He merely nodded, not unlike a man about to slip into shock.
“Wyatt, you okay?” she asked.
Sam waved off her concern. “I’ll get the car started.”
To her knowledge, his car didn’t need to be warmed up but she didn’t contradict him. Instead, she turned her attention to the little girl. She did her best to sound cheerful and reassuring. “Need help packing something to take with you?”
Lisa eyed her uncertainly. “Then I am staying at this other person’s house?”
Lisa’s voice was soft and low, but it seemed to Riley to hum with intelligence.
“Just for a few hours. You’ll be coming back here later today. Tonight at the latest,” Riley augmented. As detectives, they did have shifts, but their hours could still be rather erratic. If that home invasion had been reported last night, she had no doubt that both Wyatt and she would have gotten calls in the middle of the night to come to the scene of the crime.
She saw the solemn look on Lisa’s face. Tears began to fill the little girl’s eyes. Was she afraid? “What’s the matter?”
Lisa swallowed before answering. “That’s what Mama said before she left me. She didn’t come back.”
Riley bent down to embrace Lisa. She felt the little girl stiffen at first, then melt into her arms. Poor thing just wants to be loved, she thought.
“Honey, your mama was in a car accident.” As she spoke, Riley stroked Lisa’s hair soothingly. “She wanted nothing more than to come back to you, but well, it didn’t turn out that way.”
Lisa raised her head to look up at her. “You’ll come back?”
Riley rose to her feet. “We’ll come back,” she promised. She crossed her heart before she took the little girl’s hand in hers.
Lisa asked her the same question again just before she and Wyatt left.
Wyatt was ahead of her, obviously anxious to get going. He said a quick goodbye to Lisa. She looked so lost, standing there so forlornly, that Riley bent down and hugged her. That was when Lisa asked her again. “You’ll come back?”
“Your dad’ll come back, honey,” she promised, thinking that Lisa meant her question for Wyatt. “I guarantee it.”
“No, you,” Lisa corrected urgently. “You’ll come back?”
Riley exchanged looks with Wyatt, caught off guard by Lisa’s question. This wasn’t the time for a philosophical debate as to her place in the scheme of things—or rather her lack of a place.
Instead, she rose to her feet and promised, “I’ll come back. We both will.”
Only then did Lisa’s anxious expression begin to relax. “Okay.”
Brenda moved forward, slipping her arm around the girl’s shoulders. “C’mon, Lisa, let me introduce you to my kids.”
Lisa allowed herself to be led away, although she kept looking over her shoulder at them until Wyatt closed the front door, effectively separating them from his daughter’s view.
He blew out a breath as if he’d been holding it the entire time they’d been at Brenda’s house. “Looks like she’s already bonded with you.”
Was that relief she saw in his eyes? “If her mother never married, Lisa’s probably more comfortable around women.”
“Great,” he murmured under his breath.
“You’ll rise to the challenge,” she assured him. “Granted Lisa’s a bit younger than you’re used to, but once you turn on that charm, I’m sure you’ll have her eating out of your hand.” Her attempt to tease him out of his solemnity failed. She dropped her kidding tone. “What’s the matter?”
He paused by his car. “I don’t think I can be a father, McIntyre,” he told her.
“You’re perfectly normal. I’d say probably ninety-five percent of all fathers say that at the beginning.”
“Yeah, but they all get nine months to get used to the idea. I didn’t even get nine seconds. One minute I’m a bachelor. The next, I’m a family man,” he complained, shaking his head.
Riley gave him a knowing look. “As I remember it, you were always a quick study. You’ll get the hang of this in no time.”
For the first time since she’d sat in front of him at the academy, Wyatt didn’t look his usual confident self. Instead, he appeared worried.
As he opened the door to his vehicle, he paused. “I’ve never said this before,” he started to confess, then stopped.
“Go ahead,” she coaxed.
It took him a couple more seconds to frame his admission. “I’ve never said this before,” he began again. “But I’m going to need help.” And then, after taking a breath, he came to the crux of his request. “In short, McIntyre, I’m going to need you.”
Chapter 5
For just a split second, when Sam said he needed her, a whole different meaning to his words flashed through her mind. A meaning that had nothing to do with the present set of circumstances her partner was facing.
Riley pushed that, and the unsettling, restless curiosity away. “Need me to what?” she heard herself asking.
“Help me with Lisa.”
What else could he have meant, idiot? she silently demanded. Out loud Riley tried to sound casual as she said, “I thought I was already helping. I’m the one who got you a babysitter for the day.” And, if necessary, a more long-term arrangement could be made with Brenda for Lisa’s after-school care.
School.
Sam said his daughter was six. That meant she belonged in school. Another onslaught of questions rushed at her, temporarily squeezing out the feeling she’d just experienced.
Sam nodded. For a moment, he forgot about getting into his car and driving to the scene of the home invasion. He needed to air this out, get it said and at least temporarily straight in his mind. “And I appreciate it in case I forgot to mention it—”
“You did.”
