Love Inspired Suspense July 2015 #1 (31 page)

Still a little stunned that Jake
wasn't
there to pummel him, Cole plunged his hands into his pockets. “Trust me. I've been following every lead I can muster. That's why I turned in Eddie's phone. And now neither of them trusts me. The only reason the sheriff hasn't kicked me off the case is because he's short-handed with guys on vacation and he probably knows Zeke'll nail me to the wall if I show any favoritism to my brother.”

“I meant help her personally.”

Cole's heart hammered.
Personally?

“I don't have to be a rocket scientist to see you care about her.” Jake went on as if his request hadn't dropped a twenty-story elevator out from under Cole.

Sherri deserved a lot better than him. Frankly, he was surprised Jake hadn't already figured that out. As attracted as Cole was to Sherri, in addition to his inexplicable, soul-deep need to comfort and protect her, he couldn't mislead her. He'd seen firsthand how his dad had crushed Mom. And he never wanted to be responsible for inflicting that kind of pain. He'd clearly already given her false hope seven years ago without even realizing it.

“You know Sherri,” Jake went on. “She's never been the emotional type. On the job, she's been an Ice Queen since day one. You know how it goes. We have to compartmentalize our emotions to survive the work.”

Cole's thoughts flashed to the night at the drug house. Fire—not ice—had flared in Sherri's eyes when she'd treated him.

“Whenever anyone in the family tries to talk to her about what's going on, she sloughs off our concerns. She doesn't have a healthy enough fear of this crackpot making the crank 9-1-1 calls on her watch. And if she's convinced herself it was your brother, she'll have even less.”

“But how am I supposed to talk any sense into her? She doesn't believe I'm telling the truth about my brother.”

“If anyone can, you can. You're the first person I've seen get a rise out of her in months.”

Cole's heart pitch-poled over a full three beats. “In months?” His mind flashed to the nightmare he'd witnessed her having at the hospital—the one he'd assumed was a reaction to the dog attack, until she'd cried Luke's name. The same as his mom used to do. His mother had shut down emotionally after Dad had cheated on her. She'd boxed up her feelings so tightly that Cole hadn't had a clue to how traumatized she'd been until the nightmares had started. “You mean
months
, as in since her partner
died
?” he asked pointedly.

Jake gaped at him for an unbearably long second, then groaned, a look of total self-recrimination sweeping over his face. “How did I miss that? Of all people? With what I went through after losing my first wife the way I did, I should've...” He shook his head. “Yeah, it has been since she lost Luke.”

Cole winced at how intimate that sounded. Not “since she lost her partner” or “after Luke died,” but “since she lost Luke,” as if Luke definitely had been more than a partner.

* * *

Lost Luke.
Cole jammed his time card into the slot, annoyed that three hours later Jake's words still grated against his emotions. What difference was it to him if she'd been in love with her partner? He'd already thought as much when she'd cried in his arms at the cemetery.

Cole grabbed his jacket and plodded to his truck. It wasn't as if he had any hope of winning Sherri's heart. Or should have.

She didn't even trust him. Not anymore. He rammed the stick shift into Reverse and squealed out of the parking lot. Okay, considering his brother had held a knife to her throat, who could blame her?

But her cousin had been right about one thing. If she convinced herself that he and Eddie were the bad guys, she might stop taking extra precautions, and the real stalker could blindside her in a heartbeat.

And he couldn't let that happen.

He turned toward her apartment. Zeke's jeep slithered around the corner behind him. Cole wasn't sure where his partner lived, but somehow he doubted this was his usual route home. As Cole parked in front of Sherri's redbrick building, the man drove by with a wave.

What were the chances he didn't know this was Sherri's place? If he'd heard half of what Jake had said, then chances were next to none. Zeke was bound to manufacture implications of Cole's after-hours visit to suit his own agenda.

Yanking the keys from his ignition, Cole jumped from the truck. Let Zeke say what he liked. Sherri's safety was all that mattered.

Movement snapped his attention to the far front corner of the four-unit building. A medium-build male skirted through the flowerbeds and disappeared behind the building.

