Partner-Protector

by Julie Miller

  What?

  With a monumental heave, Kelsey twisted her body. Her bag slipped off her elbow and she caught it in her hand.

  But that poke she’d felt had been Watkins’s nightstick, and he shoved it into her chest now, pinning her arms, squeezing her breath and igniting her anger.

  “Everything was nice and quiet down in no-man’s land until you and Banning showed up. I couldn’t figure out why another cop would stick his nose into my business. But now I know why he’s so interested in my territory. I saw you two in there.” He flipped his nightstick to an obscene position against her thigh and smirked a filthy grin. “You’re just like Jezebel with her wicked ways. You got his head all turned ’round. He wants to get in your pants.”

  Watkins’s crudeness cost him. With her arm free, Kelsey swung her purse and clocked him in the side of the head. It wasn’t enough to free herself, but it was enough to knock his hand loose.

  Kelsey screamed.

  Chapter Nine

  “T-eeee!”

  Every confused, frustrated nerve still racing inside Banning slammed to a halt. Fear jolted through him. “Gotta go, Gin.”

  “What about the rest of the info I found on the doll? It’s a registered collectible and I have owner names.”

  “And I have a problem.” He grabbed his gun off the counter, ejected the blanks and slipped in a magazine of the real thing. “I’ll call you later.”

  “Be safe.”

  T ended the call and pocketed his phone, already running to the door. “Kelsey!”

  They were in the subbasement of precinct headquarters. What kind of trouble could find her here?

  Didn’t matter. He’d vowed to keep her safe, whether the threat came from inside her head or from someplace decidedly more sinister.

  “Kels!” He threw open the door and flattened himself against the wall. With his Glock gripped between his hands he tuned his eyes and ears and heart toward the source of the danger.

  The empty hall didn’t throw him. The closed access doors didn’t distract him. He heard the struggle, the low-voiced curses, the stifled protests.

  “Hang on.” He ran into the ladies’ locker room and ducked around the concrete wall, leading with his gun.

  “What the hell?”

  He’d faced down bullies on playgrounds and men with guns. But nothing had ever scared him the way seeing Ed Watkins’s nightstick rammed up against Kelsey’s throat did.

  “This woman’s trouble, Banning.” Watkins puffed the warning out on a wheezing breath. “I’m glad you’re here to back me up. Who knows what kind of hocus-pocus stunt she’s gonna pull on us next.”

  “You’re a cop. She’s on our side.”

  “I didn’t do anything.” Kelsey coughed against the pressure of the stick at her throat.

  This was crazy. “Let her go.”

  Kelsey’s eyes darted to him, but Watkins was too angry to listen to T or see him coming up behind him.

  But he felt him.

  T pressed the nose of his Glock into the side of Watkins’s neck. Cold steel got the older cop’s attention. Except for the stout man’s labored breathing, Watkins froze. “I said, let her go.”

  “What are you doing?” Watkins seemed stunned. “I’m trying to help you.”

  “Drop it, Sergeant.” It was the most succinct command Detective Banning had ever given. He removed Watkins’s service pistol and tucked it into the back of his own belt as the nightstick clattered to the floor. “Get out of there, Kels.”

  She scrambled away from the wall, picked up her bag and hid behind him. Good girl.

  “You’re on her side? Of course you are. She’s just like Jezebel. She’s got you under her spell. I’m too late.”

  “Shut up.” The sergeant wasn’t making any sense. “Against the wall.”

  Watkins knew the drill. He raised his hands slowly into the air and pressed them against the very space Kelsey had just vacated. He knew the excuses, too. “You’re making a big mistake, Banning.”

  T ignored his rambling. “Where’s your spare?” Almost every cop he knew, especially the ones who walked a beat, kept an extra sidearm hidden somewhere.

  Watkins was no exception. “Right ankle holster. I’m telling ya, man, you gotta listen to me.”

  T kept his gun trained on the target, ignoring the explanation as he knelt down and retrieved the second weapon.

