Assumed Identity (5 page)

“I asked you not to say things like that.”

“Look, lady—”

“Robin,” she corrected him. “I also asked you to call me Robin.”

He blew out a long sigh, conceding to her will—for the few moments longer he intended to be a part of her life. “Robin. You don’t really know me. You shouldn’t automatically trust me.”

“I trusted you because I had to. You haven’t disappointed me yet.”

Oh, hell. That sounded like some sort of relationship had been forged between them.

Jake was relieved as much as he was on edge when he heard the sirens in the distance outside. He nodded toward the back door where they’d come in. “You stay here with the kid. I’ll wait outside and show the police in.”

It was one thing to serve a cop a drink. It was something else to stand there and answer his questions, maybe come under scrutiny himself for wandering the streets so late at night. And being armed the way he was bound to raise a few suspicions.

Jake surmised the distance and direction of the approaching flashing lights. He paused for one shameless moment to admire the apple-shaped curve of Robin Carter’s backside, emphasized by the clinging hug of her wet jeans, as she bent over the bassinet, tending to her sleeping baby again.

The cops were close enough. She’d be safe.

“Thank you again, Mr. Lonergan. By the way, you never told me your first name...”

He never heard the end of her sentence. By the time she straightened from the bassinet, he was gone.

Chapter Three

“You take care of whatever you need to and don’t worry about Emma.” Hope Lockhart pulled her toffee-blond hair from beneath Emma’s head where it nestled on her ample bosom and shook the loose, sleep-rumpled curls down her back. “I’ll take her across the street and get the spare room ready for you two. It’ll be a lot quieter in my apartment and she can sleep. You know I like hanging out with sweetie-pie here.”

Robin followed her friend into the hallway outside her office and pulled the blanket up over her sleeping daughter’s head. “I’m so glad you came over, Hope. Thank you.”

“Not a problem. When I heard the sirens and saw all the lights... You know what I thought.” Hope’s fearful expression echoed what every woman thought whenever KCPD, reporters and an ambulance gathered in this part of Kansas City—the Rose Red Rapist had claimed another victim.

Robin adjusted the ice pack over her bruised shoulder and gave her friend a hug. “I’m okay. At least, I will be once all the craziness calms down.”

When she pulled away, Hope’s deep gray eyes had narrowed into a frown behind the glasses she wore. She was looking beyond Robin’s shoulder to the three KCPD investigators inside her office. “Can’t you tell these people to go away and leave you alone, at least until daylight? It’s not fair that the victim has to deal with all this after being attacked. I don’t think I could handle so many people poking into my life, wanting something from me.”

Robin summoned a smile as she pulled together the gaping collar of the trench coat Hope had thrown on over her nightgown before running downstairs from her apartment above the Fairy Tale Bridal Shop she owned across the street. Her shy friend was stronger than she gave herself credit for. “Who came charging over here in the middle of the night when she thought Emma or I might be hurt?”

“I didn’t stop to think about it—I just did it. And you
are
hurt.” Hope tucked a damp, frizzing tendril behind her ear. “But talking to those detectives in your office without stumbling over my words and sounding like an idiot? Trust me, I’d rather babysit.”

“Well, I’m grateful.” Robin leaned in and pressed a goodbye kiss to Emma’s soft, warm cheek. She pulled back with a stern, sisterly warning for her friend. “Make sure one of the officers walks you across the street. Even that short distance isn’t safe anymore.”

“I will. I saw Maggie Wheeler outside, blocking off the parking lot with crime scene tape. She’s a client of mine. I’m planning her wedding to that Marine, remember? I ordered her flowers through you—”

“Detective Montgomery?” The back door slammed shut and a man’s deep voice called out, interrupting Hope’s soft gasp. The pungent smell of wet dog tickled Robin’s nose a split second before Hope hugged Emma tightly to her chest and retreated a step.

“Hope? What is it?” Robin turned at her friend’s stricken expression to see a K-9 officer with his brown-and-tan German shepherd partner striding down the hallway. The dog paused when his handler did, and shook himself from nose to tail. The cop pulled off his black KCPD ball cap and knocked the excess water against his pant leg, leaving a similar spray of water droplets on the concrete floor.

“Detective Montgomery?” The officer rapped sharply on the frame of the door to Robin’s office. His square jaw warmed with a shade of pink when he realized the two women were staring at him. “Sorry, ma’am. If you point me to a mop, I can clean up after Hans and me.”

Robin suspected the blush on those rugged features meant the apology was sincere. “That’s okay. I deal with plenty of water around all these flowers. That’s why the floor is sealed and the walls have moisture-resistant wallpaper. I’ll wait until everyone’s done before I tackle the footprints and rain we’ve all tracked in.”

