by Julie Miller
“Smells good in there,” Sam praised her as she met him on the porch. “The table’s ready. I just need to get the drinks. Lemonade? Water? Milk?” he asked.
“Water’s fine.”
Jessica carefully avoided being in the kitchen at the same time as Sam. Despite his apparent efficiency as a scullery maid, the space was too small and the man too big for her to think straight, even with Harry tagging along at her heels to guard her. It wasn’t the fear so much she was worried about anymore, it was the other stuff her own mother had noticed before she even had. The attraction. The things she was feeling that she was fairly sure she wasn’t ready to feel.
He can help you forget about Alex.
If getting over a busted love affair was all she needed, she might consider her mother’s advice. Sam O’Rourke was more man than Alex Templeton could ever hope to be. Maybe he wasn’t as conventionally handsome, maybe he wasn’t as wealthy or urbane as Alex, the hotshot PR man, had been. But Alex had never worked up a sweat doing anything besides making love. He’d never shaken her father’s hand and opened himself to her parents’ scrutiny.
Alex had been offended, not hurt, when she’d told him to shove off. Losing his secret mistress had been a blow to his pride and his prowess, not his heart.
Sam was a man steeped in terminal grief, needing time and space and hard work to move past his sister’s death. He was a man who could tease, a man content with silence. He had a depth to him she now realized Alex had never really possessed.
There was a lot about Sam O’Rourke she wanted to understand. But she lacked the courage to learn more. The quiche and salad she’d served for dinner had tasted like putty in her mouth. Every time Sam had asked a personal question, she’d turned the conversation back to work. Every time she’d wanted to ask him a personal question, she swallowed her food and her words and silently wondered if she’d ever be able to relate to a man in a normal way again.
She’d turned down Sam’s offer to help with the dishes and waited until he’d climbed the stairs to his garage apartment before going inside and locking up all the cabin doors. She locked out the uncertain world that terrified her and locked herself in with only fear and loneliness and a loyal dog to keep her company.
THE LIGHT from the small television in Sam’s two-room apartment created a strobe effect in his peripheral vision while he concentrated on reassembling the Sig Sauer pistol he’d taken apart and cleaned. He found solace in the familiar, mechanized precision of his reliable weapon. Keeping it in top working order was as much a part of his personality as it was of his training.
He was the job, after all. He was an FBI agent on a mission, albeit a very personal, unsanctioned mission. On some nights, like this one, the job was the only comfort he had, the only knowledge that made the gruesome memory of his sister’s battered body and his broken promise to his family bearable.
Sam wasn’t really interested in hearing that the Kansas City area’s September heat wave might be broken by a chain of thunderstorms Sunday night. The nightly news was mere background noise to fill the sloped-ceiling cage he was calling home for the next couple of weeks.
There was no headboard on his bed, but he’d piled the pillows against the wall and propped himself against them. He should be sound asleep. His muscles ached from the day’s hard labor. Despite the stilted conversation and health-food-central menu, he’d eaten a surprisingly filling dinner. The night was dark outside his window, with a haze of humidity that masked the stars and sliver of moon.
But the closest he’d gotten to hitting the sack was to untuck and unbutton his shirt, sit on the bed and pretend he was relaxing.
He slid the barrel of the gun into place with a satisfying click and cradled the empty grip in his palm, teasing the guard around the trigger with his index finger. He felt too edgy and restless to sleep. He needed to be doing something constructive. He needed to be moving forward in his investigation. He’d been stonewalled or distracted at every turn. Something had to give soon. He could feel it in his bones.
Sighting down the barrel, warming the cold steel in his hands, gave him a sense of purpose. It played into the sense of destiny that had brought him to Jessica Taylor in the first place. She was the key.
His backpack came into focus at the end of the gun. He held it steady. He breathed in and held himself perfectly still. He curled his finger around the trigger. “Bang.”
