* * *
Penny watched Kadin the whole time the police took Makayla into their care, how he hadn’t wanted to let her go, how his eyes misted as they drove her away. She watched him as officers put Quinten in the back of a police car and how the kid looked through the window at him. Kadin hadn’t seemed satisfied, only weary after a finished job. A duty. One more bad seed removed from society. Quinten looked like a defeated young man who’d just lost a battle with a formidable foe. And lost a father he’d mistakenly believed didn’t love him, one who’d given his life trying to stop him from destruction.
Now, with the action winding down except for officers processing the crime scene, they had nothing else to do but go home. Where was home? Rock Springs didn’t feel like home. Her apartment in Salt Lake City didn’t, either.
Penny realized she had some choices to make, some big ones. Her career at Avenue One would be difficult to maintain with an infant. And, incredibly, she no longer felt as though that was so important. What had driven her to succeed but also had driven her onto a wayward course, a misguided course. She’d made her career too important. What she needed was what her mother had avoided.
She looked away from the last police car as it disappeared into the trees on the dirt driveway, seeing Kadin do the same. Their gazes met.
The way he’d kissed her in the cabin had her reigning in hope.
Her dream of love and family couldn’t be realized with him, so why did she still feel this strong tug in that direction? She released a deep, quivering breath. He was just too afraid to start over. One thing she’d learned from her mother was that you couldn’t fix a man to have him. He had to be whole on his own. Kadin was not whole, by no fault of his own. He hadn’t chosen to have his wife and child taken from him so violently. That would rip any decent man’s heart out. There was nothing she could do but leave him to figure out his future himself, with or without her and their baby.
“I’m going home.” She started walking toward the detached garage that the police had opened.
“Penny.” He caught up to her, taking her arm and stopping her.
Then he had no words. How could he explain the state of his heart?
She believed that he felt something for her and that their baby would, too, once he had time to sort everything out.
He couldn’t kiss her the way he had after rescuing her and not feel passion for her. This wasn’t about the way they made each other feel. The chemistry was there and the love would come, but only if he could get past his tragedy.
“It’s all right, Kadin,” she said. “Take some time to think. Let me take some time, too. We both need to think things through.”
The turmoil in his eyes eased, hurting her because she’d just enabled him to leave her.
“I need to get a few things I forgot,” he said, his gaze going down over her body, this time not to see if she was unharmed.
“Stop by then. I’ll meet you there.” She walked toward the garage again, feeling him watch her awhile before hearing his feet step on the gravel.
At her car, she stole a look at him. He walked with long, strong strides down the road toward the highway. Seeing how easily he walked away, Penny embraced a steely resolve. Her disappointment in him angered her. But she’d do what had to be done.
* * *
By the time Kadin reached Penny’s apartment building, he felt more settled. Maybe saving Makayla and the way she’d clung to him had shown him the light. He would always mourn his daughter. She would always be his firstborn. He would always love her and feel the loss of her. That didn’t mean he couldn’t give this new child the same love. He’d have his struggles, but he now realized he had to stand up and be a man. He had to stand by Penny.
He’d do whatever she needed him to. Marry. Not marry. Either way, he’d be with her.
Maybe he could convince her to move to Rock Springs. She’d probably want to stay home with the baby, anyway.
Penny let him inside her apartment, walking away and ignoring him, going about her business as though he didn’t matter. She expected him to get his things and leave. He almost chuckled. She had no idea what conclusion he’d just come to.
“We need to talk,” he said.
She put a glass down hard on the countertop and flashed hot sea-green eyes at him. “What’s there to talk about?”
Undaunted, he went to the counter.
“There’s plenty. You and me. The baby. We need to decide how we’re going to handle this.”
“This? Do you mean our baby?”
She deliberately goaded him, thinking he would abandon her.
“We can get married,” he said.
Her jaw went slack and she stared at him, clearly not seeing that coming. “What?”
“Married.” He felt awkward, a little hesitant, but sure at the same time. “You and me.”
“Y-you’re asking me to marry you?”
“Yes.” He understood why she had doubts.
She gave him another slack-jawed stare. “Why?”
“Because...” He thought of all the times they’d been together, how she’d threaded her way into his heart, undetected and unexpected. Unplanned. The way she made him feel made him believe in love again. That scared him, but he refused to let fear stop him. “I think I love you.”
She closed her mouth with that avowal. Her head sort of jerked back.
“You’re asking me because you feel obligated.”
She didn’t believe him. “Yes... No. I mean, I feel obligated, but I also...feel...something...for you.”
“Something?”
Was she getting mad again? “Yes. Something big. Love.” Boy was he botching this or what? Fear did that to a man. “Penny...”
She leaned forward over the counter. “I don’t need a roommate. I need a father for my baby.”
“You wouldn’t be—”
“I need a husband.”
“I’d be that—”
“A real husband. That means a man who really loves me.”