“Pike?” Spencer Montgomery, the red-haired detective who seemed to be running this whole show, looked up from the notepad where he’d been jotting information and joined them at the doorway. He tucked the notepad and pen inside the pocket of his suit jacket. “Did you two find anything?”

“Rain’s washed away any scent we can track.” The nameplate on the officer’s uniform identified him as E. Taylor. Pike must be a nickname. “Looks like there was a scuffle in the alley, though—away from the loading dock where Ms. Carter said she ended up. The perp could have escaped through there easily enough. As for the man you claim rescued you—”

“He did.”

“—I’ve got no clue where he disappeared to. There’s no car, no footprints, no sign of him anywhere.”

Spencer Montgomery nodded. “His sudden departure might mean he has reason to avoid talking to the police.”

The need to defend the man who’d saved her life charged Robin’s weary body with renewed energy. “And it might mean he had to get to work at an early morning job. Or go home to his family.”

As soon as she said the words, Robin wondered if there was any truth to them. There was something about Mr. No-Name Lonergan—his reluctance to hold Emma, his gruff demeanor and brute strength, that odd comment he’d made about not knowing if there were any children in his life—that made Robin think he was a man without any familial connections to civilize him. What kind of man roamed a downtown neighborhood in the middle of the night during a storm without benefit of umbrella, raincoat or even a cap? Where had he come from? Why had he disappeared? Where had he learned that choke-hold thing he’d done to her attacker? He’d never given her his first name, and she’d been too out of it to even think to ask. What if Lonergan
was
a criminal? He certainly looked the part of a TV or movie villain with that scarred face and misshapen nose that indicated he’d seen more than one fight in his lifetime.

But something about the sense of isolation that had fit him as tightly as the T-shirt he’d worn tugged at her compassion. She didn’t suppose he owed her anything, not even the courtesy of a proper goodbye. But she owed him everything. Bad guy or not, he’d been her hero. Robin swore to herself, not for the first time that night, that she would track down her mysterious savior and thank him properly for being there when she and Emma had needed him.

“Maybe.” The detective seemed to consider her reasoning and then dismissed any option but his own. Lonergan was still a person of interest, if not a viable suspect, on his list. Spencer Montgomery glanced up at the K-9 officer and gave his orders. “Keep an eye on things until the CSI’s are done processing the scene. And keep those damn reporters out of everyone’s way. We’ll debrief later this morning.”

“Yes, sir.” After he’d been dismissed, and the lead detective had returned to his conversation with his partner in her office, the brawny K-9 officer looked down at Hope, still frozen in place beside Robin, and winked. “Hans won’t hurt you, ma’am. Not unless I tell him to.” The officer’s teasing grin vanished when Hope’s eyes widened like circles rippling across a lake. He quickly raised a gloved hand. “But I would never give him that order. I just meant he only does what I tell him to. Ma’am?”

“Hope?” Robin reached for her friend. “He was teasing you.”

“I know.” But the tight press of her lips and ashy skin indicated that what she knew and what she believed weren’t the same thing. “He’s a cop. He’s a good guy.”

“Maybe Officer Taylor could walk you and Emma home,” Robin suggested.

“No!” Her friend’s answer was too fast and too succinct to be polite and her cheeks instantly flooded with embarrassment.

“I don’t mind,” the big man offered. “Security is what Hans and I do best.”

“No.” Hope’s gaze darted up to meet Pike Taylor’s, but then settled, almost deliberately, at the middle of his chest. “I mean, no, thank you. Officer Wheeler’s outside. She’s a friend. I’ll ask her.”

Robin’s concern shifted from defending Lonergan to the situation at hand. The Hope she knew was a gentle, patient soul—not this skittish woman who was visibly shaking in her soggy slippers.

“Hope?” She put a hand beneath Emma before touching her friend’s shoulder.

Hope snapped her gaze to Robin. “I’ve got her,” Hope reassured her, hugging the infant in her arms. And though she sounded more like the friend Robin relied on, Hope’s gaze was darting from the officer’s chest down to the dog, where he lay on the floor, panting, while his tongue lolled out of the side of his long black muzzle. The shepherd looked completely relaxed and disinterested in the people coming and going around him. Her friend, however, seemed ready to bolt. “I’ll go find Maggie Wheeler. You still have the spare key I gave you?”

“Yes. I’ll let myself in.”

Hope forced a smile and flattened her back against the wall to scoot around the police officer and his dog. “Emma and I will be at home when you’re done. Good luck.”

She’d disappeared through the heavy steel door to the parking lot before Officer Taylor spoke. “Did I do something wrong? Is she okay?”

