The waiter arrived and took their order.
“How many men have told you you’re beautiful?” Cal didn’t know why he had to ask but he had the whim to.
“Not many.” She paused as she thought. “Ryan never told me I was beautiful. He just said he loved me.”
She seemed to ponder that revelation, falling into a somber mood.
“There had to be men after Ryan died. He died what, two years ago?”
“Yes.” She still seemed somber, as though the idea of her dating other men bothered her. Why? Out of guilt?
“Men had to have hit on you in that time. Why didn’t you date any?” he asked, more curious than ever.
“It took me a while to get over Ryan’s death. I’m still not really over it.”
She’d already told him she felt like she’d be betraying her husband if she saw other men. Had she drawn the same conclusion with him? Maybe her guilt over her passion for her colleague would keep her faithful to a dead husband.
“How many men hit on you?” he asked.
“I don’t know. A couple. Another geologist and someone I met through a client.” She fingered the napkin wrapped around a knife and fork.
“Another scientist asked you out on a date?” he asked, feeling a little jealous.
“We were working a contract with a corporation interested in using wind and solar energy alternatives. The project took several weeks. We stayed at the same hotel, so we shared meals together. He asked if I’d go out with him when we got home. I explained about Ryan and he said to keep him in mind when I was ready.”
“And did you?”
She considered him a moment. “Why are you so curious?”
“Did you keep the geologist in mind?”
She breathed a laugh. “No. Not beyond him being a coworker. I wouldn’t have been interested in him anyway.”
“Why not?”
“He was too much like me, I guess. And...” Her eyes moved over the restaurant as she thought. “Too nerdy.”
She didn’t like nerds, huh? He was definitely no nerd. He grinned, seeing how she noticed.
“Why are you so curious?” she asked again.
“I’m trying to determine what I’m up against.” Would she ever be free of her guilt?
“Are you asking if I’m ready to start dating again?”
He waited, trying to tell her without words that he was. Being with his family again seemed to have reawakened him but he felt like a bumbling idiot right now.
She turned away, looking across the restaurant at other patrons as she thought. Cal became aware of muffled conversation, dishes clanking and staff moving about serving customers.
At last she faced him again. “I think being with you might help me.”
Help her. How? Was he some kind of transition? He hated this uncertainty. It made him feel weak and bolstered his resistance to dating.
“I don’t feel bad being with you,” she said.
What if she just said that to try to win his trust? Why would she do that? His family had a lot of money; maybe she had her sights on an inheritance.
He sounded paranoid in his own head. He was falling hard for her.
“I’m just not sure I’m ready for another serious relationship,” she said.
While her honesty again didn’t go unnoticed, he wondered if he’d wind up hurt anyway. She wouldn’t have to betray him. She could simply walk away because she wasn’t ready to move on. The possibility of rejection didn’t settle well with him.
“It isn’t as though we chose each other,” he said.
She smiled slightly. “True.”
Neither of them had consciously sought the other out with the intention of dating. Their intimacy had happened on its own.
He spotted their waiter, who had just then retrieved their plates and left the kitchen. Reaching the table, he set their plates down and looked at Cal. Then he glanced at Jaslene. Cal didn’t think he was wary over his tardiness in delivering their food. He seemed to have thought of something or maybe recognized one of them.
The waiter straightened after putting down the plates and contemplated Cal. “You that PI who’s looking for Riley Sawyer?”
“Yes?” Cal’s anticipation soared.
“A guy came in the other day. He was passing through and read the local paper that had an article about Riley. He said he stopped for gas in Webster Springs on his way back from Snowshoe and saw a man who fit Riley’s description filling a motorcycle with gas. It struck him as odd because it’s February and cold.”
Webster Springs. “Did you get a name?”
“No and he paid cash. Sorry. I told him he should go to police and he seemed like he would. Didn’t he?”
“No. When was that?” Cal asked.
“Oh.” His eyes lifted as he thought. “Three days ago.”
Three days. Riley could be anywhere by now.
When the waiter left, Jaslene faced him with brighter eyes. “We should expand our search to other towns.”
“Starting with Webster Springs.”
Webster Springs was about fifteen miles from Chesterville. “Riley might be gone already.”
“Not if he feels safe there. He probably didn’t see that man notice him.”
“That’s what we hope for, but in case he’s moving from place to place...”
“We will check every town.”
This time when she smiled she conveyed something other than romantic flirtation. She appreciated his determination to solve her missing friend’s case.
* * *
Jaslene drove with Cal through Webster Springs to the outskirts of town. They’d found that gas station where Riley also regularly stopped for gas or cigarettes. The attendant even told them where Riley was staying, having seen him one day as he passed by. Their luck had finally improved.
Arriving in the motel parking lot, she spotted Riley’s motorcycle parked outside a lower level room with an outdoor entrance.
“You stay back,” Cal said as they neared.
She stopped far enough away to be safe but still see Cal. He knocked on the motel room door. After a few seconds, he tried to peer into the single front window.