Cole darted after him and at the corner, plunged through the flowers himself to peer down the adjoining wall undetected.

The guy had his face pressed to a window. One of Sherri's windows.

Cole stormed around the corner and caught the Peeping Tom by the shoulder. “What do you think you're doing?” Cole hauled him back and spun him around. “Ted? What are you doing here?”

The man whipped his arms in a circle, breaking Cole's hold and lunged for the next window. This one with only a screen between him and the inside. “I've got to get in there. She needs help.”

A shriek came from inside her apartment. “No, stop!”

NINE

T
hat was Sherri!
Cole flung Ted aside and quickly scanned the empty bedroom. Seeing no one, he tore off the screen and vaulted inside.

The bedroom door opened to a short hall with two doors off it—a bathroom and another bedroom. The end of the hall opened to an entranceway to the right and a living room to the left. He strained to hear a telltale sound of which room she was in.

“You can't die, Cole,” she shrieked from the direction of the living room.

He bolted down the hall, only registering the oddity of what she'd said as he rounded the corner and skidded to a stop at the foot of her sofa where she was wrestling with a blanket, her eyes scrunched tightly closed. Kneeling beside her, he gently brushed back strands of hair whipped across her face by her thrashing.

“Sherri, it's okay. It's just a dream.”

Her limbs stilled, but the jerky movements beneath her eyelids said she was still in the throes of the dream.

She had to be reliving the night outside the drug house. Her “you can't die” plea echoed in his mind as the tension began to leach from her face. He stroked the creases carved in her cheeks from the blanket, his heart turning soft and gooey. He'd come here to scare some sense into her, but seeing her look so vulnerable, he knew he couldn't do it. He wanted to take her nightmares away, not add to them.

Ted burst around the corner. “Is she okay?”

Cole whirled toward him. “What are you doing in here?”

Sherri awoke with a startled cry and levered to a sitting position. The instant her gaze collided with theirs, she shrank into the corner of the sofa, her eyes glassy. “How'd you get in here?”

“I heard you scream,” he and Ted responded as one. Only Ted wasn't looking at her. His gaze slid intently about the room from the Bible and mystery novel on the end table to the framed jigsaw puzzles decorating the walls to the half-finished puzzle on the table at the far end of the L-shaped area, the changing nuances in his expression sending an uneasy feeling crawling over Cole's flesh.

He grabbed Ted by the collar and pinned him to the wall. “How'd you know it was Sherri screaming? How did you know she lived here? What are you doing hanging around her place?”

His hands shot into the air. “Protecting her.” His voice pitched higher—the freaked-out pitch of a delusional mental patient. “I'm protecting her.”

Sherri sprang to her feet. “Cole, let him go. You're hurting him.”

Cole shot a searing glance over his shoulder, but she stood her ground.

“If he wanted to hurt me, he wouldn't have saved my life from that dog.”

Pursing his lips to stop himself from saying something he'd regret, Cole refocused on the man's reddening face and eased his grip. “He was breaking into your house. We don't know what he might've done if I hadn't shown up.”

“I wasn't breaking in,” Ted argued, straightening his glasses. “I followed
you
in.”

“You were peeping in her window,” Cole growled, half-inclined to charge him for it.

Sherri's face blanched. “You were at my window?”

Cole gritted his teeth. This was not how he wanted to scare Sherri into being on her guard.

“I heard you cry out,” Ted said, sounding sincere. “I thought you were in trouble.”

From the tension radiating off Sherri, she didn't look convinced.

Cole gave him a hard shake. “You never answered my question. How did you know where she lived?”

His gaze darted about the room. “I didn't know. I live around the corner and was out walking. Heard her scream.”

Cole's grip loosened, his mind harking back to what Ted had said when Cole had found him outside her apartment window.
I've got to get in there. She needs help.
He'd never said her name. Was it a coincidence? Was he just the kind of guy who rushed to help a damsel in distress?

“All right, you've seen she's safe. Now you need to go.” Cole pushed him toward the door, intending to run a background check and surveillance as soon as he was through here. After the shock of Ted's appearance in her living room, he should at least have an easier time ensuring Sherri continued to take precautions. But first, he needed to get her to talk about the nightmare. Because between the nightmares and the general emotional shutdown her cousin had observed, Cole had a bad feeling she was in worse shape than either of them had thought.