There was shy and tongue-tied, and then there was freaking out. Robin shrugged her confusion, then winced at the pain radiating through her shoulder. “I honestly don’t know. I’ve never seen her act like that before.”

“Sorry I scared her. I would never sic Hans on her.”

Robin nodded, adding her friend’s behavior to the list of things that perplexed her tonight. “I know.”

“Well, we’d best be getting back to work. Ma’am.” Officer Taylor put his cap back on and tipped the bill to her before tugging on the dog’s collar and giving a command in German that prompted the dog to its feet and into step beside him.

Left alone for a few quiet moments, away from the chaos that had descended on her shop and the parking lot outside, Robin inhaled a steadying breath. Part of her wanted to go after Hope to find out what had upset her so, and part of her wanted to curl up in bed with Emma so they could get some sleep and recapture the serenity of their life before the man with the baseball bat.

But Robin knew she wouldn’t be much help to her friend, nor would there be any real relaxing, until she finished her interview with the police and got her life back to its normal routine. If
normal
was even possible.

While she considered herself infinitely practical, and was used to dealing with the problems in her life on her own, something in Robin’s world had shifted tonight. Her confidence had been rattled and, for the first time, she wondered if she’d been selfish to bring Emma into her life. She’d wanted a family to fill her big house and empty heart so badly that she’d jumped at the chance to adopt Emma when her birth mother had terminated her parental rights. But maybe she had no business being a single mom. Tonight she’d been terrified—not just for herself, but for Emma. She’d been helpless to defend herself or her daughter.

And then Lonergan showed up out of nowhere. Despite his ghostlike appearance, he was solid and real. She’d leaned on him when she’d been too weak to stand and too frightened to think, and he hadn’t budged an inch. Robin didn’t doubt that he could kill a man with those big hands of his—he’d tossed that creep aside like a bag of trash. Yet he’d cradled Emma as though she was the most fragile treasure in the world.

He’d been growly and gruff and overwhelming, and had no interest in accepting the proper thanks he deserved. Still, Lonergan’s sudden disappearance left a void in her world. Any real sense of security was gone. She was usually such a good judge of people. Hadn’t she sensed some sort of interest in his icy gaze? Even if it wasn’t sexual, she was certain that there’d been a connection between them.

But gone was gone. She had no idea why one man would come after her, and another would run away.

“Ms. Carter?” Spencer Montgomery was at the doorway again, waiting for her to come in to finish answering his questions. “Is the baby settled?”

With a nod that was more a surrender to the inevitable than an answer to his question, Robin followed him back into her office.

“CSI Hermann needs to process you.” Detective Montgomery introduced the petite brunette woman wearing a blue CSI vest. “Is it all right if she does that while we finish our interview?”

“Of course.” Since shooing them out and holing up with her daughter for a couple of hours wasn’t an option, Robin offered them a cooperative smile, instead. “Did you find that woman I saw earlier? Did she get home safely?”

Detective Montgomery shook his head. “Your description was pretty vague, but there have been no other assaults reported. I’ve got street patrols keeping an eye out for her, just in case, but they haven’t spotted anyone else.”

“It looks as though the attack tonight was all about you.”
Oh, goody.
Spencer Montgomery’s partner, Nick Fensom, pulled out the chair behind her desk and invited her to sit. He was shorter than his partner, dark-haired and stocky. Even his jeans and leather jacket were a contrast to his suit-and-tie associate. “You were about to tell us why you stayed late after work tonight?”

Right. That mess. Numbers that wouldn’t balance seemed insignificant compared to her daughter being thrust into danger and nearly dying herself.

“I’ve been on maternity leave for a couple of months,” she explained, squeezing her fingers between her knees in her lap to stop their sudden trembling. “When I came back to work this week, I discovered there were some discrepancies in my books. Money missing. On paper, anyway. Since Emma wasn’t sleeping, I thought I could use the time to try and figure out where the problem is.”

Detective Fensom pointed to the wrinkled files and printouts that had been in the rain-soaked diaper bag with Emma’s things. Now the damp papers were in sealed bags and labeled as evidence on her desk. “Did you find the problem?”

“No. I was going to take them home and study them there. I’d already disrupted my daughter’s routine more than I should.”

“Do you think someone’s stealing money from you?” he asked.

“The people who work for me are also my friends.” Did she have to defend everyone who was on her side tonight?

The detective shrugged. “Sometimes, even friends can run into trouble and resort to doing something desperate.”

“None of my friends attacked me.” Robin tilted her chin up as the conversation went off on a whole new tangent about how long she’d known her employees, and how well did she trust them? She promised a list of names and addresses, as well.