Childfinders, Inc.: An Uncommon Hero

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“You’re right, it’s an excellent book.” Handing her a twenty, he watched her ring the sale up. The last of the day. “Maybe we could go get that dinner now and discuss it.”

She was tempted, she realized in surprise. What’s more, it felt good to be tempted. She’d thought that perhaps, all things considered, she would never entertain that sensation again. But tempted or not, there was no way she could say yes, not tonight. Betty, her teenage baby-sitter, could only stay until nine-thirty. Jesse was asleep and she wasn’t about to wake him. Besides, she doubted that this would-be screenwriter, sensitive or not, would welcome a six-year-old’s company at dinner.

Handing him his change, she slipped the book into a bag with the store’s logo on it. “I’m afraid I can’t. There’re…complications.”

He played it as if she wasn’t the suspect he’d been sent to track. “Husband?”

“No.” She held up her left hand to substantiate her answer.

“Boyfriend?”

This time, Gina smiled as she shook her head, thinking him sweet and wondering if she was a fool for thinking it. “No.”

Ben raised his brows in a supposed last-ditch, far-out guess. “Strict parents?”

She laughed. “No. Just…complications.”

Gina wondered how her son would take to being referred to as a complication. In reality, he was the most uncomplicated, most wonderful part of her life. But arranging her schedule around him, picking him up at school and making sure he was safe at all times, did lead to a great many complications.

“If you come by the store tomorrow,” she told him, hoping that he would, “I’ll let you know about dinner.”

“Why don’t you just give me your home phone number and I’ll call you?” He made the suggestion as casually as he could.

He seemed like a nice person, but she’d made a costly error in judgment before. It was better to be safe than sorry. “Coming by the shop would be easier.”

“Here, let me give you my cell phone number just in case you need to get in touch with me.” He wrote it down on a slip of paper and handed it to her. Folding it, she slipped it into her pocket. “You’ve aroused my curiosity, you know.” Ben realized his mistake the instant the teasing remark left his lips. A wary look had entered her eyes. He immediately went into damage control. “Will I have to guess anyone’s name, climb up a ladder made of golden hair or slay a dragon before I earn the pleasure of your company and get access to your knowledge?”

Ben silently breathed a sigh of relief as he saw her smile again. “No, nothing like that, I promise.” Taking out the day’s cash, she put it into a metal strongbox, then slipped a cover over the cash register.

The cop in him had him glancing toward the front door. This wasn’t known to be the most savory location in San Francisco. “Should you be here by yourself doing that?”

The note of concern caught her off guard. So did the warmth stirring in response. “I’ve done this before. The front door locks automatically at nine. I’m going to have to use a key to let you out.”

“Why don’t I wait until you’re finished and walk you to your car?” He wasn’t certain if it was the man he was pretending to be or the man he was who made the offer.

There was a part of her that yearned for just that. To have someone walk her to her car, to offer her his protection by mutual agreement. But there was a part, a much larger part, that had become very leery of protectiveness because it could so easily turn into possessiveness. And that led to dark places.

So, very politely but firmly, she turned him down. “Thank you, but there’s no need for that.” Gina cut him off before he could offer a protest. “And Jon would be upset if I let someone remain in the store when I put the money into the safe.” Slipping the strongbox beneath the counter, she came out from behind it and deliberately led the way to the front doors. Unlocking them, she pushed one open and held it for him. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Ben.”

“Count on it.”

Walking to his car, he thought of following Gina when she left the bookstore. But it was harder tailing someone at night than in the light of day, and if for some reason she spotted him, it would definitely spook her. He didn’t want to undo the groundwork he’d just spent the last few hours laying down. He was going to have to wait. Tomorrow night, he’d find a way to get himself invited back to her place. Once he knew where she lived, he could return and nose around while she was at work.

Chapter 5

Despite the fact that it had been busy ever since they’d opened their doors this morning, Gina’s eyes darted toward the electronic doors when she head the tiny buzzer sound, announcing the entrance of a new customer. It was a woman in her late forties. The rise in adrenaline leveled off.

This was stupid.

She had a great many more important things on her mind than a good-looking man supposedly writing a screenplay about the massacre at Wounded Knee. A very good-looking man, her mind amended automatically and entirely against her will.

“Next, please,” she called to the orderly line of people who stood behind the deep purple plush ropes strung up solely to keep them in their place.

A heavyset man with an armload of books walked up, depositing them on the counter. Tilted, the books scattered every which way, mostly sprawling out on her side of the counter, some falling beneath. Offering a vague, sympathetic smile at the flustered man, Gina gathered the books up.

