Firefly Run (13 page)

She strained to hear any further noise, but the outdoors remained silent except for the insects in the surrounding woods. Her ears buzzed with the effort to hear more. What was out there? Knowing she wouldn’t rest until she had an answer one way or the other, she raised the poker, took a deep shuddering breath and pulled open the door with a quickness she hoped would surprise her prowler long enough for her to take advantage.

Reed jerked as if he’d been asleep and nearly tumbled from his perch on the edge of the porch. His reaction startled her, making her jump and gasp in surprise. She lifted her free hand to her breast to prevent her heart from beating out of her chest.

"Damn it, Reed, you about got yourself shish-ka-bobbed," she said when she found her voice again.

He stared down at the poker in her hand. "Looks like I still might."

She loosened her grip but didn’t set the poker aside. "I ought to give you a couple of good wallops just for the heck of it."

"That’s some Southern hospitality."

"Stop trying to be funny."

"What are you doing charging out into the night with a poker anyway?"

"I heard you scuffing around out here."

"What if I’d been a bear?"

"A bear wasn’t what I was afraid of."

They stared at each other in the dim light, not uttering Eddie’s name but knowing his menace was there between them.

"You shouldn’t expose yourself to danger like that."

"What am I supposed to do, cower under my bed?"

"If necessary."

"I won’t live like that."

"At least you’d live."

"No, I’d exist. Living is an entirely different thing."

He didn’t comment. She was right, and he knew it.

A rustling sound from the bushes beyond the clearing ended their conversation. Shelly’s heart, only now beginning to calm, leapt into her throat again.

"Turn out the light," Reed whispered, his command allowing no argument.

She took a slow step backward and flipped the interior light off.

"Go inside and lock the door," Reed said.

The hell with that. She’d made a promise to herself to protect Reed as much as he protected her. She might be armed with only a fireplace poker, but she figured she could do some damage if necessary.

A soft rubbing sound from Reed’s direction told her he was pulling his gun from his shoulder holster. The faint moonlight and the muted beams from the security light by the parking lot reflected dully on the cold steel of the barrel. Her eyes gradually adjusted to the dim light, allowing her to see the outline of the man who’d sworn to put himself between her and

the man who evidently wanted to kill her.

Fear invaded her heart like a ruthless conquering army. She wanted to grab Reed’s arm, to keep him from putting himself in danger. Maybe he could cower under the bed with her, keeping himself safe as well. But she knew him well enough to know that he’d never hide. She prayed he didn’t let his personal hatred for Eddie Victor mar his judgment to the point he’d make himself a target.

Her heart jumped when he moved toward the corner of the porch, his feet nearly soundless on the ground. She stood still, not wanting to distract him or draw attention to herself when she was Reed’s only backup.

She stared toward the forest and its thick understory of bushes and flowering plants. Its lushness provided beauty by day but potential danger at night. Eddie could be out there anywhere, watching them as if they were a pair of ducks gliding on a pond. A chill seeped down to her bones, making her shiver from the inside out.

No more sound issued from the bushes as Reed stood behind the corner porch support with his gun sighted on some indecipherable object in the woods. She scarcely dared breathe. The minutes stretched as did her nerves. Whatever or whoever had made the initial sound had either snuck away or remained still in defensive mode.

The sudden movement in the bushes nearly made her scream.

"Come out, you bastard," Reed said with deadly calm.

More rustling had Reed moving closer, using her car as a shield. Her back to the cabin’s wall, she hurried to the edge of the porch. She was determined to help Reed, but the fear pumping in her blood left a bitter taste in her mouth. She swallowed to try to rid herself of the taste but only succeeded in making it more pronounced.

More scurrying in the bushes made her stiffen. Reed, whom she could see more clearly now, propped his gun hand on the hood of the car and fished a powerful flashlight out of his back pocket. Not taking his eyes off the forest, he lifted the flashlight and pointed it toward the noise.

Two bright eyes stared back at them.

