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“EVERYTHING HAS BEEN quiet all night,” Marcos Costa told Cole as soon as he drove up next to the car.
Cole’s youngest brother may not have shared his blood—they’d met at a foster home as kids—but they’d formed a bond that went deeper than genetics. After Shaye had spent several hours in the forensics lab, Cole had driven her home and then promptly called his two brothers to see who was available to watch her house until he got off work. Their middle brother, Andre, was on a mission for the FBI, but Marcos had been free.
Now it was 3:00 a.m., and everything looked quiet on Shaye’s street. Her house was situated on a corner lot in a cute little neighborhood that boasted its fair share of picket fences and young families. The kind of place where a stranger skulking about would be noticed.
Still, it was Shaye. He wasn’t leaving anything to chance. And his youngest brother worked for the DEA, so he had plenty of experience spotting suspicious characters.
“Thanks,” Cole said through his window as his car idled next to Marcos’s.
“No problem. We all love Shaye.” Marcos glanced past Cole at his partner, Luke, in the passenger seat and nodded hello. “Is there a reason we’re doing this on the street instead of in her house?”
“She doesn’t know you’re here.”
“Yeah, I got that,” Marcos said with a dimpled smile. “I’m wondering why exactly.”
“She refused police protection.” Luke Hayes, Cole’s partner on the force for the past three years, spoke up. “Officially we can’t force her.”
Marcos frowned. “But if someone’s gunning for her—”
Cole didn’t have to turn his head to feel Luke’s glance as he replied. “No one is gunning for her. The shooting that happened earlier this evening looks random.”
“Ah.” Marcos nodded knowingly. “Got it.”
“It’s a precaution,” Cole said, not bothering to hide his annoyance at what Marcos and Luke were clearly thinking. That he was overreacting because it was Shaye. That no matter how far out of his league she was, he was still going to be there whenever she needed him.
“Don’t worry,” Marcos said, starting his engine. “I don’t mind. But right now I’m going to head home and get a little sleep.” He started to shift into Drive, then paused and asked, “Shouldn’t you get some of that yourself?”
“That’s why Luke is here.”
Marcos grinned again. “You’re going to nap while he keeps watch?” He peered at Luke and joked, “All that Marine training means you don’t actually need sleep?”
Cole’s partner had been in the Marines before becoming a police officer.
“Ha-ha,” Cole said. “We’re going to take turns getting a little shut-eye.”
“Good luck,” Marcos said. “Call me if you need anything, okay?”
“You got it.” As Marcos pulled away, Cole eased into the spot his brother had chosen at the corner of the street. It was a perfect vantage point since it gave him a good angle on the two sides of Shaye’s house that abutted streets. The remaining sides of her house were bordered by neighbors’ yards, and they would be trickier for someone to approach.
Cole shut off his truck. It was a typical November night, hovering near forty degrees, but Cole didn’t want the running engine to draw any attention from the neighbors, in case anyone was a night owl. Besides, he and Luke were used to working in uncomfortable conditions. Both of them had been patrol officers before being bumped up to detectives.
They sat in silence for a few minutes, checking the area, and then Luke asked, “Have we officially released her car yet?”
Shaye’s car was still at Roy’s Grocery, where the parking lot had been roped off so he and Luke, along with a handful of cops working with them on the case, could pull evidence. They’d finished an hour ago, but Cole figured he’d tell Shaye in the morning.
“Technically, yeah. I thought I’d take her to pick it up tomorrow.”
“Or just have it towed,” Luke suggested. “She’ll need that bullet hole repaired.”
The gunman had fired three shots. One had hit the driver’s door of Shaye’s car, another had hit the back tire of the grocery store owner’s car and the third had gone into Shaye. He’d asked the forensics lab to put a rush on reviewing the bullets, but they’d looked insulted he’d even asked. Shaye was one of them. They were already rushing it.
“We hear anything yet about those security cameras?” Cole asked. Although the camera at the grocery store wasn’t real, there were others nearby they were checking. He’d probably have heard if there was news, because he’d made sure everyone working the case knew they should call him at any hour with updates. But he’d also spent several hours this evening at the hospital while Luke headed up the investigation. It was possible he’d missed something.
