Authors: Virna Depaul
She had to be realistic about what she could have and what she could handle. A tough male like Mac, one who clearly guarded his freedom and independence, wouldn’t—even if he was open to a relationship, which he’d already told her he wasn’t—want a relationship with someone like her. And even if he was attracted to her, which she was smart enough not to deny, she wasn’t going to be a charity case, an easy lay or the pathetic disabled woman giving a man his kinky thrills during secret booty calls. Not ever. She’d rather die first. “I’ll do everything I can to help you find this person. You’ll do everything you can to keep me safe. That’s enough on both our plates. We don’t—we don’t need anything else getting in the way.”
His silence was charged. Instead of agreeing with her, he said, “Stay safe.” Then he hung up.
She palmed the unfamiliar phone, unsure where the end call button was. She cleared her throat and laid the phone on the table, then stood. “Officer, I’m—I’m going to my room for a bit.”
The first thing she did was go to the drawer where she knew she kept the bottle of
Beautiful
perfume and threw it in the trash.
* * *
M
AC
BARELY
KEPT
himself from flinging his phone across his office. The woman was driving him crazy, and the
journey had only just begun.
He’d known the second their lips had met that she held the power to drive him to his knees. And of course, even before Jase had started in on him, he’d known he couldn’t give her that power.
Not now. Maybe never.
He had a job to do. And he had reality to face.
She was a prime witness in his murder investigation.
That was all he could rely on her for.
He couldn’t rely on her to ease the ache in his groin that flared whenever they were around each other. And he couldn’t rely on her to give him that sense of peace that had floated through him when he’d been kissing her.
Despite her steely core, the woman was as needy as they came. More to the point, she was going through an incredibly difficult time, physically and emotionally. No doubt, she needed to know that, despite her disability, she was still desirable. He’d felt her uncertainty in her touch and in the hesitant play of her tongue against his. He’d also felt her
need
as she’d trembled against him. Right before she’d moaned and lost herself to the sparks between them. She was going to latch on to whatever bond she could make right now, like a duckling bonding to his mother, and it would be cruel for Mac to take advantage of that.
He wasn’t the type of man who could devote himself to anyone the way Natalie needed. Hell, he hadn’t managed to meet Nancy’s needs, and she’d been fully sighted, because his career had to come first. He wasn’t good at nurturing people, but what he did
was
important. Necessary. He couldn’t take time off to be at her beck and call even when she legitimately needed him.
Which was why Jase was right.
Despite the brash promises he’d made the day before, even after this case was over, he couldn’t let the passion go any further between them, no matter how much his body rebelled at the thought.
Still, that hadn’t stopped him from fantasizing about the two of them last night. Together. Against each other. Sweaty and hot. In a bed. On the floor. Against a wall. Outside in the rain. Hell, he’d managed to pack more creativity and more variety into those few hours of sleep than he’d ever managed to do in real life. And her blindness hadn’t slowed them down one bit. He’d woken with a hard-on that had literally had him clenching his teeth in pain and fighting to keep from spilling on his sheets, something he hadn’t done since he was thirteen. But it was the hollow ache in his heart when he’d realized it had all been a dream that had shaken him.
He’d met the woman twice. Interacted with her briefly on both occasions. And waking up to find her absent from his bed,
when she’d never even been there,
was enough to make him feel…what? Lonely? Longing?
It wasn’t possible, and even if it was, it couldn’t be allowed to continue. Hell, he’d never felt that way about Nancy. Ever. But he had loved her once. He didn’t relish the idea of spending any significant time loving Natalie, actually sleeping with her beside him, and then having to deal when she suddenly wanted to end it because he wasn’t enough for her.
So, no, he’d chalk up his reactions to Natalie as chemistry and a white knight complex. He’d get things back on track professionally, just like he’d tried to do on the phone.
Yet he didn’t want her thinking that all she meant to him was a job, either.
He’d heard the hurt in her voice when she’d said that, and he’d hated it.
“You ready to head out?”
He turned to Jase, who had his roller suitcase next to him. He had to blink several times before coming out of the fog his thoughts had shrouded him in. Memory of their present plans returned.
He’d offered to go to Plainville on his own. Jase had a new case, one that would take his considerable attention. But Jase had insisted on accompanying Mac. “I can review the files on the new case while I’m there. Make some calls. That way, if you need me as backup, I won’t be too far away. I can handle Natalie, too. If anything else comes up with her.”
