by Lisa Childs
And with Bellamy expecting his niece or nephew, he was going to need to learn—if he ever intended to help out with babysitting.
Connor’s face twisted into a little grimace, as if he’d just noticed the wetness, too, and another cry slipped out of his lips.
“I’ve got this,” Forrest assured him. “I’ll change you.” At least he would give it a try.
He carried the little guy over to the piece of furniture that looked like a low dresser that had been painted blue and decorated with sheep. The pad on the top of it also had little sheep on it. A couple of disposable diapers had been left on top of it, as well. Forrest breathed a sigh of relief that he wouldn’t have to deal with pins—just tape and the little guy’s flailing feet in those damp pajamas.
Forrest unsnapped the onesie thing but getting Connor’s feet out with all his kicking was not an easy task. He didn’t want to hurt him. “You gotta help me out here, buddy,” he murmured. “We have to get this thing off you.”
He was able to tug on the pajamas until Connor’s kicking legs slipped out. Then he ripped off the sodden diaper, pulled it from beneath him and wadded it up before opening the blue pail next to the changing table and dropping it inside. “Okay, we got that nasty thing off.”
Forrest reached for the wipes and the powder. After cleaning him, he sprinkled some powder, which wafted up like a cloud. He sneezed, and something gurgled out of the baby again, something that sounded like a giggle.
Probably just gas again. But Forrest smiled down at him anyway. “You think this is funny?” he asked.
The little feet kicked again.
Forrest slid a clean diaper beneath him and secured it around him with the tape on each side. Or he hoped he had secured it. When he lifted Connor from the table, the diaper didn’t fall off, so he hadn’t done too badly.
Except that he didn’t know where the clean pajamas were. “Do you need new pj’s?” Forrest asked as he cradled the baby against his chest. The little body was warm, and so was the house and the night outside it. He wasn’t going to freeze if Forrest couldn’t find him dry clothes. But a twinge of guilt struck him that maybe he wasn’t doing this right.
Connor gurgled again and now his little fists flailed against Forrest’s chest. He wasn’t fighting to get away, though; he was just restless and wide-awake.
“How do I get you back to sleep?” Forrest wondered aloud. “Do I sing? I don’t know any lullabies.”
But to be a good uncle, he should probably learn some. At the moment all that came to his mind were the words to the old Guns N’ Roses song “Sweet Child o’ Mine.”
As he sang, heat rushed to his face—not that singing to Connor should have embarrassed him, but he had a sensation that the baby wasn’t the only one listening to him. And this time when he glanced to the doorway, someone stood there in that old, thin T-shirt.
“Don’t stop on my account,” she said, her voice husky with sleep. “This is the first time I’ve heard a heavy metal lullaby.”
His face grew even hotter. “It was the only song I could think of.” But now he could think of nothing but her looking so damn beautiful and sounding so damn sexy with that sleep in her voice.
* * *
Sweet child of mine...
The words to the song, sung in his deep voice, resonated throughout her head and her heart.
Sweet child of mine...
Connor wasn’t his child. But he was caring for him like he was. She’d watched while he’d changed the baby’s diaper and then sung him back to sleep. While she had miraculously managed to fall asleep even after that kiss they’d shared, she’d awakened the minute she’d heard Connor’s cry.
And fear had pierced her heart like the blade of a sharp knife. Then she’d heard the deep murmur of a familiar voice, and her fear had subsided. Forrest Colton was here, protecting them.
But he’d done even more than that; he’d taken care of Connor in a way no one had but her since the baby’s birth. He’d changed him and cuddled with him and sung to him.
Warmth flooded Rae’s heart, which felt as if it had swelled in her chest, as she stared at the two of them: the big man with the tiny baby clasped against his heart. This warmth wasn’t just for her son.
Forrest was so much more than he’d seemed when they’d first met. When he’d turned down her invitation to dance, she’d thought he was cold and bitter, but that wasn’t who he was at all. There was nothing cold and bitter about him now as he gently cradled the baby.
She’d thought she’d wanted to do this alone, that being a single parent was the best for her and for her son. She didn’t want Connor to have a father who would just let him down and leave like hers had. But now she’d gotten a glimpse of what it could be like if Connor had a father—for him and for her.
Now the warmth spread to her face with embarrassment that she was fantasizing about a man she barely knew. She liked his brothers a lot, but just because his last name was Colton, too, didn’t mean that he was a good man. There were other branches of the Colton family tree, branches that were as dangerous as the Corgans had proved to be.
But Forrest was a lawman, so she doubted that he was at all like his dangerous relatives. At least he wasn’t a physical danger to her. But emotionally...
He was making her long for something she’d already given up on ever finding: love. A man who would stay.
He was only here because it was his job, though.
“I didn’t realize diaper duty was part of the service,” she said.
“If you’d known, would you have called me last night, when the intruder left the note?” he asked.
She shivered as she remembered how different last night had been from this one. She’d been so terrified—so alone. Maybe it wasn’t all that different, though. She was scared tonight, too, but of what she was beginning to feel for Forrest Colton.