* * *

Sherri held the door, waiting for Cole to leave with Ted.

Cole braced his palm against the wall, making no move to do so. “We need to talk before I go.”

“Don't you think you should follow him?” She recalled the creepy-crawly-being-watched twinge she'd felt while out with Kara, minutes before Ted had crossed the street to greet her. Had he been watching her? “I think he lied about not following me home. He spotted me on the street today. Came up and asked how I was doing.”

Cole reached for the door, but before she could exhale a relieved sigh, he closed it without leaving. “You don't have to worry about him. I'll make sure he doesn't bother you again.” Cole's voice softened. “He's not what we need to talk about.”

Remembering the nightmare Cole had walked in on, she scrambled for a way to avoid going there and blurted, “I was wrong earlier. I overreacted.” That had to be why he'd come here in the first place—her reaction over Eddie's phone. “After I confronted you Kara pointed out that the fact you'd turned in Eddie's phone instead of hiding it proved you weren't trying to get him off the hook.”

Cole's gaze looked pained. “That's not what we need to talk about.”

“But...” She turned away, afraid of what he'd see if he looked too closely into her eyes. In her dreams, sometimes it was Cole, not Luke, who would be lying on the porch, bleeding out. She'd resist waking and drop back into the middle of the dream again and again, desperate to do things differently so he wouldn't die, until she'd finally come to her senses and fling herself out of bed to make the dream stop. “My blowup over Eddie is why you came, isn't it?”

“Actually, I came to ensure you don't let down your guard.”

“Well, after this—” she strode to her bedroom, slammed shut the window and secured the lock “—I can assure you my guard is up.” She shooed him back to the living room and double checked those windows.

“I'll cut you some two-by-fours to wedge between the sash and frame.”

She wrapped her arms around her middle. “Thank you.”

“You have a tape measure?”

“In the drawer of that end table there.” With how much trouble she had getting to sleep at night, she couldn't believe she'd nodded off. Now, on top of not wanting to sleep for the nightmares, she'd never be able to close her eyes without worrying about someone breaking in.

Cole's muscles rippled beneath his shirt as he stretched the tape measure to the top of the window.

Waking up to him in her living room had been startling enough. Despite how, for the briefest moment, it had felt like the most natural thing in the world to see him the moment she opened her eyes.

Waking up to Ted would've been absolutely freaky.

She shuddered and had to admit she was glad Cole hadn't left right away. Except too big a part of her wanted to walk into his arms and feel them close protectively around her one more time.

He turned, caught her staring at him.

“Can I get you a lemonade?” she blurted.

“That'd be great, thanks.”

She whirled toward the kitchen, banged her shin on a dining chair, knocked into the jigsaw puzzle she'd been working on and disappeared into the adjoining galley kitchen. How could she seesaw in mere hours from not trusting him to these...these feelings?

It had to be the adrenaline of the dream and waking up to find him hovering over her.

If he had an inkling of how messed up she really was he'd be leaving as fast as he could before she got the wrong idea about his concern for her welfare. Maybe if she let him have his say he wouldn't repeat what he'd witnessed to anyone else.

Dropping ice into glasses, she peeked around the wall separating the kitchen from the living room.

His gaze traveled over her mismatched secondhand furniture, the shabby table lamps, the framed puzzles depicting everything from air balloons to mountain scenes, and she wondered what he was thinking. She'd moved into the apartment only a week before Luke's death. Afterward, sprucing it up hadn't been high on her priority list.

His eyes brightened when they reached the stack of jigsaw puzzle boxes on the dining table. He walked over to them and studied the pictures one after the other. He paused on the box with the picture of a teddy bear in a nurse's cap bandaging another bear's paw.

Butterflies swooped through her tummy. He'd given her the puzzle the day before he'd left for college. Said he'd found it at a garage sale and that it had made him think of her. The fact that he'd bought a gift for her had been enough to make her silly teenage heart soar for months.

