?”
“I am.”
Wilson’s eyes shifted toward Luke, and he gave him a quick once-over, all the while sucking on his front tooth. He didn’t speak, but his question was loud and clear.
Mandy jumped in to answer it. “This is my friend Luke.”
Wilson gave Luke another glance, then turned back to Mandy. “Can you show me where the intruder gained access and what was taken?”
“Oh, there wasn’t anything taken, and I don’t know how she got in.”
The wrinkles around his mouth deepened as he pursed his lips. “What do you mean?”
“The door was locked and the alarm activated when I got here.”
His mouth took on a full frown, and his eyes, which had been filled with compassion, turned uncertain.
She glanced at Luke, expecting him to step in, but he kept his distance, prodding her on with an encouraging nod from the opposite side of her end table.
Lifting her chin, Mandy said, “Someone’s been stalking me, and tonight she left me a note. Inside my house.”
That perked up the officer. “Is there an open case file?”
“I’ve been reporting the incidents to Detective Fletcher.”
Officer Wilson pulled out a notepad and jotted down the name. “I don’t know him. Do you have his number?”
Mandy stooped to pick up her purse where she’d dropped it on the floor when she’d realized that the light she’d left on that afternoon had been turned off. In that moment, she’d known someone else had been inside her home. Digging through her wallet, she pulled out the detective’s card and handed it to the uniformed officer.
He scribbled down the number as the radio at his shoulder squawked. He scrambled to turn it down before passing the card back to her.
“Do you mind if my partner and I look around for a point of entry?”
She hadn’t even noticed the rail of a man standing in Wilson’s shadow. But at Wilson’s words, he leaned to the side, his hand snaking around his partner’s arm to shake her hand. “Officer Gomez.” He didn’t say anything else, promptly disappearing into the shadows once again.
Mandy swept a hand, indicating her home. “Please.” They were halfway to the kitchen when she called after them, “Would you mind checking the attic, too? We couldn’t get up there.”
Gomez looked over his shoulder, confusion marring his features until Luke tapped on his knee brace. With a shrug, the cop pulled on the release to the attic, climbed the ladder and shined his flashlight into the darkness above.
“Nothing.”
And that was what they found in the rest of the house, too. After a thorough inspection of windows and doors, both interior and exterior, the officers met Mandy and Luke in the living room. Stymied, they looked at each other and finally shrugged.
“There’s no sign of any forced entry,” Officer Wilson finally conceded. “The locks are all intact. The windows are whole and latched. No sign that anything has been jimmied or broken.”
He paused for a long moment, and Mandy didn’t dare breathe. Maybe it was because she knew what was coming next. Or maybe it was because she hoped she was wrong.
“Whoever was in here had a key, knew your alarm code and covered their tracks.”
Her stomach dropped to her feet, and she reached out for the back of the couch to steady herself. Instead she found Luke’s hand, firm and callused and exactly what she needed.
He squeezed her fingers, and she could breathe again.
“Could we see the note that was left?” Mild-mannered Gomez looked genuinely upset that they hadn’t found anything substantial, and he seemed unwilling to leave without trying again.
With her free hand, she pointed at the end table, where a simple white sheet of paper was tented by the base of the lamp. The outside was blank, so Gomez—still wearing his gloves—picked it up by the corner and read the words that had been printed there.
Mandy didn’t need to see it again. The words had been seared on her mind’s eye.
You may have gotten lucky before, but I won’t miss again.
Wilson read over his partner’s shoulder and, without looking up, asked, “How do you know it was a woman?”
Mandy opened her mouth, then snapped it closed. She looked to Luke, whose forehead had wrinkled as though he was deep in thought.
She’d been assuming it was Camilla. Ever since Gary had showed back up in her life. And maybe it was her.
But what if it was someone else entirely? Someone who knew where she worked, where she lived and what her schedule was.
Someone who had been studying her for a long time.
EIGHT
The next day brought a chill in the air, and Luke inhaled the sweet scent of the ocean as he stepped out of his car at the address Mandy had given him at the carnival the night before. She had park
ed two spots down, where she leaned against the hood of her rental, her arms crossed over a pink T-shirt as bright as the bags beneath her eyes were dark.