Mac had understood what the other man was saying. And offering. He’d been smart enough to agree.
Both he and Jase would continue to work the case together and follow leads. Natalie would continue to be guarded by the local police, and if they needed to interview her for further information, the one to get it from her would be Jase.
It wasn’t what he truly wanted. He wanted to stay close to her, close enough to do his job, but even closer than that.
Which was why he was going to stay as far away from her as he could.
“Yeah. I’m ready. Did Plainville PD finish with the house?”
“They processed it and are testing for Hanes’s fingerprints now. It’s gonna take some time. We don’t even have the DNA results from Lindsay’s pendant yet.”
Mac knew that, but he had no doubt Hanes’s fingerprints and DNA were going to be found. Joe Casey, the cabbie who’d been carjacked, had positively identified Alex Hanes as the man who’d attacked him.
They were going to be holing up in Plainville until this case was solved, or at least until they knew Natalie was safe.
It looked like one wasn’t going to happen without the other.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
“N
ATALIE
, I’
VE
LEFT
a thousand messages on your phone,” Melissa said when Natalie finally answered her cell.
“And I told you I’d be in touch,” she said coolly. “That I was a little busy dealing with another attempt on my life.”
“You’re also mad at me, and I don’t blame you. I’m so sorry. I swear, I never thought something like this would happen.”
Natalie gripped the phone tighter.
No,
she thought,
you just thought I’d be stuck standing in the middle of the street looking like a fool.
She didn’t say anything, however. She couldn’t have, even if she’d wanted to, because Melissa was still talking.
“It was just…I thought I’d be a little late, but then I got hung up in traffic because of that accident on the highway and my cell phone battery was dead. When that policewoman answered the door, I—”
Natalie’s head was throbbing, and she pressed her fingers to her temples. “It’s fine, Melissa, really.”
“But you were kidnapped. Taken by some weirdo because of me.”
The same weirdo who tried to strangle me to death.
She’d told Melissa the connection, but that was it. As Mac had ordered, she hadn’t told her what he’d said or even that she’d ended up jumping out of the cab. “It wasn’t because of you, Melissa. It was because of my own bad luck. Now, you be sure and tell Agent McKenzie that when he talks to you. Remember, it’s just a precaution he’s taking. He has to talk to everyone. You didn’t do anything wrong.”
When Melissa didn’t say anything, Natalie frowned. “Melissa?”
“I’m here. It’s just, how can you be so damn noble all the time? Don’t you ever get angry? I fucked up, Natalie. You have a right to be mad.”
“Well, I’m not mad,” she said, her voice strained. “I’m just tired.” She forced her tone to be slightly more cheery. “Thanks for coming by today. We’ll talk later, okay?”
She hung up before Melissa could say anything else. A pinch of guilt made her chew her lip, and she struggled with whether she should call her friend back. Despite her words, she had sounded mad at the end, hadn’t she? But she’d been through so much. Wasn’t she entitled to be a little cranky, given what had happened to her?
Besides, she had some things to do. Like once again go over her copies of the photographs she’d given Mac. She hadn’t seen anything the first twenty times she’d looked at them, but maybe…
A faint knock made her look up.
“Natalie, is it okay if I come in?” Liz asked.
Natalie was sitting in the sunroom, where she and Mac had shared that disastrous kiss, and the idea of Liz inhabiting the space made her feel weird, so of course she said, “Yes, please do.”
“So, that was your friend, Melissa? The one who stood you up yesterday?”
Natalie didn’t miss the hint of censure in the woman’s voice. She raised her chin. “That was Melissa, yes.”
“You spent a lot of time reassuring her that you’re okay.”
“Why wouldn’t I? I
am
okay.”
“You’ll
be
okay. There’s a difference. You’re allowed to be mad at her.”
“I’m not mad at her! Everyone messes up. Melissa was running late because of her boyfriend. They have a complicated relationship.”
“It was still a lame thing to do. Standing you up. Doesn’t mean you can’t be friends with her anymore, but friends can tell each other how they really feel.”
“What would it matter if I told her it was lame? It can’t change anything. Besides, it was my own fault. I should know better than to rely on anyone.”
Her words surprised her. She hadn’t meant to say them.
“That’s not any way to live.”
