Harlequin Romantic Suspense July 2021 Box Set

by Carla Cassidy

  There it was again.

  Gaslighting a person to make them feel off-kilter. Or worse, to scare them into thinking they are the problem.

  It was the same thought he’d had the prior night and it was odd how neatly it meshed with Jillian’s experience.

  Before he could press her, Jillian kept on with her train of thought. “From one Colton to another, I am going to use my familial privilege to poke a bit more.”

  Despite the gleam in her eyes, Troy was still blindsided at what came next.

  “You have feelings for Evangeline and I think she has them for you in return. Don’t let this strange situation circling around you both keep you from recognizing that.”

  “It’s not like that.”

  “Oh no?” Her lone, lifted eyebrow suggested just how much she believed him, but her next words proved it. “You’re crazy about her, that much is obvious.”

  “She’s part of an active investigation. That’s all.”

  “Keep telling yourself that, cousin.” Jillian reached down and hefted one of her bags of evidence. “Just keep telling yourself that.”

  When she took off in the direction of the precinct, all Troy could do was follow, her words trailing him the entire way.

  * * *

  Less than an hour later, Troy cursed Jillian for her perceptiveness. And for the endorsement she’d given for him to pursue Evangeline.

  You have feelings for Evangeline and I think she has them for you in return. Don’t let this strange situation circling around you both keep you from recognizing that.

  Entirely inappropriate feelings, he amended.

  He was a cop and a good one. He knew how to keep his head and he knew how to assess danger. Yet despite his attention and oversight, this case had moved from bizarre to sinister in the span of a heartbeat. A shift that had happened while he was kissing her in her kitchen, brainless from the feelings coursing through him.

  That length of fuse, strung between lampposts, was the proof he needed that something was going on outside of Evangeline’s imagination. But just like everything else she’d experienced so far, the evidence of wrongdoing had disappeared. And he’d been too distracted to keep an eye on the evidence before it disappeared.

  Settling in at his desk, he pulled up his files. He’d promised Brett coffee and then he’d had to text him early that morning that he was waiting for Jillian instead. His partner had taken it in stride, wishing him luck.

  And now here Troy was, with nothing to show for it anyway.

  Which had done nothing for his mood. There had to be something he’d overlooked. Tapping in his password, he waited as his files booted up. As he did, he considered Jillian’s theory on Randall Bowe.

  Troy had been working on running down the brother, Baldwin Bowe, but hadn’t found the man yet. He knew the two were estranged—or at least had been, based on last intel on either of them. But estranged or not, familial bonds could get someone to act on behalf of a sibling or parent.

  If Randall was hanging around Grave Gulch, it gave a bit less credence to the idea he’d holed up with his brother. Troy wasn’t quite ready to close the line of inquiry, but it was something to think about.

  “One unsugared coffee, piping hot.” Brett strolled in and set the to-go cup on Troy’s desk. “Or more aptly named, why bother?”

  “I call it high-test and I could say the same about your chocolate and sugar-laden coffee that doesn’t deserve to carry the name.”

  “It’s called energy, my friend.” Brett pointed toward the computer. “And you look like you need it. What happened with Jillian this morning?”

  Troy caught Brett up over coffee, the two of them bouncing theories back and forth.

  “You’ve got photos of the fuse?”

  “Yep.” Troy called up the photos on his phone, handing them over. “It’s thin but you can see it. And I got it from a few angles.”

  “And then it was gone this morning?” As Troy nodded, Brett pressed on. “I owe you an apology, then.”

  Troy considered Brett across the desk. They’d paired up well and worked well together and he knew Melissa was leaning that way. He wanted a partner who would be honest with him and who could call him on his bs.

  That sense had always been true for him. It was even more true now, as the GGPD faced one of its biggest challenges in the history of the department.

  “No, you don’t. Not for doing your job and asking the right questions.”

  “Yeah, but you also trusted your gut. And now you’ve got proof.”

  “It all depends on what Jillian finds in the lab. She took some evidence from the blown-out streetlamp. We’ll see what she turns up from that.”

  Brett took a sip of his coffee, considering. “Your angle on Bowe is still a good one. We’ve been pursuing the idea he’s outside of Grave Gulch. I know we haven’t ignored the idea he’s stayed local, but maybe we need to put a bit more focus there.”

  “He can’t access his files. It’s seemed more likely he’d cut and run.”

  “But he’s got enough spite and anger to stick around. You know what I mean?” Brett added.

  Troy did know what he meant and that assessment fit Bowe to a T. He was about to say as much when Melissa filled his doorway.

  “Good. The two people I wanted to talk to.” She came in and stood before them.

  “What’s going on?” Brett stood to greet Melissa.

  “Randall Bowe.”

  “Yeah?” Troy asked. “Funny enough, we were just talking about him.”

  “I just got off the phone with his very frightened, still-estranged wife. He called her last night. Acted like an ass and accused her of a lot of things with respect to their marriage.”

  “You think we can get a trace?” Brett asked, sitting forward on his chair.

  “Ellie’s already on it.”

