by Addison Fox
“Yep. So can the other K-9 squad. Merlin’s shown some of the strongest aptitude on that front, but I’m hopeful we can work on all the dogs over time.”
“That’s amazing. I wonder if we can breed them for that.” Lost in her thoughts, she bent back over the table, focused on the items.
Finn watched her, that mix of curiosity and keen interest keeping her attention off him and on the evidence items as she worked her way down the table. Her hair fell in soft waves along the curve of her jaw and he could see reddish tones shining in the light that came in through the conference room’s high overhead windows. The same fierce need that had gripped him that morning was back, only this time it was layered with an ice-cold veneer of rawboned fear.
What if something happened to her?
He’d spent this op convinced he could make himself the target, but what if he’d miscalculated?
“Finn?”
He was so lost in his thoughts she neatly turned the tables, her attention now fully focused on him. And in that moment he had an overwhelming sense of remorse mixed in with the bone-numbing fear.
“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
“For what?”
“For dragging you into this. For coming up with this stupid scheme in the first place.”
“But you needed help and—”
He reached for her hands, effectively cutting her off. “I had no right to drag you into this or to ask you to put your life on the line for this dumb idea.”
“But I agreed.”
“Only after I held your personal situation over your head.”
“That’s not true. You offered me a way out.”
If only.
Something dark and bitter coated his throat as he thought about what he’d really done. He’d used a sweet, kind, generous woman to meet his own ends. Even worse, he used her financial situation against her, putting her in a position where she could hardly say no. “I used you to meet my own ends and it’s wrong.”
“But I want to help. I may have fallen out of love a long time ago with Bo Gage, but I was married to him. I also loved him once. I want justice for him and for the other poor soul who was gunned down so horrifically. No one deserves that and they certainly don’t deserve it on the eve of one of the happiest days of their life.”
“But I didn’t give you a choice.”
“Of course you did.”
“That’s not true and you know it. The one thing you needed was money and that’s what I dangled in front of you to do what I wanted.”
The sweet, quiet woman who’d snuggled in his arms that morning was nowhere in evidence as she shoved at a chair. The thick metal made a heavy clanging sound as it hit the floor as she whirled on him, her voice rising with each syllable.
“You may have steamrolled over me to get me out of my house today but you’re not going to steamroll me on this, Finn Colton. I had a choice! I could have easily let go of it all except for Penny. I could have kept her and gone back to my life.”
“You would have done that?”
“Of course, I’d have done it. I was going to do my very best by Bo, but if I couldn’t handle it or couldn’t find a way out of the financial situation, I’d have explained all that to Bo’s dad, sold off what was left of the business and gone back to my life. It’s as simple as that. So stop talking about my choices and how you took them away. You offered me a chance to keep what I wanted and to clear my name and to help you end this evilness that has put a level of fear into this town I’ve never seen before.”
Heat still flared high in her gaze, but along with it he saw something else.
Satisfaction.
Where he’d mistaken her for a woman with little choice or opportunity, he suddenly realized just how wrong he’d been. The situation Bo had put her in—a nearly broke business and a barely functioning home—had actually made it easy for her. She could have walked away from all of it with minimal loss and still taken care of the one thing Bo had valued above all else. Penny.
He’d believed himself holding the upper hand, but all he’d done was provide an opportunity. To fix all Bo had done wrong but also to provide an avenue for her to see that Bo hadn’t died in vain.
If the steely look in her gaze was any indication, he’d have a damn time convincing her otherwise. “It’s too dangerous. I can see that now.”
“Then we face it together.”
He tried once more, bringing back recent events in the hope of deterring her. “No. Absolutely not. We’re done parading around town. Last night’s chase through the parking lot proved that to me.”
“We’ve come too far to back out now.”
Where had this stubbornness come from? And why was he even considering—for one small nanosecond considering—going along with what she demanded?
“You can’t do this. There are other ways, but we’re not setting ourselves up as bait for a killer.”
“Cold feet, Finn?”
“That’s ridiculous.”
“Is it?” She cocked her head, seeming to consider the situation. “Or are you backing out now that we’re finally making progress? If that was the Groom Killer last night, hiding out in the parking lot, that means we got his attention. We’re too close to stop.”
“We’re too close to danger.”
“So what’s the alternative?”
She moved closer and placed a hand on his chest. His pulse was already racing, but the press of her warm palm did the oddest thing. Both calming and exhilarating, the beat picked up even harder, even as he felt a strange sense of peace descend over him.
He’d worked so hard over the past month to keep his spirits up, but he’d be lying if he didn’t admit to the fraying he’d begun to feel around the edges. Bo’s death—still unsolved—and then a second murder had put a black mark over his department and the men and women who worked so hard to keep the peace in Red Ridge. Add on the general sense of panic in town and the loss of business experienced by so many of Red Ridge’s merchants and the murders were taking their toll.
