Slow Heat (25 page)

“I think it’s time you went home.” Micah adjusted his grip on her until he was holding her firmly against him with both of her arms confined within his.

She leaned her head back against his arm. “Will you take me home and put me to bed, darling?”

Aiden cleared his throat. Maggie didn’t appear to notice.

“I think we should go to your house instead.”

Micah looked over at Aiden, whose pained expression might have been comical if circumstances were different. “You said she doesn’t drink?”

“I don’t drink,” Maggie announced. “Who wants to feel drunk all the time?”

Aiden rubbed his chin and studied his sister. “Our youngest sister is with us for the first time in two years. We were all going to go home with her. She and our mom had a falling-out of sorts.”

“Mom is a prude!” Maggie announced and tried raising her arm but couldn’t move it with Micah holding her so tightly. “I wouldn’t love my sister any less if she were straight.”

“Maggie,” Aiden hissed. “Let’s not tell the world about family business.”

“What world?” Since she couldn’t move, Maggie let her head roll on Micah’s arm to stare at her brother. “It’s just you, me, and Micah. And Micah is wonderful, Aiden. You should really like him as much as I do.” She rolled her head back to focus on Micah. “I think you’re wonderful, Micah.”

“Okay, darling,” Micah grumbled. “Let’s get you sobered up.”

When he glanced at the businesses around him and across the street, Aiden stepped closer. He reached for Maggie. “Might as well just take her back inside. Don makes the strongest coffee in the neighborhood.”

It was mighty convenient for the local bartender to have the means to sober up his customers after aiding in getting them plowed. Unsure if it would be a good idea if he went back inside or not, Micah tried handing Maggie to Aiden. Her brother reached for her but Maggie looked up at Micah, a mixture of confusion and hurt on her face.

“Am I ugly when I’m drunk?” she whispered. “Do you not want to be around me?”

“No, you’re not ugly,” Micah told her, staring down at her tormented expression. Her full lips curved slightly. He doubted she could ever be ugly. “But you did too many shots way too fast. You’re not accustomed to drinking, and strong coffee will help sober you up.”

“I can’t imagine you drunk,” she whispered, searching his face with her glassy eyes.

Micah tried giving her a relaxed grin, hoping it would keep her calm so she wouldn’t yell out her feelings or thoughts spontaneously. Those things she’d already said would be what she regretted the most here in a few hours.

“You were entitled to a good drunk after what you’ve just been through.”

“I wish my family held the same sentiment,” she murmured, slurring her words and relaxing completely against him.

Her legs went out and Micah was forced to adjust his hold on her so she wouldn’t slump to her knees in front of him.

“Whoa, girl,” Aiden piped up, coming forward and trying to take her from Micah. “I promise no one is going to hate you in the morning. Micah explained what happened and I agree with him. No one deserves to get drunk more than you do. But now we need to sober you up, for Annalisa’s sake. Okay, Mags?”

Her lids were heavy when she lazily looked at her brother. “For Annalisa’s sake,” she repeated. “Crap,” she hissed. “I was selfish to do this to her.”

“She won’t feel that way. Promise.” Again Aiden tried taking her.

“Maggie, go with your brother,” Micah instructed, handing her over to him.

“Are you leaving?” Maggie came to full alert quickly and managed to stand on her own two feet when Aiden put his arm around her.

“I think it would be better if you handled your family affairs with just your family,” he told her.

“Don’t leave yet.” She pressed her hand to her forehead. “Damn, everything is spinning.”

“Let’s get you that coffee.” Aiden turned to Micah. “I’d appreciate it if you came inside and explained everything to my father. It would make him feel better if he was informed. I’ll have her sisters pump coffee down her and we’ll sit alone so we aren’t interrupted.”

“Man talk,” Maggie announced and whipped her finger in the air in a circular motion. “God forbid the women are around.”

“Shut up, Mags. It’s not like that and you know it.”

“Damn right, it’s not.”

