by Julie Miller
But Robin didn’t get very far before the ache in her shoulder, the weight on her mind and the emptiness of her office suddenly overwhelmed her. She sank into the desk chair and hugged the towels to her chest, unsure whether she felt like cursing or crying. Her body was exhausted, her brain weary, and yet, she was too revved up to sleep. She couldn’t drop her guard like that again. She had Emma’s well-being to consider, not just her own. How could she make a selfish choice like working late, relying on a silly whistle to keep her safe? Only one thing had made her feel safe tonight. Only one thing had finally quieted Emma.
Lonergan. He looked more like the muscle-bound henchmen she’d seen in a dozen action-adventure movies than he did any Hollywood heartthrob.
And yet tonight, he’d been her hero.
She lifted the towels to her face and buried her nose in their cool dampness. The scent of her rescuer still lingered there, spicy and clean—dangerous, somehow. More dangerous than any threat lurking out there in the dark streets.
That was what she needed to feel safe and in control of her world again. What she needed to keep her daughter safe. He was what she needed. No one could make her afraid if he was around.
Except maybe the man himself.
Ignoring a twinge of common sense that warned her she was putting her hope in someone she didn’t completely understand, Robin dropped the towels and dashed into the hallway to catch up with Spencer Montgomery.
“Detective?” Montgomery turned as he shrugged into a dark blue KCPD raincoat at the shop’s back door. “If you find Mr. Lonergan, would you let me know? I’d like to thank him.”
The detective offered her a curt nod before following his partner and the CSI out the back door.
Chapter Four
Forty minutes later, Robin shut off the lights in the empty shop and turned, breathing in the familiar scents of freesia, gardenias and chemical preservatives. Guided by the lights inside the refrigerated display case opposite the front counter, she opened a glass door and pulled out a lavender gladiolus that was sagging over the edge of its pot.
She looked at the broken stem in her hand, recognizing the tidying up for the stall tactic it was. With a groan of disgust at her seeming inability to function with any sense of urgency, she tossed the wilted flower into the trash and headed to her office. “Get out of here, Robin,” she chided herself.
There was no reason for her to be afraid to leave. KCPD felt confident enough in the security of her building that they had all gone. There was no more ambulance in the parking lot, no cadre of reporters waiting on the sidewalk for a glimpse of the Rose Red Rapist’s latest alleged “victim,” no reason to be fearful inside the business where she’d spent so many happy, hardworking, successful hours of her life.
She crossed the lobby to check the front door again, even though it had never been unlocked since she’d closed it at nine. Bolted tight. Alarm sensors on.
She could relax her guard and leave now, right?
Only, there wasn’t a brain cell in her head or a bruised muscle on her body that seemed to be relaxing.
The rain outside was still coming down in buckets, although the thunder and lightning had finally eased their fury. An eerie sense of déjà vu washed over her. Not five hours ago, she’d stood in the same place, thinking of how the rain nourished her flowers and grass. Her biggest concerns had been a few lousy numbers and a daughter who wouldn’t sleep. She’d felt more confident—more naive, perhaps—the last time she’d stared out this window. Five hours ago, she’d mistakenly thought that a purposeful walk and a steel whistle would keep her and Emma safe.
Now she was more aware. More alert. More suspicious of the dangers that lay in wait for them out there in the night.
Raising her chin against the wary uncertainty she wasn’t used to feeling, Robin’s gaze tilted up to the row of windows over the Fairy Tale Bridal shop. Hope had turned a light on in the guest bedroom, no doubt as a courtesy for her late arrival. Robin’s mouth eased into a smile. She wasn’t alone. She didn’t have far to go to find warmth and welcome and a chance to regain the emotional equilibrium tonight’s attack had stolen from her.
The smile lingered on her lips as she let her gaze follow the line of windows to the end of the redbrick building. She nodded, telling herself she was reassured by the security camera and lights installed at the corner of Hope’s shop. Detective Montgomery had already requested any footage that might have recorded Robin’s attack. She could do this. She could be independent again. Like any other challenge she’d faced in her life, she’d refuse to let the fear defeat her.
