Cold Case Reunion

by Kimberly VanMeter

  Her frozen expression lost some of its rigidity, but he wasn’t surprised when she stiffly declined.

  “I don’t think that’s wise,” she said, ducking to get into the car.

  “Why not?” he dared, cursing himself for not adhering to good sense when clearly he was out of his mind at the moment. Her refusal smacked his pride but it also plucked at the wild, unpredictable nature of the feelings he kept under lock and key. How was it that she could be so unmoved by their past? Was he the only one who suffered regrets? They should’ve hashed this out a long time ago. Perhaps then they wouldn’t have to deal with the distraction of unfinished business. “Clearly, we’re both adults and working together for a common goal. I can handle it, if you can.”

  It was a mild taunt, pushing at the well-hidden button of competition that she’d harbored since they were kids. He ought to feel shame for manipulating her this way, but instead he felt the tingle of victory as she wavered, clearly struggling with good sense and the need to win. Her mouth firmed and she lifted her chin. “I’ll be there in an hour—on one condition. No talk of the past as it pertained to you and me. Got it?”

  He smothered a smile, knowing it would likely cause her to change her mind, and nodded gravely. “Of course. Strictly business. Like I said, it shouldn’t be a problem. Not for me anyway.”

  “And it won’t be for me,” she said icily. Before he could retort, she slammed her door and drove away.

  Angelo let out a pent-up breath, laughing softly even as his hands shook, betraying just how much he’d been holding back, pretending not to care when, in fact, a part of him wanted to grab her and kiss her to make up for time lost. That would likely go over very badly.

  He climbed into his own car. Tonight ought to be interesting, at the very least.

  Mya’s heart raced, almost tripping over itself in a rapid staccato, nearly beating out a message that translated to: Bad idea! Bad idea!

  And she heard it loud and clear but she wasn’t going to be that sad, sorry woman who couldn’t bear to be around the man who broke her heart—a million years ago—and who fell into a sobbing heap because he happens to show up all of a sudden. If he could be aloof and distant, she could be equally so.

  She blasted into the urgent care facility to check in with Dr. Solvang, and, finding everything in order and moving smoothly, she detoured to her office to write a few notes for the nurses when she found Iris coming from the staff lounge. She mentally winced when Iris came at her with a big grin. “Drinks at your place, right? Sundance is working late—” Iris saw Mya’s chagrin and her smile fell. “You’re canceling on me?”

  “I’m so sorry, something came up,” Mya said, dancing around the true reason until she realized she had nothing to hide. “Angelo and I are going to go over notes from the case.”

  Iris’s displeasure rippled across her beautiful face; even in anger the woman was jaw-droppingly gorgeous. Mya resisted the urge to take a pass with the lipgloss across her own lips when she realized that would only look highly suspect in her best friend’s eyes. “For a smart woman, you’re being very dumb,” Iris stated flatly.

  Mya made a face. “Thank you. But I’m fine. I know what I’m doing.”

  “Yeah, you’re going to be doing Angelo in about three hours,” Iris quipped, earning a shocked gasp from Mya. She certainly wasn’t going to be having sex with Angelo. The very idea— A flash of heat and desire and longing unsettled her, but she hid it well under her annoyance with Iris for knowing her so damn well. “And might I add that Angelo isn’t likely to stay this time, either. You’ll give him your heart and he’ll give you nothing in return. He’ll leave.”

  “I’m not interested in marrying the man,” Mya snapped, her temper rising. Iris held her ground and simply stared, her eyes hard. “Why are we arguing about this? I’m a grown woman. I can make my own decisions. I don’t need anyone’s permission. And maybe I want him to leave. Maybe I’m okay with sleeping with him and then watching as he goes on his merry way. Not that I’m saying I would or am…I’m just saying, I don’t have to report to anyone about my personal life, and that includes you. I seem to remember I never judged you when you were going out and doing your thing back in the day. At least I’m not picking up strangers in a bar.”