Drawing his gun, he glanced at her and said, “Stay here,” and ran toward the side of the motel.
Alert and ready to run if need be, Jaslene went to Riley’s motorcycle and unbuckled one of the side storage bags. Nothing was in the right rear bag and the left was also empty. She hadn’t expected to find anything of value, but still looked for anything that could link him to Payton. Hearing sudden rapid footfalls, she looked up and saw Riley running toward her—toward his bike. Just as she straightened and would have moved out of the way, he reached her, grabbing her arm and throwing her aside.
She landed painfully on the concrete, on her hip, elbow and hands. Luckily she wore gloves and a winter jacket, but the hard pavement still dug into her hip.
Cal ran toward them as Riley revved his bike and started to back it up. Seeing she was in his way, she rolled to the side as he backed away from the parking space and swung the bike into a skidding curve.
Cal reached her, crouching before her. “Are you all right?”
“Yes.” She scrambled to her feet with Cal helping and ran with him to his SUV. But by the time they raced into the street, the bike was out of sight.
Cal cursed and pounded the steering wheel once.
Jaslene would have done the same if she’d had one in front of her.
They returned to the motel, climbing into the room through the bathroom window, which was how Riley had escaped. He’d left his clothes and a mess but it took them minutes to go through his suitcase. He had receipts on the TV counter, one from a coffee shop in Chesterville.
“He’s been going to Chesterville,” Cal said.
“And renting
adult movies.” She held up a motel receipt that included a list of charges.
Cal took it. “He must have planned to check out today.”
That meant he was on the move, trying to avoid capture. “For someone who knows the police have no evidence to arrest him, he sure acts guilty.”
* * *
The case stalled again. Days passed and no sign of Riley. She and Cal drove to Webster Springs every day, searching for him. He had likely gone to another town. Cal had contacted every law enforcement office in the surrounding cities and towns, but no word had come of Riley’s whereabouts.
Jaslene had to work on her frustration. Would they ever catch whomever was responsible for Payton’s disappearance? Would Jaslene ever know what had become of her friend? She wouldn’t quit until Payton was found, but what if they never learned anything new? What if eventually even Cal gave up? How long could they keep this up? Not forever. Jaslene would have to go back to work and Cal would have to take on other cases.
Sitting with a cup of tea, her legs curled up on a wingback chair in the family room, she watched snow flutter down in the fading afternoon light. Rapunzel lay curled in her lap and she stroked her soft, sleeping head.
A faint odor tickled her nose. She went still, thinking she smelled smoke. Then she heard the fire alarm. Propelled into action mode, she stood and put Rapunzel on the chair and walked from the family room into the kitchen; smoke floated, thicker and thicker, toward her.
“Oh my God!” Where was Cal?
Just as she turned to go get Rapunzel and get out of the house, a shape appeared to her side and hit her over the head with something hard. Everything went black.
* * *
Cal heard yipping from downstairs as he emerged from the walk-in closet fully dressed after his shower. The shrill scream of fire alarms a second later had him grabbing his pistol from the nightstand and running from the bedroom before buttoning up his shirt. As soon as he entered the hallway, a man appeared at the top of the stairs wearing a ski mask and aiming a gun. Cal had just enough time to register that the intruder looked to be about the same size as Riley and not as tall as Dr. Benjamin, before Cal ducked into the next bedroom and the first gunshot rang out.
He quickly poked his head into the hallway and shot back. The man had begun to walk down the hall toward him as though he meant to kill Cal and leave him and Jaslene in the house to burn. The man flinched as a bullet from Cal’s gun hit him in the leg. From all he could see in the fleeting time he’d stuck his head out into the hall, he’d only grazed the man, who clearly had not expected Cal to be armed. He’d planned to catch him and Jaslene by surprise.
Where is Jaslene?
Cal peered into the hall again and saw the man going back downstairs. With his gun raised, he ran after him. When he reached the stairs, the man turned back and fired. Cal held back at the corner as bullets hit the stairway and the wall across from the top step. When the gunfire paused, he fired back, going down the stairs after the man, who limped as he swung the front door open and fled.
Smoke filled the lower level and he saw flames engulfing the family room.
“Jaslene!” He glanced toward the front door, wanting to go after the man who’d set fire to his house and tried to kill them.
Yipping preceded Rapunzel’s running entrance. Swooping the tiny dog up, he covered both their faces with the open lapel of his shirt and saw Jaslene on the floor.
Heat from the fire grew nearly unbearable close to the kitchen.
Coughing, he put Rapunzel down to lift Jaslene into his arms. The dog clawed at his leg.
“Come, Rapunzel!” Cal ran with Jaslene toward the front door, still coughing.
Rapunzel leaped through the open door ahead of him, tearing across the front yard to the sidewalk, where Cal stopped and lowered his head to choke out the smoke that had irritated his throat and lungs.
Cal searched for the masked man but saw nothing but concerned neighbors. He’d gotten away.
