by KyAnn Waters
Today she had sold her father’s car. At least now she had money in the bank, hopefully enough to stretch until she located Elliot’s assets.
McKenna booted up the computer and logged into the Internet. The mail icon flashed. She clicked and waited while her account uploaded.
The phone on the corner of the desk rang. Dustin Pearce appeared on the caller ID. McKenna smiled, her pulse fluttering, and picked up the handset. “Hi.”
“I thought I’d come over and tool around on the computer.”
“It so happens that is precisely what I’m doing.” Cradling the phone with her shoulder, her fingers clicked across the keyboard.
“I’m out front. Open the door.”
McKenna hung up the phone and went to the door.
He came up the walk, smiling. “Did you just get home? I’ve tried calling a couple of times.”
“Next time leave a message instead of hanging up on the answering machine.” That way she wouldn’t worry that some maniac waited to pounce from the shadows. “I take it it’s your day off?”
Wearing cargo shorts, a short sleeve pullover, and running shoes, he entered the house and headed toward the kitchen with a Wal-Mart bag. “Yep.”
Dustin wasn’t nearly as large and sculpted as Tyson. That didn’t make him any less intimidating…or less appealing. He had the lean torso of a swimmer with strong shoulders tapering to a trim waist and calves that could have been chiseled from stone. Definitely too good-looking. She wiped her damp palms on her thighs.
He took a six-pack of micro-brewed stout from the bag, grabbed one, twisted off the cap and handed it to McKenna. Then he opened one for himself. “Look,” he said and leaned against the counter. “My job is to find out what happened to Dr. Porter. I’m not going to lie to you. Everyone working with the investigation believes you’re involved.”
“Except you?”
“Except me.” He took a drink of beer. “Mickey—” It was the first time he used the name reserved for friends and family. It sounded altogether different than simple friendship on his lips. “You need my help. I’m here so let’s go see what we can find in the computer.”
“Okay.” They went back to the office. Dustin pushed the high-backed, leather desk chair into the hallway and pulled the small couch over to the desk. McKenna nervously licked her lips. If Elliot weren’t already dead, it would kill him to see Dustin pull the antique couch with carved wood Queen Anne legs and a decorative scrolled edge backrest across the floor.
Dustin sat down and patted the seat beside him. “Do you have a cd-r, travel drive, or external hard drive? We should back up the system first.”
She glanced over to see him staring at her. Butterflies filled her stomach. Maybe she could sit next to him and not want to jump his bones if he looked like the intimidating detective she’d met in the hospital. This man, sitting on the small sofa, clouded her thinking and liquefied her melting core. She sat down next to him. Whether Mr. Good-looking or Mr. Intimidation, she needed his help.
McKenna had to lean over Dustin to put a writable cd into the disc drive. Her breast brushed his arm. The contact tightened her nipple. She froze. Awareness streaked down her spine, sending heat to her pussy. Now wasn’t a good time to be aroused by the detective. Convince her body of that. She shifted on the seat attempting to quell her arousal. Her breath caught as her panties slid into her damp folds and rasped against her clit.
Oh, god. He noticed. His fingers momentarily paused before continuing to dance along the keys of the computer. Windows opened on the monitor. With a few keystrokes, he deleted insignificant clutter from the hard drive.
McKenna didn’t understand the series of numbers and letters scrolling down the monitor.
“How many e-mail accounts does one person need?” Dustin asked.
“How many are there?” She slid in closer until they were sitting hip to hip.
“Four.”
“One is mine,” she said glancing at his face. To cover the lust simmering at the surface, she brought the bottle of beer to her lips and put distance between their faces.
“I’ll need his password.”
McKenna’s lips sealed the rim of the bottle as she drank her beer. Erotic images of her mouth doing far different things filled his mind, causing a more personal problem. If he didn’t stay focused, the problem would become quite apparent. Not exactly a condition he was prepared to explain.
A battle raged between his head and his gut. He teetered on the edge of protocol. There were two ways to approach the situation--carry out his duties according to police procedure or make a choice his conscience could live with. In the last couple of days, he’d proven he couldn’t follow protocol. And he couldn’t be close to her and not want to touch her, kiss her, and damn, but he wanted to fuck her.
“I wouldn’t know his password.” McKenna’s voice took his focus from her soft kissable lips. “I assumed but didn’t know for sure that he even had a personal e-mail account.”
Dustin leaned back and looked at the computer screen. He knew he could get into the accounts, but it would take time. Technically, he wasn’t on duty. The Porter case, McKenna, had become personal and he had to keep Tyson and the department from discovering his conflict.
Perhaps skirting the issue of propriety, but he considered himself an invited friend helping with a problem. He didn’t need a warrant, right? However without one, he couldn’t remove the computer and take it to the station.
And right now, sitting with McKenna, he didn’t want to. Remaining physically close to her was important. For the investigation. At the very least, for her safety. Not because he wanted in her bed. Yeah right, he couldn’t lie any better than she could.
He clicked through a few more files. “Get another disc,” he said when he came across information relating to Dr. Porter’s research. “This is probably what his colleagues were looking for.” He tapped a few more keys. “Nothing unusual in the recycle bin.”