  Iris blinked in wounded surprise and Mya realized she had been overly harsh. Immediately sorry, she reached out to Iris, but Iris wasn’t having it and walked away but not before Mya caught the sheen of tears. “Iris, wait…”

  “Have fun doing whatever it is you’re doing,” Iris said, her voice husky with tears or pain, Mya wasn’t sure, but she felt terrible for causing it. She shouldn’t have said that. It was low and it’d taken a long time for Iris to come to the realization that what had happened to her hadn’t been her fault. Miserable inside, Mya wanted to run after her friend, but she knew Iris wasn’t going to accept her apology. Not yet anyway.

  “Well, crap,” she muttered, hating herself yet still preparing to meet Angelo. She grabbed her purse and closed up her office. “Here goes nothing….”

  Darrick tossed in a sweat-soaked fever, the restraints on his arms and legs biting into his chafed skin. He was sober—a terrible consequence of getting locked up—but the nurse had given him some kind of drug that kept him locked in his own head, unable to get out.

  And Darrick hated being in-his-head sober.

  He had to talk to Angelo. Seeing the man after all this time, it had awakened something he’d have preferred to remain dormant—but he couldn’t quite trust himself with the details. For all his alcohol abuse and subsequent vices, he knew he wasn’t a well man and that sometimes what he thought he knew wasn’t always true.

  Except in this.

  There was one thing he knew with the clarity of a man going before the Creator to be judged.

  It was something he’d hidden a long time ago, back when he’d been terrified and alone. When Waylon had taken a bullet right in front of him. But he couldn’t quite remember where he’d put it. It was definitely important, something he had to give to Angelo.

  He groaned as his brain refused to cooperate, mushing the details of what he knew and what he thought he knew until the picture was fuzzy and distorted.

  Darrick twisted against the restraint, as Waylon loomed before him. Impossible, he told himself, though he wasn’t entirely sure, and it was the uncertainty that caused him to cry out in fear and pain. He thrashed harder and screamed, his throat convulsing on a ragged shout. The door opened, flooding the room with light, and a disapproving presence came into the room.

  “Keep him here,” the voice said as he shrank into the mattress, trying to get away. The disgust in the voice was clear. “His brain is pickled from all the drugs and alcohol. I don’t know what else to do with him. What a waste.”

  The last part, muttered but crystal clear, made him want to tear off the restraints and rip out the man’s throat, but he had neither the strength nor the courage.

  Darrick stopped struggling and let the drugs steal his will to fight.

  There was a reason he needed to wake up…but for the life of him, he couldn’t seem to care.

  Chapter 14

  Angelo sat at his grandfather’s old kitchen table that wobbled on uneven legs and nursed a soda. Grace always gave him a hard time for drinking soda when everyone else was slugging back beers or whiskey, but he never touched alcohol because of what he’d seen it do to the tribe. His own parents had been alcoholics and he wasn’t about to tempt fate by pouring poison down his gullet for the sake of numbing what was happening in his head. He stilled when he heard a car come up the driveway. His heart rate kicked up, but he deliberately kept his seat and waited for her to knock. He’d given this night some thought as he’d waited. It was unlikely he’d get another chance to clear the air and although he might be a bastard, he was going to take it. Maybe it was selfish—okay, it was purely selfish—but he suspected Mya needed closure, too. And he owed her that, at the very least.

  So if t
hat meant he had to draw her to him under false pretenses, so be it.

  A short rap on the front door sounded and, after a quick swallow of his soda, he rose and opened it with a sense of detachment. “I’d almost given up on you,” he stated. She was only a half hour late but each minute had felt like an eternity. He’d almost been tempted to call her cell but he knew that would’ve put her in the power seat and he needed to be the one driving tonight. “That would’ve been fine but a call would’ve been professional,” he chided her lightly.

  She puffed up and lifted her chin, her eyes glittering coolly. “I’m here, aren’t I? My world doesn’t revolve around you, Angelo. I had business to attend to at the clinic before I came.” She shrugged out of her coat and gestured to the table where he had his paperwork. “Shall we sit at the table?”

