Return of the Lawman

by Lisa Childs

  In the light, Hutchins was an old man. He sighed. “I believe you will, son. You’ll be anything you want to be.”

  “Now, Jeremy!” Sarah pointed toward the door. “Bed.”

  “Are you a cop, too?” Jeremy turned to Lindsey, the first twinkling of male appreciation of female beauty glinting in his deep blue eyes. He was Jimmy’s son, all right.

  “Naw, I’m a reporter.” Lindsey smiled. “I write stories for the news pa per.”

  The kid ran his finger over Dylan’s badge again. “I wish you’d brought the car and the gun.” He expelled a wistful sigh.

  Sarah propelled her son from the room. At the door he caught the jamb and turned back. “It was nice meeting you, Deputy Matthews.”

  “You, too.” With a trembling hand Dylan shoved his badge in the front pocket of his jeans. His heart hurt. Lindsey’s cold fingers slid around his and squeezed.

  “Sit down before you fall down.” Hutchins gestured toward a chair before his desk.

  Dylan sank into it, stunned. He’d thought himself totally alone, no family left. But there was Jeremy.

  “She’s not going to let you see him again.” The old man leaned his head against the back of his chair. “I have money, lawyers. On your paltry salary, you can’t challenge me.”

  “He’s my nephew.”

  “He’s my son.” The old man’s voice broke.

  Lindsey huffed out a breath. “This is ridiculous. Dylan was not involved in Steve’s death. He doesn’t deserve to be treated like a criminal—”

  “As my brother was treated.” Sarah strode back into the room. “He was hand cuffed, convicted and executed—”

  “He hung himself!” Lindsey defended.

  “He was innocent.”

  “He confessed.” Dylan sighed.

  Sarah shook her head, tumbling auburn hair around her shoulders. “That lawyer advised him to plead guilty, to save his family the ordeal of a trial he’d lose, anyway.”

  “That lawyer is dead.” Lindsey’s dark eyes narrowed.

  “I know, and I’m glad.”

  “Sarah!” Hutchins cautioned. “You’ve said enough. Calm down. This isn’t doing you any good.”

  “We know where you were, Mr. Hutchins, on the night Oliver died. Quade vouched for you.” Lindsey turned back to Sarah. “But where were you?”

  “Get out of my house!” Sarah shrieked.

  Dylan forced his weight on his trembling legs and tugged on Lindsey’s hand. “We’re leaving.”

  “But, Dylan…” Lindsey pro tested.

  “Not now.” His gaze fell on Sarah’s livid face. Her rage had twisted her pleasant features into ugliness. He shook his head.

  In the driveway he sat behind the wheel of the Expedition and gazed for a long moment at the house. His nephew lived in this mansion. What could he offer a boy who had everything?

  The badge in his pocket bit into the flesh of his thigh. The boy had been fascinated by it.

  “Another time,” he promised. Then he turned the key in the ignition. “And I’ll bring the squad car next time.”

  He caught Lindsey’s smile and her soft agreement. “He’d love that.”

  THE FOG SWALLOWED DYLAN as he strode away from the motel room Lindsey had rented. “You’re going to be okay?” she called after him.

  His golden blond head bobbed once, and his voice drifted back to her. “I need to walk awhile.”

  “Don’t get hit by a car. There’s no visibility out here now.” That had been her argument for him to stop the vehicle and stay in Traverse City. She hadn’t had to argue very strenuously.

  He’d been too stunned by the discovery of his nephew to fight the elements. Would he figure out he couldn’t fight the Hutchinses, either?

  “Yes, Mother,” he called over his shoulder.

  She stepped back into the motel room and closed the door. A chair was crammed into the crowded double room next to the window. She sat on it and jerked up the blinds to watch for Dylan’s return. Then she flipped open her cell phone.

  “Dad,” she said when he gruffly answered. “Dylan and I have stopped for the night in Traverse. The fog’s just too thick to drive on.”

  “Marge told me you two were probably headed there,” he said.

  She recognized his tone. “Fishing, Dad? I’m a reporter working on a story. That’s all.”

  “Is it, honey? You had a lot of feelings for Dylan Matthews when you were younger.”

