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He angled himself for a look at her. “Do you always double-check or was something different today?”
She pursed her lips.
Cole imagined kissing them apart.
He leaned against the handrail to her porch, allowing her to pass. “I can’t help thinking about the fact there hasn’t been trouble like this in your neighborhood for quite some time, and it happened on a day when you got sick and left work early. Also on a day you felt compelled to double-check your lock.”
“Maybe you’re reading too much into this.”
He shrugged. “That’s possible. It’s certainly a side effect of the job.”
Rita slid past him into her home, and a zip of electricity snapped over his skin. “Can you think of anyone who might’ve done something like this, Miss Horn?”
She swept long auburn locks over her shoulder and bundled the strands in one fist. “No.” She lowered her arms to lock around her middle. “You can call me Rita.”
COLE UNZIPPED THE black duffel he’d left by the door.
“What are you doing?” The fear in her voice startled him.
He raised his palms in a show of innocence. “I’m going to dust the knob and jamb for fingerprints. Maybe replace this old dead bolt.”
She lifted a finger. “Can I see what’s in the bag?”
Cole felt his forehead pucker as he stretched the duffel wide for her inspection.
“Okay.” Her face flushed with the words. “I don’t use the dead bolt. It sticks.”
“Care if I put the new one on before I go? It won’t stop a professional from getting inside, but it’ll slow one down, and in this neighborhood, time is your friend. I have a feeling those people on your lawn don’t miss much.”
Her lips turned down slightly. “You just happen to have a spare dead bolt with you?”
“No. I’ve been planning to change mine for months but haven’t gotten around to it.”
She seemed to mull that over. “Can you leave the door open while you work?”
“Sure.” He applied the dusting powder to her knob and jamb. “You sure you can’t think of anyone who’d want to get in here?”
“Like who?” Rita lifted a fancy pillow from the floor and clutched it to her chest.
Cole split his attention between her and his work. “I don’t know. Maybe a rival or an ex. Maybe a lover’s significant other?”
Her shocked expression turned to disgust. “That’s awful.” She dropped the pillow onto her couch and lined it up with the others. Delicate stitching over a tiny yellow flower formed the words Suck it up Buttercup.
Cole smiled.
She frowned. “I don’t have any rivals or lunatic exes, and I certainly don’t get involved with men who have significant others.” She threw his final words back at him. “What kind of women do you normally deal with, Deputy Garrett?”
He smiled at the pleasant sound of his name on her tongue. “You can call me Cole.” He stretched to his feet and extended a hand her way.
She eyeballed his hand. “I recognize you from the courthouse.”
A smile spread over his lips. “Is that right?”
Rita blushed and slid her thin hand into his. “Can I make you some coffee?”
“That’d be nice.” He turned back to the door with a rush of satisfaction.
Rita righted furniture and photos while Cole finished his work on her door and the coffee brewed. The small, inviting space was magazine perfect when he packed up his things. The overall result was very sexy librarian. Claw-footed furniture, books by the boatload and more fancy pillows with goofy sayings like Hot Mess, Sassy,and Hell to the No.
Cole shook his head. “You might want to think about getting a new knob, too. Maybe something with a code.”
“Sure.” She rolled the vacuum into view, then wiped a bead of sweat from her brow. “Coffee should be ready.”
“Care if I shut the door and test the lock?”
“No. It’s fine.” She returned a moment later with two fragile-looking cups and set them on the coffee table. “Do you take cream or sugar?”
Cole laughed. “No, but thanks.” He made a show of testing the door’s integrity and admiring his personal handyman skills. “I think this is all set. I’ll let you know about the prints.” He dropped the keys to her new dead bolt on the table, then helped himself to a seat in the narrow armchair. “You live here alone?”
“Yeah. For a couple years since Ryan moved out.”
Cole felt his jaw lock. “Ryan?” Maybe there was an angry ex out there somewhere who needed a swift kick in the ass. Cole adjusted his position in the little seat and hiked one foot onto the opposite leg. The idea of a man attempting to harm or frighten Rita set his teeth on edge.
“He’s my little brother.” She flipped the lid on a scrapbook beside his coffee. “There.”
A younger, masculine version of Rita centered every photo. Ryan was tall and gangly, like Cole used to be. At least eight inches taller than his big sister, who was tucked beneath his arm in many of the pictures. “You’re close. That’s nice. My family’s like that. Painfully so.”
She smiled.
“Did you say Ryan lived here?”
“Yeah. Until he moved into a dorm for freshman year. I was his legal guardian through high school.” Deep sadness swam in her hazel eyes.
Cole found himself leaning forward, suddenly eager to understand her burdens and lighten them.
