“There you go, ma’am. Into the cage.” The officer opened the door for her and, palming her head, pushed her gently inside the shadowy police car. Getting in was awkward with her hands cuffed behind her. She had to turn her back, sit down, then tuck her long legs into the tight space. The door closed beside her. The back of the car was dark, the cage that separated her from the front feeling as though it was right in her face. She waited for the choked feeling, the desperate need to scream and climb out of her own skin.
Weirdly, she felt nothing like that.
Taking her completely by surprise, a voice beside her said suddenly, “Oh, God! I didn’t think about that.”
Grady’s voice. She was hallucinating. Or she’d gone insane. Or her brain had been smoke damaged, after all. Grady, sitting on the opposite side of the back seat, opened his door, climbed out, then reached in and pulled her out with both arms around her waist.
Holding her by the shoulders, he looked apologetic. “I’m sorry,” he said, reaching into the pocket of his leather jacket for a knife and cutting off the cuffs. “I didn’t stop to think that being in the cage could make your claustrophobia react.”
Cassie looked into his penitent eyes and struggled for clear thought. Two things crowded her awareness. She should have felt claustrophobic in the back of the police car, but she hadn’t. And Grady had had her arrested? If so, why had he cut her out of the cuffs? The only thing that made any sense to her was that she was freezing.
Grady pulled off his jacket and put it on her, zipping it up then holding it by the collar.
Over his shoulder, she saw Brogan and Kubik standing side by side, wide grins on their faces.
“Mission accomplished?” Brogan asked Grady.
“Partially,” he said, still holding Cassie by the jacket collar. He turned to face his friends. “The rest is up to me. Thanks for agreeing to help me, guys. And for giving up your break.”
Brogan gave Cassie an apologetic bow. “Our pleasure. Sorry we had to cuff you, ma’am, but knowing what you did to the guy you thought was stalking you, we wanted to protect ourselves.”
“Mmm,” she said, just beginning to see a trace of light and comprehension. “Seems to be some form of collusion, here. Is this kind of thing allowed in the police department?”
Both officers smiled without answering and got into their unit.
“Grady Joshua Nelson!” Diane called from her doorway. She was fighting a smile. “Get Cassie out of the cold. You’re welcome to come inside to finish out the rest of this fiendish plan. I’m going to bed.” She turned toward the stairs, leaving the front door open.
“I’m sorry about putting you in the cage,” Grady said. “After all you’d been through in the fire.”
In that instant in the back of the police car, she’d made a revealing discovery. She told him with the wonder she felt as she understood what happened, “It’s all right because I was fine. I may have conquered the claustrophobia.”
“Seriously? Because of the fire?”
She looked into his eyes. She saw the man she knew and loved in them and felt peaceful about that for a moment. Until she wondered what he saw in her eyes.
“No,” she replied. “Because I’ve been conditioning myself to learn to live without you, and now that’s the hardest thing I have to face.”
He wrapped his arms around her and held her close. “Cassie,” he said heavily, “I’m sorry I was such an idiot. I didn’t realize you’d run back inside during the fire to save me. I guess I thought you’d realize I’d gone out.”
She placed a hand on each side of his waist, loving his closeness and his rapt attention. “I couldn’t see anything. The smoke was everywhere. I felt the sofa and there was nothing on it but what felt like a folded pile of your blankets. I thought you might be somewhere else in the house and overcome by smoke. So I got my dad out and went in to find you.”
“That’s what the fire department is for.”
She sighed and leaned into him. “Grady, if you’re in trouble, helping you is what I’m for.” She raised her head from his shoulder to smile at him. “And, anyway, you should talk. You came in after me.”
“I love you,” he said simply. “In fact...” He pulled her up the walk toward the house, crushing her against his side. “I have to take issue with something you told our parents.”
She really tried to think back, but was too caught up in how tightly he held her to be aware of anything but the moment. “I can’t remember.”
He stopped at the foot of the steps to the porch and held her by the shoulders, his chin taking on a stubborn line she knew well. “You said I was too much of a gentleman to show passion.”
“Because you’re always so careful with your feelings and reluctant to—”
That was as far as she got. He cupped her head in his hand, brought her lips to his and kissed her with a torrid attention to detail that completely falsified her claim. She couldn’t breathe but that didn’t seem to matter—her lips and not her lungs seemed to be in charge at the moment.
When he finally put her a step away, still holding on to her, she gasped in a frail voice, “I take it back.”
“Good.” He took her hand and led her the rest of the way up the steps. He stopped short of opening the door.
“I have something to ask you,” he said.
She held the sides of the jacket together with one hand. “Can we go inside and sit down where it’s warm?”
“No. I have to ask you now or I’ll forget the words.”
