by Julie Miller
He hadn’t expected to see it on Jillian Masterson’s youthful face when he raised his hand to knock on her open office door.
Shock. Helplessness. Fear.
“Are you all right?”
Green eyes darted up to his and she jumped to her feet, sending her chair crashing back into the wall behind her desk. By the time she’d groused and righted the chair and spun around to face him, her cheeks were flushed a rosy color. He’d clearly startled her. Again.
“What…are you doing here?” she stammered.
His negotiator’s instincts kept his voice calm, his movements slow and precise as he stepped into the room. Whatever was wrong here, he didn’t want to aggravate the problem. “I forgot Mike’s cane. The gym’s locked. Are you all right?” he repeated.
Jillian wadded up the letter that was already half crushed in her fist and shot it into the trash can beside her desk. “I’m fine.”
And he was the tooth fairy. “Was that bad news?”
She swept aside a strand of coffee-colored hair that had fallen across her cheek and tucked it into the long, sleek ponytail at her nape. Then she was circling her desk, pulling the keys off her wrist, offering him a smile he didn’t believe. “It’s just one of those chain letters. You know, send it on to so many people and you’ll get a bunch of stuff in return. Annoying, aren’t they?”
He wouldn’t know. But he did recognize a load of BS when he heard it. “Jillian—”
“I need to sign out ASAP so I can get Troy home before dark. I’ll be right back so you don’t have to keep Mike waiting.”
Miles of long legs and the graceful athleticism of her walk quickly carried her down the hallway and around the corner. Conversation over, old man. Take the hint.
For a moment, Michael debated between trusting his instincts about people and minding his own business. But he’d spent too many years as a cop, training his mind and body to pay attention to the warning signs people gave him, to let her behavior go without an explanation. It was always easier to stop trouble before it got started.
Pretty, sassy, make-his-son-smile Jillian Masterson was in trouble.
Making sure he was alone in her office, he plucked the paper wad she’d tossed out of the trash can and unfolded it, smoothing it open against his thigh. He read it quickly. Read it again. Frowned.
A love letter.
One that made a healthy woman go pale, jump at his approach and toss the missive away with a flippant excuse before bolting from the room.
Right. Nothing suspicious about that.
Chapter Two
“Can you get it, Troy?”
“Yeah, I’m good.”
Jillian closed the passenger-side door of her dark blue SUV, pressed the automatic locks and turned a slow 360 to take note of the traffic, parked cars and local residents up and down both sides of the drab, run-down city block. There were patches of brightness and warmth here and there where hope and promise tried to shine through. A freshly painted window box waited for spring flowers to be planted. A trio of preteen girls sat on the stoop across the street, chattering in laughing voices under the rosy glow of the setting sun. Construction signs promised a condemned building was about to be razed and replaced by something clean and new.
But she was just as aware of the weary posture of the shopkeepers locking their doors and pulling down protective cages, the curious glances and quick dismissals from workers climbing off the bus at the corner and hurrying toward their respective homes before any kind of trouble found them. And she couldn’t miss the homeless man, dragging a filthy backpack behind him as he turned into an alley and disappeared.
Thankfully, though, there were no pimps, no gang-bangers, no visible dealers she recognized from those lost days a decade ago when the dark corners and hidden secrets of this Kansas City neighborhood had offered her a false escape from the sorrows and stress of her teenage life. Of course, night hadn’t fallen yet. Shadows and moonlight were usually the only invitation the cockroaches needed to come out of their holes.
A shiver of remembered nightmares rippled across her skin, leaving a sea of goose bumps in its wake.
You’ve moved beyond this place, she reminded herself with a mental nod, shaking off the sudden chill. She was older, wiser and ten years clean without a fix of coke. To her dying day, she’d atone for that wasted part of her life by helping youths like Troy Anthony move beyond the sucking trap of No-Man’s Land the way she finally had. So do it, already.
“Wait up.” Zipping the front of her sweatshirt jacket, Jillian hurried to catch up to Troy as he maneuvered his chair over the curb onto the sidewalk. She grabbed the handles and steered him up the concrete ramp that zigzagged beside the stairs leading to the apartment building’s double doors. “I promised front door service, and that means apartment 517.”