Finn laid a hand over Darby’s, the support he felt there going a long way toward reinforcing those flagging spirits. Yet even with her support, he questioned the wisdom of continuing to flaunt their relationship in the hope a killer would pay attention.
“What is the alternative?” Darby asked again.
“We end this now and go back to our lives. If the killer is looking for couples, there will be no need to look at us any longer.”
“And what if that makes them go after a different target? One who isn’t able to handle himself against a threat like that?”
Unbidden, an image of Michael Hayden lying in a pool of blood at the Circle T filled his mind’s eye, his fiancée crying softly inside the restaurant.
“That’s not fair.”
“None of it is fair. That’s why we have to do what is right.”
Darby moved even closer, the hand on his chest tracing a path up over his collarbone before settling behind his neck. She placed her other free hand around his waist and pulled him close. “We have to see this through. It’s ours to see through.”
Protest after protest rose to his lips but Finn discarded each and every one. They’d started this and, even if it had begun as a scheme to draw out a killer, it had become a mission for both of them. The time to change course had passed.
So had the time to bail.
They were in this. And while he wished he could go back in time and change the unbelievable hubris that had dragged him down this path in the first place, he had no choice but to play the hand.
The one he’d dealt all on his own.
Chapter 14
Darby took her first easy breath when Finn nodded his agreement. She still wasn’t sure when the conversation had shifted—or when she’d begun thinking of the help she was providing Finn as a sort of personal mis
sion—but she couldn’t deny the urgent need that now drove her to see this through.
She did have a choice.
He might not see it, but she saw it clearly.
All her choices, both the one she’d made to join Finn in this work and all the ones that had come before, had led her here. She could no more walk away than he could.
Pressing her slight advantage, she leaned into him and took comfort and strength from their connection. Her earlier thoughts—wondering where they were going and if they had a future—seemed distant and unimportant. Instead she would focus on the moment and take what was here.
In this, too, she had a choice. And she chose Finn.
His lips met hers in a warm welcome and Darby sunk into him. Into the strong arms that reached up and wrapped her in their strength. Into the sexy shift of his mouth over hers. Into the maelstrom of need and want and raw desire that seemed to grip her every time they both got out of their heads long enough to enjoy each other.
This was choice, too.
And for as long as he’d have her, she’d choose Finn Colton.
* * *
Darby looked around the squad room, fascinated with the hum of activity. She could only envision it during the week—each desk full, conversation, laughter and likely an insult here or there tossing back and forth across the open space.
Finn’s office had been turned into a “war room” of sorts—a place where they could set up their murder boards and hunt for the Groom Killer. He could easily have kept the office for himself, yet he chose to sit in among his men and women.
As one of them.
Did he realize how special he was? She’d watched him as he’d worked with Carson back at the ranch, going over the problem of the killer as well as the questions both had had about Demi. Finn had listened to Carson, probed when he’d wanted to know more and asked for additional clarification as the man argued his points. Finn had then posed his own thoughts and ideas, yet it in a way that was both collaborative and complementary, even when they’d differed. Darby knew she had gotten an inside sneak peek most civilians didn’t ever see because of her involvement in “dating” Finn, but it had been fascinating to watch all the same.
Her experience with men, while not nonexistent, had consisted mostly of the years she’d spent with Bo and a few other pockets of dating that hadn’t lasted all that long. She and Bo had rarely argued but she’d always had this vague sense that he was humoring her whenever they disagreed on a subject. Almost as if he were hearing her yet not truly listening to what she’d had to say.
She’d had friends at the time who’d expressed similar frustrations about their husbands and she’d chalked it up to one of those things about marriage people forgot to mention. After the vows and the champagne and the cake were done—after you went home and tried to make a life—you had to figure out how to communicate with each other.
And if you got a dud?
Well, that was marriage.
It had seemed terribly unfair. More, it had been a frustration to realize that someone she was trying to make a life with and find middle ground with seemed content to sit on his own personal high ground instead. Worse, Bo Gage had been loathe to share it with her.
“It’s sort of a mess right now. We do a massive cleanup twice a year and we’re definitely due for it.”
“Hmm?” Keying into Finn’s words, she shifted her focus to him. “What’s that?”
“The squad room. We’re a bit of a mess right now. I know how much you like cleanliness and order, and we’re a bit short on both at the moment.”
She might like order but she liked closed cases better. “I’d rather know you had a messy precinct where everyone worked on shutting down crime than waste one minute worrying about where everything was filed.”
“You surprise me. You got so quiet, I figured it was a creeping sense of horror and a desperate urge to flee out the door.”
There it was again. That reality that Finn paid attention to her.
“I was actually thinking about marriage,” she offered. “Which, if we’re being fair, sends some people fleeing for the door, too.”
“What made you think about marriage?”