He said nothing. Did he love her? What he felt consumed him and might even be stronger than anything he’d experienced.
Instead of giving in to fear, he plunged ahead. “I do love you.”
“You’re just saying that because I’m pregnant. You’re only doing what you think you have to do.”
“No.” The more he talked and denied her accusations, the more he knew he spoke the truth.
She resisted believing him. She didn’t trust him, and her determination not to end up lonely like her mother drove her now. “Please go,” she said, folding her arms protectively in front of her, holding in the pain.
“Penny. Listen to me. I didn’t see this coming, but somewhere along the way, somewhere between meeting you and now, I fell in love with you. I ignored it until now.”
She stared at him, contemplating. He could see her go over what stood in his way of love. His past. He would have hard times ahead. His loss wouldn’t go away just because he claimed to love her.
And she didn’t believe him. She didn’t believe he loved her.
Kadin decided to let her think over what he’d said today.
“I need you to leave now.” She moved around the kitchen counter. “I’d rather end up like my mother than live with a man who doesn’t want to love me and my baby.”
Doesn’t want to love...
“I do love you.” He followed her to the door, which she jerked open.
Before doing as she asked, he faced her in the doorway. “Think about what I’ve said.”
“Just, please, go.” She blinked away the moisture gathering in her eyes.
“I’ll call you,” he said, and then left, expecting to hear the door slam. When it didn’t, he looked back.
Penny stood in the door
way, looking flustered and as though already thinking about what he’d said. She hadn’t expected him to declare his love and now that he had, she was afraid to trust him.
Chapter 16
Penny ignored Kadin’s calls for a week. His words kept repeating in her mind. Somewhere along the way, somewhere between meeting you and now, I fell in love with you. Did he? He’d gone from keeping her at a distance to all-out love. What if she let him back into her life and he ran after the baby was born? For the first time in her life a man had gotten to her. Luckily she’d been busy at work. Mark had been arrested for embezzlement and she’d been named acting CEO. The trust the board of directors had placed in her went a long way in soothing her feelings—and doubts.
If she were honest with herself, she’d admit that Kadin’s pledge of love terrified her. She feared believing him. How could he know he loved her? He hadn’t gotten over his past. Or had he? Had he healed enough to make room for her in his life?
And then, of course, the matter of the tiny life growing inside her. He could have told her he loved her to make her marry him. But that was not Kadin. He was not a man who’d say what he didn’t mean.
That left her issue with being alone to blame. If she didn’t change, she’d end up like her mother. Ever since she’d left Michigan, she’d thought dating and working put her on the right track. In the back of her mind she’d thought she’d eventually get married and have kids, but she’d never considered it seriously. Afraid of ending up like her mother, she never put herself in a position to try not to—by starting her own family.
Kadin’s declaration of love had forced her to face that. She should answer one of his calls and go with him to Rock Springs.
Her office phone rang and after a jolt, she pressed Speaker.
“Kadin Tandy again,” Jordan said.
“Cancel all my meetings for the rest of the week. I’m going out of town.”
“What should I tell Kadin?”
“Tell him I’m going to see my mother.”
* * *
Penny’s mom trotted out to the driveway as the dark sedan pulled to a stop, her long gray hair dyed golden blond and hanging loose, half tied white bow blouse flowing over the waist of dark blue jeans. The driver got out and went to get her bag from the trunk while Penny stood and received her mother’s exuberant hug.
“Oh, look at you! You’re so successful. Why have you been away so long? You should have come home sooner.” She hooked Penny’s arm and led her to the house.
The driver deposited her luggage on the entry floor, and Penny thanked him. He’d be back in two days to pick her up. Penny figured two days would be all she could take of her single mom, which hit her as strange, since she’d never thought of her mother that way. They’d always been so close. But now Penny saw how she’d turned a blind eye to her mother’s loneliness, believing that Katherine had made a personal choice to be alone and lived blissfully happy.
“You’re different.”
Penny put her purse on the entry table. An archway gave a glimpse of a modern living room in the early 1900s Victorian-style house. Her mother kept the place updated and well maintained, doing most of the work herself.
“How so?”
Her mother surveyed her. “You met a man.”
“I’m pregnant, Mom. And the man isn’t interested. So take cheer. I’ll be just like you.” She hadn’t meant to be so blunt and biting. The words had tumbled out without giving them a sensitivity check.
After a brief moment of shock, her mother took no offense. “Come here. There’s someone I want you to meet.”
Penny followed her mother into the kitchen, where a man stood before the stove, cooking something that smelled rich and tasty. He turned to reveal a white chef apron covering a golf shirt and part of his jeans.
“This my daughter, Penny. Penny, this is—”
“Stewart.” The mayor of Cheboygan. Her mother had been friends with him for years.
“He moved in earlier this year.”