  “That’s it, Dad. When I was young. I’m not young anymore.”

  He chuckled. “To me, brat, you’re just a baby. I’m glad you’re not trying to drive in this soup, but I’m worried about you, anyway.”

  “It’s nothing, Dad.”

  “You’re not sharing the same room?”

  “You’re not asking that question. Are you alone now?” she snapped. An image of him and Marge together like the night she’d caught them on her living room couch rolled through her mind. Her heart ached with the memory. “Lindsey.”

  “Yeah, that’s what I thought. Let’s just leave it, okay? I’m at the Grand Traverse Motor Lodge if you need me, all right?”

  “You’re thinking about your mother.”

  “At least one of us is.” Silence.

  She dragged a shaky hand through her messed-up curls. “I’m sorry, Dad. I’ve never done enough for her. I am a brat.”

  “Lindsey, you’ve always been too hard on yourself. You take care, okay?”

  “Yeah. We discovered something pretty shocking here, Dad.”

  “What?”

  “It’ll keep until we get back. You take care, too.” With a soft click, she cut the connection.

  Then she dialed the Winter Falls police department. From almost a year of bothering Dylan there, she’d committed the number to memory. “This is Lindsey Warner, forward my call to the sheriff, please.”

  A few clicks later Sheriff Buck’s loud voice boomed in her ear. “Yeah, girl, Dylan all right?”

  She smiled at his gruff concern. Then, remembering the way Dylan had walked off into the fog, her smile faded. “Well, he’s out walking. He had quite a surprise here, Sheriff. We’re in Traverse, holed up in the Grand Traverse Motor Lodge due to the fog.”

  “It’s nasty out,” he agreed. “What was his surprise? Or is that personal?”

  She laughed. “It has nothing to do with me. But I’ll let him tell you when we get back.”

  “He’s out walking? He did a lot of that after his mother died and then after his father. He tries to get ahead of the pain.”

  The sheriff’s insight had her mouth falling open.

  “I know the boy, Lindsey. Known him his whole life. He’s a good boy.”

  It was the opening she needed. She’d been burned in the trust department, too. And she’d done a lot of growing up. “You never thought he had anything to do with Steve Mars’s suicide?” Silence.

  “I know you never pressed charges—”

  “I wouldn’t. Dylan is an exemplary officer. He came on duty after Steve Mars had already been put back in the holding cell after his sentencing. I never thought it. Neither did you.”

  Then. She didn’t say it, though. “No, it’s just that it came up tonight.”

  “Dylan talked about it?”

  “No.” She sighed. “Someone else did.” Her battery beeped low. “I’ve gotta let you go, Sheriff. We’ll be back in the morning.”

  “Take care and wait till the fog’s cleared some before you head out.”

  “We will,” she promised, and flipped her phone shut.

  The fog had thickened outside the window. Concern for Dylan brought moisture to her eyes. She closed the blinds and walked into the bathroom to splash some water on her face.

  She feared it would be a long night. How far would Dylan have to walk to outrun the pain of never knowing his nephew, or really even knowing his brother?

  Chapter Six

  A SHORT WHILE LATER Lindsey stepped out of the bathroom and jumped at Dylan’s su
dden reappearance. He reclined on one of the double beds in the motel room. His eyes were closed, but the jerky rise and fall of his chest suggested he wasn’t asleep. “You’re back?”

  He didn’t answer the ridiculous question.

  “I called the sheriff and Dad, so they wouldn’t worry. They were glad we’d stopped because of the fog.”

  “Did I know him at all?” He rubbed his hand over his stomach.

  Lindsey sat on the bed next to his. The hotel room was small, the beds no more than a foot apart. But it was clean, and it wasn’t in Winter Falls. After his recent surprise, Dylan couldn’t have handled the intensity of the memories in Winter Falls.

  “Jimmy?” She dragged in a deep breath. “He was a lot of fun, always out for a good time.”

  “I envied him that.” Dylan ran his hands over his face. “I need a shower.”

  “You’re not going to just wash this away.” Lindsey reached a hand across the space between the beds and patted his broad shoulder.

