Conard County Marine (6 page)

He was also quite certain that she wasn’t ready for that kind of attention from a man. Her trauma was too recent, and it made him feel special that she had come to trust him so much so quickly. He didn’t want to risk damaging that.

So they kept walking, he with his eyes and ears on high alert, and the feeling of being watched remained with him. There was something wrong.

He knew it in his bones. Casual surveillance should have come and gone, possibly to return as someone else saw them. This didn’t go away. It might just be someone strolling somewhere behind them, but when he glanced over his shoulder he saw no one.

Covert surveillance. A curse word rose silently in his mind. They were being stalked. He had no proof, no good reason to mention it to anyone, but he knew it with honed instincts.

Now who the hell would be following them?

In that moment he knew in his heart that Kylie wasn’t safe yet and that he had a mission.

“I think I’m going to extend my leave,” he remarked casually as they rounded the last corner that would take them back to the house.

“Why? Can you do that?”

“Yeah, I’ve got more time. As for why?” He looked down at her as they passed under a streetlight and summoned a smile. “I’d like time to get to know you better. A whole lot better.”

The smile she gave him then lifted his heart, even though his spirit darkened with worry.

*

When they entered the house, they found that Connie Parish had dropped in. Connie still wore her full deputy’s uniform, except for her hat, and her blond hair was caught up in a ponytail. She was seated at the kitchen table with Glenda. Coop bent and dropped a kiss on her cheek. “Something wrong?” he asked.

“First,” she said, “I want to give Kylie a hug, if that’s okay with her.”

It was okay. She’d known Connie forever, and they had been part of the same group of friends until she left for Denver. The hug felt good, and then the four of them gathered at the table.

“So what’s up?” Coop asked. “Escaping the hellions? Sorry I unleashed them.”

Connie waved her hand. “It doesn’t take much to excite the younger two. No, I’m going back on duty in twenty minutes. I just wanted to check on Kylie and ask you if you’d walk the kids to school in the morning, Coop. Ethan has to be out at his dad’s place early. Some late lambs will be here soon.”

Coop nodded. “Sure. Glad to do it, Cuz.”

“I thought you would.”

Glenda leaned forward a little. “Still worrying about that stranger?”

Connie nodded, compressing her lips. “There hasn’t been another contact in this case, but after Sophie...” She shook her head. “I was lucky. It was my ex who took her, criminal though he was, but we found her and she wasn’t hurt. But I’ve never been able to quite escape the fear that it could happen again, and not just to one of my children. And then we did have that serial killer a couple of years ago, although he went after young boys, not girls. Anyway, I probably won’t get past this for a few weeks. To be safe, we’re pulling double shifts in case.”

Kylie spoke, admitting to another gap in her memory, difficult as it was. “When did Ethan stop being a deputy?”

Connie smiled gently at her. “Two years ago. Micah started needing a whole lot more help at the ranch. As he’s getting older, balancing his work as a deputy with the sheep is becoming more difficult. And Ethan likes the work. I think he’s happier looking after sheep and horses than he was as a deputy.”

“And Micah’s other kids?”

“All grown up. The twin boys work on the ranch, too. The girls had bigger ideas. They’re in college.”

Kylie was grateful to Connie for filling in the blanks so easily, as if she were talking to a stranger. No expression of surprise that Kylie didn’t remember, just simple acceptance. Something deep within her relaxed a bit, let go of some of the tension that never left her. Then she asked a question to which she needed an answer.

“Connie? Are you still afraid a lot?”

Connie tilted her head, smiling faintly. “Not like I used to be. It’s not constant, it’s not every day. Most of the time I don’t think about it anymore, but every so often... I’ve got two little ones again, Kylie. So yeah, it hits me every so often, and this incident is so similar to how it started with Sophie that I’m scared to death. I don’t want my kids to be alone at all. Ethan and I have a schedule pretty much worked out, but tomorrow...”

“You can count on me,” Coop said. “As much as you want or need. Maybe Kylie can help me take the kids to school tomorrow.”

He eyed her and Kylie knew he was remembering her fear when they’d walked just a little while ago. Did he really think this would help? But it would be broad daylight and she wouldn’t be alone, and she wanted to see Connie’s kids again. Three years were missing, and those children must have grown up a whole lot during that time. “I’d like to help,” she said, sounding braver than she felt.