“Our mother was hit by a drunk driver in Oklahoma. Ryan came to live with me after the funeral.”
“I’m sorry. I had no idea.” He couldn’t imagine losing a parent. Especially not in high school. And he surely couldn’t have raised a teenager when he was in his twenties. “Your dad’s not in the picture?”
She rolled her eyes and traced the gilded rim of her dainty cup with a fingertip. “No. He’s in Kuwait or Afghanistan or somewhere else where people need him.” There was no mistaking the disappointment in her tone. She set her cup aside and slid her palms up and down her thighs, then folded her fingers on her lap.
“Do I make you nervous?”
She looked at her feet. “No. Your presence is extremely comforting, actually, but I’ve had a long morning.”
“And you don’t feel well,” he reminded her.
“Right.”
“Anything you want to talk about?” he prompted.
Rita pressed her lips into a white line and shook her head.
He levered himself off the chair and went to fish a card from his bag, leaving his finished coffee where it stood. There was little left for him to do if she wasn’t talking, and West could use his help back at the docks.
She followed Cole to the door and opened it for him. Soft scents of vanilla and honey lifted from her skin and hair.
Cole scribbled his cell number across the back of his card. “If you need anything else or think of something you want to tell me, give me a call. I always answer, and I can be here quick. Meanwhile, I’ll add your street to the other deputies’ patrol routes.”
“No. Don’t.” Rita’s hand flashed up from her side, and curled around his wrist.
He waited for additional information that didn’t come. “That’s it? Just don’t?”
Her home had been ransacked, but she didn’t want to know the sheriff’s department was keeping watch?
Her face went slack as she released him. “I’m fine. There’s no need to send anyone else out. Thank you for coming.” She practically shoved him across the threshold, then cranked the new lock behind him.
Cole dropped behind the wheel of his cruiser and grabbed the radio to call in his whereabouts before shifting into gear.
In the distance, a high-end sedan pulled away from the curb and took an immediate turn out of sight. Cole set the radio aside and reversed down the drive. He hadn’t noticed the car when he went outside to walk Rita in, and it hadn’t been there while he’d worked on her open door. Maybe it was nothing, or his attraction to Rita making him crazy, but something told him he’d better follow that car.
RITA WATCHED FROM her window as the handsome deputy pulled away. Cole Garrett wasn’t the man from the docks and her office. She’d have recognized Cole anywhere. He was the one who settled fistfights outside the courtrooms and calmed criminals being loaded into vehicles destined for prison, and the one on his knees beside benches where folks cried over an unfair verdict. Cole Garrett was a peacekeeper and a hero.
When the coast was clear, Rita kicked off her heels and traded her pencil skirt for a pair of blue jeans. She stuffed bare feet into white, laceless sneakers and grabbed her laptop bag and purse.
Five minutes later, she parked Ryan’s car against the curb outside a crowded café and wandered inside. On television, people being hunted always went somewhere with witnesses. The café seemed a smart choice. Even if she wasn’t being hunted, it surely felt that way, and her home was too quiet. Too vulnerable. If someone got inside while she was there alone, the invader would have complete privacy to do anything he wanted.
Her stomach protested the thought. “A bottle of water, please,” she said to the barista.
“Three dollars.” He set her order on the counter.
Rita gave him a five and walked away. She chose a tall table near the back of the brightly lit room and climbed onto a seat with a view of the front door and window, and also of the muted television anchored near the ceiling. She should’ve told Cole her story. She had to trust someone, and every cell in her body said she could unequivocally trust him. It was stupid that she hadn’t. She dug his card from her bag and set it on the table. She needed to stop feeling overwhelmed and start figuring this mess out.
What would she say? Where should she begin?
The white noise of two dozen voices soothed her frayed nerves. She rubbed cold fingertips in small circles against her temples, plotting ways to open the disturbing conversation. Hello, this is Rita Horn. I know we’ve only just met, but I wanted you to know that I think one of the other deputies is a murderer.
She rolled her eyes as a silent peanut-butter commercial gave way to live coverage at the river.
She dropped her hands onto the table. Her heart leaped into her throat. She scanned the room full of oblivious people, all pecking at their phone screens or chatting with friends. Rita leaned across the table, wholly focused on the scrolling text beneath the coverage.
“Witnesses reported seeing members of the Cade County Sheriff’s Department and Coroner’s Office at this location early this morning. Crime scene tape and a number of road blocks have been put in place as the hours progress. Behind me you can see the continued presence of the CCSD. Our question is, why?”
The young reporter on-screen pressed her fingers against one ear and dropped her gaze. When she raised her face to the camera once more, her skin had gone ghost white.