“Okay.”
He took a breath, firmed his stance and began haltingly. “Ah—veux tu—me...ah...étouffer?”
* * *
OH, GOD, SHE didn’t want to. He’d been such an idiot. Why did he think that his sudden enlightenment would change everything between them? He’d hurt her...
“Um...” She narrowed an eye and he began to wonder if she hadn’t understood the question. That was possible, but she was supposed to be fluent in French.
“Grady,” she said, putting a hand to his chest. He placed his hand over it, feeling as though it might burn through his shirt. “You just asked in really atrocious French if I would suffocate you—or join you in a New Orleans crab dish. I’m not sure which.”
He groaned in frustration. He’d practiced that line while he’d waited in the cage for his friends to bring her out. He consulted a note he pulled out of his pocket and began to try again.
She took the note from him and read in flawless French “Veux-tu m’épouser?”
He saw fireworks in her eyes. “You know what you’re asking?” She looked up at him. “I mean...you understand that you’re proposing?”
“I do.” He kissed her again. “I wanted to learn it in French since, you know, that’s the language of love. And the language I’ll be speaking when I go back with you.”
Her smile was blinding. “You really want to do that?”
“Yes!” Love opened his world. “I think Oliver’s going to stay to help Ben get the agency started until we come back, and I’m going to learn about the world you live in, see if I can find a way to fit in there.”
“Grady, we’ve fitted together beautifully since the day I fainted in your arms.” She wrapped hers around his neck. “My answer is oui.”
* * * * *
If you enjoyed this story by Muriel Jensen, you’ll also love her other Heartwarming books: IN MY DREAMS, TO LOVE AND PROTECT, LOVE ME FOREVER and ALWAYS FLORENCE.
All available at Harlequin.com
Keep reading for an excerpt from A DAD FOR CHARLIE by Anna J. Stewart.
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A Dad for Charlie
by Anna J. Stewart
CHAPTER ONE
“WHAT DO YOU think that’s all about?”
From where he sipped his beer, Deputy Bradley Fletcher pulled his attention from the besotted bride and groom and followed his fellow deputy’s curious gaze across the expansive—and newly landscaped—roundabout of the Flutterby Inn.
Every nerve ending in his body fired against the cool Pacific breeze coming in off the ocean beyond the nearby cliffs. Over the din of conversation and the ever-so-faint tunes of a four-piece string quartet emanating from inside the landmark hotel, the nerve-racking sound of waves crashing against the rocks echoed in his ears. He shifted position, his knuckles going white around the bottle. How, after over fifteen years of living in the oceanside town of Butterfly Harbor, could the sound of the ocean still fill him with dread?
As he caught sight of Gil Hamilton chatting it up with a neighboring town sheriff, the anxiety and unease slipped to the back of his mind.
If there was one talent Fletch had honed in his thirty-one years it was his ability to know when someone—especially a suspicious someone—was up to something.
And there were few people in Butterfly Harbor more suspicious than their very own mayor.
“Excellent question.” Grateful for something to concentrate on other than his personal demons, Fletch straightened and tugged down the edge of his rented tuxedo jacket.
“Heard Mr. Mayor is getting a little anxious about the upcoming election,” Ozzy said in his own lowered voice. “With more than a year out, I don’t think Gil expected Luke to declare his intention to run for sheriff again quite this soon.”
“Gil isn’t a fan of anyone he can’t manipulate and control.” One of the reasons Luke Saxon had earned Fletch’s respect within his first few hours on the job had been the way he’d stood up to their former classmate turned boss. The onetime Chicago Bomb Squad officer didn’t take anything from anyone; not even the mayor who had reluctantly appointed him over his personal choice of the man he was currently speaking to. “Gil might put on a good show, but he hates the fact Luke’s approval ratings are higher than his. Even in a town this small.”
“You think Gil wants to talk Sean into running? You think Gil’s coming after Luke?”
“He wouldn’t be his father’s son if he didn’t.” Far across the manicured grounds of the iconic landmark hotel, Sheriff Sean Brodie gave the mayor a toothy grin. His chuckle carried across the breeze of the perfect late summer day and rankled the last nerve Fletch managed to hold on to. “Timing can’t be a coincidence,” Fletch said. “Not with Luke heading out of town on his honeymoon. I recognize an ambush when I see it.”
“What kind of ambush?”
“Another excellent question.” Fletch toasted his fellow groomsman and took a step away to grab two more bottles. “How about I go find out?”
“Fletcher.” Ozzy’s wide eyes grew even larger in his round face. The youngest and most rotund of Butterfly Harbor’s three deputies might be the smartest of them when it came to all the advancements in law enforcement, but he wasn’t exactly the diplomat of the group. Not that Fletch was much better, but he had half a lifetime of experience with their head politician.