“You and your sisters as well as Mom would never stay quiet long enough for it ever to be like that,” Aiden complained. He gave her a playful punch but held on to her as he led her back into the bar.

*   *   *

It was dark when Micah pulled his bike into his garage. He entered his house just as he had with Maggie the other night. Micah jerked his attention to his security wire that this time was taped to the wall at the corner of the top of the door frame. It didn’t look tampered with. Then, closing his kitchen door, he walked over to flip on the kitchen light and glanced into his living room. All was just as he’d left it.

“Whew,” he breathed, letting out a heavy sigh and heading for his refrigerator.

He stared at the meager selection of food items inside as he leaned against the open door. The time he’d spent with Maggie’s family had left his head spinning. Even the ride home hadn’t been enough to get his head back on straight. Maggie had a tight-knit family. They were dysfunctional as hell but somehow that worked best for them. He wasn’t sure if he envied them or not. In the end, he simply was trying to return to his realm of indifference.

“You’ll have a harder time learning who is trying to hurt her if you get too close,” he instructed himself.

Deciding he wasn’t hungry, Micah closed the refrigerator door and walked through his house, turning on lights as he went. There was work to do. He had an agenda to follow.

“Get the wiretaps for Haley,” he began. “Somehow I need to find out if there are dirty cops out there. If they are, are they somehow connected to what is going on with Maggie?”

As he spoke he headed to his bathroom trash can where he’d thrown them away after destroying them. Micah flipped on his bathroom light and picked up the small trash can. Resting it on his bathroom counter, he stared at its contents. The condom wrapper from the other night was in there, nothing else.

“What the…,” he grumbled. He was positive this was where he’d thrown them away.

Micah looked away from the trash can and toward the hallway, replaying in his mind how he’d found the small listening devices, smashed them until he was convinced they were inoperable, then thrown them away. He had put them in the bathroom trash can.

“I’m not remembering wrong.” He looked down again, this time picking up the condom wrapper. The used condom was underneath it. There wasn’t anything else in the can.

Just staring at the contents sent his mind whirling back to Maggie here with him. He ached to be inside her again. Even when she’d been drunk and staring up at him, she’d stirred emotions inside him he’d managed never to feel for another woman.

Somehow Maggie had the ability to cruise right past the impermeable wall that had been part of his being as long as he could remember. That wall had allowed Micah to run through job after job. No matter the intensity of it, or the level of danger involved, Micah had always performed like a machine. There was a code he’d always followed, and his method had kept him alive and effective in pulling off any type of job.

Until Maggie.

He dropped the trash can to the floor and stood there as it toppled but managed not to tip over. The sooner he found his code again, wrestled with these new emotions until they were conquered and dissipated, the sooner he could properly protect Maggie.

Micah stalked out of the bathroom into his bedroom then stood there looking around the room. The instant he tried not feeling what he was already feeling for Maggie, his mood soured. He didn’t want to let go of his feelings for her, and it pissed him off.

“You don’t care about her,” he growled, saying the words out loud to help put feeling behind them.

Damn it! Yes, he did!

“Where the fuck are those listening devices?” he howled, suddenly wanting to hit something really hard. He fisted his hands, turning around in the room.

There wasn’t a trash can in here. There was no possibility of him having destroyed the devices and leaving them in his room. Micah stalked out of the bedroom, paused outside his bathroom, then stomped into his living room. Even as he was unable to squash all emotions building inside him, a specific truth surfaced.

Micah walked over to his living room door, studied it, then squinted at the barely visible wire taped to the door frame. He moved closer, then reached up and ran his finger along it. It appeared to be in position and hooked up just as he’d placed it.

“Those listening devices aren’t in the trash can,” he voiced out loud, pointing out to himself the obvious. Now all he needed to figure out was why.

Micah listed the facts. He’d found them. He’d destroyed them. He’d thrown them away. He hadn’t emptied the trash. They should be in the trash. They weren’t. Therefore, they’d been removed. He hadn’t removed them.

“How the fuck did you get in here this time?” he whispered, and stepped closer to his front door. “And why are you fucking with me in the first place?”