She knew that. Deep down, she did. But such thinking was for normal people. People who had unlimited options. People who could afford to rely on others. People who didn’t know better. The fact that this woman—this sighted, competent woman—was lecturing her suddenly became too much. In a tight voice, Natalie asked, “Do
you
rely on anyone, Officer?”
“Of course I do. When I’m out on the streets, I have to rely on my fellow officers to watch my back.”
“But that’s part of the job. It’s quid pro quo. They have to rely on you, too, right?”
“Right. But what’s that got to do with it?”
“It means everyone does what they need to survive. They ultimately do what’s right for them.”
“Cops put themselves on the line for people every day.”
“For three very important reasons.”
“What’s that?”
“Money. The thrill. And third, because no one ever thinks it’s going to happen to them. If you did, if you knew you were going to get shot and killed on the job, wouldn’t you choose something else?”
She heard her answer in Officer Lafayette’s hesitation, but she took no satisfaction in it. In fact, it made her feel so tired she suddenly wanted to simply go to sleep and never wake up.
“That’s not fair,” Officer Lafayette protested, though weakly. “That’s self-protection.”
“That’s right. And that’s exactly what I’m doing. I know who I can rely on. Myself. Anyone who thinks otherwise is a fool.”
* * *
B
EFORE
CHECKING
in to his hotel, Mac stopped by the Plainville Police Department to give the press an update on Lindsay Monroe’s murder investigation. Although he deliberately didn’t mention Natalie or her photographs, he specifically named Alex Hanes as their primary suspect. Updating the public wasn’t his only objective, however. He wanted Alex Hanes’s photo plastered on every news channel in the nation. He wanted the man to know Mac and a hell of a lot of other police officers were looking for him. He wanted him to get jittery, to imagine himself locked up in prison again, so that he’d get careless. Make a mistake that would get him caught. At the very least, he’d think twice about kidnapping a woman in the middle of the day if he felt there was a greater chance someone would recognize him.
Once he was at the hotel, Mac pulled out the photos Natalie had given him. Frustration drilled painfully at his chest along with something else—an uneasy feeling that he was missing something. That there was more in the photos than he was seeing.
Yes, the photos proved that Lindsay and Hanes had attended the same farmers’ market. Perhaps that’s where he’d first seen her. Still, other than putting them in the same location, the photos weren’t incriminating in and of themselves. Not that he could see, anyway. Yet Hanes had wanted them badly enough to burglarize Natalie’s home. He’d wanted to know what Natalie had seen that day, enough to kidnap her in broad daylight.
That told him something important had happened, something that either wasn’t depicted in the photos or, if it was, something Mac was missing.
But what was it?
Since he didn’t know, he ticked down his mental list of what he
did
know:
They knew Lindsay had attended the Plainville Farmers’ Market on the date Natalie took the pictures.
Lindsay had been killed sometime after that.
Since she didn’t appear to be wearing orange, and her body had been found with a swatch of orange fabric, that increased the chances she’d been killed on a different day but didn’t guarantee it. The orange swatch of fabric could have been from a scarf, or handbag or jacket she’d put on after the photos were taken.
They still didn’t know if she’d been killed in Plainville or somewhere else, if she’d gone to the farmers’ market with Hanes or someone else, or if Natalie had seen something she shouldn’t have and simply didn’t remember.
Basically, what they didn’t know sucked.
He and Jase would continue to study the photos for clues, and Jase was planning to go over the photos with Natalie. But for now, the Plainville Police Department had been given their orders, with clear instructions to call Mac if something turned up. First they were going to interview regular vendors at the market. Show them pictures of Lindsay, Alex and Natalie. Ask if they recognized anyone in Natalie’s photos, maybe even a local who could then be interviewed, as well. As tedious as link analysis was, it was a methodical procedure that resulted in useful evidence far more often than not.
Everything that could be done was being done and by a very competent crew. He knew that from having worked with the Plainville Police Department in the past. He’d thought about hitting the pavement himself, certainly had no qualms about doing whatever grunt work was necessary to get the job done. But there were already so many loose ends that Mac needed to deal with. He had phone calls to make. Witnesses to interview.
He’d be plenty busy, but part of him was rethinking his decision to stay away from Natalie. Mac’s main concern was finding Alex Hanes. His strongest connection to the man was the woman he’d tried to kill even
after
he’d had her photos. Staying away from her simply because of their shared attraction no longer seemed smart, but a chickenshit move that could interfere with him doing his job. Maybe instead of staying away from her, he should stay as close to her as possible. Even if that very closeness distracted him on a personal level.