Connie’s smile widened. “Thanks. I’m sure none of this is easy for you. I hate the way life can teach us to be afraid.”

Good way of putting it, Kylie thought. Lessons of life.

*

When Connie left, Coop excused himself to walk her to her car.

“Okay,” Connie said as they reached the driver’s side of her official vehicle, “what’s working on you? I can feel it, Coop.”

He kept his voice low, so it wouldn’t carry. “I took Kylie for a walk. Glenda probably told you.”

“Yeah. I gather Kylie is pretty scared most of the time.”

“She’s afraid to be alone, understandably.”

“Very understandably.” Connie leaned back against her car door. “And?”

“She felt she was being watched. Which wouldn’t worry me except that I started to feel as if we were being stalked. Not casual glances. Stalking.”

Connie hesitated, chewing her lower lip. “You’re sure it’s not...”

“It’s not PTSD,” he said flatly. “I self-checked. Now, you can brush it off, but someone was following us.”

“You didn’t see anyone?”

“Not a soul, which makes me even more uneasy.”

“Hell.” Connie tipped her head back and stared up at the night overhead. “There’s no reason to think...” Then she shook her head. “And no reason not to think. She didn’t die. The bad guy might be unhappy about that.”

“Exactly.” Coop folded his arms and looked down, testing everything inside himself. “It’s not much to go on. I get it. But I can’t afford to ignore it.”

“Absolutely not. Okay, let’s make sure she’s never alone. And I’ll mention it quietly to the sheriff. I’m not sure what we can do with all this uproar about the stranger, but we’ll try to think of something.”

Suddenly she reached out and laid her hand on his arm. “Some vacation, huh?”

He laughed quietly and shook his head. “We do what we must.”

She turned and opened the door of her car. “Call if anything grabs your attention. See you in the morning at seven, okay?”

“You got it.”

He closed the door for her and watched her drive away. A stalker? He wanted to dismiss it, to tell himself he was overreacting because of past experience, but he couldn’t do it.

Somebody had tried to kill Kylie once. That sure as hell didn’t mean they wouldn’t try it again.

He stood outside awhile longer, feeling as if the weight of his field equipment were settling onto his shoulders, familiar with its weight, straps, pockets and tools. He had the worst wish that it was really there with him.

Then he felt the prickle again. This time he didn’t bother to look around.

“Stare you, SOB,” he muttered. “Stare all you want. Because if you try anything, you’re biting off more than you can chew.”

*

Todd wished he could have heard that conversation, but since Connie and Coop were cousins it had probably been about her kids. Then he picked up the bouquet from the back of his car, and once Coop disappeared inside, he headed for the door.

He’d been too abrupt in his visit when Kylie got home. Time to make amends. Time to make her feel he wasn’t a threat.

But after only five steps, he stopped. Something was wrong. He could feel it.

Not tonight, he decided. He’d pay his visit tomorrow, in the daylight when it wouldn’t seem as unusual, an easy-to-explain drop-in and an apology for turning up so unexpectedly the night she arrived home. He looked at the bouquet in his hand and decided it would survive overnight.

Yeah, tomorrow, under better circumstances, he’d work on persuading her he was just a friend, not a threat.

Because he wasn’t. Yet.

*

When Coop returned inside, he found Kylie and Glenda had moved to the living room. When Glenda beckoned him with a nod of her head, he joined them, taking the remaining end of the couch.

“That was a nice visit from Connie,” Kylie remarked. “I’m glad I’ll see the kids in the morning. With three years missing...I can’t imagine how they’ve changed.”

“They change fast at that age,” Glenda agreed. “But you’ll still recognize them. Taller, mouthier and looking like clones of their mom and dad.”

Kylie smiled. “I’m looking forward to it.”

But she wasn’t really, Coop could tell. The tension that had returned on their walk still rode her and hadn’t really let go. It would probably remain with her in the morning, as well. If he didn’t understand what she was going through so well, he might have sighed.

But he understood it perfectly. He went through some version of this every time he returned from a combat zone. And no matter how you adapted and settled in, you could never return to the old normal, the innocent kid you’d been when you started out. Your life remained haunted, your sense of security and safety permanently damaged.

