by Joyce Lamb
“Yes,” Chase snapped. “What about you?”
“What about me?”
“You have a thing for her.” It wasn’t a question.
A small smile twitched at Wade’s lips. “A thing? What is this, high school?”
Chase straightened away from the wall, but before he could do anything stupid and immature, like take a swing at the guy, Kylie returned, wearing a clean white T-shirt and navy shorts with double white stripes up the sides. She was barefoot, and her legs, Chase noticed, were toned and tan except for the startling paleness of her skin where she wore the knee brace during lessons. A sun-kissed circle of tanned skin in the center of her knee resembled a target.
Sensing her gaze on him, he looked up to see her shooting him a squinty-eyed, go-the-hell-away look. Jesus, why had she gotten so tense again?
Wade gestured at the khaki easy chair adjacent to the matching sofa. “Have a seat, and I’ll check you out.”
Wade moved aside the wicker chest that served as a coffee table and knelt before her. He lifted her bare foot onto his thigh, then slid his pale, manicured hands over her calf and to the back of her knee, gentle as a groom divesting his new bride of her garter belt. The intimacy of the gesture hit Chase like a blow to the temple. That wasn’t the impersonal touch of a doctor.
Wade’s voice cut through the growing buzz in Chase’s head. “You’ve got a lot more muscle tone than you should. Makes me think that perhaps you’ve been playing harder than you’re supposed to.”
Chase’s hands formed fists. If he didn’t turn away, he was going to grab the guy and hurl him against the wall.
Kylie met his gaze again, and one brow ticked up ever so slightly, her steel-blue eyes seeming to ask him what his problem was.
He turned abruptly and walked into the kitchen.
31
KYLIE’S HEART HITCHED AND SPUTTERED AS SHE watched Chase’s retreating back. On one hand, she was relieved to be free of his intense scrutiny. On the other, she feared her scars repulsed him or made him feel sorry for her. She couldn’t stand it if he felt sorry for her. It shouldn’t matter, but it did. Maybe because she was so incredibly tired.
“Kylie?”
She focused on Wade. “I’m sorry?”
“I was wondering if you’ve been playing tennis harder than you’re supposed to.”
“Oh. Maybe. I fell earlier. I’m sure that’s why it’s bothering me.”
“Where’s the pain on a scale of one to ten?”
“Maybe a three.”
“Which means it’s more like a six.” He sat back on his heels with a knowing smile. “Other than some swelling, everything looks good structurally. As far as I can tell without an X-ray, anyway. Are you good with ibuprofen or do you want a prescription for something stronger?”
“Ibuprofen is fine.”
Rising, he held out a hand to help her up. She took it, but when she stood in front of him, he didn’t release her. His thumb slid over the back of her hand, and she looked up, surprised at the caress. He leaned toward her, and before she realized his intent, he captured her mouth in a seeking kiss.
She didn’t react at first, taken by surprise, and then she jerked back so quickly, the backs of her legs hit the chair behind her.
As Wade grabbed her by the arms to prevent her from falling, his cheeks reddened. “I’m sorry. I . . . that was an impulse. I’m sorry.”
Before she could respond, she heard the kitchen door slide open then slam shut hard enough to shake the house. Well, the broken doors had obviously been fixed, but one more slam like that and she’d have to have them replaced again.
Wade’s mouth lifted at one corner in a sheepish smile. “Oops. I think someone’s jealous.”
Kylie sighed. What an incredibly crappy day.
“Let’s not make more of this than it is,” Wade said. “I wasn’t thinking. Seriously. I know you don’t . . . love me.”
She wanted to ask him how he knew she didn’t love him. She thought she’d done everything she was supposed to. She’d laughed at his jokes, returned his smiles, liked it when he held her hand, responded to his kisses. Of course, they hadn’t been like Chase’s kisses. Hot and wild and breathtaking.
“I just miss you, Ky,” Wade said. “I miss you a lot.”
Ky. Her heart didn’t skip when he called her that. Didn’t even pause. Only one man could do that to her.