After examining, and testing, his security system around his house, Micah determined that it was working properly. Nonetheless, the fact remained that the smashed listening devices were no longer here. Somehow, someone had successfully entered and taken them out of his house.

“Removed all evidence that might suggest a dirty cop,” Micah mumbled.

Micah returned to the back door and scrutinized the wires in place there. They appeared to be just as he’d left them. And they were working.

“What if someone were good enough to disengage them and put them back as if they’d never been tampered with?”

He dragged his kitchen chair out and shoved it up against his back door. Then, standing, he took a closer look at the small wires that ran from his back door and across his wall until they disappeared into the tiny hole he’d drilled.

“The receptor box,” he hissed. He jumped off the chair backward, maintained his balance, and shoved the chair back under the table.

Micah grabbed his flashlight and headed outside. His backyard was unkempt and weeds grew everywhere. He let the beam of light travel across the yard before entering it. There were plants that were common to this area that probably had a name, although he didn’t know what it was. They were abundant in his backyard, though, and their thick round leaves were trampled up against his house. Someone had been back here.

“Son of a bitch,” Micah snapped, hating the feeling of someone going one-up on him. He always covered his tracks, made sure his plans were foolproof, and above all always made sure he was 100 percent safe wherever he was. Apparently just because he was a master at killing people, that didn’t make him just as good at keeping them alive. “That’s bullshit,” he grumbled, refusing to accept that he couldn’t pull off this job.

Stomping through the yard, he didn’t care what damage he did to the undergrowth. It wasn’t as if he’d pull someone back here to observe and confirm he’d had company today while he’d been gone. Micah walked up to the wall behind his house, held up his flashlight, and stared at the wires coming out of the house to the small box that relayed information to the main security system. This wasn’t the average home security system. Whoever had come out here and tampered with it understood which wires to cut to let themselves inside unannounced.

And that was exactly what happened. The wires leading to the box had been cut here and not inside his house. Someone had entered his home then fused the wires back together when they’d left. They’d entered with a specific intention. Micah held the flashlight so the circular light aimed directly at where the person had disabled his system. Whoever had been here not only had skills in wiring and handling complicated security systems, they now knew Micah required such a system. He guessed they were now wondering why.

It was one thing working for Maggie and fighting to prevent people from following her. Micah wasn’t sure if those same people were following him. He was sure that someone, and his first guess was the Osborne detective, had made quite the effort to learn how to enter his house. They’d studied his security, then breached it.

A gross unsettling feeling sunk deep in Micah’s gut. This was now not only about Maggie, it was also about him. He’d been compromised. His brain went on autopilot. When compromised, relocation was required.

Chapter Ten

Someone knocked on Micah’s front door. His heart hit hard against his chest as he slowly straightened from the squatting position he’d been in for too long. His muscles were strained, but he ignored the sharp pain. He’d sat hunched in more peculiar positions for longer in his past.

Micah shot a quick glance at the digital clock on his microwave visible in his kitchen. It was one o’clock in the morning. He rubbed his lower back. Whoever it was knocked again. Micah scowled at his front door. They weren’t pounding as if some life-threatening emergency had just occurred. It was a soft knock. He doubted he would have heard it if he hadn’t already been in his living room.

Stepping around his coffee table, Micah began cleaning up the place. There were heavy curtains drawn over the blinds on his front window. No one outside would know there was a light on inside. There was that knock again. They were persistent, if not determined.

What if Maggie was out there?

He picked up wire cutters and scooped fragments of wires into his hand. Micah shoved his electrical kit under his arm and took the contents to his kitchen then dropped them all in one of the kitchen drawers. It had taken him just under three hours to devise several traps that should do the trick. If his security system were breached again, he now had backup in place. Any intruder would be in for a very unpleasant surprise if they tried entering his home.

It had been the only solution he’d been able to come up with to justify not packing up and leaving. Micah moved across his living room to his front door and lowered his head to his peephole.