“Not yet,” Luke replied, but he dutifully pulled out his phone and tapped in a text, then shook his head a minute later. “They haven’t found the guy on any cameras yet.”
Cole wasn’t surprised. The grocery store wasn’t in a highly commercial area, and it didn’t get much criminal activity, either. There weren’t as many security cameras as there would have been if the shooting had happened in another area of town. He wondered if that had been the shooter’s intent.
“Shaye’s got bad luck.”
“What?” Cole shifted in his seat to face Luke, who always looked serious, with his buzz cut leftover from the military and his intense greenish-blue eyes.
“That’s all this was. We went over her timeline. She was at work until eight, and then she drove straight to the grocery store, which she said she hadn’t originally planned to do. If someone was after her specifically, that means they would have had to watch the forensics lab from at least five and then followed her. And in three hours, sitting outside a police station, don’t you think someone would have spotted him?”
Cole nodded. He knew it was true. All the evidence said this had nothing to do with Shaye. Still, ever since he’d shown up at that shooting, his instincts had been buzzing the way they always did on a case when he knew something was off. And it was telling him there was more going on here.
“If it was random, meant to be a spree shooting, then why did he wait until the place was almost empty?”
Luke frowned. “Yeah, that bothers me, too. But he ran into the parking lot. Maybe he’d been coming from committing a crime and Shaye was in his way.”
“We didn’t have any reports that would match up,” Cole reminded him.
“Not yet. Or maybe he planned to keep going—run though the grocery store lot, taking out anyone there, then move on to the rest of the businesses on the street. There are a couple of restaurants that were pretty full.”
It was one of the reasons they didn’t have any witnesses yet. It seemed counterintuitive—the shooter had run toward businesses full of people—but on a Friday night, it meant the music was loud, the patrons were drinking and no one heard a thing. Except for Roy still inside the grocery store, who’d sheltered in place and called the police.
“That’s possible,” Cole agreed, but he still couldn’t shake the dread gripping him, saying Shaye had a direct connection. Because Luke was right about one thing: how unlucky could one woman be? Two attempts on her life in a year?
“Today is almost a year to the day of the shooting at the station,” Cole said, even though he knew Luke didn’t need the reminder. Luke had been there, too; he’d run out right behind Cole, firing back at the gang members, completely outgunned with their service pistols against semiautomatics.
“Yeah, and that’s why I’m sitting in this car with you instead of in bed at home,” Luke replied. “Because I think we got everyone in that gang. But they’ve all got families, too.”
Cole nodded. It hadn’t occurred to him that a gang member’s family member might be trying to get revenge on Shaye for speaking up as a witness in the trial earlier in the year. His thoughts had always been on the families of the three officers who’d died that day. But his and Luke’s bullets had killed two gang members at the scene, and four more had died in subsequent raids, because they’d pulled weapons instead of throwing up their hands when police came to arrest them. Any one of those men—or the ones who’d landed in prison—could have family or friends desperate for revenge.
“That theory has the same problem, though,” Luke said. “If Shaye was a specific target, someone followed her to that grocery store. And if we’re talking about someone affiliated with a gang, yes, they wouldn’t be afraid to stake out a police station, but I doubt they’d be subtle enough to get away with it.”
“True. And if we’re looking at that kind of revenge, wouldn’t someone want us to know it was them?” Cole added. “Or go after the station too? Both of us instead of just Shaye? I don’t like the timing, and it seems way too coincidental that she’s targeted by gunmen twice—”
“She wasn’t targeted before,” Luke cut him off. “They had no idea she was involved in the digital analysis that got us the lead we needed on the gang leadership in the first place. They were there because we’d been investigating. She just happened to be on our side of the parking lot.”
A fresh wave of guilt washed over Cole. He knew why she’d been by the station doors, when she should have been on the other side near the forensics lab, out of the line of fire. Most days they’d ended around the same time and stood outside chatting for ten or twenty minutes before going their separate ways. That day, he’d been late, caught up in paperwork. And she’d almost paid with her life.