For all she knew, Gina thought as she began ringing up the sale for the hapless customer, Ben’s story about needing to do research for his screenplay could have all been just an elaborate pickup line. When she’d turned him down for dinner, not once but twice, that might have been the end of it.

Gina scanned two more books quickly, punching in the total, telling herself it was just as well that he hadn’t returned.

No, it hadn’t been just about a pickup, she thought, still carrying on the internal debate. He’d sounded sincere. She knew it. Besides, he’d come to her rescue the first time she’d met him and he hadn’t tried to come on to her then. Sure he was sexy, but he didn’t seem to be deceitful. Maybe he was exactly what he seemed, an earnest dreamer pursuing his dream. An earnest, sweet, good-looking dreamer.

Ben Underwood might be a dreamer, but she couldn’t be, Gina reminded herself, slipping all the books she’d just rung up into a shopping bag and then handing it to the man with a vague smile.

“Have a nice day,” she told him. She was in no position to daydream like normal people. She wasn’t normal people. Not right now, at any rate. She was a woman on the run and she had to remember that.

Maybe not, a small voice whispered within her. Maybe the running was finally over. Maybe the man who’d robbed her of so many nights’ sleep had decided she was too much trouble to pursue any further and had given up looking for her. Maybe she was finally safe.

Safe.

God, but she’d never realized how overwhelmingly seductive the four-letter word could be. Safe. Safe to go about her life doing everyday things, safe not to be constantly looking over her shoulder, wondering, worrying. Safe not to see shapes hidden in the shadows, afraid that she was being followed.

The front door buzzer sounded. She lost her place in counting out the next customer’s change.

“Sorry,” she murmured, beginning again.

The man buying the massive cookbook looked at her as if she were incapable of counting beyond five. “Maybe I should have given you a charge card.”

The slightly condescending tone and tolerant expression on his patrician face made her want to whip out her college diploma to show him that she was quite capable of conducting monetary transactions of any amount.

A lot of good that would do, she realized ruefully. The name on the diploma didn’t match the one on her name tag.

“Please come again,” she murmured as cheerfully as she could muster.

The man mumbled something in response that was lost on her as she found herself looking up into eyes that were almost Wedgwood blue. Ben had come up on her blind side and was now leaning against the counter, blocking the next customer.

“Hi, are we still on?”

Was it possible for him to look better today than he had yesterday? Or was that just the self-imposed drought in her life that was making her suddenly thirsty? Thirsty for the companionship of a personable man who wanted nothing more from her than just her mind.

“On?” she echoed.

The customer took her books to the clerk at the next register, giving Gina an envious look. It wasn’t lost on Gina.

“For tonight,” Ben prompted. He didn’t appear annoyed that she seemed to have momentarily forgotten. “You said that you couldn’t go out after work last night, but that you probably could tonight.” He looked at her hopefully. Or was that just her imagination?

She’d talked to Betty, who had checked with her mother last night. Since tonight was a Friday night and Betty hadn’t hit the dating circuit yet—her mother referred to Betty as a late bloomer—Gina was assured of a sitter for Jesse.

Now all that remained was taking that final leap from self-proclaimed female hermit to socializing woman. Easier contemplated than done.

For most of her life, she’d loved company, loved going out. She’d always been a people person, until she’d had her trust betrayed at a college fraternity party. McNair had resurrected the leeriness that had come to define and delineate her life for months after her rape, making her hold all men suspect. Looking for ulterior motives.

She hated being that way, and yet…

“Oh, right.” Gina beckoned forward the next customer who was about to bypass her. “I can take you here,” she told the woman, then looked at Ben. “Um, I’m not so sure that I can, after all. There’s the store, we don’t lock up until ten tonight—” As she scanned the book, the numbers popped up on the register.

“Don’t they let you go out for dinner?” Ben dead-panned.

“I’ll lock up for you tonight, Gina,” a deep voice on her other side rumbled.

She glanced toward the other register, not surprised to see the slightly superior look gracing the face of the tall, thin, prematurely balding young man. The man with the improbable name of Joe Valentine had regarded her as an interloper when Jon had given her responsibility of the store over him. Joe had been working at the bookstore a total of two and a half years and considered himself not just a clerk, but Jon’s assistant. Gina had changed all that and he made no secret of the fact that he didn’t care for it.

“After all, it’s not like I haven’t done it before,” Joe said smugly.

There went her last excuse, she thought, secretly glad of it. She liked being divested of excuses, because part of her really wanted to see Ben again, under any pretext. Pretexts made her feel that it was all right. “Thanks, Joe, as long as you don’t mind.”

“Hey, where else am I going to go?”