He suppressed an impatient sigh, knowing he didn’t want to do or say anything that would alienate this woman right now. He did need her. Besides, she was his partner.
“But this isn’t some two-hour movie where everything gets neatly wrapped up and uplifting music plays as the credits begin to roll. This is real life, McIntyre.” He didn’t add that it was his life and he had no idea how he’d found himself in this predicament. He’d always been so careful. But nothing—including birth control obviously—was foolproof. “And there’s an ocean of tomorrows to face.”
It occurred to her that there might be a very simple solution to his problem, at least for the time being. “Well, ‘Daddy,’ don’t you have a current girlfriend you can turn to?” Someone eager to cull his favor by pitching in to care for his daughter would be really handy right about now.
But Sam shook his head. “Not at the moment. I seem to be in between shallow relationships.”
Her mouth curved. “Glad you said it and not me.”
The way he saw it, it had been a preemptive strike. “Figured you would.” He looked at her hopefully. “How about it, McIntyre?” he pressed. “Can you run interference for me?”
She knew he wanted her to take over. Maybe volunteer to take his daughter to her extended family and have one or more of them become responsible for Lisa.
Ain’t gonna happen, Wyatt, she thought.
“No, but I can show up temporarily in the evening and lend you a hand if you like. You’re going to have to be there, too,” she specified. “In order to get used to each other, you and Lisa will have to actually be with each other.”
Sam sighed and dragged a hand through his hair. The incredibly dry air sucked the moisture out of everything. He could feel static electricity crackling just above his scalp.
McIntyre was making sense, he knew that. But for the first time in his life, he felt unequal to the challenge that faced him. What did he know about raising a little girl? Or even interacting with one? He hadn’t a clue.
But McIntyre did. He watched her as would a desperate man searching for a lifeline. “You’ve got a big family, right, McIntyre?”
“I do now,” she qualified. Before
the wedding, there had only been her brothers and her sister. Now, of course, besides the huge entourage she’d gained, there were also her siblings’ better-halves to take into account. The size of her family had grown astronomically in a very short time. “Why? Are you thinking of trying to sneak Lisa in, hoping everyone just thinks she’s part of the under-five-foot group?”
“Not exactly, but close,” he admitted.
Riley shook her head. “Desperate doesn’t look good on you,” she told him, then smiled. “Don’t worry, it’ll be all right.” A note of kindness entered her voice as she added, “And you’ll have backup.”
He would have preferred just handing off Lisa. Not because he was indifferent, or because having Lisa around would cramp his style—cute kids were known to attract women, not repel them—but because he didn’t think it was fair to the little girl. She deserved to be raised by someone who knew what he was doing, not a father who would be stumbling around in the dark.
“Right,” he muttered. He told himself to focus on work. “Okay, let’s just table this for now. We need to get to this house before Barker has us shot.” He opened the door on the driver’s side.
After getting in, Riley found herself coaxing a reluctant seat belt to extend. On the way to Brenda’s, she’d sat in the back with Lisa to make the girl not feel any more isolated than she probably already did. Riding shotgun in this case had its disadvantage.
“Want to sit in the back?” he proposed as he started the car.
“No,” she bit off. She wasn’t about to be defeated by a safety device.
It took her two hard tugs to properly extend the belt to the length where she could secure it around herself. Holding onto it tightly, she slipped the metal tongue into its slot. That out of the way, Riley glanced at Wyatt.
He really did have one heck of a profile. No wonder he had to all but beat women off with a stick. The man was just too good-looking for his own good.
Or hers.
The thought surprised her. Riley searched for a safe topic, something to redirect her mind onto more neutral territory. She decided to ask about her new boss even though she could have just as easily asked one of her siblings, or her mother.
“How long has Barker been in charge of the department?”
Sam made a sharp right at the next light. The freeway he needed was just a block away. “For as long as I’ve been there.”
That meant at least for the last five years. “Tell me, has he always had the personality of a piranha, or is that something new?”
Sam laughed, then felt duty bound to defend the man, at least a little. “Oh, he’s a decent enough person—on his good days.”
Neither yesterday nor today came under that heading. “These good days, do they happen with any kind of reliable frequency?” she asked. “Or are they like Brigadoon? Making an appearance once every hundred years?”
The reference she’d made meant nothing to him. He had no idea what or who Brigadoon was, but he let it go. “His wife left him a couple of years ago. It really tore him up.”
“And he’s been taking it out on everyone ever since?” she guessed.
Just making the light, Sam guided his vehicle onto the freeway. With rush hour over, traffic was flying this time of the morning.
“Something like that.” He needed to focus on something other than his present situation. Maybe if he didn’t think about it, a solution would eventually occur to him. “Did the lieutenant give you any details about this new case?”
Before leaving to find him, she’d gone back to her new superior to ask for any more information. The man had seemed annoyed and then tolerant. He’d spared her a few crumbs. She was glad now she’d asked. Though they knew each other, she and Wyatt had never worked a case together. She didn’t want him thinking that he’d been harnessed with an idiot, there only because of her connections.