  Their tech guru, Ellie, had already been invaluable in this case. She’d been the one to recover Bowe’s stolen files while the whole case broke open and had been working on tracking him since.

  “Did Bowe give her any sense of where he was?”

  “No,” Melissa replied, before adding, “and she admitted it was a mistake on her part not to try and get more information. He caught her off guard and she’s pretty shaken up. We’ve already started the paperwork to put her into protective custody.”

  “Good.” Troy nodded. “That’s good. What time did he call?”

  “A little after eleven.”

  Troy did the quick math. Although it wasn’t impossible, if Bowe was calling and picking a fight with his wife at that time, it was increasingly unlikely he was also at Evangeline’s property, setting off fireworks and later drawing down evidence.

  Which put them right back at square one.

  No theories and some faceless threat lurking around Evangeline’s home.

  Troy quickly caught Melissa up on that detail as well as the news that Desiree had already sent through a police sketch for the file.

  As he’d known she would, Melissa assessed the situation quickly and succinctly, cutting straight to the chase. “A fuse? So the job was done remotely? Or out of sight from where you were parked?”

  Troy nodded. “It was quick and clean and I saw no one out of place by the time I got out of the car and did a visual inspection of the grounds.”

  “Is Evangeline all right?” his cousin asked.

  “She is. Shaken, but okay.”

  Melissa took the seat beside Brett, dropping hard into the chair. “Maybe we’ve been looking at this all wrong.”

  It briefly crossed his mind to suggest Brett and Melissa had been looking at the situation all wrong, but Troy held his tongue. They were all under pressure, and reminding his colleagues—who were also friends and, in Mel’s case, family and his boss—of that felt petty. Instead, he opted for “How so?�
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  “Based on the time of Evangeline’s nine-one-one call and the report from the couple whose home he invaded, the would-be killer she observed wasn’t Len Davison.” Troy tapped his chin. “But what if Len is inspiring others?”

  Brett took a sip of his coffee, thoughtful. “A sort of copycat?”

  “She described a gunshot. That’s Len’s MO, too.”

  “But he’s killing men,” Troy argued. “A copycat would likely do the same, right?”

  “Would he? Or might he use the killings as inspiration?”

  There was hardly anything inspiring about Len Davison’s actions. But Melissa’s point still held.

  Was it that hard to believe that all this recent confusion had turned husband against wife? Neighbor against neighbor? Friend against friend?

  Or worse, had inspired the sort of mad fantasies better left alone?

  CHAPTER 13

  Evangeline peeked through the curtains once more, consoling herself that she was playing neighborhood watchdog and not indulging in mindless, paranoid behavior.

  Yeah, right. If the shoe fits, Whittaker.

  What she was doing was talking to herself and going slowly bonkers here in her living room all alone. Even her precious lists hadn’t done a good enough job of quelling the mix of fear and anxiety that had been her constant companions since Troy had left that morning, and the legal pad she’d stared at determinedly for the past half hour was still blank.

  And yes, while she might have encouraged him to go back to the precinct to handle his work and not worry about her, now left to her own quiet home, she had to admit that the push was rather shortsighted.

  Had someone really lit a fuse on a bunch of firecrackers to blow out the light in front of her door? It seemed like an odd way to scare someone, yet it made a strange sort of sense, too. It was summer and firecrackers were a ready part of people’s recreation in the evenings. No one would notice them going off. Nor would it look immediately suspicious as a scare tactic.

  Heck, if she hadn’t already witnessed the violence in the alley and experienced the scare of someone being in her home, she’d have ignored them completely, thinking them a prank gone slightly destructive.

  The heavy ring of her phone pulled her out of her musings. When she saw it was her mother calling, she dived for it like a drowning woman going after a tossed lifeline. “Mom. Hi. How are you?”

  “Sweetheart, I didn’t expect you to answer. I expected you’d be working and I was just going to leave you a quick message to call me later.”

  Although she hated the fact that she’d kept her enforced leave quiet, she hadn’t had the heart to tell her mother, either. While her mother knew about the outcome of the Davison case—who didn’t?—Evangeline hadn’t wanted to share more information. It felt too much like a failure.

  “I’ve got a few days off.”

  “Oh, good. I hope you’re making the most of them.”

  Right. Huddled in my house.

  The urge to say just that—to have the words spill out so she could tell her mother everything—was nearly overwhelming. Instead, she forced a bright smile on her face and hoped it translated to her voice. “Well, it’s lucky I can talk now, then. What’s up?”

  “I had some news I wanted to share with you.” She heard her mother’s quick inhale of breath before she pressed on. “Well, I’ve been seeing someone. Dating him, actually. He’s a lovely man. His name’s Bill.”

  “Oh.” Realizing how that must have sounded, Evangeline quickly added, “Oh, Mom, that’s wonderful!”

  “I can’t wait for you to meet him. And, well, it’s a strange time right now, with all that’s going on in Grave Gulch. But we met and it seems right. We’re being careful and I won’t let him walk in the park, even if he’s with me.”