Almost hyperaware of her surroundings now, on guard against any threat that might approach her or Emma again, Robin dropped her gaze down the sidewalk, past the row of cars parked there for the night, visually scoping out the path she’d take across the street. She followed the wooden, ivy-twined fence that framed the parking lot beside Hope’s shop. Gaining confidence with every moment of this silent pep talk, she looked into the emptiness of the alley beyond that fence and...her heart stopped.
“Lonergan.”
She breathed his name. Leaning closer to the window, she peered through the rain, fogging up the glass for a moment as she identified the ghost lurking in the shadows. Arms folded across that massive chest, leaning against the bricks at the edge of the alley across the street. Black T-shirt, broad shoulders, silver hair.
Icy blue eyes meeting hers.
“Lonergan!” she shouted, pulling away from the window. Recognition jump-started her focus out of that anxious lethargy. Purpose energized her steps.
Robin ran through the swinging doors into the hallway and dashed into her office where she grabbed her raincoat and purse. She stuffed Hope’s spare keys into the pocket of her jeans and ran through the workrooms. She never questioned the anticipation coursing through her, never wondered what propelled her out that thick steel door.
He’d stayed. He’d come back. He was still watching over her, protecting her.
She had to see him, had to thank him, had to find out his damned first name.
The splash of cold rain on her skin startled her from the blindly eager rush. She paused beneath the edge of the awning to pull on her coat and blink the moisture from her lashes. By the time she’d cleared her vision, he was gone.
“Son of a...” Slightly breathless and unsure whether she felt disappointment or anger, she clutched her slicker together at the neck and trained her gaze onto the alley where she’d seen him. She moved closer to the street, looked up to the stoplight on the corner and deliberately scanned her way down the block, past every recessed entryway and parked car where he might hide. “Why are you doing this to me?”
Her gaze stopped at a dark green sedan, parked next to the entrance to Fairy Tale Bridal. Her breath stopped, too. It filled up her chest and squeezed out any false sense of security she’d felt at seeing Lonergan again.
There was a man inside the car, dressed in dark clothes. But there was no startling thatch of silver-white hair, no battered face—no face at all that she could see—only shadows.
Feeling his eyes on her as surely as she’d felt Lonergan’s, Robin instinctively backed away. She’d go back into the shop. Call 911. Demand to speak to Spencer Montgomery and tell him there was someone outside the shop again. The same man who’d attacked her? Someone else?
Since she couldn’t see his face, for all she knew, the man could be sleeping and was no threat at all. Still, that possibility of danger, that hypercharged suspicion of the unknown, prompted her retreat. Keeping her eyes on the car, she backed up beneath the awning until her fingers brushed against the reassuring hardness of hard, cold steel.
“Ma’am?”
Robin screamed. A dog barked and she screamed again as she spun toward the uniformed officer and his German shepherd. She clutched her hand to the quick rise and fall of her chest, unable to summon anything resembling relief. “Officer Taylor. You startled me.”
“Sorry.” He held up a glove
d hand in apologetic surrender and backed away a step. “I don’t make a habit out of scaring people, I swear. Detective Montgomery asked for a volunteer to patrol the neighborhood and I...I just...” His blond eyebrows arched into a frown as he fumbled for the words he wanted to say. “I felt so bad about your friend earlier, Hans and I wanted to hang around to make sure you got to where you’re going.”
“I’m only going across the street.” When she pointed toward Hope’s apartment, and Pike Taylor’s attention shifted to the bridal shop, the engine of the car that had alarmed her turned over and roared to life. Pike’s shoulders straightened, taking note of the green car pulling out and disappearing over the rise of the intersection at the top of the street.
Had the uniformed officer scared off the driver? Or was the sudden departure a mere coincidence?
