Tactical Advantage

by Julie Miller

  She moved away from the brush of his hand, more alarmed by the instant tingling of heat and awareness she felt than by the holiday traditions he described. “You played a game for twenty-four hours?”

  Even in this well-tended, tree-lined suburban neighborhood, Nick kept looking back and forth, scanning up and down the street, taking note of cars driving past and neighbors shoveling or snowblowing their driveways and walks. “I won, by the way. Reclaimed the title that Nate stole from me last year.”

  Despite the friendly chatter and clear sunshine, he didn’t seem any more relaxed about watching over her than he’d been last night. But if he could pretend he hadn’t moved closer to shield her from a direct line of sight from the street, then she could pretend her nerves weren’t perched on a thin ledge, waiting to jump at anything that moved in the shadows. “With your competitive streak? Who could believe that?”

  He laughed at her sarcasm, pausing for her to precede him up the painted white steps onto the porch. “Did you and your folks ever do anything crazy like that for the holidays?”

  Annie’s boots stuttered to a halt. He was bringing up her parents? After the horrific loss she’d shared with him last night? But then she looked up into her reflection in his wraparound sunglasses and saw the sadness and shock there. A pang of guilt made her look away. Steve and Amaryllis Hermann had been supportive, fun-loving parents. She was doing them a disservice by focusing on the loss instead of remembering the good times, too.

  She looked up again and watched her face transform into a wistful smile. “On New Year’s Day, we used to set up all the TVs we had in the apartment in the living room, so Dad could watch as many football games as he could. Mom and I would set up a card table and put together jigsaw puzzles or play cards. The only rule we had was to have fun and not work. We’d order pizza or pop popcorn for dinner. Sometimes we’d stay in our pajamas all day.”

  Nick’s answering smile felt like some kind of reward she’d earned for sharing that part of herself. Her parents were probably smiling, too. “All play and no work. Sounds like a celebration I could get into.”

  That he made the effort to include memories of her family amid all the talk of his own warmed a chilly place inside Annie, and fortified her for what promised to be another challenging social situation for her. He pulled open the storm door and knocked on the welcoming red door inside. “Hello? Anybody home?”

  “Do-o-or,” someone yelled. A herd of trampling feet stormed the door from the opposite side.

  Annie couldn’t stop herself from startling when the door swung open with a flourish. But the hand at her back reminded her there was no retreat.

  “Nicky!” Trudy Fensom threw her arms wide and welcomed her eldest son with a hug and a kiss.

  “Hey, Mom. Grandma.” Nick moved on to his white-haired grandmother for another hug and kiss. As he moved through the crowd, there were handshakes with his father and grandfather, a pinch on the cheek for one of his sisters and a smack on the shoulder for his youngest brother.

  Annie thought she could slip inside the door and wait for all the greetings to finish. But Nick’s mom pulled her into a hug. “Welcome, Annie.”

  “Hi, oh.” She felt honor-bound to hug her back. “Thanks.”

  She was reintroduced to his grandmother, Connie, who squeezed her hands and smiled. “You’re looking much better this morning, dear. There’s a rosy glow to your cheeks.” She reached up and patted Annie’s face. “Oh, but you’re cold. We’d better get something warm inside you.”

  “I’m fine, thank you.”

  But Connie tugged on her daughter-in-law’s sleeve and the two hurried off to the kitchen. Then she was ushered through the same lineup of handshakes and hi’s Nick had passed through. Clay Fensom took her coat. Noah, no, this one was Nate, scarcely more than a teenager, blushed.

  “I’m Nicolas, remember?” Nick’s grandfather took Annie’s hand and slipped it through the crook of his arm to lead her along the hallway next to the stairs. “We’re just getting ready to sit down for some breakfast. Have you eaten yet?”

  As charmed as she was by the gallant escort, she was

  already starting to feel the clan closing in on her. “Thank you, but we can’t stay long. We have to get down to the precinct. There’s a task force briefing this morning.”

  “We’ll wrap up something for you, then.” He took her through a squared-off archway into a spacious kitchen with tall white cabinets and green tile backsplash. “Connie, we need to get some meat on this girl’s bones. What can we send with her?”