  Although she suspected Bill was a bit older than the men who’d been targeted by Len Davison, Evangeline was glad for her mother’s caution. For the mysterious Bill and for her mom’s own safety. “That’s wise. We have to all hope this situation will clear up soon but until then I’m glad you’re being so careful.”

  “You have to be. Even the protests downtown have me concerned. I respect the right of peaceful assembly, but it seems like a crowd like that could hide a person attempting to do harm, too.”

  Although their discussion was about a scary and dangerous topic, she could still hear the joy that floated beneath her mother’s words. It was something she’d missed for a long time and it was only now, as she heard her mother’s voice, that she understood what that sound was.

  Hope.

  “You sound really happy, Mom. I know you weren’t for many years and, well, I’m glad you are now.”

  “Thank you for saying it. And it wasn’t that bad.”

  Evangeline started to protest but her mother pressed on.

  “What I mean is that it was bad, but I’d do it all over again to keep you safe.”

  “That wasn’t a reason to stay in such a bad situation.”

  “Oh, sweetie. That’s every reason and it’s the only reason, all rolled into one.”

  Once more, that desperate urge to tell her mother all that was going on swelled deep in her chest but Evangeline held back. She’d never heard her mother this happy and there was no way she wanted to ruin that or dim it in any way with worrisome news.

  News that was still too amorphous for comfort.

  She could picture the conversation now. So, Mom. I saw someone shot in an alley but there’s no body, no blood and no sign that it ever happened. There was a mysterious book showing up in my house and someone’s lurking outside my front door.

  Nope. No way. Not when her mother had finally found so much joy of her own.

  Instead, she opted for a different tact. “When can I meet this Bill? Check him out myself.”

  “He’s visiting his children this weekend down in Kalamazoo, but maybe next weekend?”

  “I’d like that.”

  They spoke for a few more minutes and Evangeline promised to call later in the week to set some time for the following weekend. It was only when she hung up that the tears tightened her throat and the oppression of what she’d been living with for the past few weeks finally came crashing down.

  An oppression she faced all alone, unable to even tell her mother.

  She kept her gaze on the blank legal pad in front of her, the thin blue lines quickly going blurry with her tears.

  * * *

  Melissa Colton had no problem doing her job. Whatever was needed in her role as chief of the Grave Gulch Police Department, she was willing to do. That included seeing difficult cases all the way through to conclusion, investigating disturbing crime scenes and testifying against worthless weasels when they finally got their day in court.

  But as a woman, she avoided poking into other women’s business like the very plague.

  Which made her visit to Evangeline Whittaker’s condo as out of place in her day’s agenda as if she’d decided to take half a day off and go skinny-dipping in a nearby watering hole with her attractive fiancé.

  Actually...she thought as she shut off car, that last one wasn’t a bad idea. And with Antonio in the forefront of her thoughts, she quickly dialed his number.

  “I was just thinking about you.” His greeting brought a smile to her face and she marveled at how easy that had become since Antonio Ruiz had come into her life.

  “Fancy that, since I was thinking about you.” She gave herself thirty seconds to indulge in what she’d mentally dubbed the kissy-kissy aspects of their relationship before shifting gears. “I have an idea brewing and I wanted to see if you could reserve a private table in a private corner of the hotel’s restaurant.”

  “For us?”

  “Not us this evening but my cousin. Troy’s been putting in quite a lot of overtime and I’m ordering some R and R. My treat.” />
  “Our treat, darling. And a private table suggests that the R and R is with someone.”

  “That’s my plan.”

  Antonio’s laughter came rolling through the phone. “I’m not going to bet against you on that one.”

  Melissa indulged in fifteen more seconds of the kissy-kissy stuff before ending the call. With her smile still humming as she walked up to Evangeline’s front door, she stared up at the parking lot lamps that had caused such a stir this morning. She’d looked at Troy’s photos from the night before and there was clearly something strung between the two lights. But now, as she looked at them, it was obvious it had been removed.

  Which meant she not only owed Evangeline an apology, but she also owed Troy a bit more of her attention on this case. The situation downtown was still puzzling, with a K-9 as well as the CSI team finding nothing that suggested a murder or any sort of gunshot wound.

  But harassment at home was another layer that wouldn’t be ignored.

  Melissa knocked on the door, brisk and efficient, even as a small voice inside began to waver. The cop part was easy to handle. The woman part, not so much. What was she doing here? And would her overture be received in the way she’d meant?

  Or maybe a better question, what did she possibly hope to accomplish?

  The question vanished as she came face-to-face with Evangeline. And as she took in that tear-stained face, it was easy to see she’d shown up at just the right time. “May I come in?”

  “Of...of course.”

  Evangeline waved her in, keeping her face turned slightly away. “Would you mind giving me a minute?”

  She nodded, moving more fully into the condo while Evangeline disappeared into what looked like the master bedroom. Melissa looked around, unwilling to hide her curiosity or her perusal of the home. The ground floor unit made it more readily accessible off the bat, with two entrances in the front and back of the home. The first-floor windows also offered someone intent on doing harm an easy view into the layout of the house.