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“Do you understand our power now, Judge Nicholas Floyd?” he read aloud. “Mr. Frasier was guilty. You know it and we know it. But we wanted a not-guilty verdict. So we got it. Drop the de Lugo case or you will die and leave poor Lindsey and Christopher true orphans.”
His back teeth ground against each other. Through tight lips, he muttered, “I knew someone got to that jury as soon as I saw the verdict.”
“What do you mean?” Carly asked.
“The evidence was too clear-cut—and Harrison was too cocky. It should have been an open-and-shut case. The de Lugos got to the jury and swayed the judgment—just to prove to me they could.”
“How many jurors do you think they got to?” Mason asked.
He shrugged. “It would only take one if he or she had the right personality. But I’m guessing it was probably more than one. All you have to find is a juror with a kid. Threaten the kid, and get the juror to do anything you want.”
“Then we need to talk to the jurors,” Carly stated.
He shot her a wry look. “If you think it would do any good. We already know who was doing the threatening, but yeah, we’ll send a report in and let the proper authorities take care of it.” His jaw hardened. “Can’t hurt to have one more charge to bring against the de Lugos.”
“All right, we need to get you into a secured area.” Mason shoved his gun in his shoulder holster. “Right now, that’s going to be your home. How many people live there?”
“There’s six of us right now. My housekeeper, Stella, and her husband, Carl, a nanny, Debbie, myself and the children.”
“Two marshals will stay on the children as they go to and from school. You might want to consider letting the nanny go for her own safety.”
“Fine. What about Stella? She’s trained to defend herself.”
Carly remembered the woman from the last time she’d been in his home. “She’s an ex-police officer. Her husband is the groundskeeper, right?”
“Right. She’s the niece of my mother’s best friend. She was wounded in the line of duty and took an early retirement. By the time she’d recovered, Mom decided she couldn’t handle the housework anymore and asked Stella if she’d be interested in doing it. She wanted someone she knew and trusted and didn’t want to go to all the trouble of interviews, etcetera. I didn’t think Stella’d be interested, but fortunately for us, she jumped on it. She said she needed something to keep her busy, but I think she enjoyed being around us and the children since she couldn’t have any of her own. She and her husband, Carl, live in the mother-in-law suite attached to the house. To ask them to leave would really put them out.”
“They can stay as long as they understand the dangers.”
Nicholas rubbed his eyes. “I’ll give them the option of moving into a hotel at my expense, although I don’t know what they would do with their two dogs.”
Mason raised a brow. “Dogs are good. They bark.”
“True. In this new house, I had the security system upgraded with motion sensors and security cameras. Plus, I had a wrought-iron fence installed. And all of this in a gated community.”
“What else?” Carly urged.
“It’s an electric fence. If anyone tries to go over it, they’ll get a pretty nasty shock. That’s about it.”
“It’s better than a lot we’ve worked with in the past.” Thank goodness. The thought of Nicholas or one of the children ending up dead sent shivers of fear all over her. The thought of being around Nick 24/7 made her stomach clench, too, although she wasn’t sure if it was from dread or the pull of attraction she couldn’t deny feeling.
She shrugged off her feelings. Time to do her job. “All right, let’s get going.” Carly held up the paper bag with the second letter. “I’m just going to turn this over to the crime-scene guys. Then we can get out of here.”
Two minutes later, they were on the road. Carly drove the unmarked police car and Mason followed behind in Nicholas’s car. He watched Carly’s slender fingers grip the wheel.
When she’d invaded his home two years ago, just a few months before his wife’s death, they’d butted heads on the protection issue yet Carly in his home brought a certain peace to the household that had been distinctly absent before her arrival.
His wife, Miriam, had basically closed herself in their bedroom and become a hermit for the duration of Carly and her partner’s stay. It had been a relief, he remembered with guilt. Miriam had changed in their six years of marriage, depression stealing her sweet, happy-go-lucky personality away from him.
She’d wanted a baby, and they hadn’t been able to have one. The fact that no doctor could tell them why just compounded the problem. His home life had started to unravel and quickly became unbearable. And while Nick never thought he would consider divorce, he had to admit it had crossed his mind in the weeks before Miriam had been killed.
Then the marshals had arrived. He smiled at the irony. He hadn’t wanted the marshals at that point in time any more than he wanted them this time.
But then he thought about the nights they’d sat up talking, the three of them; Carly, Mason and himself. A friendship had formed. Since then, he and Mason had gotten together for the occasional game of racquetball or met up at the high school football stadium to watch the local teams go at it.
