Hidden Fire, Kobo (15 page)

"ETA?" Randy asked.

"Under ten."

Which would put the officer on scene well
before he arrived. Until tonight, he hadn't thought much about living outside
the city limits. Gram had left her house to him and he never considered living
anywhere else. He enjoyed the drive in, the drive home. Gave him time to gear
up on the way to work, unwind on the way back. Also gave him an out if the
neighbors started asking too many favors.

If the town council disbanded the police
force, he might end up working for the county and he'd be able to answer a call
on his own block. But right now, he regretted not living closer in. His foot pressed
harder on the gas.

"Neville, it's Detweiler," he
said into the radio, trying not altogether successfully to keep the emotion out
of his voice. "Keep me apprised. I'll be there in under twenty."

"Yes, sir. Had to let the kids off
with a warning when I got the call about some lights on in a store downtown."
Mockery dripped from his voice, roughened by too many cigarettes.

Crap. Did Neville think he'd been pulled
to do a favor? He kept his tone professional. At least as professional as it
could be, considering he wanted to throttle the guy. "I have no doubt you
scared the kids enough so they won't be back."

Neville sputtered a sound that might pass
for a laugh, then coughed. "Yeah, I made them dump the booze. Told them
they were lucky whoever killed that guy in the field the other night hadn't
been waiting for them. Took their car keys. They're waiting on a ride."

Hoping to lighten the mood, Randy
searched for something positive to say. The best he could come up with was, "Look
on the bright side. No booking paperwork."

Neville coughed again. "You're right
about that."

Randy ignored the issue of the
confiscated car keys for now. Let Neville's supervisor deal with it. "What's
your twenty?" he asked. "Did you call for backup?"

"No point calling for backup until I
know what we've got. Besides,
you're
rolling. I'm in front of the shop,
Detective. Looks quiet. I'll go around back, sir." The words were clipped,
terse, relayed in full-blown reporting-to-a-superior mode. With a generous dash
of condescension on the side.

Heart pounding, he listened, waiting for
the radio to reveal the scene. Like being blind and only hearing the sound of a
movie.

"I'm parked in back, sir. Checking
the vehicle which is registered to one Sarah Tucker of Pine Hills. Nothing
unusual noted. Engine's warm, not hot."

Randy gritted his teeth. "Thank you,
Officer Neville. Can you tell me what's going on inside?"

"Yes, sir, Detective Detweiler. I'm
approaching the door."

The radio went silent.

Damn.
Attitude or not, with both hands occupied, Neville wouldn't
be able to key his mic. Randy bit back the urge to ask questions, knowing his
voice in the officer's earpiece could distract him, keep him from doing his
job. Put him in danger. Put Sarah in danger.

Or had something already happened to her?
Had she gone back to the shop? Had the asshole who'd wrecked her shop come back
for something? Had she walked in on him? All the pictures, the crime scenes he'd
studied in San Francisco kaleidoscoped through his head, with Sarah's face
filling the images.

And why the hell had she gone back
without calling him?

Damn it, Neville. Report.

Despite the acid-dump to his gut, he
found the wherewithal to keep from interrupting. Carmen would be monitoring the
radio and policy was to check with an officer every three minutes if they were
on a call. He could wait three minutes. Two minutes, thirty-eight seconds. He
hit the horn as some idiot in front of him decided flashing blue lights in his
rearview mirror meant slow down to the speed limit.

Great. Now the jerk was
stopping
?
In the middle of the road? What ever happened to
move right
! He hit the
horn again. The guy pulled onto the shoulder. Finally. Randy straddled the
center line, dodging another idiot in the oncoming lane. The sweat trickling
down his neck was not from the near miss.

One minute fifty-two seconds.

Sarah jumped to her feet at the
resounding knock accompanied by a growling male voice shouting, "Pine
Hills Police." Brushing her hair out of her eyes, she rushed to the back
door. She squinted through the peephole into the distorted face of a glowering
police officer. In the yellow light of the streetlamp, his skin tones took on
an unhealthy jaundiced shade beneath the brim of his uniform hat. Bulldog
jowls. Broad nose above his scowl. She lowered her gaze enough to take in the
police uniform shirt. He didn't look familiar, but she didn't normally see the
night shift.

She had one hand on the knob before
caution took over. "May I see some identification, please?"

"Are you alone in there, ma'am?"

Something in his tone raised her hackles.
"Please let me see your identification." She whipped her head around,
trying to remember where she'd dropped her purse when she'd come in. She'd call
Randy and verify this guy was a real cop. No, not Randy. She would call the
police department. Do things through the channels any proper citizen would use.

"I'm Officer Neville, ma'am. Just
checking. Someone called in about your lights being on." His tone was less
menacing.

"One minute." She grabbed her
purse, rummaging for her cell while looking through the peephole again, seeing
a Pine Hills police badge and ID card. She'd seen Randy's enough to assume
these were authentic. Besides, she couldn't think of a reason someone would
want to pretend to be a Pine Hills cop. Cautiously, she unlocked the door.

Officer Neville stepped to one side as
she did, then strode into her shop, closing the door behind him. "And
would you have identification for me, ma'am?"

She palmed her cell phone and fished out
her wallet with her driver's license. He gave it a cursory glance and a quick
head bob.

"Are you all right?" He had his
holster unsnapped and one hand on the butt of his pistol. "Is anyone else
here?" His voice was lower and less belligerent.

"No, I'm alone. I'm fine. This is my
shop. I have a right to be here."

"I'm sorry, but it is unusual to be
working after midnight."

