“The last I heard, Captain Jones and Police Chief Hawser were discussing the possibility of a connection, but there’s not enough to go on yet to make any real claim.”
“Other than ‘some people’ think it’s a joke,” Caleb deadpanned.
Dante held his hands up in defense.
“Hey, man, I’m just telling you what people are thinking,” he said. “You’re not the most loved guy around here—seemingly of your own choosing, which is fine, you do you—so I’m trying to keep you in the loop here.”
Caleb wanted to retaliate with a barrage of “you don’t know me” and “I don’t need your help or pity” sentiments, but for once, he let it lie. Because Dante wasn’t exactly wrong. Instead the deputy’s words rolled into a silence that he waited a few moments to break.
“Listen, I just wanted you to know what’s going on,” Dante continued. “And not just because I know you a little bit better than the rest of the department, but because of what you did today. Took guts.”
At this, Caleb snorted.
“I don’t think the captain or sheriff appreciate my ‘guts,’” he mused. He’d been on the receiving end of some heated words from Captain Jones for disobeying a direct order.
Dante nudged Caleb’s shoulder. “Well, I know one person who does.”
Caleb followed his gaze down the hall behind him.
Captain Jones had his head bent and his brow pulled together as he talked and walked along with a woman.
Caleb wasn’t sure what reaction he’d expected to feel when he saw Alyssa again, but whatever he was currently feeling he couldn’t quite place. Even when she brought those startlingly blue eyes up to meet his.
However, that feeling went away when Captain Jones swung his stare toward him.
“Ruh roh,” Dante said beneath his breath. They both stood tall and ready. Before Alyssa or Jones could reach them, Dante added an afterthought. “Remember to be nice,” he whispered.
“Good to see you up and moving around.” Dante greeted Alyssa before the captain could get his, no doubt, hit in at Caleb.
“Thanks,” Alyssa said with a smile. It was amazing how much better she looked from earlier that day. Then again, the AC in the hospital was no joke. The silver lining, at least, to having to be there at all. “I still would love to shower and get some fresh clothes, but I’m not going to complain, since it could have been worse.”
Her eyes flashed to Caleb’s. He kept quiet. Jones did not.
“Which brings me to the what-happens-next,” he began. “I’ve told Miss Garner here that the bomb squad has finished its search of her residence and come up empty. Still, I’d like to keep a law enforcement presence around her until we can find this man with the glasses you both have described or another lead.”
Caleb felt his jaw tighten. He wanted to volunteer, but seeing as how his last conversation with Jones had gone, he was sure that he would only dig his proverbial grave deeper with the man.
“Miss Garner has agreed to this suggestion, and—” Jones took a noticeable pause to draw in a deep breath. Frustration. “—has requested that that deputy be you, Mr. Foster.”
“If that’s okay,” she hurried to add. “You’ve already done more than enough, thinking you were risking your life to keep me, a stranger, company.” Her eyes flickered over to the captain. “It was brave and selfless.”
The captain gave a tight nod. His smile was tighter. A muscle twitched at his jaw. Caleb felt his eyebrow rise. Was she pleading his case in a not-so-subtle way to the captain?
“It was no problem,” Caleb assured her. “And if it’s okay with the captain, then that’s fine by me.”
Captain Jones brandished a forced smile. “Who am I to bench such a brave and selfless man?”
Chapter Seven
“I think my love for cars is now forever tainted.”
Alyssa gave Caleb what she hoped was a humorous expression, not one that reflected the anxiety that had begun to well up inside her at the mere sight of his car.
“Or at least the seats,” she added with a little laugh. Just beneath her surface, her already tired muscles were tensed.
Her car might not have been the most reliable vehicle—it was over a decade old and had the rust and wear to prove it—but at the end of the day it was hers. To have someone go plant a bomb, fake or not, inside it felt a little too intimate. She had, admittedly, felt upset when Captain Jones told her it had been transported to a different site where CSI and bomb squad could take a better look at it. Captain Jones assured her she’d get it back in a day, two tops. Still, with nerves twirling in her stomach like a majorette’s baton, she knew her days of carelessly sliding into any car would be met with a good dollop of anxiety. Her car especially.
And she hated that.
Caleb settled in behind the wheel and looked through the opened door out at her. He motioned to the passenger’s seat, unflinching. “Don’t worry. When I came down to turn the AC on while you were talking to the captain, I made sure to look beneath all the seats. No bombs, real or otherwise, in this car. I promise.”
She kept her fake smile in place and covertly let out an exhale of relief. Soon she was buckled in and they were pulling away from the hospital. The trip had been another unwelcome surprise to a day she’d never expected to live through.
Alyssa was glad to see the hospital move to their rearview as they drove toward her house. With close to no interaction with him, she pointed out which streets the deputy needed to take. The lunch traffic was tapering off, but it was still congested in some parts and slowed their progress. The quiet that had taken over the car intensified. It made her uncomfortable. Or, rather, the time it gave her to think did. By the time they hit the intersection that guided them toward her neighborhood and had to wait through two more lights, Alyssa was nearly out of her mind. So she tried to alleviate the heaviness of memories starting to weigh down on her by talking.