Sirens sounded from down the street as Cal lay Jaslene on the front lawn. Brushing hair away from her face, he noticed blood on the sleeve of his shirt where her head had rested as he carried her. Oh no.
Gently he felt her head and found a lump and a gash. Nothing life threatening.
He breathed heavy with relief. “Jaslene.” He touched her face.
She moaned.
“Jaslene. Wake up.”
Rapunzel appeared at her side, licking her face with a whimper.
Jaslene moaned again and her eyes fluttered open and focused on him. “What happened?”
“You’re okay,” he said. “Someone set the house on fire.”
A fire truck stopped in the street and an ambulance and two police cars weren’t far behind.
Cal turned to his house. The living room had gone up in flames and the fire was spreading. He felt a deep and ravaging sense of loss. While he might not have consciously bought this place with having a family in mind, he’d stolen a few moments to entertain those possibilities since Jaslene had been living with him. Now it was gone.
“You can rebuild.”
He looked down at Jaslene, who had watched him and accurately ascertained his thoughts.
“In the meantime, you can stay with me at my place.”
At first she flustered him with her disarming solution.
“You think I’d let you out of my sight?” he murmured.
A slow smile curved her mouth, soft and full of emotional connection. He felt himself drift into deeper, more undeniable territory, the territory of love. He meant to keep her safe, but his words had dual meaning in this case. He wouldn’t let her out of his sight because that was also what his heart clamored for.
Danger brought out his protective and affectionate sides, apparently.
Chapter 12
Sitting at her high, four-seat kitchen table, Jaslene arched her back and twisted left and right. She ached and her stomach was upset. Was she getting sick? It had been a couple of days since the fire and they still didn’t know who started it. She had fallen into a domestic routine with Cal at her house. Sleeping together, just cuddling. Having dinner together. Waking in the morning and sharing coffee and the local news. It was so easy talking with him. But underneath the facade of normality was the ever-present uncertainty of where they would end up when all of this chaos ended.
Rubbing her belly, she tried to focus on the book open on her Kindle. Queasiness had woken her just after 2:00 a.m. and she didn’t think she was ready to try to go back to bed yet. She almost woke Rapunzel to keep her company, but Punzie looked so adorable sleeping peacefully at Cal’s hip that she’d left her.
Jaslene had tried drinking warm milk but that hadn’t helped and neither was her attempt at reading. Putting down the Kindle, she looked around her kitchen, noticing how bare it was. Why had she never decorated? She had bought the house after Ryan died, unable to live in the home they’d had together.
She’d been busy with work in the past few years. Home life hadn’t worked out so well for her, so maybe she’d given up. Her house was a ten-year-old, modern, two-bedroom ranch. At the time she’d bought the house she hadn’t planned on being home much, not wanting to be alone. She worked long hours and spent a lot of time outside or doing other things, going to movies, events in town. That had been a by-product of her failed relationships. She’d decided to just be alone for a while. No more men.
And then Cal had come along. At first, she had considered him no different than other men she encountered in her post-failed-relationship era. Only until he’d left the force and joined DAI had the attraction taken on its own life. She still wasn’t sure how she felt about him now. She only knew she didn’t want to think about it.
Her stomach churned again, signaling she’d be up a little longer.
Standing, she walked to the den and went to the blue-and-off-white love seat w
ith a soft blue throw draped over the back. She’d picked up the old trunk at a garage sale and it served as her coffee table. She’d also found the paintings hanging on the walls, her favorite cities at night. New York. San Francisco. And smaller unknowns, little towns in the Midwest and Rockies. She had other art depicting places that fascinated her, places with geological features like the Grand Canyon at sunset, folded rock formations in the Wasatch Range and, of course, Yellowstone.
Curling up on the love seat, she turned on the television, thinking maybe her nausea was beginning to subside. Flipping through channels, she checked the weather and news.
Another sudden wave of nausea commandeered her stomach. Jaslene bent over and couldn’t suppress a moan. She held her stomach and wondered again why she felt so awful. She didn’t have a fever.
What the...
She lifted her head and stared straight ahead at the television without really seeing it. Nausea...?
She’d had late periods before but now as she counted, she came to the shocking realization that she was much too late. Her breasts had been a little sore. But she hadn’t thought to be concerned. Memories of making love crashed upon her.
“What are you doing up?”
Jaslene sucked in a breath when she heard Cal. The sound of his footfalls accompanied his affectionate, deep tone.
“I couldn’t sleep.” She saw him going to the fridge in the kitchen, sleepy-eyed and in only his boxers. She tried not to look down there or at the rest of his rock-hard body.
“How come?”
“I...don’t know.” His sexiness took her mind off her nausea.
Taking orange juice out, he turned his head with a half-awake but skeptical look. “Is something bothering you?”
She almost laughed, panicked. Should she tell him or was it premature? She might only have a bug.
“I slept but woke and couldn’t go back to sleep,” she said.
He poured a glass of juice and put the container back into the refrigerator. Taking a drink, he came into the den, his eyes scanning the room.
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