Cold Midnight (16 page)

Quinn closed his eyes. Christ, he was fucked.

And he deserved it. If he hadn’t been such an immature butthead ten years ago, this wouldn’t be happening now. But he’d been filled with bitter resentment then, blaming his older sister, the tennis star who was everything he wasn’t, for his own unhappiness. As if Kylie had anything to do with his teenage desire to do nothing but skip school and hide out in the garage with whatever booze he’d swiped from their clueless parents’ liquor cabinet.

He’d thought the alcohol helped. He’d thought it numbed the pain, back when he didn’t even know what true pain meant. He could sit on the cold concrete in the garage with his back against the wall and swallow shot after shot, raising the bottle for toasts like a drunken idiot.

Here’s a toast to failing American history.

Here’s a toast to skipping English class. Over and over and over.

Here’s a toast to being denied his driver’s license because Dad caught him watering down his favorite bottle of Jack.

Here’s a toast to being so desperate for a mind-numbing drink that he suffered through his mother’s sugary favorites: root beer schnapps and crème de menthe.

Here’s a toast to getting only half the tennis-playing genes that it took to please a demanding, driven father.

Here’s a toast to being sidelined as his sister’s training partner because he was no longer good enough to challenge her.

Here’s a toast to life, at sixteen, already sucking more than he could ever imagine.

And on that day ten years ago, drowning his lame sorrows in the cheapest crap he could afford, bought at the only liquor store in town that sold to minors, he’d blown off the sister he couldn’t stand. He’d told her, “Bite me, go to hell, fuck off. Take your pick.”

She’d walked away without saying a word, heading into a workout on her own.

He’d raised his bottle in one final toast: “Drop dead, gorgeous.”

That one had made him giggle. Loaded, toasted, smashed, blasted, wasted—whatever he was, it had felt pretty fucking good. While under the influence, he hadn’t felt bad about anything. He’d just felt good. Great, really. Fucking great. The world, especially his father and his tennis-prodigy sister, could have kissed his ass.

He’d flipped the universe the bird that day. And now the universe was flipping it back.

24

CHASE PACED HIS TINY KITCHEN. HE HADN’T HAD
any coffee this morning, yet his heart raced as if he’d drained three supersized cups. Who needed caffeine when they’d had no sleep and carried around enough nerves for three football players the night before the Super Bowl?

He’d called Steve Burnett, the officer sitting in front of Kylie’s, every couple of hours, and every time the report had been the same: All’s quiet on the driveway front.

Chase had delivered the requisite chuckle at his co-worker’s effort to lighten his surly mood, but he hadn’t felt like laughing. He felt like beating something with his fists. Not that that would solve anything, but it would bleed off some of this restless energy.

Sex would help, too.

Groaning, he stopped pacing and braced his hands on the edge of the counter.

Kylie brought out the pieces of himself he couldn’t stand: his propensity for violence—how many times had he pummeled inanimate objects after she’d walked out on him?—and his blinding, driving need when he was around her.

He wasn’t a just-out-of-his-teens adult anymore, eager to get his rocks off with a hot girl. He was a grown man perfectly capable of controlling himself. Yet, from the moment they’d kissed in her kitchen, glass glittering on the floor all around them, he’d felt . . . edgy and out of control. Quality time in the shower, while thoughts of Kylie naked and moaning danced in his head, hadn’t helped. He’d simply dried off with a bigger need growing inside him, a need that his hand and a fantasy wouldn’t satisfy.

And it pissed him off. He’d vowed not to let her twist him into knots, yet that’s exactly what happened. And instead of focusing on the case, working the angles and theories and suspects, he was pacing the kitchen like a caged panther, frustrated and wanting.

Sam was right, he thought. He should have let his partner handle the case. He should have walked away, from the case and Kylie, and everything would have been fine. The status quo. How he loved the status quo.