  He groaned. “She was sixteen. He was twenty-three. I can’t believe…” He trailed off miserably.

  “But you do. And you blame yourself for not putting a stop to it.”

  “He kept saying I should take you up on your offer. I thought he was joking.”

  “You’d hoped.” She shivered. If Dylan had been less honorable, she could have been like Sarah, a teenage mother….

  Abruptly he swung his legs over the bed, so they shared the space with hers, knee brushing against knee. “Did he try anything with you?”

  Lindsey winced over the despair in his deep voice. “No, not really.”

  He caught her chin in his hand and tilted it, so her eyes were level with his. “He did?”

  “He was just being Jimmy. He never forced anybody. Sarah had a crush on him, like I had on you. But Jimmy wasn’t half the man you are.”

  The deep blue of his eyes shifted, rage flashing. “She was his best friend’s little sister. How could he?”

  Lindsey shook her head, her curls wrapping around his wrist where his hand still held her face. “I don’t know.” She sighed. “So that’s why Steve killed him.”

  Dylan shrugged. “I always wondered about that. It didn’t seem right. Steve was Jimmy’s best friend. I envied them their close ness. Then Steve killed him.”

  Lindsey’s heart ached for the pain in his voice and on his handsome face. “We don’t need to talk about this. It happened a decade ago.”

  “A reporter who doesn’t want to talk something to death?” His hand slipped from her face.

  “You’ve had a shock today. You don’t need to talk about Jimmy now.”

  He chuckled, bitterness giving it an edge. “I have a nephew I never knew. And if Sarah has her way, I won’t get to know him.”

  “She wasn’t talking rationally. It was a shock for Sarah to see you.”

  “Was it? Why’d she come back to Winter Falls after all these years?”

  “She didn’t, Dylan. We’re miles from Winter Falls.” She gestured with wide arms.

  “But her husband’s mall won’t be. And didn’t you say the bar tender told you their move here was recent?”

  She nodded, and her reporter’s mind started with questions. “Why?” Lindsey asked.

  Her practical sense provided some answers. “After her parents adopted Steve from Arborview, they stayed in Winter Falls. They believed it was a great small town in which to raise children. Maybe Sarah believes the same, so she moved close to it. You’ve been gone a long time, Dylan. She couldn’t have known you’d return. No one thought you would.”

  “Because they thought I killed Steve Mars.” The bitter ness choked his voice. He cleared his throat. “Thank you.”

  “For what?”

  “For defending me. Thank you for saying that I didn’t, that I couldn’t.”

  A wave of nausea washed over Lindsey, and she wiped her sweaty palms on the denim covering her knees. “Yeah, I had your back at Hutchins’s.”

  Dylan’s hand covered hers over her knee and squeezed. “I like you having my back.”

  “Ten years ago I defended you, after you left. I yelled at the gossips, told them they were wrong.” She remembered the vigor of her defense, her blind love and trust for a man she’d never really known. She’d been so young and trusting. But she wasn’t anymore.

  “You shouldn’t have done that. You didn’t have to. I was gone.”

  “And I blamed them for driving you away. Then I blamed them for pitying me after my mother, well…”

  His hands slid up her arms to her shoulders. He leaned close, so that his lips brushed hers. Soft. Fleeting. Sweet.

  She would have accused him of pity, too, but then he deepened the kiss. Hard. Lingering. Hot. His mouth slid over hers, pushed and pulled until their tongues mated. He urged her closer.

  Lindsey’s heart hammered in her chest. She’d bet Dylan could count its beats. His kiss was warm and passionate, all the things rumor claimed he wasn’t. And full of gratitude for her defense of him.

  She dragged her mouth from the temptation of his. “No, you shouldn’t be thanking me,” she managed to gasp.

  “What?” He stared at her, his blue eyes glazed with desire. She’d never believed he could feel that for her. But he didn’t know the whole truth.

  “Ten years ago, I truly believed you couldn’t harm anyone for any reason. But I’ve seen a lot since then. I know that good, rational people are moved to do horrible things. Some for no reason. You believed you had a reason.”

  Dylan swung his legs over hers and struggled through the small space between the beds. He stopped at the window. The blinds were pulled. She didn’t know what he could be looking at, just that he couldn’t look at her.