“Well, still,” Cole said, hoping Luke didn’t notice the new tension in his voice, “she’s been shot at twice in just over a year. I don’t like it.”
“Me, either,” Luke said, then swore.
“What?”
“Here she comes.”
“What?” Cole said, spinning back toward the direction of Shaye’s house.
His partner was right. Shaye was storming their way, her injured leg dragging a little behind, her hands crossed over her chest and a furious look on her face. None of that stopped him from noticing she was heading toward them in a nightgown that was way too short and way too thin for this kind of weather.
His mouth dried up as he got out of his truck, rushing over to her side and slipping his arm behind her shoulders in case she was still off balance from her injury. Behind him he heard Luke step out of the vehicle a little more slowly.
Shaye shrugged his arm off. “What are you doing?”
“Keeping an eye on things,” Cole said. “Just until we catch the shooter.”
She scowled but didn’t look at all intimidating in her nightgown. It was just cotton, basically a big T-shirt, but on Shaye it somehow looked sexy. Especially with her hair spilling around her shoulders, loose and rumpled.
“I told the chief I didn’t need protection.” Her words lost some of their anger as he continued to stare at her, trying to keep his gaze on her face. As if she suddenly realized what she was wearing, she tugged the hem of her nightgown farther down her legs, her gaze darting to Luke and back again.
Then she spun around. Just when he thought she was going to demand he leave and call the chief about his unauthorized stakeout, she called over her shoulder, “This is unnecessary. But if you’re going to insist on being here, you shouldn’t sleep in the truck. Come on. You can stay with me.”
A million images rushed through his brain, most of them involving that nightgown on the floor, and Cole knew he should refuse and climb back into the truck with his partner. Instead he followed Shaye inside.
Chapter Four (#u7ad02723-41b0-5f69-a36f-b1bc725b0b43)
Shaye tried not to feel self-conscious as she strode quickly back to her house, but she’d never been more aware of the swing of her hips as she walked, of her long, awkward limbs. She pulled at the hem of her nightgown, willing her cheeks to cool as she held the door open for Cole without turning around.
Mixed in with her embarrassment was annoyance. The chief had offered her protection, even though she could tell he thought it was unnecessary. She’d had only a moment’s hesitation before she refused. And yet here Cole was anyway, deciding what was best for her.
She tried to shove back her frustration. Cole was just doing what he always did, what seemed to come naturally to him: protecting everyone around him, whether they needed it or not.
“I’ll be right back,” she said over her shoulder as she headed to her bedroom. Pushing the door shut behind her, she changed quickly into a pair of loose sweatpants and a T-shirt, cringing every time she moved her leg. The painkillers were starting to wear off.
She paused a minute in front of the mirror, combing her hands through her messy hair. There wasn’t much she could do about the deep circles under her eyes, not without makeup, and she wasn’t going to dress up for Cole. Not when he’d shown up uninvited, determined to look after her whether she wanted his help or not. And not when the sound of his car on the quiet street had woken her from an almost sleep.
When she returned to her living room, she found Luke settled on her couch, his legs stretched out in front of him and his hands tucked behind his head. Somehow he managed to look relaxed and totally alert at the same time. She nodded at him and continued looking around, until Luke pointed silently into her kitchen.
That was where she found Cole, checking the locks on her windows.
Shaye let out a heavy sigh. “I always leave those unlocked.”
He spun toward her. “What?”
“The front door, too. I just let anyone in who asks.”
He frowned, giving her the kind of stare she’d seen him use on hostile suspects. “That’s not funny.”
She planted her hands on her hips, subtly resting more of her weight on her left foot as her whole right leg started to throb. Apparently when the painkillers wore off, it wasn’t a gradual thing. “I told the chief I was fine. You told me I had nothing to worry about, that this was an unlucky fluke. So why are you here? Were you lying to me?”