The single, low-pitched syllable echoed in the room, reminding him of the emptiness in his soul. He’d lost everyone who mattered in his life—a mother to cancer, a father to the line of duty. A sister to some sick bastard who didn’t know he had Sam O’Rourke coming after him. But he’d know soon enough. And then he would wish that he’d never—
The cell phone on the nightstand buzzed as it vibrated against the wood. Sam watched the silent ring summon him a second time before he reloaded the clip of bullets into his gun. He snapped the Sig Sauer into its holster and laid it next to the polished Bureau badge on the bed beside him.
Finally he picked up the phone and read the number of the incoming call. Something was about to break. He punched the talk button. “O’Rourke.”
His partner, Virgil Logan, didn’t bother with hellos, either. “How’s life in the boondocks treating you?”
“Kansas City’s a decent-size town.”
“But you’re not in town, my man. I’ll bet there’s not a coffee shop or gym for miles.”
Sam shook his head and grinned. Like he needed to go anywhere else to get good food and a workout. “I’m managing.”
He could hear the amusement in Virgil’s city-born-and-bred voice. “You make a connection with your Jane Doe yet?”
Sam’s gaze strayed to the window. Earlier he’d watched the cabin, trying to learn everything he could about the woman and her habits. The lone light she’d turned on was near the front window beside her desk where her computer was located. She planned a nightly check of her e-mail and Web-site orders, she’d said. He couldn’t see the window from this angle, but the light was still shining onto the porch. Seemed like the only connections they shared were a willingness to work and insomnia. “I got a job with her. She’s not much for talking, but I’m working on it.”
“Work faster.” Virgil wasn’t laughing now. His articulated reminder was as ominous as a whispered warning.
Sam sat up straight. He swung his feet off the side of the bed and planted them firmly on the floor, literally and figuratively bracing himself for the reason behind Virgil’s call. “You found out something,” he challenged.
“Nothing good. There’s been another rape-murder that matches the same MO as Kerry. In Las Vegas, sometime last night. Successful woman in for a convention wound up in the wrong part of town. Strangulation. Marks at ankles and wrists. Dark hair. A lock of it sawed off with a knife.”
For an instant Sam couldn’t breathe. The room swirled into blackness. Just like Kerry. He forced himself to inhale, forced himself to think instead of feel. As his head cleared, he spoke again. “You’re sure it’s the same guy?”
“Everything matches, right down to him using a condom and not leaving any DNA. I’ve got the forensic report right in front of me.” Virgil hesitated, giving Sam the impression he was shifting uncomfortably in his chair. “This guy’s sick. He’s got a grudge against something or someone that just won’t quit.” He paused again. “Maybe you’d better tell your new boss who you really are and get her to a safe house. This guy doesn’t strike me as the kind who’d let anyone get away. He’s all about punishment and retribution. He might track her down.”
The bastard coming here? Right into the sights of Sam’s waiting gun?
The idea didn’t give Sam the pleasure it would have two days ago. Jessica Taylor had been a statistic in a computer then. Now she was a living, breathing, vulnerable woman. She didn’t deserve to be hurt again. Not by her rapist. And not by him.
The idea of her getting hurt didn’t sit well at all.
“I’ll think
about it,” Sam conceded. Confessing his true agenda might seal any chance of getting Jess to talk about her attacker. But if he was coming for her… “It’s a catch-22, Virgil. If I show her my badge, I think she’ll kick me out of here. But she’s covering up for something. Or someone. And if I leave, she’ll be alone out here.”
“A sitting duck for our perp.” Virgil’s grim sigh matched Sam’s mood. “You don’t think she’s holed up out there on purpose, do you? I’ve read that women who’ve been raped deal with a lot of shame. Depression sometimes. She’s not suicidal or anything, is she? Hoping he’ll come back and finish the job?”
Sam shot to his feet, defending Jess. “This lady? No way. She’s smart and successful. She’s got a dog who can take your head off, and she knows her way around a gun. She’s a survivor—a fighter, not a victim.”
Virgil laughed, deep in his throat. “We-ell. Looks like somebody’s gotten under your skin, Irish. Let me guess, she’s pretty, too.”