“Ky?”
She raised her gaze to Wade’s, tried to recall what he’d said. Oh, yes, he missed her. “I miss you, too.”
His lips pressed into a thin line, as though to say, “Sure, you do.”
Sighing, he moved the wicker chest back into position in front of the sofa and chair, then headed for the door. “Take it easy on the knee. Technically, you shouldn’t be playing tennis at all, and the swelling won’t go down if you keep abusing it.”
He shut the door without looking back, and Kylie stood there and felt like a jerk. The guy cared enough to stop by to check on her, and all she’d done was make him feel bad. She couldn’t win with anyone.
Alone, she sank into the squishy cushion of the chair, laid her head back and shut out the world.
32
CHASE CALLED TO THE DOCTOR BEFORE HE COULD get to his shiny new Beemer. “Dr. Bell.”
Wade turned, his look quizzical as he propped his sunglasses on his head. “Yes, detective?”
“I have a few questions for you, if you’ve got a minute.”
“A few questions about what?”
“Just bear with me,” Chase said, flipping open his notebook and jotting the doctor’s name at the top of a page. His pulse was just now slowing since he’d stood at the spot where kitchen tile met carpet and watched the doctor lay a kiss on Kylie’s ready and waiting lips. He hadn’t waited for the embrace to end, just about-faced and stalked outside, where he’d braced his hands on the deck railing and heaved in deep, calming breaths, fighting the urge to rip the railing from the deck and snap it like a twig, preferably over the doctor’s skull. Instead, he’d stared out at the gulf waves rolling ashore, concentrating on the ebb and flow until he could notch his brain into work gear.
That was when he decided that Wade Bell might be someone worth questioning.
Jealous bastard? Sure, why not? Cop with a job? Even better.
“Where were you this morning?” Chase asked.
The doctor’s blond brows shot straight up. “Why?”
“Just answer the question.”
Wade hesitated. “I’d like to know what this is about first.”
“I’d like an answer first.”
“I was with someone.”
“That someone have a name?”
“I answered your question, now you can answer mine.”
Chase took a step closer. “Who exactly do you think is in charge of this conversation?”
“You are, but wouldn’t it be easier if you gave a little instead of being a total asshole?”
Smiling, Chase backed off. So the doctor wasn’t easily intimidated. He could deal. “Kylie’s had a little trouble lately.”
“Yes, I know. I read the newspaper.”
“Not everything that happens to her ends up in the paper. Someone smashed her windshield with a bat yesterday, just like the one used to destroy her knee. And this morning, she got caught in a deliberately set fire.”
Wade paled beneath his tan. “Holy Christ. I had no idea.” Then, as it clicked why Chase was questioning him, his shoulders went rigid. “Wait a minute. You think I had something to do with that?”
“I’m just covering all the bases.”
“Why would I do anything to hurt her?”
“You used to be a couple, didn’t you?” Chase asked.
“So?”
“Who instigated the split?”
“I don’t see what this has to do with—”
“Just answer the question.”
Wade rolled his eyes. “Maybe you’ll find this hard to believe, but I did.”
He was right. Chase didn’t believe him. “Why?”
Wade leaned back against the car and folded his arms. “I wanted all of her, and she wasn’t ready for that kind of commitment.”
Chase didn’t find that hard to believe. “What was the tone of the breakup?”
“Amicable, of course. Did you see her tell me to get the hell away from her when you two got here earlier?”
Chase didn’t respond at first as the image of that kiss seared through his frontal lobe. “I’m just wondering if you’re one of those guys who tries to win over a woman by scaring the shit out of her.”
Wade jerked his keys out of his pocket. “I’m leaving before one of us gets punched.”
Chase couldn’t help the tight smile. “I wouldn’t recommend assaulting a police officer, doctor. Why don’t you tell me your whereabouts this morning?”
Grabbing the sunglasses off his head, Wade folded them and shoved them into his shirt pocket. “Like I said, I was with someone. I’d rather not say who.”