  “So,” he said, still facing the window, “it’d be okay if I killed Steve Mars because I believed I had a reason?”

  Lindsey shivered at the coldness of his tone. “I didn’t say that. No, it wouldn’t.”

  “I don’t think so, either. And I think you still believe in me, Lindsey. It’s yourself you doubt.” He turned back to her, his eyes penetrating.

  Lindsey shivered again at the heat in his gaze. “Yeah, maybe I do. But this…” She lifted a hand to en compass the small motel room. “This shared room was because there was only one vacancy. The fog drove many travelers off the road. The lot’s full of big rigs. I wasn’t—”

  “It’s okay, Lindsey. I know you’re a tease, just all talk.”

  She would have blustered and taken offense, but he smiled as he laid down the insult. She narrowed her eyes, but she wouldn’t call his bluff because he’d already called hers.

  “I’m going to take a shower.” He exhaled a gusty sigh. “A cold one.”

  Lindsey forced her wicked chuckle. “Want me to wash your back?”

  “There you go again.”

  On his way around the beds to the bathroom, he paused behind her and squeezed her shoulder. “Who’s this guy who hurt you, Lindsey?”

  She shrugged, but his hand remained. “Nobody. But at one time I thought he was somebody. I was wrong. That hurt more than anything he did.”

  He tugged a curl, and she hissed a curse at him even as her lips curved into a smile. “Pride,” he scoffed.

  She laughed. “And you always thought I had none.”

  “No, that was just a rumor. I never believed it.”

  DYLAN LINGERED in the shower, shivering under the tepid drizzle from the bent shower head. He had to contort his neck to get his hair wet, but he stayed behind the locked bathroom door. He’d caught Lindsey’s naughty little chuckle when he’d turned the lock.

  Then she’d called out, “Didn’t you just accuse me of being all talk?”

  “Well, you’ve done some peeping, too.”

  “Shy?” she taunted. “You have no reason to be.”

  His shower had started icy cold. He finished with one blast of warm before he shut off the faucet.

  Her voice drifted through the door. “You don’t
mind staying here?”

  With her? He heard the unspoken part of her question. But he did mind staying with her. Kissing her had been a major mistake. He wanted her. He wanted the incessantly questioning Lindsey Warner.

  “No,” he said. “I know we’re about a half hour from Winter Falls, but it wouldn’t have been smart driving in this thick fog.”

  “Not used to it anymore?” she asked through the door while he toweled off.

  “Detroit has fog, too. But it does get thick here.” He might have forged on over her suggestion to stop if he hadn’t been so stunned by what they’d discovered in the Hutchinses’ home.

  “You were distracted,” she added.

  He sighed as he stepped into his jeans. He left the shirt on the bathroom counter as he opened the door. “Yes. Any ideas?”

  “Hmm?” she murmured as she glanced up at him. She reclined on her back on the bed, which Immediately brought to his mind the image of lying on top of her.

  He swallowed a groan and leaned against the bathroom doorjamb. “Uh,” he stammered, trying to remember what he’d asked her.

  “Any ideas about what?” she prompted.

  “My nephew. How to get visiting—”

  From the corner of his eye, he glimpsed a shadow behind the blinds. Instinct had him diving for Lindsey just as the first gunshots rang out.

  He rolled with her into the foot of space between the beds and pressed her face into his chest. His heart jumped with an erratic beat against the softness of her mouth.

  A bullet shattered the window.

  “You’re okay?” he whispered as glass rained onto the floor on the other side of the bed.

  She jerkily nodded, her lips brushing against his bare chest.

  “Damn it, I never would have gone anywhere in Detroit without my gun.” He cursed his stupidity. “I didn’t think I’d need it today.” Even while he spoke, his mind played with images of the shooter bursting into the room.

  He had to protect Lindsey. He had to act. Before he could, the gunshots stopped and foot steps re treated from outside the room.

  He vaulted over the bed and to the door, but the fog enveloped the vehicle careening out of the lot. Other guests nervously peered from around cracked open doors as Dylan stood outside the shot-up motel room.