Attraction and something deeper, something that would cause her pain if she gave in to it, but she couldn’t—she wouldn’t—give in to her feelings. He wasn’t even sticking around Whisperwood. He was only here because of the hurricane, because he was a volunteer for the Cowboy Heroes. He probably would have been gone already if he hadn’t been hired to help out the Whisperwood PD with the murder investigation.
Rae had to protect her heart. She couldn’t be like her mother, who’d fallen for a man who hadn’t stuck around. While Georgia hadn’t realized that about Beau Lemmon at the time she’d met him, Rae knew Forrest wasn’t staying.
“I’m not sure I should have called you at all,” she admitted. She knew she definitely shouldn’t have kissed him—because now she wanted to kiss him again, so badly.
“You’re worried about the threat,” he surmised. “That the intruder will come back and make good on it.”
She nodded. But with Connor clasped in Forrest’s arm, he was safe. She was the one in danger, because she wanted to be clasped in Forrest’s arms, too.
“I’ll make sure you and Connor have twenty-four-hour protection,” he assured her. “There’s no way the person who left that note will hurt either of you.”
He sounded so determined that some relief eased the tension that had been gripping her. “Thank you,” she said.
His face flushed. “I’m just doing my job.”
After she’d kissed him, he probably wanted to make that clear to her, so that she didn’t misconstrue his protection as affection for her or for Connor. But the way he’d kissed her...
And the way he held her son, so gently.
She shook off the wistfulness that had suddenly come over her. “I know,” she assured him, but her lips curved into a teasing smile. “Although, I’m not sure diaper duty is part of being a detective.”
He smiled back at her. “I didn’t want him to wake you up.”
She couldn’t help but wonder why. Out of consideration? Or because he hadn’t wanted to see her aga
in?
“I—I should call in a replacement for me for the morning,” he said. Clearly he didn’t intend to be her twenty-four-hour protector. He had a job to do, and babysitting her and Connor was not part of that job.
He carefully placed the sleeping baby back in his crib before pulling his cell phone from his pocket. “I’ll make my call outside,” he said. “So I don’t wake him again.”
But he hesitated over leaving the room, as if reluctant to pass her in the doorway. When he neared her, his body tensed, and he sucked in a breath and held it.
She stared up at him as he passed her, and his hazel eyes darkened with desire. Or maybe that was just wishful thinking on her part, because he continued past her as if she hadn’t tempted him at all.
But she was tempted to follow him out, to kiss him again. The crib sheets rustled as Connor moved in his bed and a little cry slipped through his lips. His cry brought Rae to her senses. She couldn’t throw herself at Forrest again; he obviously didn’t want her.
* * *
“I want her,” Forrest Colton said.
The chief blinked away the bleariness of sleep, jerked fully awake and focused on the cell in his hand. “What?” he asked.
“I want Rae Lemmon to have around-the-clock protection,” Forrest said.
Maybe that was what he’d said the first time, but Archer had been partially asleep and hadn’t heard him correctly. Or maybe what Forrest really wanted had unconsciously slipped through his lips. “Why would she be in danger?” Archer wondered aloud.
“I told you about the note,” Forrest said.
Maybe he had, but again the chief hadn’t been paying much attention yet. He couldn’t wake up as quickly as he used to. “Tell me again.”
When Forrest did, Archer still wasn’t certain how threatening it was. “So somebody was in her house, but he didn’t hurt either her or the baby when he’d had the chance?”
“He scared her,” Forrest said.
Detective Colton sounded scared, too.
“He threatened her baby,” Forrest continued.
“But he didn’t hurt him,” the chief said. “Of the bodies, we’ve found none of them was a baby. No baby has been hurt.”
“No, it’s women who are winding up dead,” Forrest said. “So Rae Lemmon’s the one in danger.”
“We don’t have the extra manpower to provide around-the-clock protection for her,” Archer said. And he wasn’t certain how necessary it was. Sure, someone had been inside her home, but she hadn’t been hurt.
If the killer had intended to make her his next victim, he’d had the chance. Now that she’d been warned, she would be more aware, more careful. She didn’t need the already limited police resources, and Archer proceeded to tell his new detective this.
“She does,” Forrest insisted. “I promised her that she and her son would be protected.”
“She can stay with friends or get out of town,” Archer suggested, “and she’ll be safe.”
“No,” Forrest said. “The only way she’ll be protected is if I do it myself.”
Archer cursed. “I need you focused on solving these murders,” he reminded him. “That’s why I hired you. Not to play bodyguard to a single mom and her infant son.”
“I know,” Forrest said. “And I’ll figure out a way to do both.”
Before the chief could say anything else, Colton broke their connection. Not that there was probably anything Archer could have said to change the young detective’s mind. Forrest Colton seemed pretty damn determined to play guardian to Rae Lemmon and her baby.
Why?
Was he just concerned about the threat and worried that some harm might actually come to her child or to her? Or was there something else making Forrest Colton so protective?
Was he falling for the single mom?