Which was bullshit. He’d fooled himself into thinking that for the past ten years in order to get through. But the truth was, the status fucking quo
happened
to him when he wasn’t looking. He became a father by accident. He got married because that was the right thing to do. He got divorced because that was the right thing to do. He became a cop because he didn’t know what else to do, and his father had been such a lousy one that he’d wanted to show the bastard how it was done. Plus, that would gain him access to the biggest cold case in Kendall Falls history: Who destroyed Kylie McKay’s knee? Not that he’d made any more progress than the cops at the time had. Until now.

And that put him at a crossroads. He wanted two opposing things.

He wanted Kylie.

He wanted to find the bastards who tore her apart, and one of them might be her brother.

He couldn’t very well build a case against Quinn McKay while rebuilding a relationship with the guy’s sister.

He had to choose. Kylie or justice? And if he chose Kylie, would she choose him?

The phone rang, jolting him, and he snatched it up without checking the caller ID. “Manning.”

“Chase, Sylvia Jensen here.” He turned to lean back against the counter as the crime scene analyst kept talking. “I pulled a clear set of prints off the bat used on Kylie’s windshield.”

He straightened away from the counter. “Excellent.”

“That depends on how you look at it.”

 

 

AS KYLIE STIRRED SWEETENER AND CREAMER INTO
her coffee, her back to her plastic-covered deck doors, she worried about Quinn. He hadn’t been in good shape when she and Jane had dropped him at home after bailing him out of jail yesterday. When they’d offered to stay the night with him, he’d brushed them off with the excuse that he needed some alone time. Kylie feared that meant he planned to try to drink his troubles away again. He’d gone through a stage like that in his teens, but he’d managed to kick the habit before it became a problem he couldn’t deal with without intervention. Now, she wasn’t so sure.

But when Jane didn’t push to smother him with her usual sisterly assistance, Kylie backed off, too. Her sister knew, better than anyone, how to deal with someone in Quinn’s state of mind. “Let him cool off,” Jane had said. “We won’t get anywhere with him until he’s had some time to process what’s happening.”

Still, Kylie had to fight the urge to reach for the phone and check on him. Or maybe it’d be better to go by his house and do it in person. Except maybe not enough time had passed. Should she call Jane first?

Sighing, she picked up her coffee and sipped, wondering if this was how her siblings felt when they wanted to reach out to her. Not knowing what to do sucked. And not doing anything seemed wrong.

The shoe was on the other foot, and it pinched.

Deciding not to hover, at least until she’d talked it over with Jane, she carried her coffee to the table and stared down at the bold newspaper headline that had her heart pounding double-time all over again.

Apparently, there was no bigger news happening in Kendall Falls.

She thought of Chase, so determined to pin the attack on Quinn. He had nothing else to go on, no other evidence, so he went gung-ho after her brother. How could she make him understand that Quinn hadn’t hurt her? She would have
known
.

Meanwhile, Chase seemed just as driven to pick at her. Like he had something to prove. Like he thought he could back her against the wall and kiss the past away and none of it would matter.

But it
did
matter. It did. He replaced her in a heartbeat. Less than a heartbeat. True love shouldn’t be so easy to discard. She certainly hadn’t been able to. If she had, she wouldn’t be resigned to an eternity alone and unloved. She’d have fallen for Dr. Wade Bell, like a normal woman. Yet, she’d botched that, and every other relationship attempt over the years.

She’d thought she’d done everything right with Wade, until the day he looked her in the eye and said, “You’re here, but you’re not
here
.”

And instead of trying to fix it, of trying to be
here
, she’d let him walk away.

The story of her life.

And then there was Chase.

Just thinking about him saying that, his voice low and sexy as he held her so close that his heat surrounded her, made her shudder.

The phone rang, startling her, and she picked it up off the table and walked into the living room for a change of scenery. The caller ID didn’t look familiar, and she hoped like hell it wasn’t another reporter. She’d have preferred to silence the ringer last night but had feared she’d miss a call from Quinn.

“Hello?”

“Hi. It’s T.J.”

