A Date for the Detective_A Fuller Family Novel

by Liz Isaacson

  Chapter Nine

  By the time Kyler got back to Brush Creek, he was cranky and hungrier than he’d ever been. Milt met him just inside the front door, his eyes broadcasting his worry and his relief at the same time.

  “There you are.”

  “They took my phone.”

  “McDermott told me.” Milt grabbed his wallet. “Let’s go get a burger and a new phone.”

  “It’s Sunday.”

  “A burger then.” He opened the door, obviously not going to take no for an answer. “I know you’re hungry.”

  And Kyler didn’t really want to be alone either. Left to himself to consider that the man that had come to the cabin door had warranted two dozen people to come sweep for hair, fibers, take casts of his footprints, all of it. He wished now more than anything that he’d been able to take a picture of him. It seemed like Dahlia and her partner had never seen the man in real life or in a photograph.

  So Kyler followed his brother out to his truck and got in, a long sigh slipping through his lips. “What a morning.”

  “I didn’t realize how big of a deal it was,” Milt said. “I was talking to Tate at his desk, and McDermott overheard me. He sort of went nuts and started asking all kinds of questions. Then he got on the phone and disappeared into his office. Next thing I know, he’s dashing out and asking if I could call you to make sure you stayed at the cabin.” Milt gave him a sideways glance as he drove.

  They arrived at the T-junction, with Oxbow Park straight in front of them, and their destination on the other side of the forest. In the winter, Kyler could see Ruby’s through the bare branches, but in mid-June, the diner was obscured.

  “I didn’t get a call from you,” Kyler said.

  “It went to voicemail.”

  “He must’ve had me put the phone down already.”

  Milt drove over the river and around the park, taking a spot right in front of Ruby’s Roost. “Come on. Come tell me all about it.” He smiled at Kyler and a blast of reassurance hit him in the chest.

  “I have something else to tell you too,” he said, climbing out of the truck.

  “Oh yeah?” Milt kept his eye on him as Kyler circled the hood. “What about?”

  “A woman.”

  Milt’s face exploded into a smile. “How long have you been keepin’ this a secret?”

  Kyler shrugged. “Not that long. I met her this weekend.”

  His brother’s smile faltered and confusion colored his face. “Weren’t you at the cabin this weekend?”

  “Yep.” Kyler popped the P sound as he reached for the door to let himself into the diner. “And there was a storm, and this woman showed up on my doorstep needing a place to stay.”

  “Kyler,” Milt said, a note of chastisement in his voice.

  “What?” He held up two fingers to the hostess and started after her when she grabbed two menus and headed down the aisle between the tables.

  “So who was she?” Milt asked as he slid into the booth across from Kyler.

  “Dahlia Reid.”

  Milt dropped his menu. “The detective.”

  “The one and the same.” Kyler lifted his eyes to the waitress and said, “As much Dr. Pepper as you’ve got. With lemon.”

  Milt could barely order his diet soda, and when the waitress walked away, he stared at Kyler. “I need details, now.”

  Warmth finally started to spread through Kyler again, and he didn’t feel one breath away from shattering. “So I was just making dinner when someone pounded on the door….”

  Kyler’s house sat in the middle of the block, on the east side of town, in a quiet neighborhood where children rode their bikes and the summer breeze lilted through the treetops. He sat on his front porch as the community went to sleep, moving to the back where there wasn’t as much light pollution so he could see the stars better.

  Nine o’clock came, then ten, and Dahlia didn’t arrive. He could hardly stand to think of her out in the wilderness surrounding the cabin in this darkness, especially with the level of exhaustion he’d seen in her face much earlier in the day.

  He wondered if this was her reality all the time, or if big cases like this were rare. He wasn’t sure, but he wanted to find out. His feelings ping-ponged around, never really settling in one place long enough for him to make sense of.

