In Broad Daylight (7 page)

She began to leave.

The patrolman came to life. "Wait, Detective Cavanaugh said I was to take you to your

car."

Her car was still parked in the school lot. She was about to call for a cab, but this made

things easier. "Always thinking, your detective."

The patrolman flashed her a smile. "We like to think so."

Once they got past the media reporters camped outside the door, the trip was relatively

quick. Hers was the only vehicle left in the lot.Danvers, the patrolman, pulled up beside it.

Dusk had descended, and with it a strange clamminess in the air. It was a strange May

night. But then, it had been a strange day all around.

"I can follow you home,"Danversoffered as she unlocked her car.

She shook her head. "I'll be fine," she assured him. Brenda got into the driver's seat. She thought of the scene they'd just left behind. "I think your partner might need help with

Mrs. Tyler, though. You'd better get back there."

Danverssighed, looking none too happy. "Right."

As he drove off, she turned her key in the ignition. But as she began to drive out of the

lot, she changed her mind. Making aU-turnthat brought her right back to where she'd

parked, she turned off the engine.

The night promised to be a very long one. She sincerely doubted she was going to get any

sleep. If she was going to remain awake, she might as well put the time to good use.

She needed to feel as if she was doing something. Anything.

Getting out of her car, she locked it again, then walked slowly toward the school. The

evening was eerily quiet. The sound of her heels hitting the concrete reverberated back to

her, adding to the surreal atmosphere.

There was yellow police tape draped across the front entrance. She debated ducking

under it, then decided to use the side door.

The way the kidnapper probably had, she reasoned. Except that Brenda had a key.

"Hang on, Annie," she whispered to the night air. "We'll have you home soon."

She refused to believe anything else.

"What are you doing here?"

Brenda shrieked as she spun around. She nearly jumped out of her chair and wound up

hitting her knee against the side of the desk. Nerves vibrated throughout her entire body

as she pressed a hand to her hammering heart. Her throbbing knee would have to wait.

As far as she'd known, the building was empty.

She stared at Dax in the doorway.

"That's some scream you have there," Dax commented as he approached her. He nodded

toward her leg. "Your knee okay?"

It throbbed, and there would probably be a bruise, but that was of no consequence. She

shrugged carelessly.

"I'll be fine."As soon as my heart stops pounding.It didn't seem to be an appropriate

comment to share with the good-looking detective at the moment.

What was she doing here, he wondered.Wasshe more deeply involved than he'd thought?

"There's yellow tape on the outside of the doors," he pointed out.

"Yes, I know."

He noticed the tape hadn't been touched. She'd probably used the side entrance. "That

means it's a crime scene."

She knew that, too. But this was the only place she could think of that had the proper

tools she needed in order to work up the flyers with Annie's picture.

Sitting at the state-of-the-art-computer, she indicated the printer. There was a stack of

colored flyers beside it. "I wanted to print up flyers to distribute around the area. The

school has the best program for that sort of thing."

"You have a photograph of Annie?"

"I always take photographs of my class during the school year. I like to keep albums."

She didn't add that having photographs of the various children and tracing their progress

over the school year helped to give her the sense of family she so sorely lacked in her own

life.

Dax picked up one of the flyers she'd run off from the industrial-sized printer. It looked

very professional. "I'm impressed."

She thought he was referring to the equipment. "Mr. Harwood feels that the students

deserve nothing but the best at the school."

"No, I meant by the flyer." He put it back on top of the pile. "Nice work."

She shrugged. "It's not hard when you know how."

He wouldn't have thought that a woman who looked the way she did would be so self-

deprecating. Every time he gave her a compliment, she discounted it.

Having replenished the paper just before he'd entered the room, Brenda pressed the

print button again. "What are you doing here?"

"I was driving by, I saw the light." In actuality, he'd come by to see if she'd picked up her car yet. Seeing a light in the second-story window had made him investigate.

She tried to second-guess his reasoning. "And thought the kidnappers might have come

back to the scene of the crime?"

"Actually," he leaned against the desk, looking down at her, "I didn't know what to think."

And that, he decided, was the case here with her. Every time he made up his mind about

Brenda York, something else was thrown into the mix. "I try not to jump to conclusions

until all the evidence is in." And then, because the moment was so serious and begged to be

lightened, he smiled at her. "But it doesn't hurt to stay on top of things."

The air felt a little rare. She moved back a little. "How did the canvas turn out?"

"Nothing so far." How long did it take for perfume to fade, he wondered. Hers was still getting to him. He rose, moving back toward the printer. "We have an Amber Alert going."

Over the last couple of years, it had become standard procedure every time a child went

missing. Descriptions of the little girl now flashed across freeway signs up and down the

state. A great deal of distance could be covered in eight hours.

She nodded toward the radio she had on beside the desk. "Yes, I know."

She'd been on his mind ever since he'd left her at theTylerestate. He wasn't even sure

exactly why, but she was, lingering in the corners like the scent of some potent flower

drifting invisibly through the warm summer night air. When he'd gone back to theTylers—

and spent some time with a tearful Mrs. Tyler—Danvershad told him he'd dropped her off

at the school.

Seeing her car in the lot had given him a measure of concern. And made him wonder if

he'd written her off a little too soon.

"How are you doing?"

She blew out a breath. Maybe it was because she was too tired, or too stressed, but for

once in her life, she didn't hide her feelings behind a smoke screen. "Not too well."

«^»

Lookingcloser at her, he could see the definite signs of weariness. Her skin was almost

translucent.

He curbed the urge to run the back of his knuckles against her cheek, as if that could

somehow bring the color back to her face.