“Good morning,” she said, a yawn cracking her jaw. “You ready to go for a walk?”
He glanced toward the red track that encircled a lush football field. Its white lane lines had been freshly painted, and it looked as if it belonged to wealthy college athletes rather than the high school students he knew used it during the week.
“I suppose so.” He glanced down, watching as his foot pressed against the black asphalt and fire exploded in his knee. Forcing his face to remain unaffected, he took another step. He couldn’t stop the whoosh of air that escaped on a wheeze. “Wouldn’t a swim be better than a walk today?”
She unfolded her arms and pressed her hands to her hips. “Are you trying to kill me?” Her face twisted more with each word. “Or just your chances for a full recovery?”
He laughed out loud at her overly animated facial expression, her affront clearly not fully realized.
“I don’t swim.”
“What?” He took another step without thinking and nearly buckled beneath the agony. He grabbed for his car door and hugged it under an arm until the flames in his leg were only a flicker. “You’re kidding, right?”
“No.” She locked her car with two staccato honks and nodded toward the track. “Ready?”
He glanced at the backseat, contemplating pulling out his crutches. He’d hoped that keeping a crutch at his side the night before would spare him this kind of pain. But his knee seemed to have a different opinion. Apparently he’d pushed a little too hard.
Clearly she could read his mind. Or more likely his hesitant movements. “Are you going to get your crutches?”
“I thought you were going to bring me a walker.”
“I didn’t have one tall enough for you. Besides, I’m not quite that cruel.” Her lips pursed as if she was holding back a chuckle, and he forced aside the thought of just how close he’d come to kissing her. He’d been half an inch away—maybe less.
Oh, man. It would have been absurdly stupid. But that didn’t mean he didn’t want another chance.
Stop it. Don’t think about that, Dunham.
It wasn’t smart. It wasn’t safe.
He yanked the back door open, pulled out the crutches and slammed it shut, forcing himself to think about what lay ahead. This walk and the next one. And the next. This was going to get him back on the teams.
Eventually.
Maybe.
“How’s your knee feeling this morning?” Mandy took off through the gate and onto the track, and he had to hustle to catch up with her.
“Fine.”
“You going to tell me the truth?”
He caught a quick glance of her face, out of the corner of his eye, as he finally settled into a rhythm. She hadn’t looked his direction or even slowed her pace, but there was no doubt in her tone, almost as if she could feel the stress of his muscles in her own.
“How’d you know?”
“You only used one of your crutches last night and took a lot of steps on your leg.” Now she risked a glance in his direction, her eyes filled with knowing and compassion. “No one can jump in that fast without feeling the pain.”
“Why didn’t you tell me to use them both?”
“I’m not your momma.”
He snorted at her immediate retort, but she wasn’t done.
“We’ve been over what a reinjury to your knee would cost you.”
A certain end to his career.
“I’ll do everything I can to help you get back in fighting shape, but you have to do your part, too.”
He knew it. He’d always known it. A return to active duty was almost entirely up to him. With a couple ifs.
If he did his therapy.
If he could be patient.
If his knee cooperated.
That last one was the crux of the whole thing. And the only one entirely out of his control.
He didn’t want to think about what he’d do if his body let him down. He couldn’t and keep his sanity.
And his recovery hadn’t crossed his mind even once the night before. Not since the moment he heard her strained voice over the phone. He’d known nothing but getting to her side and keeping her safe.
He hadn’t thought about it until he woke up sore and aching. But didn’t want to talk about his pain.
Luke grasped at the first thing that popped into his mind as they rounded the end of the track, halfway through their first lap. “So, you don’t swim? At all?”
“No. I don’t like the feeling of being out of control, and I’m afraid of being sucked into a riptide.” She was so matter-of-fact about the whole thing that he thought she might be teasing him again. But there was no break in her smile or twinkle in her eye. There were only measured, even steps and unblinking eyes.
“But a pool doesn’t have a riptide.”
“I know.” No argument. No excuses. Only the certainty that she knew herself and knew what she liked.
He couldn’t hold back a smile. Good grief, that utter confidence was appealing. Along with her wry wit and eyes the color of dark chocolate. They were so expressive. So kind. So beautiful.
Get yourself together, Dunham.