  When eleven o’clock hit, he went inside and brushed his teeth, BB at his heels. “She said she’d come,” he told his dog, but BB just cocked his head to the side. He couldn’t bring himself to commit fully to going to bed, so he stretched out on the couch, the TV on in front of him and his dog pressed against his chest. That way, he’d be closer to the front door if Dahlia came knocking.

  It would normally be this time of night where Wren would text him his schedule for the following day. Milt said he’d pick him up and make sure he knew which jobs needed to be done. Kyler sighed just thinking about ten hours of trimming, weeding, hauling, and mowing. He loved it; he wasn’t like Brennan who wanted to do something different with his life.

  He just wanted more to his life than mowing grass or building retaining walls. He wanted someone to come home to at night, someone to share his life with besides a twenty-pound dog, maybe a few kids. Yawning, he let his eyes close, and the next time they opened, five sharp raps echoed through his still-soft mind.

  His heart catapulted to the back of his throat, BB barked and jumped down from the couch, and Kyler sat up abruptly, trying to gain his bearings. The TV still flickered, as did the lamp on the end table. The knocking came again, and Kyler launched himself off the couch and to the door, saying, “Dahlia,” before he even had the door open all the way.

  She stood on his front porch, haloed by the light. When she looked up at him, he saw her with every defense down. She was soft and beautiful, as well as fierce and determined when she stepped into his personal space and ran her hands up his chest.

  He went with her, not quite sure what she needed but willing to give it to her. Her fingers curled around the back of his neck, drawing his forehead to hers. “I’m so tired,” she whispered. “And yet I couldn’t just go home without seeing you.”

  She gave him a bit of breathing room, and their eyes met, locked. “Why is that? I used to go home without seeing you all the time.”

  “Things change,” he said, pushing BB back with his foot. Apparently the little dog liked Dahlia as much as Kyler did, as he kept putting his front paws on her legs.

  “In an instant.”

  “Did you find what you were looking for up the canyon?”

  Instead of answering him, she drew his mouth toward hers, kissing him with those soft lips, her fingernails tracing along his hairline and sending shivers across his shoulders. He kissed her back, exploring gently, before realizing they stood on his front porch where anyone could see.

  “You want to come in?” he asked.

  She nodded and stepped past him.

  “Coffee?” He shut the door as BB trotted after Dahlia. “Tea? I have both.”

  “Tea would be great.”

  Kyler busied himself in the kitchen while she sank onto the couch where he’d just been asleep. One glance at the clock—twelve-ten—told him he was going to be in serious trouble tomorrow when he had to work.

  A few minutes later, he presented her with a cup of chamomile, and she breathed in the steam. A smile pulled at the corners of her mouth, but it disappeared quickly. She took one sip of the tea and set the cup beside the lamp.

  “Kyler, there are…certain things I can’t tell you.” She kept her focus on her hands for a moment before lifting them to meet his. “Ever. Certain parts of my job that you can’t know.”

  “All right.”

  “No, it’s not all right.”

  Kyler didn’t know what she expected him to say. She sighed and took his hand in hers, gently tapping it against her thigh before wrapping her other hand around his too. “You really think you can live with not knowing everything I do at work?”

  She seeme
d genuinely concerned, and Kyler cocked his head, trying to figure out the real conversation they were having. “I don’t think I need to know everything, no,” he said. “I don’t detail every aspect of what I do at work.”

  “What do you need?”

  He wished he’d had a little more time to prepare to answer these questions. But he said, “I think I need to know you’re safe,” and that idea felt right coming from his mouth. “And that you’ll be coming home at night.” Vulnerability tore through him. “I think that’s what I need.”

  “I can work on giving you those things,” she said. “I’ve been single for so long, I sometimes forget I should check in with my boyfriends.”

  The word ripped through Kyler, making his blood pump faster in his veins. “Is that why you’re not seeing anyone? I mean, besides me.” He tried a smile, glad when her lips up curved for a moment.

  “My job has ended several relationships over the years,” she said. “My mother took care of the rest.”

  “Your mother?”