The girl's abduction had taken a toll on her. He thought of his gut feelings, the instincts

that had absolved Brenda of the crime. If she was faking it, then she was a damn better

actress than he would have thought she was.

"How did it go with Mrs. Tyler?"

"Not well." She was trying to be charitable toward the other woman, but it was difficult.

Frowning as she remembered the encounter at the mansion, Brenda pushed herself away

from the desk. "She blames the school, blames me." She sighed, dragging her hand through her hair. "Is probably on the phone with her lawyer right now, discussing a lawsuit."

He parked himself on the corner of the desk. He'd formed his own opinions about the

actress after only several minutes in her presence. His sympathies were entirely on

Brenda's side.

"Lawsuit?"

Brenda nodded. "Those were the last words Rebecca Allen-Tyler said to me. That she was

going to 'sue my ass.'"

Was that what had drained the color from Brenda's face? Fear of being taken to court?

"I don't think you really have to worry about that."

The threat had never concerned her. She had precious little that could be taken from

her.

"I'm not worried. I'm annoyed, maybe, but not worried." Her thoughts returned to Annie.

"Not about her, anyway."

"Annoyed?" He wasn't sure he followed her. "Why annoyed?"

Try as she might to suppress it, her anger rose up like bile in her throat. She thought of

the sad look in Annie's eyes when she tried to get the little girl to talk about her mother.

"Because this woman can't spare fifteen minutes for that little girl. Because she's always

'on,' not to mention the fact that she's usually away on some trip. And now suddenly she

wants to sue everybody because her daughter's been kidnapped? Why isn't her first

concern to do everything she can to have Annie found? Why isn't she taking herself to

task because up until now, she's been such a lousy mother?" With every word, her anger

grew. "I went to see her once to discuss Annie's shyness with her and she fluffed me

off—this after breaking I don't know how many appointments." She straggled to calm

herself down. "Rebecca Allen-Tyler is not my candidate for mother of the year."

"What about her father?" When he'd left the house, Simon Tyler hadn't returned yet.

Brenda waved her hand in dismissal. "Worse than her mother." It struck her as such a

tragedy. And it all could have been avoided. "Annie worships the ground they both walk on

and they just keep walking on it, not bothering to look down, not seeing the wonderful little

human being they're ignoring."

He couldn't help notice that the color had returned to her cheeks. And that it made her

even more attractive. "You sound pretty passionate about this."

She blew out a breath as she sighed. "Maybe because I am. I hate seeing a kid get a raw

deal." The printer had stopped. She hit the appropriate button again. The machine began

spitting out fresh flyers. "They've got such a very short time to be innocent, they should

be allowed to enjoy it."

"Did you?"

Brenda raised her head, caught off guard by the question. "What?"

"Did you?" he repeated. When she continued to look at him quizzically, he elaborated on the reason for his question. "I get the feeling you're speaking from firsthand experience."

In response, she got up and crossed to the printer, her back to him. He'd struck a nerve,

he thought. "What was your childhood like?"

She lifted her shoulder in a vague, noncommittal shrug. She'd talked too much. That was

her problem, she thought. She always shared herself too quickly. You would have thought

that she would have learned not to by now. That having a mother who abandoned her and a

father who took out every failure in his life on her would have taught her to keep her own

council. Even Wade had been closemouthed and had cut her off more than once when she

tried to talk to him, to get him to share his feelings with her.

All of her life, there had been nothing but emotional disappointment after emotional

disappointment. Except for the children.

"I don't remember," she murmured, putting more paper into the printer's tray. "It was a long time ago."

She was putting him off. But he had a feeling she needed to talk, so he pressed. "Not that

long ago, you're what, twenty-two?"

"Twenty-six."

Because she continued to keep her back to him, Dax rounded the printer and faced her.

"I'm impressed, you preserve well."

She laughed then and it was like the breeze weaving its way through wind chimes. Not the

annoying ones like his neighbor had that clanged, but the small ones, the ones that sounded

like music.

"That's nice," he told her softly. "You should do that more often."

She stopped stacking the finished flyers beside the printer. "Do what?"

"Laugh."

Her thoughts returned to Annie. "I guess there isn't that much to laugh about right now."

He curbed the urge to put his hand on her shoulder, to make some sort of contact that

could convey comfort far better than any words that might come out of his mouth. "There

will be. We'll find her."

Her mouth curved slightly. Sadly. She wished she could believe him. But she knew what

the world was like. "You sound so certain."

"Only way to go."

She looked at him for a long moment, gazed into his eyes. He truly believed that, she

realized. It gave her a measure of comfort to have the man in charge of the investigation

so sure of the results. She wouldn't have thought that a cop could be this optimistic.

"You must have had a very good childhood."

"As a matter of fact, I did."

With little effort, she could almost see him as a child. Bright, gregarious, taking over any

room he walked into. "Apple of your mother's eye?"

More like the source of most of her gray hair. "I don't know about that. There were too

many of us around to be anyone's favorite."

Because she was one, she'd pictured him as an only child. "How many is too many?"

Dax paused, doing a head count. "Eleven, counting me."

Brenda was aware that her mouth had dropped open. "Your mother had eleven children?"

At least she got a chance to go home at night. Being responsible for that many little souls

twenty-four hours a day seemed like the surest path to early burn-out to her. "That poor

woman. She probably didn't have time to eveneatan apple, much less—"

Dax held up his hand, laughing. "No, after four kids Mom told Dad that if he wanted any

more, he was going to find a way to push them out himself because she wasn't going to