Shoulders relaxing, she turned toward the bay window and, for the first time since the cop car had parked in the driveway, she didn’t feel like scowling, or hiding, when she saw it. Maybe T.J. was calling to ask for some extra tennis-court time. That’d be a welcome distraction. “Hey, T.J.”

“I need to talk to you. I . . . I’m . . . I need to talk to you.”

At the anxiety in his voice, she stiffened again. She’d never heard him sound so distressed. “What’s wrong? Are you all right?”

“I think I’m in big trouble.”

“Where are you?”

“Will you . . . I need . . .” His voice wavered as he trailed off.

“Let’s start with where you are, T.J. I’ll be right there.”

“Will you meet me at the health club?”

“You’re at the health club?”

“No, I’m at home, but I—”

“I’ll come there then. Just give me your address.”

“No!” He sounded panicked. Worse, he sniffled, like he’d been crying. “I’m . . . fine. I just . . . I just want to . . . I have to tell you something, okay? At the health club.”

“You’re not all right, T.J. I can tell.”

“Can you be there in an hour and forty-five minutes?”

She knew it took him an hour to get to the club by bus. The extra forty-five minutes must take into account the bus schedule. “Let me pick you up.”

“Just, please, can you meet me there? Okay? Is that okay?”

“Sure, of course. In an hour and forty-five minutes.”

He released a sigh. “Thank you.”

“Whatever’s going on, it’s going to be okay, all right? I’ll help you figure it out.”

He sniffled again, and when he said, “Okay,” it sounded choked. “Bye.”

The line clicked in her ear.

 

 

CHASE STOOD ON KYLIE’S FRONT PORCH AND RANG
the bell. Last time he’d done this, they’d ended up pressed against the wall, about to board the F Train to paradise. He figured the only train they’d board this time would be the Go-to-Hell Train, and he’d be riding it solo.

When Kylie pulled open the door and cocked her dark head, Chase immediately noticed the flat expression and bored eyes. The game face in all its maddening glory. Yet it didn’t distract from how sexy she looked in bare feet and a black, form-fitting T-shirt that didn’t reach past the waistband of her faded jeans. She had her long hair pulled back in a Tennis Pony, and other than tired, she looked . . . God, she just looked
good
.

“Is this stopping-by-unannounced thing going to become a habit?” she asked.

He didn’t waste time with a comeback. He had a job to do. “I need the address of your student, T.J. Ritchie.”

Her eyes flickered with something—surprise, yes, and something else—but her full, tempting lips remained set in a straight, uncompromising line. “Why?”

“I need to ask him some questions.”

“What kind of questions?”

“I’m not at liberty to say.”

She folded her arms under her breasts. “Then I’m not at liberty to give you his address.”

“It’s police business, Kylie.”

“What business could the police possibly have with a fourteen-year-old?”

“That isn’t for me to tell you.”

“Well, you’re going to have to if you want information about him from me.”

“Damn it, Kylie—”

“Why don’t you just get what you want from some police database?”

“His correct address isn’t in the database.”

“Hmm, well, that’s too bad for you, then, isn’t it?”

Okay, if that’s the way she wanted to play it. “We got a hit on fingerprints found on the bat used to break your windshield. They belong to T.J.”

Shock parted her lips, and her eyes went wide. “That’s not possible.”

“Fingerprints don’t lie. So if you don’t mind, I’ll take that address now.”

She straightened her shoulders, lifted her chin. “I don’t have it.”

“Kylie—”

“I can’t give it to you if I don’t have it.”

She was lying. He couldn’t see any clues, but he knew she was organized and methodical. She’d have records on all of her students, especially her favorite. “This isn’t the time to be stubborn.”

“If you’d like, I can make one up.” She smiled, but it didn’t come close to reaching her still eyes.

He tried another tack. “What about a phone number?”

“I’m sorry, but no.”

“How do you reach him when you have to cancel a tennis lesson?”

“I’ve never canceled a lesson.”

He almost groaned aloud. “Of course you haven’t.”

“Is there anything else? I have a lot on my plate today, what with my brother going to jail yesterday and all.”