by Julie Miller
“Shauna?” Eli hurried across the filthy room and unhooked the collar from her neck. “Bastards.” He smoothed gentle fingers around the welts on her neck. “Are you hurt?”
“I’m okay.” Those dark gold eyes conveyed so much—relief, anger, fear…love. “Nothing serious.” She twisted around to show him her bound hands. “A little help?”
Amidst another bout of swearing, he retrieved bolt cutters from a team member and cut the chain between the cuffs. They’d figure out the rest later—for now it was enough to ease her shoulders back into their normal position and have Eli massage her chafed wrists. “You are hurt. Dammit. I didn’t figure it out in time.”
“But you did figure it out?” Smart guy.
“Yeah.” At last she saw the crook of a familiar smile. “I’ve got Yours Truly handcuffed in a police car outside. I brought the whole cavalry. He’s not going anywhere.”
Neither was Richard Powell. And LaTrese Pittmon, she hoped, would make Dwight Powers’s year. “I know who killed our Jane Doe. Makayla, I mean. Makayla Hughes. I can finally put her name on that grave marker. I think a DNA test will prove Pittmon’s not just her biological father, but her killer. I don’t know if he figured out how to dispose of the body on his own, or if—”
“—Garner told him how. There are a lot of messed-up people in this case, Shauna.”
Shauna smiled. One thing, at least, was perfectly clear. She tried to reach up and stroke his handsome, battered face, but her fingers were still numb. “I want to touch you.”
“Me, too. Shall we get out of here?”
Her knees were still weak from whatever knockout drug Michael had given her. But when she stumbled, Eli swung her up into his arms and carried her outside. “I’ve got you, boss lady.”
“Eli, your arm—”
“Can hold you just fine.” He carried her outside to a circle of police cars. Mitch Taylor was there. Cooper Bellamy. Michael was in the back seat of one of the cruisers. So that’s why he’d been so late making the call to Pittmon and Powell. And Eli stood in the center of it all—part of the circle, an outcast no longer.
“I’ve got you.” He kissed her then. Kissed her in front of a dozen KCPD detectives and uniformed officers. He held her tightly, taking his sweet, leisurely time to break the rules.
When he finally raised his head, Shauna was flushed and needy and scared at how much she loved this man.
“I’ve got you. And I don’t care who knows it.”
“NO. I REFUSE to accept this.” Shauna looked at the badge and gun and letter of resignation on her desk. Then she looked up at the tall, wonderful man who’d walked into her office this morning, intent on throwing his career away.
“I need you more than I need this job.”
She reached into the drawer of her desk and pulled out her own letter of resignation. “I typed this up last night. After we…made love.”
“Which time? In the shower or in the kitchen?”
“Eli!”
The glow of mischief never left his eyes as he circled her desk and took her hands, letting his thumbs gently stroke her healing wrists. “This city needs you. KCPD needs you. They need a leader with a conscience—someone who enforces the rules—with heart.”
“But, Eli—”
“No buts, boss lady. You can’t quit.”
“You’re not the boss of me.”
“You’re not the boss of me anymore, either.” He snatched her resignation and tore it in half before she could reach it. “Stay. On the job.” He sat on the edge of the desk, V’d his legs and pulled her between them. “And with me. Dwight Powers offered me a job as an investigator at the D.A.’s office. It might actually be nice to go to work someplace where people are glad to see me.”
“Are you sure? I’m ten years older.”
“I’m ten years smarter. Smart enough to fall in love with you.”
Shauna reached up and touched the scar at his temple, the one he’d earned the first day he’d entered her life. “Seriously, Eli. I love you for it, but don’t do this for me.”
“I’m not. I’m doing it for us.”
Then he gathered her in his arms and kissed her like the equals they were. She kissed him back. Yeah. Shauna liked the sound of that. Us sounded perfect.
ISBN: 978-1-4268-6759-0
BABY JANE DOE
Copyright © 2006 by Julie Miller
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† The Taylor Clan
† The Taylor Clan
† The Taylor Clan
† The Taylor Clan
† The Taylor Clan
† The Taylor Clan
* The Precinct
* The Precinct
* The Precinct
* The Precinct