Troy turned his key in the lock of the inner lobby door. “Ain’t nothing wrong with these magic hands. I can get up to the fifth floor by myself. You’d better head on home before dark.”
“Is everybody my big brother today? This’ll take like, what, five minutes max?” Jillian rolled him across the cracked tiles of the lobby floor, and waited while he pushed the elevator’s call button. The numbers over the elevator doors didn’t light up, but she could tell from the grinding of gears and cables that the car was descending inside the shaft. “I don’t want your grandmother to worry about you getting home safely. She’s got enough on her plate.”
“You’re sure you’re not coming upstairs to snitch one of her chocolate chip cookies?”
“Hey, if somebody offers me homemade cookies and there’s chocolate involved…” Jillian waved her arms out in a dramatic gesture. “Ahh!”
Their shared laughter ended abruptly when the light beside the super’s door clicked on. Jillian clutched her fists back to her chest and she masked the catch in her throat with a cough. Great. Since when had she gotten so skittish?
Stupid letter. Stupid flower.
She smoothed her hair into her ponytail and tried to ease her paranoia by taking stock of her surroundings inside the lobby. She and Troy were alone. The super’s light must be rigged with some kind of motion sensor that she had inadvertently set off, because no one else had entered the building behind them or come out of the apartment. She should be relieved the light had snapped on because it dispelled the evening gloom gathering in the lobby, although the corridor beyond the super’s apartment remained in shadows. She was relieved. For a moment. Deliberately focusing her senses also gave her a whiff of a pungent odor that was decidedly less pleasant than the aroma of freshly baked cookies she imagined coming from Troy’s apartment.
Jillian wrinkled up her nose. “What is that smell?”
“Probably Mrs. Chambers’s cats in 102. She can’t say no to a stray. You all right?”
“Yeah, I’m fine. I think somebody needs to change the litter box.”
“You sure? You seem a little rattled.”
“Just tired. It’s been a long day.” A final ding of the elevator gave her the perfect excuse to brush aside Troy’s concerns. As the steel doors parted, she grabbed the handles on Troy’s wheelchair. “The Jillian Masterson chauffeur service is ready to—”
“There you are. Where have you been? You’re late. Way late.” A sharp voice from inside the elevator greeted them before the tall, stout black woman braced the doors open with her thick, gnarled fingers.
“Grandma—”
“Don’t you Grandma me.”
Jillian pulled the chair back as LaKeytah Anthony stormed out. The older woman with the purplish-dyed hair reached out to her grandson to give him a tweak on his chin and a light cuff on his ear in one smooth motion. “Dex is upstairs by himself, doin’ his homework. You were supposed to have him here forty minutes ago. Now I’ll be late gettin’ to my shift at the Winthrop Building.”
“I’m sorry, Mrs. Anthony. I got held up at the office for a few minutes. Troy called.”
“An hour ago!”
“
It’s rush hour,” Troy defended. “Jillian drove as quick as she could. You know there’s construction and stuff.”
LaKeytah wouldn’t hear it. “I thought the whole idea of you drivin’ him was to get him home early. You know what I’m fearin’ when I don’t know where my boys are.”
The idea was to get Troy to therapy, period. Saving the Anthonys time, money and concern was supposed to be the bonus. “It wasn’t my intent to worry you.”
“I can’t get to work if he isn’t here.”
“Dex is fourteen,” Troy argued. “He can be by himself for half an hour.”
“How old were you when you got shot?”
“Mrs. Anthony!”
The older woman’s fatigue was evident as she finally paused to catch her breath. “Maybe if I’d been here to walk you home that night…”
“Then maybe you’d have got shot, too.”
Dismissing the sad logic of Troy’s words, LaKeytah straightened and pointed a stern finger at him. “Dinner’s in the microwave. Make sure Dex finishes his algebra.” The accusatory finger swung toward Jillian. “I’m gonna be late to clean my offices now, thanks to you. If you want to help Troy, you get him home on time.” With a grunt and a glare, LaKeytah stormed outside, letting the lobby’s double doors slam shut behind her.
