She drained the glass. “I inverted it, you know, with my fingers cupping the plastic so as not to actually touch the brooch. The blood—I know it has to be blood—it didn’t smear, so I guess it’d been there long enough to dry. The girl’s been missing a week, so I took time to look for hair, fibers. Nothing.”
“Nothing visible,” he corrected. “Luminol, the proper light. Experienced professionals. We might find trace evidence of blood or smears where it was cleaned up. Hair follicles. Fingerprints. The brooch is of no use to us now.”
His hand came up to stop her protest. “How you collected it isn’t the issue. You’re a civilian, Georgia. That taints it whether you touched it or not. Any two-bit attorney could say you planted it. It won’t hold up in court, and if it doesn’t hold up in court, it might as well be tossed in the trash.”
“You wouldn’t!”
“Hell no. But as soon as I get a pad and a pen, we’re going through this all again. Every last detail, Georgia, right down to the name of the dry cleaners and the road you were on. I want the time and date of when you had the breakdown. If you so much as sneezed in that car, I want to know about it.”
Chapter 2
Well, shit. Trevor could all but see the expletive flash through her mind. Her eyes went wide as saucers as the reality of his statement crept in. Her DNA was undoubtedly infused in the vehicle’s interior, much in the way of Eric Rothschild’s. Hair, skin cells, clothing fibers, the most miniscule scrap of evidence and this could be twisted around to loop over Savannah’s lovely neck and hang her like a squawking goose.
No way was Trevor going to let that happen.
She rubbed at her lids. “I should have called the police. I know that.”
“Too late for hindsight, Georgia. You didn’t, and like it or not, you know you have a reason.” Why he had to push it, he couldn’t quite understand himself, but it was a damning necessity. He was afraid he knew her answer, afraid he knew the depth of his own ridiculous need for it, yet still he said, “I’d like to hear why that is.”
“The mayor, he’s more than just a boss. He’s been so good to me. I mean, it’s obscene the money people in his position are willing to pay for a personal assistant, and I’m damned good at my job. Mr. Rothschild treats me like family, not like the hired help or the typical secretary. That’s more of a benefit than the health insurance. Trust me. The people I’m introduced to, the functions I attend, you just wouldn’t believe. For a dirt-poor nobody from Georgia, it’s like living a fairytale. Only lately, I’ve been waking up in the middle of nightmares.”
Guess that’s where she’d acquired her taste for hard liquor, Trevor decided. He was worried her loyalty to the mayor would present a problem, and he hadn’t really gotten her to address the heart of what kept nagging at his gut.
So, in his way, he just had to push another inch. Or twelve. “Were you and Eric ever...or are you presently...involved?”
It was the natural progression of thought, or so he tried to tell himself. He would’ve asked the same line of questioning in any given interview.
The truth—that he’d asked on a purely personal level—Trevor found strangely hard to swallow. Like shards of fiberglass.
* * * *
“What? You mean sexually? With Eric? God, no.” She shook her head at the absurd idea. “I have not, nor do I ever intend to be involved with that…that…louse.”
He wasn’t an unattractive man, but his playboy personality, the arrogance and sense of entitlement that flowed through the life of Eric Rothschild did not appeal to her at all. Even if she didn’t suspect him of foul deeds, she would never have considered him as relationship material. She wouldn’t have slept with him for a cool million, after taxes.
She did not do casual sex, Savannah regretfully reminded herself while admiring Trevor’s undeniable charms. If any one man could persuade a woman to toss her morality to the wind, it was the hunky detective, not the spoiled politician’s son who owed everything to Daddy’s good graces.
“You think maybe this is some sort of revenge?” There was no stopping the way her voice rose with indignation when the thought occurred to her. “That I’m setting him up because of jealousy—”
“Any detective worth his salt would have asked the same,” he stated with conviction. “And any detective worth his salt would see the truth in your eyes.”
The idea that he did so sent a tiny thrill through her system and had hope lacing her words. “So you believe me?”