She pressed a hand to her mouth as another yawn gripped her.
“How’d you sleep last night?”
She glanced toward the sky, seeming to follow the only cloud dancing across a canvas of blue. “Fine. I mean, it wasn’t ideal, but I’m fine.”
Fine. There had never been a more benign word that could cover such a multitude of emotions.
In the tension of her neck below a bouncing ponytail and in the tightness around her mouth, he could see that for the moment fine covered for fear.
“Did you get any sleep at all?”
She shrugged, her tennis shoes slapping against the Tartan track. “A little bit.”
“Was there a problem at the hotel?”
Her forehead wrinkled, and she waved her hands in front of her. “No. It was fine.”
There was that word again.
After the police had left the night before, he’d offered the guest room at his parents’ home, but she’d insisted on finding a hotel to stay in until whoever was after her was arrested. And a hotel was as secure as any home would be. But she was still alone.
She didn’t need to be on her own, but no matter how many times he told her he would stay by her side, she didn’t seem to believe it. Or she didn’t know how to accept it. Even after he’d followed her to a hotel and made sure she was checked in, he’d seen the emotion in her eyes. Why did she force herself to face this threat on her own, even when she didn’t want to?
Despite physical exhaustion, he’d tossed and turned the entire night, wondering if she was all right, wondering if he should have stayed in the parking lot until she was up. What if the fire alarm had gone off or there’d been an emergency?
And was it possible Officer Wilson had been right and Camilla wasn’t the one after her? Had they made a potentially deadly assumption?
“Were you awake thinking about who else might be after you?”
Mandy slammed to a stop. “How’d you know?”
He smiled as she asked the same question he’d posed just minutes, just steps, before. “You have your expertise. I have mine.”
Her eyes narrowed. “I thought yours was navy medicine.”
“I didn’t mean my job.” He adjusted his crutches so they’d quit rubbing on a sore spot under his arm. “I know people in jeopardy. I know what they think about, how they react.”
Two little lines formed between her eyebrows, and her lips grew tight. “And how do people in danger act?”
Talk about a loaded question. She had no idea how many memories that seemingly simple question conjured. Locked trunks. The unending shriek of an AK-47. A throat so dry he couldn’t swallow and nothing but desert for miles around.
His firs
thand experience had taught him that when someone’s life was on the line, that person thought about only one thing: survival.
Mandy was looking for a shelter. And now the cops the night before had planted a seed that neither of them could ignore. If Camilla wasn’t after Mandy, they had to figure out who was.
He could feel her gaze heavy on his back. Instead of turning toward her, he lifted his face to the breeze, breathing in the heady aroma of fresh air and freedom.
This wasn’t the time to tell her about the danger he’d survived, even as a child. This was the time to find out who else they should be looking into. They didn’t have any time to lose.
But maybe if he wanted her to trust him, he was going to have to give her something to show he trusted her. Just a little bit.
“One time when I was in Ly—in the Middle East, I was out on patrol with some marines.” He stopped walking, as Mandy was still standing ten yards behind him and stubbornly refusing to move. But he didn’t turn toward her. Keeping his voice just loud enough, he said, “One of the guys took a stray bullet to the arm, near a café. It wasn’t life threatening, but I was the only corpsman for miles.” Suddenly the memories flooded through him, and his throat closed.
This had been a terrible idea. He wasn’t ready to talk about this. He wasn’t ready to share.
He risked a glance in Mandy’s direction, and her throat was tense. Her arms hung loosely at her sides, but her hands were balled into fists. “What happened?”
It would have been so easy to say that he’d patched the guy up and they’d gone back to the base. Man, he wished he could say that. He didn’t want to relive that street or remember the rancid odor of burned flesh.
But he’d gotten himself into this. He’d started the story, and he was either going to have to finish it or lie for all he was worth. The second wasn’t really an option, so he took a deep breath and rubbed a hand over his face.
“It was a busy area, packed with people who were almost entirely unfazed by the sound of gunfire, so I jogged across the street to patch up the guy. I was weaving in and out of the crowd, and I caught a glimpse of this man. He was a little bit behind me, and his eyes were jumpy, shifting back and forth. His arms were skinny, but his middle bulged beneath his coat.”