A secret. Now they were getting somewhere. “I can be discreet, Dr. Bell.”
“I appreciate that, but no.”
“Let me put it to you this way: Answer the question here or we take this downtown.”
“You’re going to arrest me because I won’t tell you who I spent the morning with?”
“No. But I will take you in for questioning.”
Wade’s chin jutted out. “I hate to have to mention this, but the mayor is a personal friend of mine.”
“Did you spend the morning screwing the mayor?”
Wade barked out a laugh. “No.”
“Then I don’t give a shit how friendly you two are. Now answer the question or I’m hauling you in. I can make it painfully public, if you’d like.”
“Jane,” Wade blurted. “I was with Jane McKay.”
Chase almost failed to school his shock. “And Jane will confirm?”
“I really don’t want Kylie to—”
“Jane will confirm?” Chase repeated.
“I don’t know. She doesn’t want Kylie to know about us.”
“Really. I wonder why that could be.”
“I trust you’ll be discreet, like you said.”
Letting the statement dangle, Chase moved on. Let the shifty son of a bitch sweat. “One other question.” He flipped to a new page in his notebook. “How is it that you ended up being the surgeon who worked on Kylie’s knee ten years ago?”
“What the hell does that have to do with anything?”
Chase waited for a response.
Wade’s complexion turned a fiery red as he curled his hands into fists. “I was already in the ER for another case when she was brought in.”
“And the case you were originally there for? What was that?”
“It’s unrealistic to expect that I would recall.”
“But if I were to go back and check the ER records, there’d be another patient with your name on their file?”
Wade, seeming to have gotten control of his anger, cocked his head. “What exactly do you think I did? I’m in the mood for a good laugh.”
Easy, Chase thought. Don’t blow it. “You were in the ER when Kylie arrived, were you not?”
“You make it sound like I was waiting for her at the door.”
“Were you?”
“No, damn it. She was in a trauma room when a nurse came to get me for a consult. And she was damn lucky I was there. If I hadn’t been, she’d have a stump instead of a knee.”
Chase took a steadying breath against sudden vertigo. “Certainly you acknowledge that was some good fortune for you, too. A star athlete with a terrible knee injury that you fixed. She’s a walking billboard for your good work, not to mention an attractive woman who’d make someone like you a kickass trophy wife.”
“So what do you think happened, detective? You think I arranged the attack on her so I could fix her up and woo her?”
“You’re forgetting. I was there,” Chase said. “I saw the way you looked at her back then.”
“And I saw the way you looked at her. I had no intention of getting in the way of that.”
“Yeah? Why do I have a hard time believing that a guy who puts the moves on two sisters at the same time is the upstanding kind?”
Wade took a step toward him, his fury palpable. “Listen to me, you son of a bitch. I work in Florida, the retirement capital of the fucking world. I’m up to my eyeballs in knee and hip replacements. I don’t need to go around looking for work, and I certainly wouldn’t sic two fucks with a baseball bat on a defenseless girl alone in the woods.”
Satisfied, Chase put away his notebook. As much as he wanted to go after Wade for the attacks past and present, it didn’t fit. If Wade were truly twisted, Kylie would have had trouble with him a long time ago. “If I have any other questions, I’ll call you.”
Wade got into the BMW and took off with a squeal of tires.
Good riddance, Chase thought as he opened the front door and stepped into Kylie’s living room. He paused when he saw her with her head lolled back against the chair cushion, her eyes closed. He thought she was sleeping soundly, thank God, but then noticed the fine film of perspiration that dampened her brow.
Her whimper shot his heart into his throat, and he took a step toward her just as she shifted restlessly, flinging an arm out that crashed into the lamp on the table beside her. She started awake with a sharp gasp and frantically looked around.
When she saw him, she pushed herself straighter, the fearful expression on her face smoothing into blank indifference. How quickly she managed it floored him. Maybe they hadn’t made any progress after all.
“Why didn’t you wake me?” she asked, groggy.
“You obviously needed the rest.”