“Sources have confirmed a body was pulled from the river just after sunrise.”
Chapter Four (#ub3f5438b-1665-5899-846f-dd74f072bd4c)
Rita rose on shaky legs as images of the coroner’s van crossed the communal screen, a turbulent Ohio River in the background. An old factory and a dozen feline silhouettes anchored the scene.
Her ears began to ring as she strode conspicuously to the door, bumping into people and chair legs while watching the television for any last-minute announcements.
The wind was brisk and nippy as she shoved free of the coffee shop’s warmth and safety onto the sidewalk where anyone could see her. Namely a nefarious deputy and the other man from the docks. The one who’d had blood on his dress shirt. She hurried to the little borrowed car and shoved her purse and laptop bag across the console. Rita locked the doors and checked her mirrors before dropping her forehead onto the steering wheel.
Think.
The men she’d seen at the docks had murdered someone. She’d heard the splash. Seen the blood.
And the men had seen her.
She raised her eyes to scan the street and sidewalks around her once more, begging her mind to focus. She couldn’t stay at the coffee shop without someone noticing her imminent breakdown. She couldn’t go home or back to work. The bad guys had already been there. She paused at the thought. Bad guys. Was this even her life?
“What do I do?” she whispered to her windshield. They know who I am. Where I work and live. What did they want? To kill her? Why? She hadn’t seen anything. Couldn’t even identify them. Though she had gotten a good look at the deputy who came to her office this morning and could give a rough description of the other guy—size, height, weight, but not much else. Her gaze traveled slowly to the bag on her passenger seat. The pen. What if it was evidence in a murder investigation, and she’d wadded it in tissues and stuffed it in a plastic baggie? There could be fingerprints or DNA evidence or an imperceptible thread. Forensics could find anything, and if the killers knew she had something linking them to the crime, they’d definitely want it back. So what should she do with it?
She considered tossing it out the window.
Her head spun as she pulled carefully into traffic. She should’ve told Deputy Garrett what had happened. Something in her gut said he had nothing to do with the man at her office or the crime scene. Deputy Garrett was trustworthy, and he would help her. There was no more doubt as to whether or not she’d been present for what she thought she’d been present for. She was a witness, albeit probably after the fact, to murder. And she was in danger.
It was time to do what she should’ve done all along.
She slowed at the traffic light and dug through her bag for the handsome deputy’s business card. She’d call him as soon as she got to wherever she was going. Where was that?
The light turned green, and Rita lowered her foot against the gas pedal. The sun-bleached hula girl on her brother’s dashboard bobbled. “Oh, no.” A new and terrifying realization slid like ice into her stomach. If the bad guys knew who she was, where she worked and lived, then they also knew what she drove. And her little brother was currently driving it!
Rita applied brute force to the narrow pedal, racing through downtown, then over the bridge and across the river. She dialed Ryan repeatedly from every traffic light and stop sign.
No answer.
Her mind conjured ghastly images of her new silver truck rolled onto its top or sinking in the river, Ryan trapped inside.
“Hi, Ryan,” she told his voice mail as calmly as possible. “It’s me. Listen. I’m sorry, but I completely forgot I had a thing today, and you can’t use my truck. I’ll make it up to you as soon as I finish my thing.” She cringed. Ryan would never accept her flimsy excuse without explanation, but she couldn’t offer him anything more. Bringing him in on her mess would put him in danger. “Anyway, I’m on my way to your place now. I’ll just trade you back real quick. Sit tight and I’ll be there in ten.”
She bit her lip, hating the lie. She’d promised Ryan long ago that he could always trust anything she said, and until now, she’d held tight to that promise. Hopefully he’d forgive her when she was able to explain the gruesome truth.
Rita switched to back roads as the campus came into view. Main routes and intersections were bogged with student traffic and puttering locals. The little hatchback took corners with ease as she cut through the rear entrance to Ryan’s neighborhood. Her much larger truck would’ve barely passed through the narrow alleyways with cars parked on both sides. If his car didn’t smell like a gym bag filled with burger grease, she’d agree to trade with him more often.
Finally, the home Ryan shared with two other students came into view.
The only vehicle in the driveway was another old compact.
“No.” Rita pulled up to the curb and stared. Where was he? Why wasn’t he answering her calls? Again, the scary images beat a path through her mind. Please, she sent up a silent prayer, don’t let anything happen to my baby brother.
Her phone buzzed against her lap and she jumped.
Ryan’s name appeared on the screen beside a tiny envelope. He’d sent her a text message.
She released a happy sob and swiped the screen to life.