“It looks like it’s all settled, then,” Ben said to her. “Unless you don’t want to.” He knew if he left it open like that, she wouldn’t feel he was trying to pressure her into anything.

Oh, she wanted to, all right. Maybe a little too much. “It’s not that—”

“Something else?”

The cop in him rose to the fore. He peered at her, keeping his voice casual, wondering if her resistance involved Andrew in some way. Was she keeping the boy someplace accessible? Was there someone else involved? Was this not just about revenge, the way McNair thought, but a child kidnapping ring with Andrew the latest victim?

It was a horrible thought, but one that was far from new. Ben knew that Cade’s own son had been kidnapped for just that reason. It had taken Cade three years to find the boy again. Darin Townsend was the reason ChildFinders, Inc. existed.

She almost said something about Jesse and being reluctant to leave him, but at the last minute decided not to. She was undoubtedly being overly paranoid, but there was no harm in keeping her private life private. No harm and maybe a great deal of good.

“No, nothing else.”

Score one for the home team. “Well then it looks like it’s settled. How about Wellington’s?” Ben asked.

She was familiar with the restaurant. It was a place she’d treated herself to once a month while she’d been attending college. The food was wonderful and the ambience even better. It was a place she could easily see him in, but not for the type of thing she’d thought he had in mind. Suspicions whispered in her ear again.

“Isn’t that a little fancy? I thought you just wanted to grab a bite to eat and talk about research.”

His smile disarmed her before he said a word.

“Who says the bite has to be in a fast-food place? Or that we have to chew fast?”

He saw the protest forming on her lips, saw the indecision in her eyes. He was winning her over, but he had to talk quickly to sustain his advantage. Getting her to a friendly, neutral place that might seduce her defenses was all part and parcel of his plan to get her comfortable enough to talk to him. The more she talked, the more likely she’d be to let something slip.

“Think of it as partial payment for your time,” he told her.

She couldn’t help smiling. “Script points and dinner?”

“Right. And anything else you can think of, too.”

Her eyes narrowed. Was this just an elaborate come-on after all? She didn’t want to believe it, yet… “Such as?”

“I’m very handy with my hands.”

Her heart sank. It was a come-on. “I’m afraid I really don’t—”

He stopped her before she said something he was going to regret. “That didn’t come out right. What I mean is that I can fix things around the house. Cracking plaster, doors that stick, things like that.”

The small condo she had sublet from Jon’s friend could more than use a face-lift, but not from someone she didn’t know. She knew the danger of opening her door and her life to someone.

“I don’t need anything fixed,” she assured him.

“All right,” he replied philosophically, “then it’ll just be dinner and research.”

“Dinner and research,” she echoed.

A line was beginning to form at the register again. Joe was looking toward them with a less than friendly expression on his face. Ben began to talk quickly before Gina saw the clerk and retreated to help him. “What time would you like me to pick you up?”

It would keep things simpler if he didn’t know where she lived. “Since this is dinner and research, why don’t I just meet you at the restaurant?”

He picked up on her reluctance to share her address. The scale tipped against her again. “You really are an independent woman, aren’t you?”

The grin that curved her mouth nearly unraveled him. It was completely guileless and captivating. “Whenever possible.” Hearing Joe clear his throat, she realized that she’d somehow managed to drift away from the register. She began moving back toward the registers. “Now then, I’m afraid I’ve got to get back to work.”

He wasn’t finished yet. There was one more thing he needed from her. Her prints. Ben glanced toward the section she had directed him toward yesterday. “Um, I was wondering if you could recommend any other books for me from the store?”

She thought a moment, shaking her head. “I think we covered that last time.” Surprise flittered over her features. “You didn’t finish the one you bought yesterday already, did you?”

He nodded. “Stayed up all night. I thought if there was something else—”

“All right, let’s see.” Because he seemed so eager, she went to check the books listed by subject on the computer. Going over the inventory, she stopped at a particular title. “Well, there is one more that might help—”

All he needed was one. Because the books were accessible to the public, the idea of getting her prints from the one he’d already bought hadn’t occurred to him until after he’d handled it extensively. He wasn’t about to make the same mistake again. “Take me to it.”

She couldn’t help smiling. “You really are eager about this, aren’t you?”

He said what he knew she needed to hear, even though there was a part of him that was starting to feel uncomfortable with the duplicity. “So eager I can taste it.”

Telling Joe she would be right back, she brought Ben over to the American history section and, after a moment, found the book she was looking for. It was out of place. “This one doesn’t go into depth on the battle, but it does give you a pretty good background on the tribal life and the people.” Turning from the shelf, she started to hand the book to him.