  “Actually, my butt is numb from sitting in those hard chairs. Would you mind if we sat on the couch?”

  She hesitated and was no doubt remembering the things they’d done on that very sofa so many years ago when his Papa had gone to run errands and Waylon had been off with Darrick doing God only knew what. He couldn’t blame her. The memories had scorched him when he’d first walked through the front door. It seemed only fitting that she should suffer from them.

  “It’s not much to look at but it’s comfortable enough,” he said mildly, as if he thought that was her only concern.

  She shrugged. “I’m sure it’s fine. I was just thinking of the practicality.”

  “I’m good if you’re good,” he said.

  Mya gave a minute shake of her head as if to say whatever and took a seat on the couch, but she couldn’t have looked stiffer if someone had shoved a branch up her backside. She looked up to him, her eyes wary. “Well? Are we going to do this or stand around discussing the merits of an old sofa?”

  He chuckled under his breath, scooped up his notes and stuck his pen behind his ear. “Thirsty? I’ve got some soda and bottled water in the kitchen.”

  “No, thank you,” she answered, risking a glance around the small, shabby place. He caught sadness in her eyes before she could mask it, and he knew where her thoughts had traveled. It was hard not to remember Waylon and Papa. “It looks the same,” she observed with a catch in her voice. “How’d you manage that? I would’ve thought everything would’ve disintegrated with time.”

  “I paid someone to come and keep the place up,” he said, knowing his answer surprised her. He didn’t blame her. He’d surprised himself when he’d set up the caretaker, but as much as he’d never wanted to return he couldn’t let it molder into the ground. “He kept the place in order, with sheets on the furniture and whatnot.”

  “Why?” she asked, the bald question cutting at him. As if realizing she’d been rude, she rephrased it with more tact. “I know when Waylon and your grandfather died, you hated this place. I figured you would’ve been happy to see it fall.”

  “I couldn’t,” he admitted, adding with a slight arch to his brow, “Contrary to popular belief, I’m not that much of a bastard. I care about some things. Even old, smelly houses.”

  She let her gaze wander the old house, taking in the plank flooring that Papa had installed himself as a young buck with a family, and the rough-hewn table that Papa had fashioned from a fallen piece of cedar, to the rudimentary kitchen that surely wasn’t going to win any awards but got the job done with a simple stove, sink and fridge. “It doesn’t smell,” she finally said with a tiny smile, the first since walking through the door. “I always liked it here. Your grandfather was a good man.”

  “Yes, he was.” On that they could agree. Papa had been a very good man, solid in his beliefs, which were simple and to the point. Be good and Great Spirit will be good to you. Treat the land with the same respect you would your elder and take pride in who you are. But Angelo didn’t want to talk about Papa. It was too painful. He grabbed his paperwork and shuffled through it, reaching to pluck his pen from behind his ear. “Has Bunny come to the clinic for treatment of the stomach problems he was talking about?” he asked.

  Seemingly relieved that they were back on track, Mya shook her head, adding, “However, patient confidentiality prevents me from talking about any health concerns I’ve addressed with Bunny.”

  “I’m not asking for details, just confirmation or not,” he retorted.

  “I know what you’re asking. And I’m telling you what I can within my limitations.”

  “Great,” he said dryly. “Now that we have the fine print out of the way…”

  “You didn’t used to be so flippant,” she observed, not shrinking or backing down from the look he gave her. He’d changed a lot since leaving the reservation. She was only seeing the tip of the iceberg. He remembered laughing more. Of course, back then, there’d been more to laugh about. The cases he handled, the people he dealt with on a regular basis and the job itself had a tendency to leach the joy out of his life. He shrugged off the weight of her stare and her judgment, intent on returning to the case, but she wasn’t finished. “I remember a different you. I know we all change and sometimes change is a good thing, but I don’t know you well enough any longer to say whether this is a good change or not.”