If that was the case, and that threat was as serious as Forrest believed it was, then she and her baby weren’t the only ones in danger. Forrest was in danger, too.
Hell, since the threat was about getting rid of the detective, he was in the most danger—and maybe not just from the person who’d left that note, but from that single mom and her baby, as well.
Chapter 10
He could work anywhere—even in Rae Lemmon’s kitchen, even with her wearing just that T-shirt while she slept in her bed just a few yards from where he worked. After his call, he had returned to the nursery to find her already gone.
Which was good because he hadn’t wanted to admit to her that the chief hadn’t seen the same need for her protection that Forrest had. Was he overreacting?
Not at all.
Somebody had invaded her home. Even if he’d used the key under the flowerpot or found the door unlocked, he had still entered her house without her permission. He had also snipped a piece of hair from Connor’s head and left that threatening note.
That was some kind of sick individual to scare a single mom like that. Maybe he was even a killer.
So she and her son absolutely needed protection. Forrest could protect them most if he figured out who the hell had left the note and who had killed those women.
Were they the same person?
He stared down at the pictures he’d spread across her kitchen table. In the light from the pendant hanging over the table, he studied each of the crime-scene photographs for a clue he might have missed, like those buttons had been missed on the first pass through at the drug company’s parking lot.
He’d sent those off to the FBI’s crime lab because he’d wanted results back faster than he’d been getting them from the Whisperwood crime-scene technicians. But the FBI’s lab was backlogged, too. If only solving crimes was as easy as TV shows made it look, then he could have investigated everything and wrapped up all of the cases within an hour.
He’d been staring at these damn pictures for more than sixty minutes, and he hadn’t discovered anything new. Hell, he hadn’t discovered anything at all. Maybe if Rae wasn’t so close...
And so sexy and beautiful that she kept distracting him from his job. But he wasn’t even sure what his job was at the moment—to be a detective or a bodyguard.
His physical exhaustion and the weight of his concern for Rae and Connor settled heavily on his shoulders, so heavily that he closed his eyes for a moment. Just a moment...before a soft gasp jerked him fully awake, so awake that he scrambled up and knocked over the chair he’d been using and nearly struck Rae.
She stood next to the table, her brown eyes wide with horror as she stared down at the pictures spread across the white painted surface. “Oh, my.”
“I’m sorry,” Forrest said. For so many things...
Sorry that he’d let his guard slip long enough for her to sneak up on him.
What if she’d been the intruder?
He was also sorry that she’d seen the gruesome photos of the victims and the crime scenes. With his hands shaking slightly, he swept the pictures back into the folders.
“It’s fine,” she said despite the catch of emotion in her voice. “I’m going to need to get used to seeing photographs like that with the profession I’ve chosen.”
“Does Lukas, Jolley and Fitzsimmons handle criminal cases?” he asked.
Her eyes went wide again with surprise. “You know where I work?”
He shrugged. “Bellamy must have mentioned it.” And he’d paid attention despite himself, because he was so damn curious about Rae Lemmon.
She smiled at his comment. “Bellamy likes to brag about me.”
“She does,” he agreed. Was that because Rae was her best friend or because she was playing matchmaker?
The same thought might have occurred to Rae, because her face flushed with embarrassment. “To answer your question,” she continued, “no, they don’t. But after I pass the bar, I’d like to work in the district attorney’s office.”
“You want to be a prosecutor?” he asked. Every damn thing she did fascinated him and appealed to him.
She nodded. “Yes. There’s been so much crime in Whisperwood lately that I feel compelled to try to help stop some of it.”
“That’s why you’re going to law school while working and raising your son alone?”
She nodded.
“And here I thought you were just a masochist.”
She smiled again, and a strange warmth spread throughout his chest. She had a beautiful smile that lit up her chocolate-brown eyes. “That, too,” she said, and as if to prove her point, she took the folder from his hand and started flipping through the photographs. The smile left her face, and her eyes darkened with sorrow.
“You don’t have to look at those,” he said. She probably shouldn’t be looking at them, not that she was a potential suspect or anything. But she might know a suspect.
Why else would she have been threatened like she’d been?
“But since you have seen them,” he continued, “what are your thoughts? Could these murders have been committed by the same person?”
She shivered even though she wore a light robe over her T-shirt. That must have been for his benefit. But he would have preferred that she’d skipped the robe.
Hell, he would have preferred that she’d skipped the T-shirt. Heat flushed his face and his body at the thought of seeing her naked, of touching her.
He drew in a deep breath and pushed the image of her, like that, from his mind. He pointed toward the folder. “There was no attempt to mummify the body that was found in the parking lot.”
“Maybe he didn’t have time,” she said. “Maybe he was interrupted. Or not as physically able as he once was.”
Forrest sucked in a breath, awed by her insight. “You’re going to make a damn good prosecutor.”
She smiled and spread that warmth through his chest again. She was so beautiful that he found himself leaning toward her. But before his lips could brush across hers, a cry rent the air between them.
Had someone gotten inside the nursery? Panic replaced the warmth in his chest, pressing heavily against his heart as he ran toward the nursery and Connor.