“Are there any personal files?” She took a long drink of her beer. “Lauren was my mother’s name. Grace is my middle name. Perhaps he kept a file on us.”
“Dawn told Tyson about your childhood. It wasn’t much fun for you.” He held his beer between his index and middle finger and let the near empty bottle teeter.
“Dawn talks a lot for someone always telling me to shut up.” Nervously, McKenna stood up and walked to the window, looking outside. “You know how to read people, Detective.”
“Today I’m just Dustin.”
She glanced over her shoulder to him and smiled. “Do you think he knew I wasn’t his daughter? Is that why he never cared for me?” Crossing her arms in front of her stomach, her hands held opposite elbows. “If he did, it explained why he wouldn’t let me call him ‘dad’.”
Dustin leaned back and stared at her back. “I didn’t know Dr. Porter. I couldn’t say.”
“I look like my mother. So I know I wasn’t adopted. I have a baby book with pictures. A curl from my first hair cut.” She turned around and met his gaze. “There isn’t a single family photo since my mother’s death. It’s thanks to Dawn’s parents that I had school pictures taken.”
“How did she pass?”
“Breast cancer.” She took a steadying breath. “At least, that’s what he told me. But he’s lied about so much. I don’t know what to believe. All my life I thought my mother’s death was too painful for him. That he saw her when he looked at me. Maybe what he really saw was that I wasn’t his.” She pulled back the curtain.
“There’s an old proverb that says you don’t blame the child for the sins of the father.”
“The proverb may be true, but it doesn’t make me feel any better.”
Fabric crunched beneath her hand. McKenna looked closer at the material. Something had turned the fabric hard. “Detective?”
“Dustin. I’m off duty.”
Her brows furrowed as she scraped the hardened area with her fingernail. A fleck of red drifted into the dust, visibly fl
oating in the rays of the sun streaming through the window. “Go back on duty. This looks like blood.” She held out the curtain for his inspection.
Dustin went to her side. “I have to take this to forensics.”
McKenna grabbed hold of the drapes and nearly dropped to the ground as she pulled the entire curtain rod from the wall. Plaster cracked and chunks of wall crumbled away. “Take it!” she cried.
“Easy.” He pulled McKenna into his arms. Tears shook her body. Soothing and gentle, his hand went up the ladder of her spine.
She locked her arms around his middle, clinging to his torso. “Help me find who killed Elliot.” Shivers broke across her flesh and she trembled.
“I’m going to.”
“We’re wasting time.” She pulled back, wiped tears from beneath her eyes, and walked back to the computer.
Dustin slid his hands into his front pockets. “Is there more to this than what you’re telling me?”
“No.” She clicked a few keys.
“What about the men at the funeral? We need to know what they want. We can’t fight what we don’t know.”
“All they said was that they were acquaintances of Elliot’s. I’d never seen them before.”
“I ran the license plate. The car was rented by Robert Marino.” Tyson was currently trying to find out more on the man and the other two with him.
“I don’t know who he is. I can’t help you.”
Dustin sighed and leaned against the wall. “It’s time to put all our cards on the table if we’re going to work together.”
“I agree.”
“Then when do you want to talk about Scott?”
“How did you…I don’t want to talk about him. He’s none of your business.”
“The D.A. thinks he is.” Dustin growled and ran his fingers through his hair. “I’m getting another beer.”
Finding a way to get her to open up was proving difficult. She had to trust him. He had his fucking career at risk. Getting involved was beyond stupid, but he couldn’t seem to change course.
He returned with another stout for her as well. She hesitated before taking the bottle from him.
“Think I’m trying to get you drunk?”
“Alcohol tends to loosen one’s lips,” she whispered.
Dustin watched her lips and talking was the last thing he wanted to do. Maybe if he plundered her luscious mouth, tasted the heat of her kiss, he could burn through her resistance. He wanted to crack her reserve and see if there was as much fire in her body as danced in her eyes.
“I don’t know what you want from me. As hard as it is for you to believe I knew nothing of his life, it’s true. We lived in the same house, yet hardly ever saw each other. Now and again, we’d watch television. We never talked. We sat in silence. I need your help to find out what my father was doing. Was he the source of the trouble or did he fall victim to it?”
“I’m committed to finding out what happened to your father. I’m using every tool at my disposal to keep you safe.”
“I don’t want to be here alone.”
“You aren’t. I’m here.”
“But what happens if whoever killed Elliot comes back?”
“We’ll be ready.” Dustin sat in front of the computer again. “This may take a while. I need to locate the configuration file for the e-mail accounts and retrieve the passwords.”
“Then I’ll leave you to work.”
The ticking sound of the second hand on the grandfather clock mingled with the tapping of computer keys. Like a machine, Dustin focused on his task. Any little clue he could find could help. Anything to shift suspicion off her.
McKenna left him alone. Hours passed and dusk settled outside the window. She changed into mint green lounging pajamas. The silky material hung loosely from her shoulders. She peeked in on Dustin. He continued to make notes on a yellow legal pad.
Her stomach growled. Making him dinner was the least she could do. In the kitchen, she opened the fridge, but the expired milk smelled and the tinfoil-covered casserole dishes were starting to separate into part grease and part unrecognizable mush.