A beat of shocked silence passed before Troy leaned forward to open the elevator doors again. “Sorry about that.”
Still feeling a sting of guilt, Jillian summoned a wry smile. LaKeytah Anthony worked two jobs, raised two teenagers and had plenty of reason to worry about her family in this neighborhood. Though she didn’t appreciate being anyone’s whipping post, Jillian thought she could understand the other woman’s anger. “Your grandmother’s stressed out about work, and like she said, she’s concerned about you.”
“She’s concerned about Dexter.” He rolled his eyes to punctuate his mocking acceptance that he was the grandson LaKeytah had already given up on. “She just wants me home so I can babysit.”
“Troy.” Jillian squeezed his shoulder. “It’s more than that.”
He shrugged off her offer of comfort. “She’s got no cause to jump your case like that.”
“Forget it.” She wheeled him inside and let him position his chair while she pushed button number 5.
“I can get upstairs on my own.”
“I know you can. But I promised to see you home, okay? Home’s the fifth floor.” The doors drifted shut. Let him be all tough and hide the hurt he must be feeling—Jillian was still going to care. “Besides, if anything happens to you between here and there, I don’t want your grandmother chewing me another new one.”
“I hear that.” Troy grinned.
Jillian relaxed. He was going to be okay.
HE SILENTLY PULLED THE DOOR SHUT behind him and crept out of the shadowed hallway into the lobby, his senses finely tuned to the sweet scent of Jillian Masterson, despite the ammonia odor of soured kitty litter that left his eyes watering.
A terrible sense of right and wrong burned through his belly. What he’d just overheard had been wrong. All wrong.
He needed to make it right.
The old woman in apartment 102 had generously opened her door to give him directions to Troy Anthony’s place. It had probably been more foolish than generous for the old cat freak to unlock her door to a stranger—but not as foolish as the woman who’d just reamed Jillian up one side and down the other for no good reason. Grandma Anthony’s harsh words had upset Jillian, he could tell. She was worried about the boy, too.
She smiled and tried to apologize, even joked with the kid afterward, but he could tell.
Nobody upset his sweet Jillian.
And got away with it.
JILLIAN SWALLOWED THE LAST BITE of the rich chocolate chip cookie and laughed as the two Anthony brothers dutifully closed the cookie jar and reached for their dinner plates to cut up their chicken. Dessert first had lightened Troy’s mood, the sun was setting and it was time for Jillian to say her goodbyes and go home.
She plucked a stray cookie crumb from the sleeve of her jacket and popped it into her mouth before pushing her chair away from the kitchen table. “Don’t forget to study for your GED, Troy.” She winked at his younger brother. “You’ll have to have Dex help you with the math.”
Dexter laughed. “I will if you teach me how to dunk.”
Troy rolled his eyes and put his big hand over Dexter’s face, pushing the grin aside in a timeless gesture of brotherly annoyance.
Good. LaKeytah’s lecture, the resulting guilt and the challenges of coping with his disability had all receded to manageable levels for Troy, and his attitude seemed fixed firmly back in the positive position. Jillian had trouble masking her own smile at his resiliency. Everything in Troy’s apartment seemed clean, relatively clear of obstacles to his wheelchair and safe. He would be okay. “Call me if you need something. Otherwise, I’ll see you Monday at the clinic.”
“I’ll get the door,” Troy answered, angling his chair to follow her. “See ya.”
Jillian waited to hear the door lock behind her before she went back to the elevator and pushed the call button. The doors opened immediately. She pulled her keys from her pocket and stepped into the empty car with a weary sigh. Short temper and paranoia aside, LaKeytah Anthony was to be commended for keeping her home in such good shape, and for putting square meals and a strong set of values on the table every day.
As she rode the elevator down, the musty odor of age and neglect screamed for some antiseptic and air freshener. But when she stepped out into the lobby, the smell turned more perfumey, more musky, like the scent of cologne on a man.
