I want to be a part of your life. I want us to share everything.
I want you.
I want you.
I want you.
Hazel might not recognize flirting anymore—or maybe she subconsciously chose to ignore it. Her relationship skills might be rusty since her divorce and bankruptcy and the threats and humiliation that had filled her life during her husband Aaron’s trial and for several years afterward.
But she’d been a different person then. Now she knew when something wasn’t right. A man who wrote I want you a dozen times on a letter, and then refused to sign it or even include a return address, did not have her best interests at heart.
This letter, and eight more she had like it at home, told her she’d become someone’s obsession.
The feeling of being watched, of being stalked, of feeling terrorized in the places she was supposed to feel safe felt a lot like...
She gasped at the knock outside the open door. “Todd, I said...”
“Whoa.” Jedediah Burke filled her doorway again. His hands raised in apology did nothing to lessen the impact of his size dwarfing the tiny room. “Sorry about that. You were really concentrating. Everything okay?”
When Hazel realized she was clutching her hand over her racing heart, she immediately reached for her glasses again and put them on. With his eyes narrowed on her, she doubted she was fooling him. He’d startled her, and he knew it. Avoiding Burke’s probing gaze, she studied the troubling results of the X-ray. “You can’t seem to leave.”
After a moment he nodded. “I forgot to tell you what time lunch was tomorrow. I know I could have texted, but I was already here.” He stepped into the room, stopping beside her chair to glance at the X-ray. Unlike when Todd had invaded her personal space, she knew the strongest urge to turn and lean into him—especially when his hand settled gently on her shoulder. “Did something happen? Lose a patient?”
Damn it. The man smelled good, too. An enticing combination of spicy soap and the subtle musk of the early-October afternoon clinging to his skin that only intensified in the small confines of the X-ray room.
Hazel considered brushing off his concern and sending him on his way. Then her peripheral gaze landed on the brass KCPD badge clipped onto his belt. Burke represented help and safety in more ways than one. She’d known him for five years now. She could trust him with this. She tucked her glasses back into her jacket pocket and tilted her gaze up to his. “Could I ask you something? As a police officer?”
“Of course.” He pulled away, the moment of compassion masked by his wary alertness.
She pulled the note from her pocket and spared a few moments to smooth it open against the tabletop before handing it to him. “Would you read this?” He’d probably think she was being paranoid. Or maybe he’d be angry that she hadn’t reported the letters sooner. His chiseled expression grew grimmer with every line he skimmed.
“Is that normal?” she asked.
“Who’s it from?”
She hesitated a beat before answering. “I don’t know.”
“Then no, it’s not.” He leaned against the door frame, facing her again. “Got a jilted boyfriend I need to worry about?”
The friend she knew might be teasing her to help her feel a little less worried, but the cop was waiting for an answer.
She’d asked for his opinion. She owed it to him to give him a clearer understanding as to why an innocuous note could rattle her this much. “At first, I thought my ex-husband, Aaron, was writing me again. You probably remember him from the news a few years back.” Burke nodded but waited for her to continue. “He used to send me flowery garbage like that when we were dating. I told him I wasn’t impressed, and he stopped. He always said he liked my directness—until he went to trial. Then he wasn’t real keen on me telling the truth. The letters he used to write from prison were straight-out blame for testifying against him. Those were angry tirades. I stopped opening his mail and then had a judge stop them altogether. I asked him not to have any contact with me or the girls. There were too many threats back when the trial...back when Aaron was arrested. He ruined a lot of lives when he raided those retirement funds. I didn’t need his vile messages on top of the threats we were getting from other victims.”
“Other victims?” Oh, hell. He’d picked up on that rare slip of the tongue. “Were you a victim, too?”
She shook her head instead of answering the question. “I just meant I thought the obsessive language meant they were from my ex.”
“You said they?” Burke repeated, holding up the letter. “You thought they were from your ex.”
Damn. He didn’t miss a trick. No sense avoiding the full truth with this veteran cop. “That’s the ninth one I’ve gotten since the first one came on my birthday, August 5.”
“Nine letters in nine weeks?”
“The first ones were pretty innocuous. But...he seems to get angrier or more frustrated with each letter.”
Burke turned the paper over, inspecting it for identifying clues she knew he wouldn’t find. “Did the envelope have a post office stamp?”
“Kansas City. But no return address.”
“Is Aaron still in prison?”
Hazel shook her head. “He got out on parole the end of last year. The restraining order should prevent him from having contact with me or the girls. But then these started arriving. They’re not exactly a threat, but they’re...unsettling.”
“Do you know where he is now?”
She stood when he handed back the letter. “Our lives have been a lot more peaceful without him. I didn’t want to jinx anything by reaching out to him. Even through a third party.”
“I’ll look into it.” Burke reached for her hand. But it wasn’t a reassuring squeeze he offered so much as a warning. “But I’m guessing he’s here in Kansas City.”
Copyright © 2020 by Julie Miller
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ISBN-13: 9781488067549
Identical Threat
Copyright © 2020 by Tyler Anne Snell
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
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