  Trudy pulled a cookie sheet of scones from the oven and swatted Nick’s hand away from the steaming treats before pointing to the long farm table already set for breakfast. He snatched up a strip of crisp bacon and jostled aside the other brother—Noah, a shade taller and skinnier than Nick—to get first pick from a basket of baked goods.

  “Where’s Nell?” he asked around bites.

  “She went out to walk the dog,” Noah answered. A dog was part of all this, too? “Nadine’s in the shower, getting out of setting the table.”

  “I am not.” A new voice entered the fray as Nadine Fensom walked in, wearing a black-and-gold Mizzou sweatshirt. “It was your turn to set the table. I’ve got dishes after we eat. Hi, Annie.”

  “Hi.”

  Nadine walked over to the table and pulled out a chair. Nick leaned down and pressed a kiss to the top of her head. “Morning, shortstuff.”

  This was beginning to look far too cozy, far too much like he was settling in for a big holiday meal while she floundered as the odd man out. He’d promised this would be a quick stop. Annie held up the watch on her wrist. “Nick, remember the time.”

  He poured himself a glass of milk and gave her a thumbs-up as he downed half of it.

  “Here, dear.” Grandpa Nicolas pulled out a stool at the island counter for her. “Will you at least join us for a cup of coffee? Nicky always has a glass of milk with breakfast.”

  When she realized he was politely waiting for her to sit before he did the same, Annie’s no, thank you died on her lips and she replaced it with a smile instead. She was starting to get an idea of who had gotten the charm in this family. His bullying grandson might give her fits, but this one was hard to resist. She supposed one cup of coffee couldn’t hurt, and climbed onto the stool. “Do you have any sugar?”

  Seeming delighted that their guest had asked for something, Nick’s father quickly pulled down a mug while Natalie brought her the coffee carafe, a spoon and the sugar bowl.

  Annie was cradling the warm mug between her hands and inhaling the fragrant brew when Nick walked by with two more strips of bacon in his hand. He took a bite and chewed around his words. “Give me five minutes to pack all my gear. Then we can go.”

  “You’re leaving me?” No. He was already gone. She heard his booted feet on the stairway as his grandmother set a platter of something warm and spicy on the counter in front of Annie. She was being bombarded with delicious smells and friendly conversation, and needed to concentrate on the rest of the busy family to keep up. She took a deep breath. She could manage five minutes on her own if she occupied herself with something to eat. “Cinnamon rolls?”

  “Freshly made.” Connie’s smile was as warm and irresistible as her husband’s.

  Annie surrendered. Socializing like this was stressful for her because of that pesky shy gene and the fact it was so different from her day-to-day life. But it was good stress. It was safe stress. Besides, the warm icing was oozing over the edge of the platter, tempting her to run her finger beneath the rim and pop the yummy sweetness into her mouth. “I love cinnamon rolls.”

  Truer to his word than Annie had given him credit for, Nick came back down the stairs five minutes later. Leaving seemed to require just as many hugs and side conversations. But Trudy’s announcement that the food on the table would get cold had an instant hushing effect, and, just like that, Annie found herself back out on the front porch with Nick. He carried a duff
el bag over his shoulder while she carried a plastic container filled with enough baked goodies to either make her fat or make her extremely popular at the task force meeting.

  She opened the corner of the plastic tub one more time and inhaled the heavenly scents. “Your mom and grandmother are fabulous cooks. I don’t know which one I liked better.”

  “I’d say the cinnamon rolls.” He reached over and flicked a tiny glob of icing from her cheek.

  Still enervated from the mad dash of family, the cold brush of leather across her skin had an oddly warming effect. She covered her cheek with her own glove and turned away, hoping a blush hadn’t given away her reaction to the unexpected intimacy. She was the one who’d insisted on maintaining a professional distance from each other. It would be difficult to persuade him they were nothing more than amicable coworkers if she kept turning into a puddle of goo every time the man touched her.

  She was facing down the street when a gray schnauzer wearing a red sweater came trotting down the sidewalk, dragging his leash behind him. “Nick, is that your dog?”