Pushing to her feet, she folded the blanket and replaced it on the back of the sofa. Other than trembling hands, she looked as steady and poised as ever. “It won’t take me long to pack.”
He watched her walk away and wondered what it would take to rip away her game face for good.
33
THEY DIDN’T SPEAK TO EACH OTHER ON THE WAY to the safe house located about an hour from Kendall Falls, though Kylie used Chase’s cell phone to call Trisha to ask her best friend to check in on Quinn for her. After that, Kylie could have used meaningless conversation as a distraction from the persistent images in her head that had started with the nightmare. Blue aluminum baseball bats, merciless attackers in ski masks, smashed windshields. She desperately wanted it to stop. All of it. Even if just for a few minutes. God, she was so tired. She just wanted to curl up and lapse into unconsciousness for a few days.
Chase steered the SUV off a two-lane Fort Myers street flanked by palm trees into a middle-class neighborhood. In the middle of the first block, he pulled into the driveway of a small, white stucco house with a tidy front yard and a large banyan tree arching over the terra-cotta roof.
“It’s nothing fancy,” he said, “but it’s safe.”
They walked up the front walk together, Chase toting her overnight bag. They could have been a married couple returning from a Caribbean cruise or walking into their new home for the first time. Inevitably, she thought of the kiss back at the police station. Nothing at all like Wade’s kiss, and Wade was a pretty damn good kisser. Yet his mouth on hers didn’t shoot her senses over the rainbow. Not like Chase’s did.
“Are you hungry?” Chase asked as he slid the key into the lock and turned it.
“Starving.” It came out with more enthusiasm than she’d intended, with guttural overtones, thanks to the clenching of her insides, and she gave him a sheepish smile. “I can’t remember the last time I ate.”
He grinned at her. “Then that will be one of our first priorities.”
He gestured for her to precede him through the door and hit a light switch. As she walked in, pleasant, lemon-scented air greeted her. The décor was simple: relatively new beige carpet, a used but decent overstuffed sofa in a generic tea
l-and-peach pattern, midsize TV and a glass and wrought iron coffee table piled with magazines. The day’s Kendall Falls News had been left amid the magazines, next to a half-full cup of coffee, as if whoever had cleaned had paused for a break with the newspaper before taking off.
Chase set her bag down inside the door. “Looks like Sam was able to get someone to prepare the place. That means there are groceries. I’m thinking pasta, if that sounds palatable.”
She nodded, but she wanted a shower first. The pungent odor of smoke clung to every skin cell.
“The shower’s down the hall,” he said. “And you can have your choice of bedrooms.”
She picked up her bag and headed in that direction, grateful that he’d read her mind.
The tiny bathroom probably hadn’t been renovated since the house had been built in the seventies, considering the aqua blue bathtub, sink and toilet. But it had a shower, hot water and clean towels—all that she needed. She stripped and stepped in and sighed as clean water splashed over her face. Thinking nothing but “lather, rinse, repeat,” she washed away the aftermath of the fire.
Afterward, she wrapped herself in a thin towel that hit her at midthigh and ventured into the nearest bedroom, where she dropped her bag on the floor by the bed. The small room had the look of a middle-of-the-road hotel: cheaply decorated with a palm tree print bedspread and a lamp with a square shade on the bedside table. A white wicker chair sporting a flowery cushion sat in the corner.
Sinking down onto the side of the bed, Kylie closed her eyes—just for a minute—and then she’d pull on some clean clothes and go check on the progress of dinner. Her stomach growled at the thought, and she tried to decide which she wanted more. Food . . . sleep . . . food . . . sleep . . .
Curling up on her side—just for a minute—she thought groggily about what she wanted more.
Food . . . sleep . . . Chase . . .
CHASE MOVED AROUND THE SMALL KITCHEN, IMPRESSED that the house had fairly new white appliances and decent blond-wood cabinets. It was a typical rental property, though: clearly lived in by people who hadn’t cherished their surroundings because they didn’t own them.