She swept her arm across the room. "Well,
Officer Neville, there
is
a lot to do, wouldn't you say?"

His eyes never softened and she decided
she definitely didn't want to be a crook if this guy was around. Then again,
that was his job. Most of the time Randy didn't get called until after the
crime was committed. This man was the one who dealt with them in phase one—when
the bad guys were likely to be doing their bad stuff. She gave him her
shopkeeper smile.

"I appreciate your concern. Would
you like to look around and see for yourself that I'm alone here? That
everything's all right?" If you could call piles of broken merchandise and
overturned fixtures all right.

He grunted something she took for a yes.

Stepping aside, she waved him in. He
glowered again—his people skills needed a major overhaul—and wandered through
the shop, not altogether carefully. She moved ahead of him, picking up things
before his shuffling gait added them to her unsalvageable pile. Halfway to the
office he stopped and pressed his finger to his ear, nodded, then pressed the
mic attached to his collar.

"On scene. Owner claims she's alone.
I'm verifying her statement."

She opened her mouth to retort but
decided he'd be out of here faster if she left him to his
verification
and snapped it shut. Keeping a discreet distance behind him and an eye out for
his clumsy feet, she watched as he gave her office a cursory look.

He touched his mic again. "Everything
is clear. Show me on normal patrol."

The back door burst open and Neville drew
his weapon. "Stay here," he said, shoving her deeper into her office.
He stood sideways inside the doorway, back to the wall.

"Neville? Sarah?" Randy's voice
sent relief surging through her.

"In back," she called.

Neville holstered his gun and stepped
into the shop. "False alarm, sir," he said to Randy, who stood at the
rear of the store. She noticed Neville's tone was as gruff with Randy as it had
been with her.

"Mrs. Tucker admits to being here
working, which explains the lights." Neville stood at attention, almost as
if challenging Randy to find fault with his explanation. Waiting.

She watched Randy. A hint of the
expression Sarah had seen when he confronted Penny Scholnik on the news crossed
his face. His pale face. His beaded-with-sweat face. He glanced her way, his
eyes asking for confirmation she was all right. She nodded.

He drew himself to every inch of his
six-and-a-half-foot height and returned his gaze to Neville. In a flash of
insight she realized Randy had started as a patrol officer long before he
became a detective and the power to intimidate was still very much a part of
him. Neville didn't flinch, Sarah gave him that much. She doubted she could say
the same if she were in Neville's position.

"That's all, Officer," Randy
said. "I'll take over here."

"Yes, sir." Neville mumbled
something Sarah couldn't understand into his mic and marched from the room. She
held her breath as he made his way to the back door, but he didn't disturb her
piles of sorted merchandise.

When the door shut, Randy took three
steps toward her, then froze. His hands clenched into fists, then relaxed, then
clenched again. His chest rose and fell, his nostrils flared and his pulse
throbbed at his neck. His Adam's apple bobbed.

Unable to speak, she waited, finding her
own fists clenching. She shook them loose and wiped them on her sweat pants.

Randy's face went from pale to flushed. "Damn
it, Sarah. What the hell are you doing? What were you thinking?"

"What was I doing?" Heat rose
to her face and she knew she was undoubtedly three shades redder than he was. "What
was I thinking? Let's see. This is my shop. I'm allowed to come in whenever I
want to. Maybe I was trying to figure out what happened here. And maybe I didn't
think it was worth bothering you until I had something concrete, because you're
supposed to be doing all your other cop stuff. Sorry if I thought this might
help." Damn. Her voice cracked and tears burned.

NO. You are
not
going to cry.

She gave her head an emphatic shake as if
that would dispel the tears.

Randy spoke. Softly. Hoarsely. As if the
words couldn't quite make it past his throat. As if there might be a lump
lodged inside, like the one in hers. He took a tentative step forward. Reached
for her with one hand. "You scared me to death. I want to touch you. Hold
you. For a minute. Please?"

Her hand, seemingly of its own volition,
moved up and toward his. Almost before their fingertips brushed, she felt the
tingle. The one that shot through her at Randy's touch. Every single time. The
one she couldn't deny.

He took a step forward. "Dispatch
called." His fingertips met hers, inched their way up until he grasped her
hand. "Lights were on. Your car was here. And then … nothing. I had all
these pictures in my head. None of them was good."

"You're still thinking of San
Francisco," she said, trying to remain rational, which was getting harder
to do as he moved closer and wrapped his arms around her.

"No. I was thinking of
you.
"

His arms tightened, pulling her to him
and she melted into his body. He barely moved, simply held her, breathing deeply.
His heart thudded in his chest. She allowed him to take what he seemed to need.
Did the contact untangle his insides, too?

For the span of several heartbeats, she
stood there, resting her cheek against his chest. He stroked her hair, caressed
her back. "I'm fine," she said.

"I'm not. I need another minute."
He embraced her, then shifted her back far enough to tilt up her chin and look
into her eyes. "I keep thinking of when Chris had you. Everything came
back."

A frisson of alarm coursed through her. "Chris?
Did you find out— Is he still in prison?"

"He's there, yes. I've requested a
list of anyone who's visited him. Any phone calls, emails."

She turned her head and surveyed the
wreckage of her shop again. "This still doesn't seem like something he'd
do."

"I agree, but people change,
especially when they're locked up. I'm not dismissing the possibility."

"So, have you eliminated anyone?"

He bent and pressed his forehead to hers.
"I think I've crossed your mother off the list."

"I'm glad to hear it." Relieved
that things were as close to normal as they could be under the circumstances,
she ran her fingers through her hair and stepped back. "I should get back
to work."