She went back to the office and poked her head inside. “I’m hungry. Are you?”
“I could eat. I’m not finished with the computer.” He glanced up from the screen and his eyes locked on her. “So I’m not going home.”
“I don’t want you to.”
“Do you want to go out?”
“I’d rather stay in.” Her heart pounded under his unwavering stare. The plan had been to use whatever means necessary to keep him close—for self protection and to discover the truth. Now, knowing how she responded to him, perhaps it was too dangerous. “Do you think it’s wise, becoming too personally involved?”
“Probably not,” he said, and then smiled. “But that doesn’t imply I’m working an angle to get you in bed.”
“What if I am?”
Dustin laughed. “I’d say go with it. Sounds like a good plan.”
She didn’t laugh at his amused expression.
“Come on, I’m making progress on the computer. I don’t want to stop. Do you want to order a pizza?”
“Not really.” She sighed. “I’ll get dressed and we can go out.”
He put his hand on her arm. “Don’t. Order something and I’ll pick it up.”
That hand slid down her arm, fingering the silky material of her pajamas. “If you want to keep working, you shouldn’t touch me like this,” she whispered.
“I know.” He let his hand drop. He grabbed his keys off the desk. “I’m going to be at it for a while.” He hitched a thumb indicating the computer. “Would you mind if I parked the truck in the garage when I get back?” He jingled the keys in his palm.
“Why?”
“You have nosy neighbors. You were right. I’m walking a fine line. The department has policies. I don’t want anyone to get the wrong idea.”
“Finding your car in my garage is going to look much worse.”
“I trust my instincts. Those instincts tell me to stay close to you if we’re going to solve this murder. Can I park in the garage?”
“I’ll get Elliot’s clicker.” She went to the kitchen and returned a moment later. “His space is empty. I sold his car today.” He raised an eyebrow. “It’s complicated.”
“You can tell me about that and Scott over dinner. How about Italian?”
“Sounds good.” She leaned against the wall. “How do you know about Scott?”
“This is a murder investigation. Every detail is scrutinized. McKenna—” When he said her name, he sounded exasperated. “This investigation isn’t going to go away. Whoever took out Elliot may return. You can’t hide from them or me. Let’s solve this puzzle, clear your name, and get you your life back.”
She nodded.
“I’ll be back in a few.” Dustin headed out the front door. A moment later, the truck roared from the curb, and the sound gradually faded as he drove away.
* * * * *
“Where’s your partner?” Captain Baird came out of his office.
“Working I’m sure.” Tyson glanced at the captain. He had his keys in his hand. “Before you head out look at this.” Tyson slid his chair over, giving Captain Baird a better view of the computer monitor on his desk. “Mrs. Westerberg lives across the street from the Porter’s. She swears she saw a dark blue or black sedan in the driveway when she let her poodle out at nine. She couldn’t identify the make or model.”
“Bring her in. Have her give a description.” If the neighbor could remember the shape of the taillights, where they were located on the rear of the vehicle, and hopefully a few specifics about the contours of the car, was it boxy, or curved, they could narrow the field of possibilities. “What color car did you say the friend drove?”
“Black Hyundai.”
Captain Baird made a clicking sound with the side of his mouth. “I think you just got a break in the case.”
“I also found some information on the Ma
rino Family. They have businesses in San Francisco and Long Beach. Shipping, paper manufacturing, a handful of other small business. For years they’ve been under suspicion for illegal activities. There’s never been enough evidence to act on by the local police departments. FBI is involved. What I can’t find is a correlation between Dr. Porter and his research and the Marino Family businesses.”
“Keep at it. Check with your partner. See what he’s found out. And tell him to check in once in a while.”
* * * * *
McKenna took a bottle of wine from Elliot’s reserve. Deep reds were supposed to go nicely with Italian cuisine. The table was set, and Dustin transferred their meals from Styrofoam onto stoneware and set them on the table. McKenna set a serving bowl on the counter for the salad.
“Excuse me,” she said as she squeezed between the island and Dustin. He went to the wall and dimmed the chandelier over the table.
McKenna inhaled sharply. The last thing they needed was mood lighting for an intimate dinner. Unless of course, she was trying to get the detective into bed. Getting close to him was beginning to feel a lot less like self-protection—and more like lust.
Dustin held the chair for her to sit and then sat across from her. Lifting his glass to toast, he said, “To finding the truth.”
Emotion churned in her stomach. Their time together represented more than finding out what happened to Elliot. McKenna lifted her glass to him. In Dustin, she had an ally in this mess. “To believing the truth.” They both drank.
Dustin set his glass down and picked up his fork. “Okay, so talk. Why’d you sell the car?” He took a bite of salad.
McKenna swallowed, then sighed. “I don’t want to play games anymore. Albert said cops would say anything to get a suspect to open up.” She glanced at him over another fork-full of chicken. “You don’t have to say anything tonight, Dustin. While you were gone I decided to tell you everything.” She took another drink to push the food down her tightened throat. Hopefully dinner would settle her stomach. Moreover, she hoped it stayed down because her nerves were tangled.