The subtle sweetness in the air was enough to pull Jillian up short and tighten her lips into a wary frown. She turned to her right, turned to her left—held her ground as the security light over the super’s door blinked on again. “Hello?”
Her breathing quickened a notch. Of course, no one would answer. The elevator had still been on the fifth floor where she and Troy had gotten out. There was no one in this lobby, no sounds beyond the usual creaks and moans of the old building, no reason for that little shiver of awareness to creep along her spine.
Get over it, girl. No one is in here spying on you.
“Right,” she agreed out loud, fighting to strengthen her resolve. Seeing nothing and no one, Jillian clutched her keys like claws between her fingers, pushed open the double glass doors and hurried straight down the steps.
Long shadows cast by the high-rise buildings cooled the sidewalk as she lengthened her stride to reach her SUV. The chattering girls from the stoop across the street had gone inside. The bus stop was clear. Traffic had trickled down to a few cars. Still, that buzz of hyperawareness refused to dissipate.
She was being watched.
Whether it was idle curiosity, or something much more focused and sinister, didn’t matter. Jillian tilted her head to check the windows of the apartments and businesses on either side of the street. Nothing but curtains and blinds and emptiness. It was more night than dusk now, yet she still peered into the alley across the way, looked through the windshields of the parked cars she passed. No one.
Those stupid letters had her rattled, that was all. Shivering, despite the decent warmth of the early spring evening, she jogged the last few steps to her car.
She’d just beeped the lock open when a beige Cadillac Escalade whipped around the corner and screeched to a stop beside her car, blocking her in. Instinctively on guard, Jillian drifted back a step. Had this guy been waiting for her to come out of the building?
The driver’s-side window lowered and her shoulders stiffened with a flash of remembrance. And not a good one. Big black man. Shaved bald head. Muscular. Silent. Sure to be armed.
Known to her simply as Mr. Lynch.
As if she wanted to visit with a face from her past.
Get in the car!
Jillian turned and plowed right into the shoulder of a man she had even less desire to see.
>
“Easy, babe.”
Isaac Rush.
As the whiskey-scented breath of one of Kansas City’s most wily and successful drug dealers washed over her, Jillian swallowed a curse and backed away. His handsome, biracial face didn’t make him charming. His tailored suit didn’t make him sophisticated. The tight fingers that clamped around her elbow did make him dangerous, however.
She yanked her sleeve from his grip. “Don’t call me that.”
Now the big Cadillac with the armed chauffeur made sense. Jillian glanced over her shoulder and exchanged a silent nod with the big man. Lynch wasn’t what she would call a friend, certainly not someone she would ever want to hang out with or run into in a dark alley, given that his job for Isaac involved guns and fists and breaking client’s fingers. But, for whatever reason, the imposing, unsmiling brute had rescued her one night, a lifetime ago…from the very man who was sliding his fingers over Jillian’s and the door handle right now.
But Lynch wasn’t helping her tonight.
“Need something I can hook you up with, sugar?”
As if sugar was any better than babe, coming from this lowlife. Jillian snatched her hand away from the smarmy touch and stood tall. She’d be taller than Isaac if she’d been wearing heels instead of running shoes, but she doubted even that would intimidate him. “There’s a reason you haven’t seen me for ten years. I don’t do that anymore. You have nothing I want. I was just giving a friend a ride home. Now if you’ll excuse me.”
Still, with money and Lynch and control of these streets to back him up, Isaac didn’t give up easily. He leaned against the door, putting his body between her and getting in. “Somebody making trouble for you around here? Maybe I can help.”
“You’re the only trouble I see.”
“Tough talk, Jilly. You know, I always liked you. And now that you’re a full-grown woman, we can do something about it.” Liar! Being seventeen hadn’t stopped him from trying to do something about his attraction to her all those years ago. Maybe she should be grateful that his attempted rape had finally driven her to that lowest point where she could agree to entering rehab at the Boatman Clinic. But Isaac was still trying to make his role as her onetime supplier sound like something romantic had passed between them. He brushed his fingertips across the back of her knuckles. “I miss seeing you. We used to be the best of friends—”