“Barker said the MO was like the home invasion you were already working on. No sign of a break-in, family bound in duct tape and held prisoner while two men dressed in black, wearing ski masks, systematically robbed the place. And when they were finished, they chloroformed the people so that they would be long gone before either of the victims could get loose and call the police.”
Accelerating to pass a truck and take the off-ramp, Sam nodded. “Does sound like the other home invasion,” he observed.
The bit about the chloroform had been left out of the description they had released to the public. That was inside information only the victims and the thieves knew about.
“How far along are you on that case?” she asked.
He’d reached a dead end, which was why the lieutenant had assigned him to the case he’d just taken back today. “Would you like that in inches or centimeters?”
“That far, huh?”
Frustrated, he said, “Yeah, but now that you’re here, we’ll just whip right through the case and find the bad guys.”
She silently counted to ten then said in a calm, neutral voice, “I don’t think that sarcasm is the best way to go if you want my help.”
Taking the off-ramp, Wyatt followed the winding path and found himself stuck at a red light. “You won’t help me work the home invasion cases if your feelings are hurt?”
“I was talking about you needing my help with Lisa after we’re off the clock.”
He’d actually forgotten this newest development in his life for a second.
“Oh, right.” He blew out a breath. “McIntyre, if I can’t remember from one minute to the next that I’m supposed to be a father, how am I going to be one 24/7?”
She put herself in his place. This must have knocked him for a loop.
“First of all, you’re new at it. Give yourself time to get used to the situation. Second, you’re not ‘supposed to be’ a father. You are a father whether you like it or not. Your little ‘play’ time created a human being. Since you were the guy involved, that makes you the father. The sooner you get used to it, Wyatt, the faster things’ll start falling into place for you.”
“What if I don’t?” he asked.
He’d lost her. “Don’t what?”
“Don’t get used to it?” He paused for a second, then said what was really on his mind. “What if I don’t want to be the dad?”
She tried to shift her body toward him but the seat belt held her tightly in place. “Are you talking about walking away?”
“I can do that?” he asked. Then, before she could form an answer that didn’t have a slew of less-than-flattering names attached to it, Wyatt shot down his own question with a resigned sigh. “I can’t do that. It’s not her fault that she’s here.”
“I’d take the word ‘fault’ out of the conversation if I were you,” she strongly advised. “Using it might undermine Lisa’s worth in her own eyes if she happens to overhear you. As a matter of fact, I wouldn’t go there at all.”
“There?” he echoed, puzzled.
“The past,” she explained. “How Lisa came to be, all that stuff. Get a paternity test if you want to. Then, if she turns out to be yours, accept the fact and go from there.”
He didn’t need a paternity test. As he’d told McIntyre earlier, there was no reason for Andrea to lie and the little girl’s age gibed with when they were together. Lisa was his. He glanced at his partner. “You charge by the hour for this golden advice?”
He hid vulnerability behind sarcasm. She could identify with that. Her answer was as flippant as his question. “Since you’re my partner, the first hundred hours are free.”
Sam didn’t completely suppress his groan as he contemplated hearing McIntyre’s voice go on and on for the next one hundred hours. “I’d better start keeping track then.”
The corners of her mouth curved. “I’ll let you know when your time is up,” she promised.
He felt like a man whose time was up already. But he couldn’t think about that now, couldn’t contemplate all the problems that lay ahead. He had a home invasion to investigate and—hopefully—solve.
Sam turned his vehicle onto the street where the invasion had taken place. “We’re here,” he announced.
“I never would have guessed,” she cracked.
The breathtaking estate-sized house had a squad car parked in the middle of the driveway, forcing them to park at the curb. A crowd of curious people was being physically held back by several strategically positioned sawhorses. And even if none of that was there, the bright yellow crime scene tape across the front of the building would have been a dead giveaway.
Getting out of the car, Sam shook his head. “You’d think people living in this neighborhood would have a better security system in place.”
She saw it differently. “On the contrary, people living here think they’re safe because of the neighborhood. They plunk down money that once would have been enough to buy them their own small European principality and they think that’s enough to keep the bad guys out, not realizing that the bad guys assume that the rich are a bunch of wimps who won’t offer any resistance if confronted.”
“I suppose that makes sense—in a perverse sort of way,” he allowed.
“Thank you.” She took his comment as a compliment and flashed him a smile before making her way toward the front door. A stern-faced policeman stood before it like a muscular roadblock. He made no attempt to move out of her way. Riley held up her ID and her badge for the officer to examine.
The stone face softened and took on mobility as the officer looked from her wallet to her face.
“New on the job?” he asked, interest entering his dark brown eyes.
“Just to the department,” she corrected. “First full day.”
“She’s with me,” Sam informed the beat policeman, coming up behind her.
Recognition was immediate. “Oh, sorry, Detective Wyatt. But you can’t be too careful,” he confided. “I just had a reporter try to get inside by claiming he was a relative.”
“What gave him away?” Riley asked, curious.
A dimple appeared on his right cheek as he smiled. “Got the victims’ last name wrong,” he told her, happy to share the story.
In Bed with the Badge Page 5