Relief overwhelmed her, and she couldn’t help the snort of humor as she sagged against the side of the cabin. "Well, Detective Tanner, you have successfully drawn down on your first raccoon." Though she couldn’t distinguish his features, Reed no doubt was looking at her with annoyance. Not only had she not obeyed his order to go inside, she also was laughing at him. But he had to see it was funny.

He muttered something, and she laughed again.

He stalked toward her. "I thought I told you to go inside."

"Yes, I must protect myself from marauding raccoons."

"It could have been a person."

"Or a bear, or a deer, or a host of other things."

He growled in frustration. "You sure are stubborn."

"Takes one to know one."

He climbed half the steps leading up to the porch, putting him at about eye level with her. "I’m serious, Shelly. If that had been Eddie, he could have spotted you and taken a shot without you ever seeing him."

"He could have taken you out just as easily." All hint of laughter seeped out of her at the thought.

"And what were you going to do if he did, attack an armed man with a poker?"

"Yes."

Her answer seemed to startle him because he didn’t reply. She wished she could see his face more clearly. Was he thinking her the biggest of idiots or was he touched by her loyalty?

As if fatigue had finally gotten the best of him, he sank onto the porch step, turning his profile toward her. She moved away from the wall and leaned on one of the porch supports.

"Were you asleep when I opened the door?"

"No," he answered in sharp annoyance, not the least bit convincing.

"That’s why you sleep so late in the mornings, isn’t it? You’ve been sitting on my porch all night every night since you got here, haven’t you?"

He didn’t respond, but his lack of words answered her questions. Her heart swelled at his dedication to seeing her remain unharmed. She leaned the poker against the wall and moved to the steps. She sat beside him and stared out toward the dim glow shed by the security light.

"You don’t have to stand sentinel every night," she said. "You need a good night’s rest, more than one probably."

He sighed and ran his fingers through his hair. She fought the urge to smooth the mussed locks.

"You don’t take this seriously enough," he said.

"What am I supposed to do? I don’t go anywhere without you, I lock my doors, I don’t leave windows open when I go to sleep. Do I need to buy a shotgun and sit on my couch staring at the door all night?"

"No."

"The thought that Eddie might show up scares me so much I can barely breathe sometimes, but I can’t help but think that he’s more concerned with staying free. It makes more sense that he’d be sipping a tall drink on the beach in Acapulco or the Keys."

"He’s not in Mexico or Florida."

"You don’t know that."

"Yes, I do."

Her nerves jolted at the conviction in his voice. "How? Have you heard something?"

"No, we don’t know where he is. He hasn’t been seen since Berk lost him in Vegas." He turned his face toward her. The faint light showed enough for her to read the fatigue and concern there. "But I know, Shelly." He pointed to his stomach. "I know it here."

Her heart seized up before remembering to beat, and she swallowed against the dryness invading her mouth.

"He’s coming for you." He paused. "And me."

****

Threat permeated the air surrounding Shelly and Reed, more real than when she’d thought only minutes before that Eddie might be standing on her porch. She rubbed her arms against the goosebumps peppering her exposed skin.

She froze when Reed wrapped his arm around her shoulder, but a memory, so bright and clear it could have been playing on a screen in front of her, helped her relax and lean against him. He’d held her like this the day of Troy’s funeral. She’d already cried so much she could barely see out of her swollen eyes, and if Reed hadn’t held her upright, she would have crumbled on the ground beside Troy’s grave. It had been Reed who’d known she couldn’t handle the sight of Troy being lowered into the maw of the earth and dirt being tossed onto his coffin, so he’d led her away.

And here he was again, giving her strength when she needed it most.

Overwhelmed with worry and appreciation, she lowered her head to his shoulder, and he rubbed up and down her arm like she had moments before.

"Thank you," she said.

"I don’t mind lending a shoulder."

"You’ve given me a lot more than a shoulder. I would have never survived those months after Troy’s death without you."

He stiffened, though he didn’t increase the pressure squeezing her. "You had your parents, your brother and sister-in-law."