  “She’s a bit critical of the men I’ve brought home.”

  “How many men is that?”

  “Four or five.” Dahlia shrugged, her eyes trained on their joined hands. “Nothing ever worked out.”

  A lump formed in Kyler’s throat. “Do you think we’ll work out?”

  Her smile carved its way across her face at the same rate it carved into his heart. “I guess we’ll see,” she said.

  “So I’m stuck waiting for a date with the detective, is that it?” Kyler teased.

  She touched her lips to his, a quick peck that still ignited something inside him he hadn’t expected to ever feel again. “That’s about it, yes.” She stood, removing her hands from his. “I’ll call you tomorrow, okay?”

  “I don’t have a phone, remember?” He got up and ripped off a corner from a utility bill stuck to his refrigerator. “Write your number down again, and when I get a new phone, I’ll text you.”

  “Always trying to get my number.” She giggled, wrote her number down, and gave him one more bone-melting kiss before slipping out the front door like a thief in the night.

  And she really was a thief, because she’d stolen his heart after only a few days.

  Chapter Ten

  The next several days passed in a blur for Dahlia. Coffee, work, stress, eat, sleep, coffee. She was never sure where her next hour would take her, and she’d been all over Maple Mountain, the bluffs, Beaverton, and the canyon where Kyler’s cabin sat.

  She never wanted to go to that canyon again.

  The coyote had disappeared, seemingly without a trace.

  Stace had searched for the number, and it belonged to a burner cell phone Dahlia and Gray found in pieces on the side of the road, only a mile from the turnoff to go up to the cabin. He’d clearly called for a pick-up, and by the time anyone knew he’d made contact with Kyler, the coyote was gone.

  But who had picked him up?

  Gray firmly believed their chauffeur—as they’d started calling the driver—lived nearby. How else could he or she just drop everything and get to that stretch of highway so far from civilization before McDermott Boyd arrived only ninety minutes later?

  Dahlia agreed with him, but short of going door-to-door and asking, the trail had gone cold.

  The fingerprints hadn’t matched any in their database. The boot prints had been narrowed to two stores in a hundred-mile radius, one of which was the sporting good store in Vernal. Dahlia and Gray had made the visit, found the boots, and questioned every employee to find out if the coyote had ever been there to buy those work boots.

  Not a single person had seen him.

  “He has a circle,” Dahlia had told Gray when they’d left. “He doesn’t go buy his own boots.”

  Gray’s stormy expression over the top of the car said he agreed. He agreed, but he didn’t like it.

  Dahlia didn’t either. It wasn’t healthy to live, sleep, and breathe a case like this, and yet she couldn’t seem to let it go. She stopped by Kyler’s when she got off work before ten p.m. Otherwise, she texted him. They still hadn’t gone on their date, and while he was being patient and chill about the whole thing, Dahlia feared he’d move on. Decide he didn’t want to be left home alone while she ran around trying to find ghosts in the wilderness. Find another woman to talk with, hold hands at a decent hour with, and kiss goodnight.

  With another Monday dawning, Dahlia stood in the shower, determined to make that evening their first official date. With damp hair and a towel still around her, she texted Gray and said she needed to take a step back from this coyote thing.

  He agreed instantly, followed with Why don’t you just come in this morning? I’ll get TJ to go out with me if something comes up.

  TJ was the Beaverton Sheriff, and he often was privy to their cases, as they shared office space with the Beaverton PD.

  Take the whole afternoon off?

  Sure, Gray messaged. Go get your hair done, or take a nap, or sip that fruity soda you like in the park. It’s a gorgeous day.

  Dahlia fingered the ends of her hair. She hadn’t been to get her hair done in a while. And she did like her peach-flavored sodas. And nothing sounded more heavenly than a nap.

  Except a date with Kyler.