“Don’t worry, Oz.” Fletch patted Ozzy on the shoulder. “I won’t do anything to cause a scene.” His only goal was to stave off any potential controversy that would mar Holly and Luke’s wedding. As best man, it was his job to make sure the happy couple’s day went off without a hitch.
As Butterfly Harbor’s longest-serving deputy, it was his obligation to protect the town and everyone in it.
Fletch maneuvered his way around people he’d known ever since he and his sister had come to live with their grandfather right before freshman year of high school. Shop owners and residents turned friendly faces, smiled at him and waved as he passed, the gushing comments and well-wishes echoing in his ears. There was little Bradley Fletcher enjoyed more than a big community event like the celebration today. Unless it was watching two of his favorite people find their way to happily-ever-after.
Not that he’d ever voice that out loud. Closet romantic that he was, Fletch would be more than content to take that particular character quirk of his all the way to the grave.
As he approached the two men—both of whom he’d had the displeasure of traversing his dodgy teenage years with—Fletch caught a flash of suspicion in the mayor’s eyes. Yep. Gil was definitely up to something.
When the suspicion faded and slipped into that familiar, over-wide, simpering smile on the face of a man who, by all rights, should be chilling out on a surfboard riding the waves far below them, Fletch shifted into what some of the kids in town would have called superhero mode.
Sans billowing red cape, of course. Fletch didn’t do capes.
“Mr. Mayor. Sheriff.” The title nearly caught in Fletch’s throat, but he was going to play nice with their neighboring town’s head of law enforcement. For now. “Pretty good turnout, wouldn’t you say?” He handed them each a beer and lifted his own in a mock toast. “Don’t think anyone stayed home today. Always great to see how much the town supports its local heroes.”
“I wouldn’t call almost getting himself blown up by a psychopath being a hero.” Sean Brodie’s dark eyes narrowed as he took a long drink. “Rex Winters did have some friends, you know.”
Fletch forced a smile onto his lips. So much for playing nice. “As difficult as that is to believe, yes, I am aware. I’ve been meaning to talk to you about Winters. Some of those firearms Rex had in his possession, we haven’t been able to trace where he got them. Any ideas?”
“I really don’t see where this is the time or place to discuss closed cases,” Gil interrupted. “Whatever Rex Winters was up to died with him. Was there something you needed, Deputy?”
“Mmm-hmm.” Fletch nodded as he drank. “Yes, actually. Luke mentioned you scheduled a meeting with him on Friday. Something about the string of break-ins and vandalisms we’ve been having.”
“With both Luke and Sean here, I did, yes.” Gil barely twitched. “I think it best to be kept up on the ongoing investigation, especially given these crimes are affecting both our communities. I was sorry to hear
Luke won’t be able to make the only time I have open.”
“You mean because he’ll be on the honeymoon he planned a month ago and you only asked him to meet two days ago? Yeah. Funny how that worked out.” Fletch’s fingers tightened around the neck of the bottle. There was the spin he’d been waiting for. “Would you excuse us for a moment, Sean?”
“Of course.” A coolness crept into Sean’s shifty eyes.
“I have to hand it to you.” Fletch managed to maneuver the mayor to a clear spot away from both the steep stairway down to the beach and the throng of party guests. As his ears cleared and his mind eased, he slipped into uniform mode. “You never cease to amaze me, Gil.”
“How’s that?”
Funny how Fletch could see that rich-kid “I dare you to stop me now” face in the eyes of the man Hamilton had become. Fletch didn’t like Gil any more now than he did the first day he’d met him. Of course Gil and his buddies had been in midbully session and slamming one of their smaller bespectacled classmates into a bank of lockers at the time. That didn’t make for a good first impression. “You never have any problem going behind people’s backs to get what you want. Yet here you are, celebrating Luke’s wedding and the entire time you’re commiserating with your longtime buddy about how to oust Luke while he’s on his honeymoon.”
“I think you’re reading a bit too much into two men talking,” Gil said without looking at him. “If Luke isn’t able to make the meeting—”
“You want an update on the case you should talk to me, seeing as I’m the one in charge of it.” Fletch watched Gil’s eyes widen at his lie. “Luke handed it off to me a few days ago. Must have slipped his mind to tell you with all he’s had going on. He wants to make sure someone will follow through while he’s gone. So if you had thoughts of bringing your buddy in to take over our side of things, you can forget it. I’m more than capable of keeping Luke’s seat warm for him.”
Gil tilted his head and looked at him for a good five seconds before saying, “If I didn’t know you better, I’d think you were vying for Luke’s job yourself.”
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