"But mostly you."

He sighed deeply, and she imagined him closing his eyes against the painful memories.

"I know you still miss him," she said. "You’re still grieving. I could see it on your face the day you arrived."

"Not something you get over."

"Not entirely, but you learn to live again. Otherwise, it eats you up inside until you’re nothing but an empty, soulless shell."

"You figure out how to do that?"

"I wouldn’t say I had any light bulb moments, but each day I think it hurt a little less than the day before. I didn’t realize that for a long time, not until I woke up and found I wasn’t crying myself to sleep anymore. The first time I laughed afterward, it startled me so much I felt guilty. I mean, how could I laugh when my husband was dead?"

"I’m glad you were able to start over." His tone told her he couldn’t imagine how.

She lifted her head and stared into his eyes. With her face so close to his, his breath caressed her cheeks. "But you haven’t. I see it in your eyes. Every mention of Troy is like a stab to you. And you can’t enjoy life because of it."

Reed retrieved his arm, and she tried not to focus on how much she missed the simple, comforting touch. He laced his fingers and leaned his forehead against his intertwined hands.

"He was my best friend. No matter how hard I try, I can’t get that image of him lying on those church steps out of my mind. Every time I think of him, that’s all I see. Not the times when we were young, not the police academy, not fishing, just all that blood."

Shelly swallowed against the rising gorge in her throat. Though she no longer thought about it every day, that same image haunted her as well. No one could see such a thing and not be scarred.

"I was the same way for a long time, but I finally had to force myself to concentrate on the good memories. Otherwise, I was going to lose my mind."

"I’ve thought I would more than once. And I’m still so damn angry I could rip Eddie’s head off with my bare hands." He unclasped his hands and made a choking gesture in front of his knees.

Shelly placed her hand over one of his. "You can’t let Eddie do this to you. If he knew how this was still ripping at you, he’d glory in it. You can’t give him that satisfaction."

"It’s not a damned water faucet. I can’t turn it off."

His muscles bunched, and she wrapped her hand more tightly around his to prevent him from springing up and stalking away. If he had any hope of healing, he needed to talk out his feelings, whether he liked it or not.

"I know that," she said in her most soothing voice. If she said the wrong thing, he’d bolt like a scared deer.

He stared forward for several seconds before glancing down to where her hand lay atop his. "How did you do it?"

"At first, I didn’t do anything but stay in bed all day and wander around the cabin all night. I cried all the time, threw up a lot. Mom was understanding for a while. But after week upon week of it, she threatened to take me to the doctor if I didn’t eat something and get some sun. I was so angry at her I wanted to leave. I mean, how dare she scold me. She still had Dad. What did she know about losing a husband?"

Shelly paused to take a deep breath at the memory of that explosive altercation. She’d never screamed at her mother like that. Weeks later, she’d begged her mother’s forgiveness only to have her mother smile and say she didn’t have to apologize. She’d said the screaming was the first step to healing.

"I learned a couple of months ago that Mom lost a baby before Sean was born. I felt awful, remembering the things I’d said to her that day. And you know what she did?"

Reed shook his head.

"She hugged me and said it wasn’t my fault. I couldn’t have known. Reed, she could have fired that back at me that day when I was screaming about how she didn’t know what that kind of loss was like, but she didn’t. She put me before her own feelings."

"You’re lucky to have such a good mother."

She squeezed his hand. "You have one, too."

"It’s not the same."

"Because you’re a man?"

He shrugged.

"Contrary to popular belief, men can have feelings. And they can talk about them."

"I didn’t see the point in bothering her."

"She’s your mother. You wouldn’t be bothering her."

He pulled his hand away and stood. He walked a few steps before turning back toward her. "I don’t want to relive it over and over, okay? It’s bad enough that Eddie’s release has dragged it all up again."

She wanted to go to him, to put her arms around him, but she was afraid he’d retreat even farther. "You’re already living it over and over, in your mind. It won’t hurt any worse if you say it."