He’d have knocked his partner flat if he wasn’t half a country away right now. “Pretty doesn’t have anything to do with it.” Sam completely ignored the fact that he’d just confirmed Virgil’s guess. “If this guy shows up, I don’t think she’d hesitate to blow his head off.”
“Then you make sure you get to him first,” Virgil warned, ever the voice of patient wisdom. “Vigilante justice will put her in jail, not him. She doesn’t need to be victimized twice.”
Sam thought he detected a personal warning in there, as well. “I’ll do it by the book if the guy gives me a chance. But if he makes trouble…” Virgil knew all too well that Sam was more than prepared to snuff out the life that had taken his sister’s.
“I know, buddy.” What more was there to say? “I’ll keep you posted if I learn anything more. In the meantime be careful. And I don’t just mean watching your back for the bad guys.”
“I will. Talk to you soon.”
There were no goodbyes between them, either. Virgil hung up and would go home to his wife. Sam tossed the phone onto the bed, crossed to the window and stared into the night.
A yard light on the telephone pole between the garage and cabin cast a halo of illumination on the raised, wood-planked walkway that connected the two buildings. All was quiet, all was still outside.
He could see onto the end of her back porch and make out one of the spoked wheels on the old horse buggy she’d parked there for decoration and repairs. She’d asked him to help move it out to the repair shed on the other side of the trees that lined her property. But that was on tomorrow’s agenda. Tonight she was working late on something else.
He looked at the lone rectangular window on the second floor of the cabin. When he’d been filling water glasses for dinner, he’d seen the stairs that led up to a loft where Jess’s bedroom must be.
But he hadn’t seen any lights go on upstairs. Either she was as incapable of sleep as he, or she made her way around in the darkness.
Though he didn’t believe she was that eccentric, Virgil’s idea made some sense. What if she was lying in wait for her attacker to come for her? But that was dangerous. Way too dangerous for a woman alone. The darkness was a perfect place to keep such secrets. And Sam wondered why Jess Taylor kept so many.
Sliding the curtain across the window for her privacy as much as his own, Sam turned and faced the empty room. Like it or not, he needed to get some rest. At the very least his body needed to recover so he could tackle the next big project at Log Cabin Acres. After he got her parking lot done and had moved the buggy, Jess wanted him to take a look at some oak furniture in her repair shed, to see if he could fix it up for resale.
But, most important, he needed to stay sharp. Catching a killer—and protecting Jess—depended on it.
He packed away his gun and badge and sprawled out on the bed, not bothering to change. If he did get sleepy, he’d just strip down to his boxer briefs. He picked up the TV remote and flipped through channel after channel of nothing that caught his eye.
Surfing through the dozens of stations from Jess’s satellite dish had a hypnotizing effect on Sam. He was actually starting to succumb to long, heavy blinks when he heard a sound that jerked him upright on the bed.
Jess’s scream.
JESSICA WASN’T EVEN AWARE that she was screaming.
She could only hear the words. Those two words on the screen.
He’d said them.
Die, bitch.
A voice tried to break free from the black void of her memory. A voice she should remember. A voice from above her, standing over her. No, kneeling over her. On her. Strangling the life out of her.
And the cat. Something about the cat.
“No!” She pounded her fists against the desktop and cried out as a blurry image began to form, then went blank, leaving her with fear but no knowledge, no power to sustain her.
Die, bitch.
The words were still there, typed in a generic e-mail along with the orders from her Web site. She clutched her hands over her ears. The voice still taunted her.
“Stop it!” She couldn’t hear the intonation of the voice, but she was trapped in its spell, reliving every breath of its deadly intent.
But she did hear the footsteps pounding across the board-walk and onto her porch. She did feel the cold, wet nose nudging her thigh beneath the hem of the oversize T-shirt she wore for a nightgown. She heard another man’s voice shouting her name.
“Jess!”
Now she knew she was screaming. “Stay away from me!”
Panicked by the approaching footsteps and the vile message, waves upon waves of chill bumps cascaded over her skin. She leaped to her bare feet, sending her chair crashing back into the dining room table.