Without thinking, she reached out for him. Trevor instantly responded by taking her hand, linking his fingers with hers across the span of gleaming mahogany. The contact felt so natural, so good. So right, Savannah mused. It was as if they’d united just this way a hundred times before. His smile radiated warmth in a way that seemed to spread over her skin as if he’d actually reached over and caressed her cheek.
She flinched as a quiver, purely sexual in nature, skittered down her spine. Looking at his strong, lean hands, she couldn’t help but wonder how they would feel caressing her skin, roaming over every inch of her body.
“The eyes never lie, Georgia. When this gets out, I can protect you from Eric Rothschild, mark my word, but there’s no getting around it, testifying against your boss’s son. You’ll likely be out of a job.”
“Not if you help me.”
“Ah, Georgia.” Breaking the all-too-wonderful contact, Trevor refilled his glass, then hers. “You would work for the man, knowing his son’s a criminal?”
Dammit, she wanted him to touch her again. There was something indescribable in the physical connection with him that had her feeling weak, cold, bereft, now that it had been broken.
“Sins of the son. That’s not fair, Mr. Bird, and you know it. My parents aren’t responsible for the stupid mistakes I’ve made in my life. I’m a grown woman for Christ’s sake. Certainly you wouldn’t blame your own parents for the missteps you’ve taken.”
The challenge was given, tossed out like a gauntlet before him. She arched her brow, sending him a look that dared him to correct her.
“No, dammit, of course not. And stop calling me Mr. Bird. If we’re gonna catch this S.O.B., you might as well call me Trevor.” He shoved his glass away, still full. “Shit, I need to think.”
“And I desperately need to forget,” Savannah murmured, sipping the fiery liquid.
* * * *
It was well after midnight when Trevor placed a quilt over Savannah-from-Macon-he-preferred-to-call-Georgia. Smiling, he tucked the edge in under her chin and couldn’t resist brushing the tumble of spun gold from her cheek. The texture of both her creamy skin and her hair was as luxurious as finely spun silk. And both left him craving more.
The delicate beauty looked even more fragile, more vulnerable, he thought, in the peaceful realm of slumber.
Damn it all, he thought as his heart swelled, thudding against his ribs.
She had spent the last few hours wracking her brain for every minute detail, never once complaining when he asked her to repeat it or when he tried—unsuccessfully—to trip her up with the facts.
The fact was her story was rock solid, but he’d needed to believe that for himself without allowing his friendship with Jackson to influence his view. Nor was it smart to let his lustful urges sway his mind.
Just as he’d needed to look into her eyes when he’d questioned her relationship with Eric Rothschild, he’d needed to dissect the details, scramble them about, listen, observe, and gauge her reactions while she put the puzzling pieces of this bizarre case back into place.
Trevor believed her. Every word.
No question.
If she was lying, then he was the biggest fool ever born. He’d had the misfortune to witness everything imaginable when it came to interrogations. Everything ranging from nervous suspects, career criminals, petty thieves to murderers, their cohorts and their lying, conniving ways. Trevor could spot a fraud at ten paces. Hell, he could sniff one out as instinctively as any well-trained
bloodhound.
Savannah Beaumont was telling him the truth, the whole truth, so help her God, as she knew it.
Looking at her, so peaceful now, he could still see the pain that had been mirrored in her eyes. The reflection of sorrow had touched on something deeply hidden within his soul.
“I met her, worked with her actually,” she’d told him. “Tori. She went by Tori, not Victoria. It was a couple of summers back, when she interned as an aide for Mayor Rothschild. I suppose that’s when she and Eric first met as well. It was a brief, three-month position before she rotated to another internship he’d set up for her.
“I want to say she was a political science major. She was nice, easy to talk to. I mean that’s what everyone says, I know. No one’s going to jump in front of a policeman or the news media and air the girl’s dirty laundry or tell about the time she was a bitch to some little kid because she was having a moment of temporary hormonal insanity.”