He set the box on top of the stack. “You kept it,” he said, his voice husky.

Her heart did a ridiculous somersault. When months and then years had gone by without him coming home, she'd stuffed away her silly dreams along with the box. But she'd never quite been able to throw away the puzzle. “Mom brought those out when I was at the house. She thought they'd be a good distraction while I recuperate.” Of course, she'd avoided the teddy bear puzzle. Some wounds were better left scabbed over.

She splashed lemonade into the glasses. Okay, so maybe she'd never quite stopped hoping that one day he'd suddenly wake up and realize he was in love with her. But she wasn't the reason he'd come back to Stalwart. And really...she scarcely knew him. She shoved the lemonade pitcher back into the fridge. A childhood crush was no basis for a lasting relationship.

Neither was his protecting her from some psycho stalker.

If she even had a stalker.

“You know—” she handed him a glass “—maybe I am Princess Dark Cloud like the guys tease. And bad things just
happen
to happen on my shifts.”

“Have you forgotten that someone else was in those woods? And whistled for the dog?”

She gulped.
Oh, yeah.

“And it's far too coincidental that he happened to drop my brother's cell phone.” Cole sifted through the puzzle pieces scattered about the table and fitted one into the lake scene she'd been working on. “It was clearly a calculated move.”

The ice in her glass rattled, betraying her trembling as she strained to make sense of what he was saying. “You think this guy deliberately set up your brother?” She pressed her glass to her chest. “Why? He had to know you wouldn't fall for it.”

“Because Eddie is an easy scapegoat. Your partner was already accusing him to anyone who'd listen. What better way to muddy the investigation than to throw more suspicion where it already lay? Not to mention pushing for other suspects would reek of a cover up with Eddie being my brother.”

Just like she'd accused. “I'm sorry I thought that.”

“It was a natural conclusion to jump to and my fault for not telling you about the phone in the first place.” Cole splayed his palm across the small of her back and nudged her toward the sofa.

Warmth slid through her the same as she'd felt when his voice had reached into her dream earlier.

“If you think about it,” Cole continued, “everything points to a setup. First the guy tells Eddie that stealing drugs from your ambulance will be easy. Next he calls to tell him about the drug house, claiming he wants to make up for getting him in trouble, which puts Eddie in the vicinity when you run into the booby trap. Then he drops Eddie's phone in the woods to implicate him in the dog attack.”

“If it's the same guy.”

“It seems likely, don't you think?”

Taking a seat on the couch, she replayed the scenarios in her mind and had to admit it did. “Except he hadn't counted on Eddie being with you at the time,” she whispered.

“Exactly.” Cole snatched up a couple of coasters from the far end table, then sat in the armchair kitty corner to her and set his glass on the table beside them. “That was his critical mistake.”

He took her glass and set it on the table. “How are you really doing?”

At the compassion in his voice, her gaze snapped to the table he'd grabbed the coasters from. She'd printed out a couple of articles on PTSD. Her pulse raced.
Where did I leave them?
Had he seen them? Was that why he looked so worried? Except they weren't on the table.
Thank goodness.
“What...what do you mean?” Her mind scrambled to recall where she'd left the papers as her gaze skittered over the tape measure Cole had left on the table.
The catchall drawer?
She scooped up the tape measure and edged open the drawer.
No papers. Whew!

She swallowed the lump in her throat and slipped back into her seat. “My shoulder has healed nicely. I'm fine to return to work tomorrow.”

“Are you?” His thumb tenderly stroked her fingers.

When had he taken her hand? She snatched it back. “Of course I am.” Why did she have to offer him lemonade? She should've shooed him out after assuring him she'd be on guard.

He didn't attempt to reclaim her hand, but leaned closer, his eyes going irresistibly soft. “Sherri, having nightmares after a traumatic event is normal.”

Great, he was pitying her.

“Talking through them can ease the need for your subconscious to work through your fears while you're sleeping.”

She forced out a laugh. “You sound like a psychology professor.”

“I took a few extra courses on the subject hoping to help my mom.”

“What happened to your mom?” she asked, latching on to the chance to get the focus off her.