Pike Taylor wasn’t taking any chances. “Across town or across the street, we’d be happy to walk you, ma’am.” Clearly, his vow to serve and protect was no joke to him. “I wanted to do the same for Miss Lockhart, but she wouldn’t... I mean, she was more comfortable with Officer Wheeler. Maggie’s a good cop, don’t get me wrong, but I’m not a horrible... I’m rambling, aren’t I?”
Her terror eased into something approaching motherly concern at his struggle to express himself. Robin inhaled a deep breath that seemed to calm them both. “I’d be relieved to have you walk me over to Hope’s apartment.”
“Okay.” With a brusque command to Hans, the three of them crossed the parking lot. Robin noticed how Pike Taylor’s gaze scanned up and down the street with every step, just as Lonergan’s had when he’d taken her and Emma inside the shop.
Robin, too, searched the lights and shadows as they stepped off the curb. “Did you see him?”
“The guy in the green sedan?”
“No, the...” Lonergan was gone. Again. He was a mystery who fascinated as much as he frustrated her. But the message was clear. For whatever reason, he wanted nothing more to do with her. He’d said he had only one good deed in him, and she’d already taxed his quota for the night.
She tried to block out her curiosity about her rescuer and concentrate on the young man beside her. “So staying late is Hans’s idea, too?”
Pike Taylor grinned. “The two of us think a lot alike.”
Robin smiled at the idea of a man and his dog thinking as one. “My friend Hope bought the bottom two floors of this building from the same man who sold me my space across the street. She’s converted the entire level above her bridal shop into storage and a generous-size apartment.”
“I remember her, from interviews and security sweeps early in our task force investigation. She usually wears her hair all up in a bun so I didn’t recognize her tonight. I thought she was older.” He followed Robin through the parking lot gate to the building’s side entrance. “She’s not.”
Robin was beginning to wonder if Pike’s interest in Hope had to do with something other than guilt. “She’s younger than me,” Robin assured him. They reached the brick archway framing the door and she pulled out the keys to unlock both the outer entrance and the inside door that led upstairs to the private apartment. “Thanks for the company.” She smiled up to the man holding the glass door for her and then looked down to her other escort. “Is he friendly?”
“Unless I tell him not to be.”
“May I?” Pike nodded at her request to pet the sleekly muscular dog. Feeling the closest thing to normalcy that she had all night, she scratched around the shepherd’s wet ears. When he pressed his head up against her palm in silent approval, she petted him again. “Thank you, too, Hans. Now you tell this big guy to get you a treat and a warm, dry place to sleep for what’s left of tonight.”
“I will.” Pike tipped the bill of his KCPD cap and twisted his mouth with a wry smile. “And, please, give my apologies to Miss Lockhart. I’m really not that scary of a guy.”
Tilting her face into the rain to assess his height and the equally brawny dog at his side, Robin begged to differ. But there was such a boyish earnestness in his blue eyes, she didn’t have the heart to argue. “I’ll tell her. And thanks.”
Such a simple word—thanks. Such a relief to get to express gratitude where it was due.
“You’re welcome, ma’am. Good night.”
“Good night.” Robin bolted the door behind her and watched as Pike and Hans jogged back across the street. She turned to unlock the door that led to the upstairs apartment when she heard a sharp rap on the glass behind her.
Wishing her startle mechanism had fritzed out for the night so she’d stop jumping at every little noise or movement, Robin pressed a hand to her racing heart and turned—fearing her attacker had returned, hoping Pike Taylor had forgotten something.
She didn’t expect to see a ghost.
“Lonergan,” she whispered, quickly unlocking the outer door and pushing it open. “I thought I saw you. You came back.”
He squinted against the rain pelting his face. “Are you and the kid okay?”