He hadn’t seen Carly since they’d found out the threats had been a hoax. But that hadn’t kept him from keeping up with her.
Through Mason, and frequent chats with Ian, Carly’s brother and Nick’s former college roommate, Nick had gotten snatches of what her life had been like over the last two years.
He also knew that she blamed him for something he’d had no control over. He’d let a killer go. The one who’d ended up murdering Hank, a good friend of hers. His stomach twisted itself in knots every time he thought about it. He didn’t have to wonder what she thought of him.
He could read the wariness in her eyes. The borderline contempt she tried to hide.
And yet, because he knew the kind of person she was, he had no doubt she would do her job to the death for him if it came to it.
He vowed it wouldn’t.
Lord, let me get a chance to explain why I had to let that man go. Please. And let her understand.
“Why did you move from the house at the beach?”
Her question seemed to come out of left field as he shook off his thoughts. “Because we all needed a change.” He pictured the large, sprawling estate and felt a pang of nostalgia. “I loved that house, but I built it for my wife. When she and my sister were killed…” He shrugged and sighed. “Plus the children had to ride past the accident site every day on their way to school.”
“How did they even know where it happened?”
“Lindsey was having nightmares about it. The therapist suggested taking her to the site and placing a memorial there. We built a little cross and put her mother’s name on it, and I let her pound it into the ground. She seemed to get a little better almost overnight.”
“But?”
“As time passed, it continued to affect them. Especially Lindsey. She’d do better, then worse, constantly back and forth. If there’d been another route to the school, I would have taken it, but there wasn’t. I suggested changing schools, and Lindsey completely freaked at the idea, so…” He shrugged again. “Then Mom left for California…” A deep breath. “When my buddy Wayne encouraged me to come back to Spartanburg so we’d have some support, it seemed like the right thing to do. With my sister gone, I became an only child and didn’t have any close family around, so we moved.” He turned the tables on her. “Why do you do this?”
She shot him a startled look. “What? My job?”
“Yes.”
She blinked then focused back on the road. “Because I like it.”
“I know a lot of your family is in law enforcement. But why did you choose it?”
A faint smile curved her lips, and he wondered what they’d feel like. The thought came out of nowhere, and he quickly put on the mental brakes.
Someone was threatening him.
It was Carly’s job to protect him.
End of story.
“I don’t know. I never had any major catastrophe in my life or anything that pushed me toward this kind of career. But I grew up with it. It’s what I know. I suppose it was a natural choice with Ian being in the army and my dad being a cop. He was just so satisfied every time he put a bad guy in jail. It was literally the highlight of his day. That really influenced me.” She smiled at him. “He retired a couple of years ago.”
“Ah, so that’s why.”
She shrugged. “It probably had a lot to do with it. But I just really like the job.”
“Then why don’t you want to do it?”
Carly nearly swerved off the road. Instead, she took a moment to gather her composure and said, “Why would you say that?”
“I get the feeling that you don’t want to be here. With me.”
She bit her lip. How to explain? Should she even bother explaining? And how had he picked up on that, anyway? Had she gotten that bad at hiding her feelings?
But he was trained to read people. And he’d read her like a first-grade primer.
Squaring her jaw, she shot him a look. “Your feelings are wrong.” Sort of. Actually, they were dead-on. “I want to do my job. I will do my job, no matter what it takes, got it?”
He remained silent for a moment, his eyes searching for things she’d rather keep hidden. “Do your feelings have anything to do with the fact that I let Richie Hardin go and he killed your friend Hank?”
Bingo.
She blinked and did her best to cover her initial impulse to blurt out “yes!” Instead, she took a deep breath and said in a low voice. “That’s irrelevant to what I have to do here with you. I don’t want to talk about Hank’s death or the cause of it.”
“Sooner or later, we’re going to have to, I think.”
“I don’t know why. It has nothing to do with my ability to do my job. I’ll do mine, you do yours. Put the bad guys away instead of letting them walk, and everyone wins.”
“Carly…” He sighed, and she saw him struggle with whatever it was he wanted to say. “Fine. But we will discuss it. Soon. Just don’t let your negative feelings for me or my judicial decisions put my family in danger.”
His words sent a shaft of pain through her. Did he really think she would be that unprofessional and allow that to happen? For a moment, she couldn’t speak. She just pulled into the gated drive and waited for Mason to pull in behind her in Nicholas’s car and use the remote to open the gate.
Soon the iron gates began their inward swing. Carly stepped on the gas and wound her way up the drive to the front of the house and parked behind the brown sedan that belonged to the two marshals inside. Instead of opening her door, she swallowed hard and turned to look at Nicholas.