  “Mozart?” He made a shrill whistle through his teeth. “Mozart!”

  With a yapping bark, Mozart bounded up the stairs. He put his front paws up on Nick’s thigh, wagging his stump of a tail in furious excitement. After a scratch around his ears, the dog dropped down onto all four paws to sniff his way over to Annie.

  “Is he friendly?” His tail was still wagging as he climbed up Annie’s pant leg. Apparently so.

  The thump of Nick’s bag hitting the porch startled the dog and he scooted behind Annie’s legs. She didn’t need to see Nick’s face to read the tension straining those broad shoulders. She looked up and down the street with him. “Where’s your sister?”

  “I’ll go find her.” He handed her the dog’s leash and headed down the steps. “It may be nothing. Maybe Mozart got away from her.”

  “But?” She could tell he didn’t think this was nothing.

  He turned and pointed a finger at her. “Stay put. I mean it this time. Keep the little noisemaker with you.”

  He was jogging down the front walk before she could answer.

  “Stay put” meant stay on the porch, right? Not venture back inside and possibly alarm his family? Nick dashed down to the four-way stop and scanned every direction before deciding to turn right. Once he’d disappeared from sight around the last house, Annie set down the tub of rolls and scones and knelt to give Mozart the tummy rub he’d rolled over onto his back for. “So you’re not a guard dog, huh?”

  If she had to wait, had to stay put, then Annie fell back on what she did best. Mozart seemed happy to let her roll him from side to side and check him for any signs of injury. He was less thrilled when she tugged at his paws. If there’d been some kind of accident, the dog hadn’t been a part of it. The sweater was clean except for a black smudge across the dog’s shoulder blades, as though he’d scooted beneath something sooty or—she leaned down to give it a sniff—greasy.

  Annie got a lick on the chin for getting too close and she quickly pulled away. Her training wanted her to analyze that smudge. But her kit was in Nick’s car, and if this was a situation where she truly needed to get her kit, then she should be calling 9-1-1.

  She was almost ready to alert the family when she caught a glimpse of a dark brown ponytail bobbing beyond the railing of the porch. Annie exhaled a sigh of relief as Nell trudged through the snow around the corner of the house, having cut through the neighbor’s backyard.

  Nell grabbed the stair railing with her bare hand and mounted the first two steps before she saw she had company. “Annie.” The teenager dropped her gaze to the dog. “Oh, good. You caught Mozart.”

  “Hi, Nell.” Annie was still in analysis mode when she stood. But she didn’t need to be a scientist to see the puffy redness rimming those young blue eyes Nell tried to hide. Or to note the thick red welts circling the girl’s exposed wrist. How hard did a dog have to yank on his leash to leave that mark? Annie glanced down at the tail-wagging fireball. This one wasn’t big enough to do it. “Are you okay?”

  Seeing the injury had caught Annie’s eye, Nell tugged her coat sleeves down over her fingers. She climbed the last few steps onto the porch where she could turn and survey the neighborhood. “Where’s Nick?”

  “Out looking for you.” The teen’s eyes lighted everywhere except on Annie. Nothing suspicious about that. Much. “You didn’t answer my question. How did you get hurt?”

  Now the blue eyes blinked and looked straight at her. “That’s not what you asked.”

  Annie quickly sorted through her first meeting with Nell Fensom, with the texting and secrecy and the 7th Street gangbanger Nick had mentioned. No wonder Nick had reacted with such concern. “Your walk with Mozart didn’t, by any chance, include a rendezvous with your boyfriend, did it?”

  Nell’s slim shoulders tried to puff up like her brother’s. “Maybe if my family didn’t give me so much grief about Jordan, I wouldn’t have to sneak out of the house to see him.”

  “Did he grab your wrist and hurt you?”

  The teen’s delicate shoulders sagged. “It was an accident. Mozart started chewing on the backseat of Jordan’s car where we were parked and Jordan threw him out. I went to open the door to catch him before he ran off, but Jordan grabbed me and said we weren’t done talking.” She massaged her wrist, no doubt replaying the incident in her head. Her worried blue eyes sought out Annie’s. “Don’t tell Nick, okay?”