She had laughed at the absurdity, and between the infectious sound and her humor, he’d been unable to hide his amusement. He’d even brushed a thumb over her cheek and fought back the urge to claim those curving, luscious lips. But the sounds had died on both their lips, and the urge was quickly doused, when she mentioned the nightmares. The way seeing the woman’s face, the press photo from the night Tori had gone missing, every time she closed her eyes made sleep nearly impossible.
“The one where she’s wearing the brooch,” she’d explained, grimly.
She admitted to knocking back a stiff drink, like tonight, or resorting to a few over the counter pills for insomnia. Both, Savannah had vehemently insisted, were things she’d never imagined herself being caught up in, this never-ending cycle of restlessness from which there was no peace unless she could numb the pain, cloud the visions, and dull the senses.
Trevor felt as if he had no choice but to help her, if for no other reason than she was Jackson’s sister. But it was an excuse, and he knew it. Her beauty had lured him in. His grandmother’s words, the feelings of some unknown, unseen connection that he just couldn’t shake, had set the hook. His own damn lustful urges coupled with the unmistakable need that had come over him to protect her were reeling him in.
Fast.
He was interested in her on a physical level. As a man, he couldn’t imagine anything better than fucking her. And if there were a man alive who would have disagreed, Trevor would have called him a bold-faced liar. With that sweet little body, those tempting curves, the lush tits, Savannah Beaumont was the epitome of a man’s wet dreams.
And she’d shown him there was more than just that physical beauty lying below the surface: a sharp wit, compassion, determination.
In simple terms that felt rather complicated, he liked her. Even without this between them, he could see them becoming friends. She and Jackson had the same affable manner, which would lead to him easily finagling a date. Maybe more. Maybe even getting her naked.
Yeah, baby.
She may be the baby sister of a great friend, but she was also a mature, desirable woman. No way he was discounting that fact.
He was going to help her. More, he was going to protect her from Rothschild and, by God, if there were any way possible, find a way for her to keep her job. He owed it to Jackson, if it came down another level. He’d been the truest of friends, sticking by Trevor’s side in the darkest of days, when he’d faced the reality of losing everything he’d ever dreamed of.
Trevor Bird was a man who paid his debts.
The questions now, for Trevor the Detective, ran to motive and physical evidence. Primarily: a body. Getting an arrest would be simple enough. Scrounging up the substantial evidence necessary to secure an indictment and an arrest warrant was one thing, but getting a conviction without a body would be far more difficult.
Juries were comprised of everyday working class folks who would expect the police to produce a body. It wasn’t that they weren’t intelligent enough to take the evidence and connect the dots to form proof of murder, but it left a very wide gap when it came down to reasonable doubt if there was no body.
One juror, one Doubting Thomas, and the DA would be facing the grim reality of a hung jury. Trevor had seen it too many times to count.
How best to proceed?
Everything inside him shouted: Follow protocol. That meant going to his partner at the least and ultimately his chief, but Savannah had pleaded with him to help her find a way to get through this and still come out smelling like a rose on the other side. She’d begged him to keep it just between the two of them and to help her keep her job.
Right. While he was at it, he’d pull a gilded rabbit out of his ass. Both required a skilled magician, one thing he was not.
With the wheels of his mind spinning, he strode into the bedroom, shucking clothes and dousing lights. He faltered for a moment at the door. Habit warred with the novelty of having a tantalizingly beautiful woman on his couch.
A woman he was outrageously attracted to.
If the facts were reviewed, he’d be found guilty of preferring his solitude when it came to his home and his bed. The farm was his haven, untainted as it were from the effects of his job and his limited social life. When he had sex, it was most always on the woman’s turf, and he always made certain he slipped away before morning or that he diplomatically sent her on her way as soon as possible afterwards.
It had nothing to do with his grandmother’s crazy superstitions and rants of The Great Spirit or a man’s destiny, he told himself.