The shrill ring of his phone made him jerk. When he glanced at the screen, he grunted. Alex Hanes’s parole officer was finally getting back to him.
“McKenzie.”
“Agent McKenzie, this is Cora Concannon, Phoenix Parole Department.”
“Thanks for calling me back. Anything new on Hanes?”
“I’m sorry, but no.”
“Did you get my message about the cross pendant found in a woman’s home in Plainville, California?”
“Yes, I did. I’m sorry, but I’ve been out of town before now. You said the pendant belonged to your murder victim?”
His
murder victim. It was how many people often referred to the dead whose killers Mac tried to hunt down. The wording never failed to impact him. It was a reminder that he did have a personal stake in every case he worked. That he stood and spoke for those who couldn’t do it for themselves.
“That’s right. Lindsay Monroe’s father said she always wore a cross pendant he gave her. One with a very unusual engraving on it—Litsy. It was a term of endearment the family used. The pendant was found, chain broken, in the home of a woman who’d just been assaulted. I have reason to believe, now more than ever, that that man was Hanes. I think he kept the pendant as some kind of memento.”
“I think you’re right.”
Her quick and easy agreement took him by surprise. “What makes you say that?”
“I only spoke with Alex a few times before he absconded from parole, but when I did, he was quite vocal about having found God. He peppered his vocabulary with scripture and said he owed his release from prison and his bright future to a higher power.”
“And yet his DNA was all over a sixteen-year-old murder victim. And I’ll bet all over the house across the street from that of the blind woman he tried to strangle to death just one month later.”
“A blind woman? Is she okay?”
“She’s fine for now.” And Mac was going to make sure she stayed that way. “So Alex was religious. Did he mention a particular religion? A church he was attending? A pastor he spoke to?” Was it possible he’d confessed his crimes to someone under the protection of religious confidentiality? The very thought left a sour taste in Mac’s mouth. He was all for spirituality, still believed in God even if He wasn’t quite the same one he’d learned about in Sunday school.
When it came to organized religion, however, he couldn’t help being a skeptic. In his line of work, he knew how often those who claimed to worship God could do the unthinkable and then rely on their inherently sinful natures as an excuse. Forget about questioning how a creator could allow such horrible things to occur in the first place, but the idea that criminals could have their sins washed away through confession and repentance? It seemed a little too easy for Mac to swallow.
“No, nothing so specific. He was staying at a halfway house for recently released inmates, however.”
“I remember. Amber House. I talked with the owner soon after I first contacted you. I’ve got a call out, but haven’t heard back from him yet, either.”
“It’s a particularly hard time to catch people, given all the last-minute vacation plans before the school year starts again.”
Mac caught the note of defensiveness in the woman’s voice. “That wasn’t a jab at you.”
Two seconds passed before Concannon continued. “Anyway, it was his brother who arranged for him to stay at Amber House. Maybe he’d know whether he attended a particular church.”
Mac shook his head. “What brother?”
“Excuse me?”
“I said, what brother. None of the documents I have, including Hanes’s parole sheet, lists a sibling.”
“Really?” Mac heard bumping sounds coming from the other line. “Wait, I’m pulling out his file… Let me check… . Well, you’re right. For some reason, I remember him telling me about a brother, but obviously I could be wrong about that.”
“Or the records are just incomplete.”
“That’s always a possibility, too.” Again her tone was laced with defensiveness. Not good. Because his jurisdiction was so broad, Mac’s effectiveness hinged on his ability to keep good working relationships with all the different law enforcement agencies throughout the state. Still, he couldn’t overlook shoddy work or pull his punches just because someone might take offense.
“Do you remember a name? Did Alex say where his brother lived? What he did for a living? Anything?”
“No. Like I said, I think he mentioned a brother, but I can’t be sure now.”
“Please let me know if you remember anything else,” he said, striving to be as polite as possible, though it was more difficult than usual. “I hope you enjoyed your vacation.”
“Goodbye, Agent McKenzie.”
When he hung up, he immediately pulled out transcripts of his interview with Lindsay’s father. He flipped through pages until he found the section he’d been looking for. According to Monroe, his family was devoutly religious. Some tension had occurred when Lindsay started expressing doubts and had refused to attend their church. That tension had probably contributed to her running away. And it didn’t mean she hadn’t changed her mind afterwards, or that another religion hadn’t held more appeal to her.