  She dressed quickly, throwing her hair into a ponytail and grabbing a banana before she left the house. Once at the office, she sat in the car and texted Kyler at his new number. Are you free tonight? I’ve just decided to take the afternoon off, and we could go to dinner…

  When he didn’t respond instantly, she grabbed her purse and headed into her desk. Gray already sat at his—he seemed to always arrive before Dahlia and leave after her—and he glanced up as she set her bag down, quickly followed by the forty-four-ounce soda she’d bought on the way out of town.

  “Morning,” she said, sitting down and jiggling her mouse to wake her computer. “Did you go home last night?”

  Dahlia had managed to zip over to Vernal for a single hour to have lunch with her parents. Her father knew she was working a difficult case, and neither of her parents had said anything about her shorter and shorter visits.

  “Yeah.” Gray wiped both hands down his face, his eyes bleary and bloodshot when he opened them again.

  “That’s not healthy,” Dahlia said. “You need more to your life than this job.”

  “Says the woman who hardly ever goes home herself.”

  “I’m taking the whole afternoon off.”

  “Which means I can’t.”

  “Take tomorrow,” she said, peeling her banana and keeping one eye on Gray. He’d been good to her, kind, patient as she learned her new role when she’d first started.

  Gray sighed, a long hiss that alerted Dahlia to something more than just being overworked. “And do what?” he asked.

  “Rest,” she said. “Go play golf. You’re always talking about that course you want to play, and you never go.” She bit into her banana, fully staring at him now.

  She saw him roll his eyes. Saw the tick of the muscle in his jaw. Saw the way he glanced away from her as if he had something he wanted to stay secret.

  “Get a coffee,” she said. “And drink it on the couch instead of in your car. Go to breakfast with your daughter. Take a walk on the riverwalk. There are literally a hundred things you could do.”

  He pinned her with his detective’s glare. “I could say the same for you.”

  “I’m taking the afternoon off,” she repeated.

  “You gonna finally go out with that boyfriend of yours?”

  Dahlia’s hand froze, her fingertips digging into the soft flesh of the banana a little too hard. “I don’t have a boyfriend,” she said, her eyes narrowing. “Where did you hear that?”

  “That man at the cabin?” Gray said, making it a question when he already knew. “I know you like him.”

  Dahlia lifted her chin a fraction of an inch, refusing to confirm or deny. Surely Gray couldn’t know about the kissing. Or that she’d gon
e to see Kyler several times last week.

  “I heard something in your voice when I mentioned we should have Stace check him out.”

  “He checked out,” Dahlia said. “And it’s not his fault he was at the cabin when the coyote came. He has nothing to do with him.”

  Gray chuckled. “There it is again.”

  “There’s what?” Dahlia tossed the half-eaten banana in the trashcan, unable to take another bite. She didn’t like mushy fruit, and she’d practically squeezed the life from the banana during this line of questioning.

  “Defensiveness. And you haven’t denied or confirmed anything. Classic avoidance.” Gray cocked one eyebrow at her and returned his attention to the paperwork he’d been studying. “You should go to Teddy’s in Maple Mountain,” he said as if she’d asked for the best restaurants for first dates.

  Her phone buzzed, and she flipped it over fast just in case it was Kyler.

  Gray chuckled now, and added, “They have the best burgers and sandwiches in the county.”

  “I’m more of a salad girl,” she said.

  “Right,” Gray said. “But I imagine someone who works outside all day has an appetite for something more substantial in the evening.” He said it casually and kept his focus on the folder, though there was no way he was even reading the report inside.

  Kyler did like sandwiches, and Dahlia liked trying new places. She’d been everywhere in Brush Creek, and maybe they could make the twenty-minute drive north and experience something different.

  She picked up her phone and found that Kyler had responded with Sure! What time? Where do you want to go?

  The smile crept across her face before she could command her lips to stay straight. Of course, Gray saw it, another chuckle filling the silence between them. As Dahlia tapped out the words I’ve heard Teddy’s in Maple Mountain has the most amazing sandwiches and burgers, she said to Gray, “You’re a real pain, you know that?”