Moved in? Penny rounded on her mother. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“You’ve been avoiding me. I’ve tried calling you several times and you haven’t called me back.” She took her arm and guided her back into the living room. “You can talk to him later.”
Penny sat down on the sofa and her mother settled beside her.
“What’s all this about being pregnant?”
Penny regretted telling her. “How long have you been seeing him?”
“We’ve been in a relationship for a year now.”
And friends long before that. Penny was chagrined that she hadn’t taken that into consideration. Her mother hadn’t been nearly as lonely as she’d thought.
“Why do you say you’ll end up like me, Penny?”
She lowered her head, wondering where she’d gotten so confused over her mother. “You’re alone. You’ve always been alone.”
Her mom put her hand on Penny’s knee. “Honey, I’ve never been alone. I have friends, and most important, I have you.”
“I mean with men. You loved my dad and never got over him.”
Her mother laughed softly. “He called, you know.” When Penny lifted her head, she said, “He told me you went to see him and that he talked to you. I always knew you would find him someday.” She patted her knee. “Good for you.”
“You always said you were happy,” Penny said.
“Of course I am. Why would you think I wasn’t? Because I’ve been alone?” Dawning drew a grunt out of her mother. “Penny,” she protested. “It wasn’t because of your father that I never married. I loved him in my adolescent mind, but the truth is, he wasn’t the right one for me. My life was full with you and my friends and my activities, and I made a promise to myself to never settle for any man. If I were to ever marry, I’d have to meet someone I truly loved.”
Penny realized her mother had never said outright that she’d never marry again. Penny had drawn her own conclusion there.
“Tell me about this man.” Her mother sat back, getting comfortable, ready for a story.
Penny felt reluctant to share until she recognized why. Fear. Fear of losing Kadin. Fear of never having him in the first place. But he must be just as afraid, for different reasons.
Seeing a tablet on the big, square white coffee table, she picked it up and navigated to web browsing, then found the article on Kadin Tandy. Then she handed it to her mother, who took it and read. When she finished, she spent some time studying his photo.
Then she lowered the tablet to her lap and looked at Penny. “You have to go after him.”
That her mother would say that, of all the other things she could have said, made Penny smile.
“He’s different than your other boyfriends, Penny,” her mother said. “You have to give him time. Patience. You can’t discard him the way you have the others. He’s had something tragic happen to him. You can’t walk away without giving him a good chance.”
“I know.” Now she did. Now that she understood her mother better and why she’d discarded so many boyfriends, everything made sense. She didn’t have to be afraid.
* * *
Kadin would have to get used to having an assistant sitting in the front lobby answering phone calls and handling the administration of his company. He’d received a package this morning that contained a file on a ten-year-old cold case. That made four cases, and from the sound of his busy new assistant, more were pouring in. He read an email from Lucas Curran asking him if he’d had a chance to look at his case.
Even the new cases and Lucas Curran’s mystery weren’t enough to distract him from Penny. Why wouldn’t she answer his calls?
Marriage and all that entailed still gave him cold feet, but not when he thought of Penny. With her, he believed in the possibility of having a
family. Burning hope began as a tiny pinhole and had mushroomed into a volcano. Hope. Sweet hope.
He hadn’t liked the way she’d kicked him out of her apartment, as though she’d kicked him out of her life the way she did all her old boyfriends.
Lucas. Back to that...
Kadin focused on the Lucas Curran file. He needed another investigator. He needed two or three. Lucas was his best candidate. Well, only candidate. He had no homicide investigation background. He had earned a college degree in criminal science while in the military, where he’d learned to become a sniper. Those skills had led to the LAPD and the SWAT. The file only said that he’d resigned. Early retirement.
As Kadin read the personal information, his eyes zeroed in on a name.
He pushed some papers out of the way on his desk and found the package that had come in this morning. He’d skimmed through the contents of the ten-year-old case.
The woman was Lucas Curran’s sister.
He had intended to tell Kadin without words that he could solve this case, not only that he had a personal reason for wanting to, but that he might also have key information that would lead to solving the case, and that he wouldn’t hand over the information unless Kadin hired him. Lucas might not be an experienced investigator, but he had enough to buy him a beginning.
That type of tiptoeing around the truth didn’t curry favor with Kadin. Lucas Curran obviously had a bone to pick with whoever had killed his sister. Who wouldn’t? That alone wasn’t significant. What grabbed Kadin and wouldn’t let go was that he suspected Lucas could put a name to the killer. That by itself tempted Kadin enough. He hadn’t formed Dark Alley Investigations to go by the book, not completely. As long as his team followed his moral code, he’d let just about anything go. And if this mysterious Lucas Curran’s personal vengeance brought information to the table, Kadin would give him at least a start of a chance. Kadin’s business centered on solving cold cases. This was as cold as they got.
He picked up the phone and called Lucas.
“Curran.”
“I’ve read your file.”
A Wanted Man (Cold Case Detectives Book 1) Page 24