“Jess!” Terrible, thundering fists pounded at her door. Harry barked a deep, emphatic warning that vibrated along her nerves.
She scrambled over the tilted chair and knocked the next one with her shin, sending it flying into her path. Pain shot up her leg, but it didn’t stop her from making a beeline for the gun cabinet.
“Jess, it’s Sam O’Rourke.” The floor shook as he pounded again. “Are you all right? Talk to me!”
She halted in her tracks as the deep-pitched lilt registered. Not his voice. Sam. Tall, annoying Irishman with the shoulders and the grace. Her mother thought he was hot.
“Jess?”
“Sam?” Her whisper didn’t carry beyond her own ears. Suddenly she was back in the present again. But the words were still there behind her. The blank memories, the fears, they still pursued her. “Sam!”
The pounding stopped. “Jess? What’s going on?”
Demons nipped at her heels. She rounded the corner of the armoire and banged into a display case. Dishes toppled. Something broke. Jessica ran. The hardwood floor gave way to Harry’s soft woven rug beneath her feet. She fumbled with the dead bolt, cursed the hardware before she slid it free of its catch. Then she was twisting the knob. Throwing open the door. Unlatching the screen.
The screen door jerked out of her grasp and Sam was there. A solid, unwavering savior in the shadows.
“Sam.” Jessica threw herself against his chest. The door slammed shut behind her. “I was so scared.” Strong arms folded around her and pulled her close as she clamped her fists to the waistband of his jeans.
“Scared of what? Are you alone in there?” One palm cradled the back of her head, the other skimmed the small of her back. She could feel him moving, retreating, pulling her along with him. Away from the unknown danger. “Are you hurt?”
For an instant she was surrounded by strength and heat. Sam’s husky voice skittered like an urgent caress across her eardrums. Her cheek pressed against a bed of crisp, ticklish chest hair and warm skin beneath. Bare skin. Jessica came to her senses with a startled gasp and breathed in the clean, masculine smell of soap, and the earthier scent of the man himself.
She waited for the shock of being clutched against a man’s hard chest to undermine the comfort seeping into her. But
she was okay. She was okay with this. She needed this. Alone in the middle of the night with that voice, those words, wasn’t a place she wanted to be anymore. She wanted this instead. She nuzzled her cheek closer. “Sam, I—”
One vicious, booming bark was the only warning before the screen door swung open and smacked her in the back, shoving her weight against Sam. “Harry!”
Sam stumbled back, catching himself and her on the top step. Jessica pushed away from his protection and solace, spinning around as her canine guardian burst out the door and lunged toward Sam. She blocked the dog’s path and shouted a stern, “Down!” She flattened her hand in a visual signal to reinforce the command for the dog to drop to the ground. “Harry, down! Stay!”
Obeying the instinct to please her rather than the instinct to attack, the dog hunched down on his belly. His bark settled into his throat, becoming a low, growly woof. Jess knelt beside him, curling her fingers beneath his collar, just in case he still considered Sam a threat.
“Good boy, Harry. Good boy.” She scratched the dog’s ears, then swept her palm across the dog’s raised hackles, smoothing the thick fur atop his shoulder blades. She talked in her gentlest, most playful voice. “I’m okay, sweetie. Sam’s not the bad man. You’re taking care of Mommy, I know. Harry’s my good boy.”
The threatening sounds ceased at his mistress’s reassurance that all was right with their world, at least for this moment in time. Jess released a pent-up breath as the dog’s tail began to wag. She continued to stroke Harry’s flanks, but risked glancing up with an apologetic smile. “I’m sorry. He was just protecting me.”
“Obviously. I hope he goes after real intruders the way he comes after me.” Sam hovered behind her on the steps, his Irish roots more pronounced in his agitated voice. But she didn’t think it was just the dog’s attack that had his nostrils flaring. He pointed toward the door. “What exactly is going on in there that you scream bloody murder in the middle of the night and the dog thinks I’m the reason why?”