“I don’t like hospitals,” she admitted.
The deputy cut her a look. It made her feel silly for blurting out the first thought that had popped into her head.
“I think that’s a universal truth,” he said. “Show me someone who loves hospitals and I’ll show you a liar.”
Alyssa had to agree with that. “I suppose you’re right. I guess I should say my last experience with one was...” She paused, looking for a word that expressed terror mixed with confusion but still polite for everyday conversation. “...unsettling.”
No sooner had she said it than Alyssa realized she had no idea if the man next to her knew what had happened the year before. At least not to the extent of her personal injuries. While she was in the car that morning, they hadn’t spoken about anything personal.
“I was hurt during the bank robbery last year and woke up in the hospital,” she hurriedly explained. “Law enforcement referred to me as a victim, while the doctor and nurse referred to me as a survivor. And all I wanted to know was how I’d gotten there and how badly I was hurt. It was all very...” She paused to look for another word to describe such a heavy feeling.
“Unsettling,” Deputy Foster offered. Alyssa nodded. “Was today the first time you’ve been back after the robbery? If you don’t mind my asking.”
Again, Alyssa nodded.
“At least this time I woke up beforehand,” she said. A fresh wave of heat moved through her cheeks. “Though it was definitely an experience to wake up to my clothes being taken off in an ambulance. Again, definitely not how I saw my day going.”
Deputy Foster kept his eyes on the street. Alyssa felt her blush cranking up the heat. Again she found herself wishing she’d worn a different bra and panty set.
“The EMTs were pretty quick with it too,” he said, eyes still averted. “I turned away one second and in the next they were handing me your clothes.” He shrugge
d. “But they assured me that they were used to dealing with heat exhaustion and knew what they were doing.”
Alyssa patted the buttons on her blouse. “I am impressed they didn’t rip anything. I already lost my favorite shirt last year.”
The deputy chuckled but didn’t respond past that. Alyssa decided to steer clear of any more hospital talk while silently saying a thank-you to the powers that be. At least this time she hadn’t died in between the ambulance ride and the ER.
Carpenter was small but not small enough where there weren’t a handful of heavily populated neighborhoods in and around the town. Alyssa lived in one named the Meadows, closer to the town limits. The houses were older and, at times, funkier than the traditional ones in other parts of the town. She liked to believe it was an infusion of character and not simply houses that were in desperate need of renovating.
“So, this is me,” she said, pointing to her house at the end of a cul-de-sac. Again she thought of the word character as he pulled into the driveway of the two-story.
“Nice house,” he said, not cutting the engine off. She wondered what his plan was but couldn’t find the courage to ask. He was still a stranger, despite their shared morning.
“Thanks. My sister calls it the jigsaw house. It’s a work in progress, on the inside, that is. I’ve been slowly remodeling it since I moved in. The previous owners had a hard love for 1970s-style wallpaper and green tile. Almost every room looks different from the others.”
Deputy Foster switched his gaze back to the house and nodded. His talkative levels were plummeting. And she didn’t know why. One of his hands rested lazily on the steering wheel, the other on his lap. He seemed bored.
“Okay,” she rallied. “Well, thanks again for everything. I can’t imagine how I would have handled everything without you there earlier.”
Alyssa fumbled for the door handle. Her embarrassment made the space between them seem so small. She was itching to get inside the house.
“No need to thank me. I was just doing my job.”
He turned off the engine but didn’t move a muscle.
Alyssa hesitated. A part of her wanted to invite the man inside—it was the least she could do—but the way he was acting ignited her self-preservation.
“I’ll be out here if you need me.”
A new hardness edged its way into his tone as he said it. One that spoke of finality. Alyssa finally got a hold on the handle and let herself out. Her muscles whined at the quick movement, but her blush compelled her to keep the pace until she was at her front door. It wasn’t until she was in the privacy of her bedroom that she wondered what the deputy was thinking.
Because the man she’d just left wasn’t the same man who had promised he wouldn’t leave her that morning.
* * *
NIGHT WAS CREEPING around the car before the porch light clicked on. Caleb had been listening to the frogs chirping like insects for the last half hour. Before that he’d focused on the birds. And before that he’d been thinking about him being an idiot.
If Alyssa hadn’t requested him to guard her, Caleb would have volunteered, no doubt about that in his mind. Yet as soon as he’d seen the fear—the vulnerability—that had overtaken her outside his car in the hospital parking lot, he’d remembered his one rule while in Riker County.
Don’t get attached.
So he’d shut down. Spoken only when spoken to and kept things professional. Yet he couldn’t deny that he’d wanted to know more about her. And it was that feeling that had only strengthened his resolve to stay in the car.
Even though he’d wanted to go inside.
Now, after his resolution had hardened, Alyssa stepped onto the front porch and turned her gaze directly to his. She’d dressed down in the few hours that had passed since he saw her, wearing a white T-shirt and jeans. Her hair was wet and dark, pulled back at the nape of her neck, and her glasses were off. She was squinting. It compelled him to step outside his car.