  It wasn’t. He couldn’t say that he’d improved since bailing on his people, on her. Damn. How’d she manage to turn the tables on him so quickly? He shot her a cool look. “What happened to no talk of us? Because if you want to go there, I can with no qualms. I’ve got things to say and I suspect you’ve got plenty to say to me.” He finished by affecting a lounging position against the cushion, watching and waiting for her next move. She regarded him with those fathomless dark eyes, and, though he wore an armor of confidence, his insides had begun to shiver at the very real fear that whatever she had to say, he didn’t have the strength to hear.

  Mya felt played. She could sense a world of deception in that gaze of his, and she didn’t buy his nonchalance one bit. One thing she remembered about Angelo was that he had always been a cool bluffer. He’d stood down bullies twice his size without flinching because he’d carried himself with the strength of a much bigger man. Later, he’d confide in her, joking that he’d been scared spitless and had been hoping and praying that he didn’t end up a smear on the pavement.

  She smiled, enjoying the slight falter in his smirk. Anger, fresh and raw, gave her smile an edge, she could feel it. He had no idea what he was playing with and she certainly didn’t appreciate his easy treatment of their past. “You wear arrogance well,” she said softly. “But I think you’re lying. You’re not so jaded that you don’t feel something since coming home. The thing is, I think it’s because of what you feel that you’re deliberately acting like an idiot, because if people are angry with you then they stop asking the questions you don’t want to answer.”

  “Very philosophical. What would you say if I told you that the whole reason I asked you here was to get you into bed?”

  She laughed. “Nice. Another attempt to deflect, but here’s the rub, earlier I said I didn’t know you any longer, but that’s not true. Standing here now, watching you try to pull off this act, it’s readily apparent that in some things you haven’t changed at all.” He stiffened, and she continued, almost smugly. “I know your tricks. You can’t bluff me. And so I have to ask why you’re going to so much trouble to color my opinion of you. What are you afraid of?”

  “Who says I’m bluffing?”

  Mya held his gaze, felt the pull between them and heard Iris’s voice in her head screeching at her to stop, but the man was mesmerizing to look at. She understood attraction, knew the physiological signals, and even accepted that it was likely she was sinking to her basest levels of human nature, but then she’d be the one dissembling. She couldn’t hide behind clinical explanations when her heart was hammering in her chest and her body was heating simply from sitting near him. The attraction was there, alive and well and demanding attention. Back down, don’t go there. His tongue slid along his bottom lip and he started to lean toward her, his
gaze feasting on her mouth. But just as her breath hitched in her throat, caught between desire and prudence, she managed to scoot away, putting a safe distance between them, saying with only a slight shake to her voice, “I came here to help you with your notes. So let’s get to that, shall we?”

  Angelo’s nostrils flared at her rejection, and she might’ve seen a hint of relief mixed with disappointment, which she understood because she felt the same. He relaxed again, chuckling as he grabbed his pen. “I bet you drive the guys crazy here.”

  “What do you mean?” she asked, not sure she wanted to hear the answer.

  “Forget it.” She pinned him with a hard look that communicated how she felt about those types of games and he relented. “Well, guys love a contradiction. You’re all professional with the doctor gig and you wear it well. But all a guy has to do is look past the uptight persona to see the wild woman beneath. You are sex and erotic fantasies tightly locked down behind that serious nature. You used to be a lot less…locked down. But that’s okay. Guys love that. So I’m sure you’re a real treat here on the rez.”

  “If you refuse to act like a grown-up, I’m leaving. I didn’t come here to talk about my sex life. I came here to help, but I see that’s not what you had in mind.” She rose and she saw surprise in his eyes, as if he hadn’t expected her reaction. “Tomorrow I’ll meet you at Bunny’s, say, around 10:00 a.m.? I’m bringing Iris and Sundance with me, so keep your inappropriate comments to yourself or risk an unpleasant altercation with my brother.”