His heritage was diluted by generations of mixed races yet he had never denied that portion that ran the deepest and richest: his Lakota blood. Hell, he had only to look in the mirror and see the very face of his ancestors, the tanned skin of brave warriors, his hair, black as raven’s wings, and his equally dark eyes.
He left the door ajar, just in case, and set his alarm.
It was foolish, he mused, to put stock in the beliefs of his mother’s people. A man made his own destiny in Trevor’s mind, made choices, good or bad, that affected the final product. A real man lived his life, lived, not mired through until The Woman he was destined to be with came along to lift him up out of the mud.
He was living just fine on his own. Independent. Self-sufficient. Content.
Okay, so, moderately content. God and the Great Spirit could keep their lightning strikes. He’d learned to appreciate the benefits of living alone. There was no one to yell at him for leaving the toilet seat up, no one to nag if he didn’t feel like making the bed because he was more exhausted when he crawled out of it than when he fell in it. There was no one around to be angry with him when he finally strolled in late for dinner or when he didn’t come home until breakfast.
God knows, he’d done that too many times to count.
Covering a yawn, he flipped off the lamp beside the bed and climbed in under the covers. Trevor couldn’t help wondering what it would be like to have someone who really, truly cared. Someone who would worry about where he was and what he was up to.
He kept in contact with his parents. They’d moved since retiring, but he called them as often as possible. His maternal grandmother, however, was as immovable as an oak. She still lived in town, and he made a point to see her at least once a week.
He had loved ones.
Lovers.
What would it be like to have a Love? The Love? True Love that inspired commitment?
He hooked a hand behind his head and pressed it into the pillow. A gentle wind played over the bows of a nearby tree, casting shadows that swayed and danced over the quilt and the floor.
His land. His trees.
His home.
His bed.
He was alone by his choosing, he reminded himself, and if he happened to find the right woman for all the rest, then it would be his choice to fall in love or reject it.
It would not be because of an ancient legend or spirits of the Lakota guiding them to one another.
The only hand that had guided swee
t little Miss Georgia in his direction belonged to a potential murderer.
What sort of twisted, illogical myth could his grandmother attribute to that fact?
* * * *
Caught in the sticky, humid web of fitful slumber, she fought for breath. The air was stale, the heat sweltering, stifling. Her lungs felt heavy, and heavier still, as every ragged breath drew in more and more thick, rank air. It was dark, so very dark, and though she couldn’t see, she could smell the sharp, pungent aroma of her own fear. Reaching out, she shoved with all her weary might, but there was only the press of hard metal to her palms.
Frustrated, she pounded.
Unsuccessful, the panic crept in.
Frantic, she called out.
Savannah came awake with a start, bolting straight up. Dragging in great big gulps of fresh air, she shoved a shaky hand through her tousled hair. In the instant it took for her to remember where she was, to smooth a hand over the quilt that had become tangled around her legs, Trevor was there, sitting with her and gripping her upper arms.
“A nightmare,” he said and pulled her to him.
She gave herself a moment, just a moment, as she pressed her cheek into the solid curve of his shoulder.
Safety. He held her in the wonderfully warm press of sinewy flesh, stroking her hair and murmuring soft words.
Comfort. Every cell in her body ached for more, so she eased back, eased away.
Shaking off the way she found herself entranced by him, once again, she insisted, “I...I’m okay now.”
“The hell you are, Georgia. You’re shaking like a damn leaf.” Trevor rubbed her arms briskly.
How could she tell him it was the effect of his embrace more than the horrid dream?
“Really, Trevor. It was unsettling, I won’t lie to you—”
“Tell me.”
She licked her lips, swallowed hard. “I was locked in a trunk. I know that now. It was hot and getting harder and harder to breathe, and I couldn’t get out. My lungs were burning. My heart was nearly racing out of my chest. Trapped. I was trapped. I pounded and pounded, and it was so dark. I couldn’t see. I couldn’t get out.”
Saving Savannah (Siren Publishing Classic) Page 3