He unhooked his seat belt and caught her gaze. When she was certain she had his full attention, she said, “I’m a professional. I’ll do my job regardless of my feelings. If it comes down to it, I’ll die for you or those children. Are we clear?”
He lifted a brow, then gave a slow nod. “Crystal. In fact, now you’ve got me a little worried. I don’t want you to die for me, Carly.”
She gave him a tight smile. “I don’t want to, either. But I will if it comes down to it. That’s all you have to know.”
End of discussion.
Carly climbed from the car and swept the grounds with a practiced eye. Everything seemed quiet. She drew in a deep breath of air and got her bearings. She could do this. It’s what she’d trained for, lived for…and would someday probably die for.
But right now, Nicholas and the children were counting on her.
Then the front door opened and two marshals stepped outside. She recognized them as a team she’d worked with on a number of occasions. “Grady. Maria.”
Mason shook hands with them. Grady, a tall, trim man with salt-and-pepper hair, spoke. “Everything’s quiet. One of us has done a perimeter sweep every fifteen minutes. The dogs have been calm, and nothing has set off any alarms.”
Carly motioned for Nicholas to go into the house, worried about him standing out in the open. She might have a problem respecting him, but she sure didn’t want him dead.
He nodded and moved to stand inside the doorway, off to the left. Out of sight of anyone watching the house, but not out of earshot. She knew he wanted to hear every word the four marshals might exchange.
Maria came from a long line of cops. Stocky and short, she was light on her feet in spite of her build. Maria was good at her job and didn’t let anything get in the way of her goal: to keep her assignment alive.
“The kids are good kids,” Maria said. “Better watch that girl, though. I have a feeling she might be a handful. We’ll be back tomorrow. Let us know if you need anything before then.”
“Will do. Thanks.”
Carly and Mason said their goodbyes to Grady and Maria and followed Nicholas farther into the house. She shut the door and glanced around.
Nice.
Not extravagant, but definitely upper middle class. She’d done her homework on the man but remembered her brother Ian telling her that Nicholas had designed a video game that made him a lot of money before he’d even graduated college.
He probably could have gone into the gaming business and become a multimillionaire, but his passion was the law. And he’d succeeded there, too.
For the most part.
When he wasn’t letting violent criminals out to kill good cops. Hank and Lily, two people who’d become good friends. Hank who had taught her everything she knew. And now he was dead, and Lily a grieving widow. Her gut tightened at the thought, and she pulled in a deep breath. Don’t go there, Carly, or you’ll go crazy. Keep your objectivity. Remember, you don’t know the whole story.
But she knew enough. Enough to know she’d better keep her guard up and her emotions under control when it came to Nicholas Floyd.
“Debbie? You in here?” Nick called as he walked into the den area.
“I’m right here, Nick.”
Carly turned at the intrusion of the feminine voice. A pretty young woman in her late twenties stood at the entrance to the kitchen, wiping her hands on a dish towel. She had her reddish-brown hair pulled up in an attractive loose ponytail. She stopped when she saw Carly and Mason. “Oh, sorry, I didn’t realize we were having more company.”
“These are two more U.S. Marshals, Deb.” His dark gaze swept back to Carly. “This is Debbie Thomas, the children’s nanny.”
“For now.” Debbie flashed a smile and held out a hand that Carly and Mason took turns shaking. “I’m filling in until Nick finds a permanent one.” She flushed and said, “I have to confess I was just popping some popcorn for the kids. I know it’s close to dinnertime, but…”
Carly just noticed the mouthwatering smell of freshly popped popcorn. It reminded her she hadn’t eaten dinner yet.
Nicholas gave a small smile, a mere twitch of his lips, then said, “That’s fine, Debbie. A little popcorn before dinner won’t hurt them.” The he blew out a rough sigh. “Since Mom left to take care of her sister in California, I haven’t had the time or energy to look for someone to…” He shot the young woman an apologetic look.
Debbie patted the man’s arm. “It’s all right, Nick.”
Watching the interchange, Carly couldn’t help but wonder if there was something more between the two than a business arrangement. The little twinge of jealousy took her by surprise.
Oh, no, there was no way she was jealous. She wasn’t remotely interested in starting any kind of relationship, especially not with an assignment. Period.
Kicking those feelings as far to the curb as she could get them, she pulled out her notebook. “All right, let’s go over some ground rules, shall we?”
“Are they the same rules as last time?” he asked.
She couldn’t help the small smile that curved the right side of her lips. “Yes, pretty much.”
“Then I think I’m covered.”