“Is everything okay?” he asked.
Alyssa adjusted her gaze. It was still a little off. It made him wonder how blind she was without her glasses.
“Um, actually, this is kind of embarrassing.” She shifted her weight from one foot to the other. “But could you give me a hand? I kind of...” She said the last part so low Caleb started toward her.
“Say that again?”
Alyssa shifted her weight again. She was embarrassed, that was clear. It intrigued Caleb even further. He was already at the steps when she spoke up.
“I kind of lost my glasses,” she repeated. She let out a long sigh. “In the attic.”
It was so unexpected that Caleb’s rule of staying away from the woman took a back seat. “Okay, you’re going to have to explain that one.”
Alyssa’s cheeks noticeably reddened. She motioned for him to follow her. “Remember how I said the inside of the house is like a jigsaw?”
“Yeah.”
“The attic is more of an endless maze.”
She shut the door behind him and motioned up the stairs. Just from where Caleb was standing in the entryway, he could already agree with Alyssa’s sister’s nickname for the place. The stairs were oak but had a thick green carpet runner, while the tile they were standing on was a multicolored mosaic design. Of what, he couldn’t tell, but it was definitely different.
“The second story isn’t as dramatic,” she promised, guessing at his thoughts. “Just some funky wallpaper I’ve been avoiding. The shag carpet, however, officially died right after I moved in.”
She led him up the stairs into a hall that opened up to one guest bedroom, one bathroom and he assumed the master suite. He couldn’t help pausing at the open door to the closest bedroom.
“Well, you weren’t lying about the funky part.”
There was bright-orange-striped wallpaper as far as the eye could see. If he had a weekend, he could tear it all out, no problem. Then they could paint it something less intense and headache inducing.
They.
That had popped up out of nowhere.
“It’s a work in progress,” she continued, unaware that he’d just mentally coupled them. “The attic, though. It’s stuck in its ways.”
“And can I ask why you were up there and how you lost your glasses?”
He followed her to the ladder in the middle of the hallway. Instead of going up, she hesitated and turned to face him.
“Short story, everything that happened today got me feeling...” She paused, seemingly looking for the right words. Her eyebrows drew together and her lips turned down in a frown. Those lips. He’d noticed them while hovering over her waiting for a bomb to go off. Pink and bare.
“Nostalgic,” she supplied, holding up her hands. “I know that sounds strange, but when I was in the hospital, right after what happened at the bank, my sister, Gabby, took a leave at work to help me while I recovered. We were really close growing up and she lives in Colorado, so it was the longest we had seen each other in a while. And it was nice.” She smiled. Those distracting lips stretching wide. “Today got me thinking about what happened then, which got me thinking about Gabby and, well, that snowballed into thinking about my parents.” She laughed and pointed to the ceiling. “And I was trying to get to a particularly difficult box with photo albums in them when my glasses dropped out of sight.”
“And you’re one of those people who really can’t see without your glasses,” he guessed.
It earned him a laugh.
“Blind as a bat,” she answered. “I tried feeling around for them but for the life of me couldn’t find them.” That blush was back, showing up against her skin in a flash. It surprised Caleb.
And intrigued him.
“So I should probably go up first just in case,” he said with a laugh. She nodded.
“If you don
’t mind. I’m not a fan of contacts and would really like to not break my current pair of glasses.” She groaned, blush burning bright. “Because I kind of already lost my only spare.”
Caleb couldn’t help continuing to laugh.
It in turn grabbed a giggle from her. “Armed robberies and fake bombs? I can be smooth. Any other time? Not so much.”
“Being good under pressure isn’t a bad thing,” he pointed out.
“But having your glasses fall off your face into oblivion isn’t either.”
He couldn’t argue with that.
They climbed the ladder and began the great attic search, as Alyssa dubbed it after several minutes had gone by without any luck. The space was roomy and easy to stand up in, but thanks to boxes, old furniture and awkwardly shaped decorations, navigating around wasn’t the easiest thing to do.
“I just have to ask,” Caleb finally said, after pushing aside another box like he was directing a game of Tetris. “Do you have a box in here that leads to Narnia maybe? Because I—”
“Ah!”
Caleb shot up from the crouched position he’d been in just as Alyssa danced, twirled and then flung herself toward him. He met her halfway between their original spots just as she grabbed the hem of her shirt.
“Spider,” she shrieked. “Spider!”
Without wasting any time, Alyssa yanked up on her shirt and pulled it clear over her head like it was on fire. She threw it across the attic. Caleb watched in awe as the T-shirt soared through the air and fell out of sight through the open attic door. Still, the woman was not satisfied.
“Is it on me?” she yelled, flapping her arms in the air. Her terror had its claws in her so deep that she didn’t seem to realize she’d just stripped down in front of him. Wearing a white lace bra, definitely not the beige one from earlier in the ambulance, she kept flailing around with fervor. The motion might have helped her with the bug problem, but it wasn’t helping with his concentration.
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