  “I didn’t hurt her,” Watkins protested. “I just wanted her to understand that they’re on to her. She can’t go back there. We can’t keep her safe.”

  T straightened. “You hurt, Kels?”

  “I hit my head on the wall. He just…spooked me. He said something about Jezebel and my kind causing trouble. He’s not making any sense.”

  She sounded a little shaken, but strong. He thanked her stubborn, red-haired temperament, whether the hair color itself was real or fake. “On the floor, Watkins.”

  “What are you gonna do? Arrest me?” He started to turn.

  “On the floor!”

  Once he’d assumed the prone position, T gladly put a knee in the middle of Watkins’s back to hold him down while he handcuffed him. Then he rolled to his feet, called for backup, and eyed Kelsey to make sure everything was unharmed and in one place. “How’s your head?”

  “I’m okay.” She was hugging herself, squeezing that pendant.

  Not as okay as he’d like.

  But he couldn’t reach for her now. Watkins was squirming like a beached fish and blathering like a crazy man. “You can’t do this to me, Banning. You have to let me go. Let me go back to no-man’s land and get everything back to normal. You can’t take me off the street. He’ll find her. Just like he found Jezebel.”

  “Who’ll find her? What are you talking about?” T traded a confused glance with Kelsey, then tried to force Watkins to make sense. “Who are you talking about? Siegel? Zero? Who’s looking for Kelsey?”

  “He’ll find her.”

  T knelt down and jerked Watkins up by the collar to look into those beady, cowardly eyes. “Who?”

  “T.” Kelsey’s soft hands on his shoulders warned him off the violence. “Something’s wrong. I don’t think he understands you.”

  “He understands enough to track you down and rough you up.” He turned his focus back on Watkins. “What do you want from Ms. Ryan?”

  “Don’t lock me up.” The pitiful pudge of a man pleaded. “Word on the street is that she’s talking about stuff no one’s supposed to know about. She makes people nervous. Draws too much attention to folks who don’t want anyone to know who or what they are.”

  “Give me a name.”

  “I don’t know.”

  T heard the ding of the elevator, heard the footsteps in the hall and knew backup was on its way. He stood, linked his hand with Kelsey’s stiff grip and backed her to a safer position.

  “Sergeant. Ed.” He tried a more personal appeal. “Who wants to hurt Ms. Ryan?”

  “Jezebel can explain. I loved her. I tried to help her, but I couldn’t. He knew she was different. That’s why her husband threw her out. That’s why she was all alone.”

  “Who is he? Who was Jezebel’s husband? If we knew that, we could identify her real name. C’mon, Ed. I need answers that make sense. Why would he throw her out? Why would he kill her?”

  Was that a sob? What the—? The man was crying. “I don’t know who he is. She never said his name. I’ve looked all these years. If I’d found him, I could have saved all those girls. Poor Jezebel.”

  T knelt down beside the whimpering man. “Do you know who killed them?”

  Watkins shook his head back and forth. “But I know why.”

  T squeezed the sergeant’s quaking shoulder, urging an answer as much as offering comfort. “Why?”

  The sergeant tilted his bald head and looked up at Kelsey. He looked more frightened than frightening.

  “That one’ll understand. Jezebel can explain.”

  “WHAT DID HE MEAN—Jezebel can explain?”<
br />
  Kelsey had her pendant out now, openly worrying the blue crystal between her palms.

  “Don’t let Watkins get to you. The police psychologist seemed to think he was having some sort of breakdown.”

  “Yeah. And I’m the freak who sent him over the edge.”

  “Don’t.” T took his eyes off the road long enough to reach across the front seats of the Jeep and squeeze her knee. He wanted to offer some friendly reassurance. But judging by the stiff way Kelsey held herself—as if it required a great deal of will not to jerk away from his touch—he suspected he was only adding to her stress.

  Respecting whatever space she thought she needed right now, he reluctantly put both hands back on the wheel.

  He hated seeing her like this. The way she’d been when they’d first met—aloof, closed off, suspicious.