“Yes, I...” She invited him to step into the vestibule, but wasn’t surprised when he chose to remain out in the elements. Somehow, the unforgiving downpour that soaked his hair and plastered his shirt to every intimidating cord of muscle fit his wild, dangerous looks. Fine. He had an aversion to civility? Then she’d enter his domain. Letting the door close behind her, she joined him out in the parking lot. Her hood fell back and the rain chilled her skin even as her temper brewed. “What kind of game are you playing? The police wanted to talk to you. What’s with the magician’s act of showing up and disappearing without a word?”
“I wanted to make sure you got from point A to point B without another incident. Glad Officer Taylor there had the gumption to do the same.” Cryptic dodge of her questions. And how did he know Pike’s name? Just how closely had he been watching and eavesdropping? And for how long? “The guy in the green sedan back there pulled up and started watching your shop—waiting for you to leave, maybe—as soon as the cops cleared out. Couldn’t get a clear look at the driver without giving away my position.”
Giving himself away to whom? The driver or the cops?
“I did get a license number you can hand over to the K-9 Corps there. Tell him you saw the guy watching your place and you want to see if you can get an ID.” He nodded toward her shop across the street. “Did the suits give you any idea why someone wanted to hurt you? Why they’d still be following you?”
“What?” She glanced down at the scrap of paper he pressed into her hand and read the make and model of the green car, as well as the plate number scribbled there. The man was thorough as well as observant. Shaking her head, she crumpled the note in her fist and tipped her chin, looking beyond the forbidding angles of his face to meet his cool blue glare. “I don’t understand you. You’ve been here this whole time? Hiding out and watching this nightmare? Are you afraid of the police? Have you done something wrong? Did I say something that offended you? I know I screamed at you when we first met, but I was under a little bit of stress. You startled me.”
“No. I frightened you. It’s part of my charm,” he added in a self-mocking tone. “I’m used to it.”
Robin bit down on the urge to argue her point. One look into those craggy, distorted features and she knew he wasn’t exaggerating. It wasn’t a handsome face. There was no friendly vibe here. Still, there’d been other things she’d noticed—his strength, his protective nature, his willingness to help a stranger in trouble—that she’d been attracted to, that she’d longed for tonight. “I’d hoped you’d stay with me. I needed you.”
“You don’t know me, lady. I’m not what you need.”
“It’s Robin, remember? And you have no idea what I needed tonight. I needed to feel safe. I needed to believe that no harm would come to my daughter. I needed an anchor in the middle of all that chaos. You said you’d stay.”
“I said I’d stay until the cops showed up. I kept my word.”
“You kept...?” She tapped the
fist that held the paper against his shoulder, knowing she couldn’t be so unkind—or foolish—to really vent her frustration against him. “The only time I felt safe tonight was when you were with us. I felt like somebody had my back so I didn’t have to be afraid for a few minutes and I could think straight.”
Lonergan shook his head. “I can’t be that guy for you.”
And yet he had been. “You’re right. I don’t know much about you. I don’t know where you’re from or what you’ve done. But tonight, you were everything Emma and I needed. That’s the man I know. That’s the man I expect you to be.”
“You’re welcome to your expectations, lady.”
“Robin,” she corrected, irritated with his adamant refusal to be civil. “Are you ever going to have the courtesy to tell me your first name?”
“I don’t do niceties. Small talk isn’t my thing.”
“No. Strangling masked men, lurking in the shadows and being stubborn is your thing. At least have the good sense to get out of the rain.” She retreated to the door, unsure whether she was inviting him in or urging him to leave.
“I will. Now that I know you’re safe. Don’t go out at night by yourself again. Especially with the kid. She’ll distract your attention and slow you down.”
“I’ll do whatever is necessary to protect my daughter.”
“Exactly.” He moved a single step forward, filling up her personal space, perhaps trying to frighten her again, perhaps succeeding. “You won’t do her any good if someone takes you out.”
“Takes me out?
“I’m not talking about a date.”
She knew what he’d meant. Why go to that dark, morbid place? What kind of man thought like this? In terms of basic survival. Black and white. Good and evil. Robin didn’t know whether to fear this beast of a man or pity him. “Who are you, Mr. Lonergan?”