Sometimes he’d wished he could forget it all ever happened, but now, considering Kylie, he had to accept that forgetfulness would never do the job. The scars went beyond memory, beyond the conscious mind, to a place too deep to restore. The best you could ever hope for was to make peace with it.

Kylie was a long way from that, and as he listened to her and Glenda talk casually about safe and unimportant subjects, he wondered what the hell would happen to Kylie if she recovered her memory. Would she be able to deal with it? If it came in small bits, maybe. But what if she got slammed with the whole thing at once? She might drown in it.

At least his experiences, awful as many of them had been, had mostly been parsed out over time. There’d been breaks, times he’d been able to hunker down in relative safety at a base and deal with it. And the rest of it...well, there was a certain acceptance and adaptation to being at war when you dealt with it day after day. Adjustments made. A change in the way of thinking.

Kylie wouldn’t get that, however he looked at it. Her trouble had apparently come out of nowhere, an attack in the night without warning. No time to prepare, no time to deal or adjust, and then...nothing but the remaining terror.

He hoped she never remembered that attack. Never. While he understood she felt she’d been robbed of her future, maybe she could get back all the missing stuff that was good and skip the bad things.

Yeah, how likely was that?

He raised a hand to rub his chin and realized he desperately needed a shave. But not tonight. The rasping sound of his skin against the stubble drew Kylie’s gaze his way. He saw the fear pinching her eyes even as she offered a small smile.

“I need a shave,” he remarked, trying to keep things light.

“Thus speaks the marine.” Glenda grinned. “You’re not on duty, Gunny. Let it go.”

“I often did when I was on a mission.” He seized on something that might amuse them both. “For a while I had a beard halfway down my chest. I blended better that way.”

The eyes of both women widened and he could tell they were trying to imagine it.

“Seriously,” he said, making a blade of his hand across his chest. “Down to here once.”

Kylie tried to imagine it. “But wouldn’t your uniform give you away? How was that blending?”

“I wasn’t always in uniform.”

Simple truth. There were times he’d looked more like a mujahid than most of the mujahideen. Like an Afghan rebel. But he wasn’t allowed to talk about those times he’d been slipping around in places he wasn’t supposed to go, so he dropped it. No need to get into any of that. It wouldn’t help him to remember it and it wouldn’t help Kylie with any of her problems.

Then Kylie turned the conversation back to their walk. “Was I crazy to feel I was watched? Coop?”

He didn’t even hesitate. “No, I felt it, too. Most people can feel eyes on them. It was probably just folks looking out windows or whatever.” Lie. He didn’t believe it, but he didn’t want this woman any more frightened than she already was.

“Yeah, probably,” she said quietly. “God, I hate this fear. I just wish it would go away. There’s no point to it. I’m safe here. How much safer could I be than being with you and Glenda?”

Coop nodded in agreement, but he was sickeningly aware of how little
real
safety there was. “I don’t know if you’ll ever entirely shake it,” he admitted. “Look at Connie.”

“Right,” said Glenda. “You heard her. Most of the time she forgets about it, but nearly losing Sophie...well, it still comes to mind from time to time. And now with this new incident, it must be like reliving her worst nightmare.”

“She seems to be handling it well, though,” Kylie said.

“She’s had more time,” Coop answered. “It’ll get easier, I promise.”

Kylie seemed to wander off in her own thoughts for a few minutes, then shook herself and smiled. “I need to stop being such a baby. Worse things happen to people and they survive. I will, too.”

“Of course you will,” Glenda said swiftly. “I don’t doubt it for a minute. You were always strong. That hasn’t changed.”

Except in one important way, Coop thought but didn’t say. Later Kylie decided she wanted to try sleeping in her own bed by herself. He was sorry about that. He’d started to really like the long night hours with her head on his lap, stirring from sleep any time she moved or murmured.

He wondered how many people looked as good as she did when they were sleeping. He doubted he looked good at all racked out with his face slack and probably snoring. Not that he snored, as far as he knew. No one had ever complained about it or mentioned it, and there’d been plenty of times when he would have been kicked awake by his buddy for making that kind of dangerous noise. No kicks had ever come his way.