  He was still keyed up from that kiss at the firing range—how close they’d gotten. How fast they’d gotten there. At first, he’d just needed to hold her, to take back some of the pain she’d absorbed from his past. She’d understood how much it hurt to have his body ripped apart by bullets. How afraid he’d been to think he would die before he could see his friends to safety. How hard it was to turn off his emotions, raise his gun and take another man’s life.

  She’d felt all that. She’d hurt for all of that. And so he’d held her. But then he wasn’t comforting her. He was finding comfort for them both. Acceptance. Healing. He’d been dying to kiss those lips, dying to feel the curves beneath those colorful clothes, dying to taste a little of that fire burning inside her.

  So he’d kissed her. And when she didn’t stop him, he’d kissed her more.

  He hadn’t expected Kelsey’s uninhibited response. But he’d reveled in it. She was always so careful about how she touched. And whom. But she’d grabbed on to him, bare-handed, and wouldn’t let go.

  It was the truest passion, the deepest connection to another person he’d ever known.

  Then the phone rang and the connection with Kelsey had been lost. It had been lost long before Ed Watkins ever got his crazy, pudgy paws on her.

  Maybe he could reassure her from a distance. “Don’t put stock in anything Watkins said. Apparently, he had feelings for Jezebel. Tried to look out for her after her husband kicked her out on the streets. And then she was murdered. He couldn’t save her, and he couldn’t find her killer. That kind of guilt could break a man.”

  “But what’s the connection to me? Sergeant Watkins can’t stand to be around me. Why did he think I would understand?” Kelsey stared out into the night as they drove through the lights and parties and people getting ready to ring in the new year. But she wasn’t seeing the festivities outside. “A man has to hate his wife an awful lot to throw her out without any money or any way to support herself. Thank God there are places like the mission, shelters and crisis centers. But, why not just divorce her? It feels as if her husband was punishing her.”

  Maybe, in some gruesome plan that required no cash and no hit man, Jezebel’s husband had been hoping she wouldn’t survive. It was a damn coldhearted way to save on alimony. The mysterious husband might even qualify as an accessory to murder because of his reckless indifference to his wife’s safety.

  But T didn’t share his dark thoughts with Kelsey. She already had enough gloom hanging in a cloud around her.

  “I wish Watkins could give us something on the husband,” he said, opting to stick to business. “A description if not a name. If they really were close, Jezebel must have told him something.”

  Watkins had been booked for assault, and was now an official guest of K.C.P.D. until after the holiday when he could post bail. Though chances were, he’d be spending his time in a hospital ward instead of a jail cell.

  “He seemed to think she was going to tell me.” Kelsey tucked the lap blanket more securely around her legs, even though he’d already cranked the heat up to maximum. “One minute Watkins is accusing me of hocus-pocus and warning me not to use my gift again. The next, he’s looking at me as if I’m the only one who can help his dead girlfriend.” Her heavy sigh fogged up the passenger-side window. “I just wanted to put those women’s spirits to rest and get them out of my head. I didn’t mean to cause all this trouble.”

  “You haven’t done anything,” T insisted, slowing the Jeep as they neared a stoplight. “We’ve stirred things up by asking questions and paying unexpected visits. A smart criminal is going to know we can’t arrest or convict anybody except on hard facts. And while you’ve pointed me in some new directions that have paid off with legitimate leads, I don’t have a case I can take to court yet.”

  “What if the murderer isn’t that smart?” Her hesitant sigh burned into his compassion.

  “He’s gotten away with it for eleven years. And a whole neighborhood has kept quiet about it. I’m thinking our guy’s pretty sharp.”

  “Funny how that doesn’t seem like much of a reassurance.”

  Sarcasm. Was she coming back?

  The light changed. He debated an idea for all of about two seconds. Then he wheeled the car around to the right.

  Kelsey perked up in her seat. “This isn’t the way to my house.”

  “It’s New Year’s Eve. I think we should do some celebrating.”

  Groaning, she turned in her seat. Good. Eye contact. “C’mon, T. The last thing I want to do is go to a party. Or sit in a bar with a bunch of strangers, waiting for a ball to drop.”