  Annie’s heart lodged in her chest. Nick’s gut had been right about this guy. “If your boyfriend hurt you, I can’t keep that a secret. I’m a mandated reporter.”

  “Fine. Then nothing happened.” She snatched the dog’s leash from Annie’s hand and headed for the door.

  “Nell—”

  The teenager hesitated before pulling open the storm door. “Jordan asked me about Nick.”

  “What did he want to know?”

  “It wasn’t like before, you know, like, ‘Is your brother gonna get in my face for kissing you?’” She glanced over her shoulder and Annie could see that Nell’s gut was telling her something was wrong with her relationship, too. “He wanted to know what kind of cop Nick was. He heard that Nick used to work on the anti-gang squad, and wanted to know if he still did.”

  “Is Jordan part of a gang?”

  “He says he’s not. And he doesn’t hang with them at school, but...”

  “But why ask about it?” Annie turned back to the street, searching for Nick. He needed to be hearing this, not her. She hadn’t raised a kid, didn’t have any little sister she’d practiced giving advice to. But she’d weathered a lot of hard stuff on her own. Nell was lucky to have a family who cared. “Sometimes the people who bug you the most are right. Even when you don’t want them to be. If you think this Jordan is just using you—”

  “But I love Jordan. And he loves me. He’s always been so sweet. I don’t understand why he got so mad.”

  “Here.” Annie opened the flap of her purse and fished inside for her card wallet. She pulled out one of her business cards and handed it to Nell. “Call me sometime. Maybe we could meet for tea or a soda. Just the two of us. We could talk. I bet it’s hard to get some quiet time to think when you’re surrounded by so many outgoing people.”

  Nell took the card and summoned half a smile. “You noticed, huh?”

  “It doesn’t take a forensic scientist to figure that out.”

  The smile widened and she stuffed the card into her coat pocket. “Thanks. We’ll see.” And then the smile vanished. “Jordan?”

  Annie spun around to see an ice-blue Impala with a young Latino driver turn onto the street. With its music thumping loudly enough to vibrate the icicles hanging from the gutters, the car cruised by the front of the house at a snail’s pace, giving Annie plenty of time to see the boy’s olive-skinned face and dark eyes. He put two fingers to his lips and blew a kiss to Nell. A harmless enough gesture if Annie hadn’t just heard about his temper
and his curiosity about a former anti-gang cop.

  “Come on.” She reached for Nell’s arm. Annie didn’t like being this exposed to watching eyes, not after last night. And a chill crawled right up her spine when Jordan’s dark gaze settled on her and he blew a second kiss. That wasn’t flirting. That was cockiness. That was a taunt. It felt like a threat. Annie pulled the storm door open herself. “We’d better get inside.”

  “Nell?” The crunch of snow beneath Nick’s boots announced his return as he followed Nell’s trail through the side yard. “Thank God you’re home. I circled around half the block looking for— Hey!”

  As soon as Nick stepped into view, the two-fingered kiss turned sideways and Jordan mimicked the action of shooting a gun.

  At Nick.

  “Get inside!” Nick warned, reaching beneath his jacket and charging toward the street.

  “Jordan!”

  Annie shoved open the door, remembering Nick taking aim at the man who’d attacked her. But the Impala’s big engine roared to life and Nell’s boyfriend sped away. “Garza!”

  Nick had pulled out his phone, not his gun. He ran out into the street, shouting to the number he’d dialed—traffic patrol, most likely—while Jordan Garza careened around the corner without stopping and raced out of sight.

  Annie took in Nell’s white-knuckled grip on the door frame and wondered which player in that thirty-second scenario had scared her more. When Nick turned around and cut a new path straight through the snow to get to his sister, Annie knew her answer. “Your brother would never hurt you. If your boyfriend is giving you ultimatums, think about that when you choose whose side you want to be on.”

  Nick came up the porch steps two at a time. “Call me when you find him. Fensom out.” Nick disconnected the call and stuffed the phone into his pocket, never breaking stride as he pulled open the storm door and reached for his baby sister. “You okay?”