He leaned back slightly, and she could tell she’d caught him off guard. Good. She was tired of being scared all the time, tired of waiting for someone else to solve her problems. Tired of being in the dark about what was happening with cases that concerned her.
“No,” he said slowly, looking her over as if he wondered what had happened to the nervous computer nerd he was used to.
She’s gone, Shaye wanted to say, and she’s not coming back. Except that wasn’t the truth.
The truth was she was scared. But she needed to take charge of her life instead of letting things happen to her.
“Maybe you should sit down,” Cole finally said.
Frustration built up in her chest, and she was humiliated to feel tears prick the backs of her eyes. But she’d been shot today, so maybe she had an excuse. Her hip felt like it was on fire.
“I’m fine,” she lied. “And I really don’t need a couple of babysitters.”
“If I’m a babysitter, my rate is ten dollars an hour,” Luke called from the other room.
A smile quirked her lips, and she tried to hide it as Cole rolled his eyes.
“I wasn’t lying to you,” Cole said, taking a step closer, his hand hovering near her elbow, as though he expected to need to catch her if she suddenly fell. “There’s no reason to suspect this guy was specifically targeting you. Because if that were the case, how would he even know where you were at that exact time? It makes more sense that he’d come here, beat the pathetic lock on your front door and do it in the middle of the night when you were sleeping.”
She must have gone pale, because he was quick to continue. “That’s not what happened. You were at the wrong place at the wrong time—that’s it.”
“Then why are you here?”
“Because.” His frown deepened, but instead of looking annoyed, he looked flustered.
She didn’t think she’d ever seen him flustered. She tilted her head, curious. “Why?” she insisted. “If this was a total fluke and no one was targeting me, then what were you doing sitting on my street in the dark, watching my house?”
They were keeping something from her. She stared up into his light blue eyes, trying to find answers there. “It’s gang related, isn’t it? You think this guy wants revenge for last year?”
“Probably not.”
“Then what?” she snapped, leaning even more on her uninjured leg. She wanted to sit, but he already had a height advantage. Plus, he was properly dressed in dark jeans and a button-down while she was dressed like a slob. And she needed answers. Needed the truth about what danger she was really facing. “What is it?”
“I can’t take the chance,” he barked right back at her.
She swayed, and it had nothing to do with her injury. “It is connected to the shooting from last year?” She had an instant flashback to being in that parking lot, bullets flying over her head as she hugged the pavement. To the panic, the absolute certainty she was going to die, and all the things she hadn’t accomplished yet in her life.
“It’s not connected to anything. Everyone thinks I’m crazy. But it’s you, so...”
Her lips parted and she tried to find words, but there were none. Because all of a sudden, she saw what was underneath the anger and worry and frustration in his gaze. He was attracted to her. And not just in a he’d-seen-her-in-her-nightgown kind of way, but genuine interest.
The realization slammed through her, shocking and empowering. The pain in her leg faded into the background as she took a small step forward, then leaned in.
For several long seconds, he stood immobile. Then something shifted in his eyes, and all she could see was desire.
Shaye’s heart took off at a gallop as his hands came up slowly and feathered across her cheeks. His thumbs stroked her face, and then his fingers plunged into her hair and his mouth crashed down on hers.
I’m kissing Cole Walker. The stupefied thought blared in her head as he nipped at her lips with his mouth and tongue and teeth until a sigh broke free and her lips parted. Then his tongue was in her mouth, slick against hers, sending shivers up and down her entire body.
She leaned into him, and thankfully he dropped his hands from her hair to her waist, keeping her from falling. His big hands seemed to make a hot imprint through her T-shirt and for a second, she wished she’d worn something sexier. Then she couldn’t think at all as he changed the angle of their kiss, and every nerve in her body came alive.
The scruff on his chin abraded her face, but it didn’t stop her from pressing even harder, wanting more, wanting it now. Looping her hands around his neck, she pulled herself up on her tiptoes to eliminate any last space between them, and then yelped as pain shot down her leg.
Cole lifted his head, the fire that had been in his gaze doused with worry. “Did I hurt you?”