  He headed south toward the Plaza. “I don’t want you home by yourself tonight, and I have a distinct feeling you wouldn’t invite me in.”

  Now she was pointing a finger at him, getting herself a little riled up. “Do you have any idea what it’s like for me in a crowd? Brushing against people? Especially if they’re drunk and uninhibited? It’s like having dozens of people shouting at me all at once. I can’t push a mute button and make it go away. I’m too tired to deal with all that tonight.”

  “Trust me. I have something quieter in mind.”

  She sank back into her seat. “I’m not very good company tonight.”

  “Are you afraid I’m going to take up where that kiss left off?”

  She shot him a startled look, then turned toward the window. There was enough light from the street and the dashboard to see the blush coloring her cheeks. But she didn’t answer.

  An unexpected anticipation lit in his veins. “Are you afraid I won’t?”

  “T.” Her cheeks almost matched her hair now.

  “Here.” He twisted in his seat and fished a twenty-dollar bill from his pocket. He dropped it into her lap. “Take it.”

  “What’s this for?”

  He grinned. “Cab fare.”

  She held it out to him. “I don’t want your money.”

  He curled his hand around her gloved fist and folded the money inside. “Think of it as insurance. If you don’t like my idea, if you decide you’d rather go home—you can call a cab anytime you like.”

  “YOUR MOTHER’S HOUSE?”

  Kelsey had to hand it to him. When T had promised to take her someplace away from the crowds and partiers, he’d delivered.

  “Won’t she mind?”

  “Nope.” T wore a grin on his face that made her think they were getting away with something. Like sneaking in after curfew or skinny-dipping in the family pool. He dangled his keys in front of her face. “That’s why she left me a spare key.”

  The two-story brick home south of the Plaza was small on the scale, compared to some of the wealthy old homes in the neighborhood. But it boasted a big yard behind its brick walls and wrought-iron gate. And the decor inside was elegantly homey, inviting guests to sit and relax.

  Kelsey felt a sense of shelter and serenity from the moment she walked in. Still, “Why here?”

  T closed the door behind them and locked the dead-bolt before pocketing his keys and taking her coat to hang beside his own in the foyer. “One, I could guarantee that it would be quiet. Mom’s visiting her aunt and uncle in Albuquer
que thanks to a lovely Christmas present from her thoughtful son. Two, we’re high enough on the hill that we can see the public fireworks display at midnight. And, most importantly, I know for a fact that she has champagne in the fridge.”

  He touched his hand to the small of her back and turned on lights as he guided her down a long oak parquet hallway to the spacious kitchen at the back of the house. Kelsey felt her mood lightening, and knew that had been T’s intention. She was exhausted from fighting headaches and crazy men and the memories of two women who still needed her help.

  There was something almost naughty about being in Moira Banning’s beautiful home and raiding her fridge at 11 p.m. It felt juvenile and impulsive and fun—three things that had been missing from her life for longer than she cared to admit. “Your mom must be a really nice lady.”

  “She is. Of course, I’m a little biased. It’s been just the two of us since I was eight.” He opened the refrigerator door while he pulled off his tie and tossed it onto the center island counter. “So quit worrying. We’re actually doing her a favor.”

  “How’s that?”

  “I promised to check the house while she’s gone.” He glanced over his shoulder and grinned. “So right now I’m checking the refrigerator.” He pointed to the cabinets beside the sink. “And if you look up there, you can check out the plates and some champagne goblets.”

  Kelsey circled the island and opened the cupboard doors. “You’re goofy, Banning.”

  “Yeah, but I’m awful cute. Just ask my mom.”

  She laughed. It was the first of many.

  Bologna sandwiches with pickles and pretzels made a fine accompaniment to champagne bubbles. They toasted Moira Banning and the New Year. By the time she had licked the frosting off her fingers from the last of Moira’s lemon bundt cake, Kelsey felt almost normal.

  As normal as a psychic who relived murders in her head and fell in love with men who loved someone else could be, that is.