“I was thinking about how you are with your staff. How you listen to them. Take their thoughts into consideration. It’s an amazing trait and one not everyone has.”
A dull flush crept up his neck. “It’s my job.”
“No, I don’t think so. Your job is running the precinct and carrying the weight of Red Ridge on your shoulders. That would make anyone think their way was the right way. Yet you bring others into the process.”
“I may carry the weight of expectation but the men and women of my squad are out there every day, putting their lives on the line. It would hardly do to forget they have eyes and ears, too. They see things I never will because I’m stuck in here so often. And they’re never going to hone their instincts or their ability to think through a problem if I shut them down all the time.”
Did he have any idea how rare he was?
Putting Bo and their relationship aside, she’d known a lot of people in her life and few were as emotionally evolved as Finn. From her fussy boss at the diner to the way Hayley Patton had pranced around the K-9 training center, hollering out orders to the staff even though she had no real authority, Darby had observed far too many people who just wanted it done their way.
Without checking the impulse, she tugged on his shirt, pulling him close for a kiss. Every time felt fresh, but something had changed. She saw Finn Colton through a different light than before and it changed everything. The kiss was deeper. More intimate.
And while all that had come before hadn’t been even remotely cold or unfeeling, this one was hot.
A loud hoot interrupted their kiss and Darby pulled back, a big grin on her face. “Sorry. You are at work.”
“They’ll survive.”
“Still.” She backed away, bumping into the edge of the desk he’d set up at here in the squad room. The move was enough to have a stack of papers and folders tumbling off the edge along with a loud thud.
“Oh! Oh! I’m so sorry.” She hunkered down, reaching for the folders, and saw a small package nestled among the mess of papers. Darby picked up the box, surprised at how heavy it was. A small card was stuck to the top with “Chief Finn Colton” printed in neat script. “This looks like it’s for you.”
“Where did you find that?”
“It was here. Among the folder and papers. I must have knocked it off along with your files.”
“Was it on top?”
She’d seen any number of emotions flicker through his gaze over the past week, which made what she saw now that much more startling.
Traces of fear.
“Finn? Are you okay?”
“Sure. I’m fine.”
He took the box from her and shoved it into his pocket.
“What is that?”
“Nothing, I’m sure.”
“It looks like something. And, wrapped in red paper, it suggests you have a valentine.”
The idea that Finn actually did have a valentine stabbed at her. He’d told her last week when they’d started their fake relationship that he was unattached. How silly of her to believe him.
And how easy it was to fall back into the same pattern. An attractive man showed interest and in a little more than a week she was right back to the same place she’d been in her marriage. A trusting fool.
“I don’t have a valentine.”
“It appears otherwise.” She kept her tone low and even, praying the quaver she felt tickling her throat didn’t come through.
“I really don’t. These—” He broke off, a grimace turning his mouth into a straight line. “These gifts keep showing up. They’re all anonymous and they suggest I have a secret admirer here in town.”
A secret admirer? Was this 1952?
“No one knows who’s sending them?” she asked.
“I didn’t pay attention at first. And the last few that I did question were brought in by a delivery service.”
“Do they know who it is?”
“Someone paid cash.”
She wanted to press and probe him as to why he wasn’t taking the situation seriously, especially because it was at direct odds with the behavior she’d seen with his staff. Where he focused on them and encouraged their work, his reaction to these so-called gifts to himself seemed to be dismissive.
As if he sensed what she was thinking, he rushed on. “It was a box of candy, some flowers and a few dopey cards. What am I supposed to do about it?”
“For starters, maybe take it more seriously. Finn, you’ve been trying for the past week to entice a killer. Maybe you’ve succeeded.”
* * *
Finn ignored the discomfort that tightened the back of his throat. “It can’t be the Groom Killer. The gifts came before you and I began parading around town.”
“That doesn’t mean it’s not. He or she may be courting a new victim. Did Bo or Michael Hayden receive any presents or trinkets?”
“No. Not that we’ve found.”
“So what if it’s some sort of escalation?”
“Darby—” He stilled, her comments sinking in. “You’re not half bad at this, you know.”
“I watch cop shows.”
He frowned at that. “Most of which are loosely based on the truth and dramatized in most parts to highlight a sense of danger. I mean the way you’ve quickly processed this.”
It was just like earlier, when she’d posed the question of breeding her dogs to better detect materials. She was whip quick and, with sudden clarity, he saw a reality of her life.
She’d spent most of it sorely underestimated.
First by her mother and later by her husband.
He thought about Bo’s business, his beloved Penny and the future of the dogs he loved so much. The man might have been a poor husband and unskilled business owner, but the one thing he’d loved without reservation had been his dog. Finn had to wonder that maybe Bo had known exactly what Darby was capable of and known all along what he was doing. It certainly gave credence to why Gage had never changed his will.