Renegade (Elite Ops 5) (31 page)

"That's so not fair. You shouldn't do this stuff by yourself. You need a lookout."

She was laughing at him. It was in her voice and in her eyes.

"Don't you have dresses to make?" he growled, wondering how the hell he was going to maintain the emotional distance he was trying to keep between them.

"Maybe this is more fun." Her brows arched as he opened the door and stepped into the short hall. "Besides, I called Bailey and Kira. They're going to meet me at the house this evening instead."

Gina Foreman was waiting for them in the living room, her gaze somber as they

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walked toward her.

"Did you find anything?" she asked.

"Nothing yet, Mrs. Foreman," Nik answered her.

She nodded slowly as her lips turned down with an edge of bitterness. "At least someone is trying to find out what happened. It gets hard working at the police station, wondering if the chief is lying, wondering what really happened." She shook her head as she shoved her hands into her jeans pockets. "It destroys your faith in people."

Nik watched as Mikayla crossed the room and wrapped her arms around the other

woman as though a hug could fix anything. Everything.

"I'm sorry," he heard Mikayla whisper. "I'm so sorry, Gina."

The woman's arms went around her as Gina nodded, sniffed, and, strangely

enough, seemed to find strength from that hug.

"You call me if you need me." Mikayla stepped back and gave the other woman's arms a brief rub. "I mean it. Come by the shop, whatever."

A timid, saddened smile pulled at Gina's lips. "Thank you, Mikayla." And she suddenly sounded as though somewhere, somehow, she had found hope.

Would he have felt differently after his daughter's death if he had felt such hope?

Nik wondered as he and Mikayla left the house. Would he have made different choices, found other ways to strike back at the men who had killed his family?

If Mikayla had been a part of his life would she have shared her fairy charm with

him and helped heal those shattered remnants of his soul?

It was possible, he admitted. She seemed to carry with her a capacity for love that astounded him. But even more, an ability to find softness within people that they didn't know existed.

Within Nik she had found emotions he'd never wanted to feel again. Emotions he

feared could well and truly destroy him.

"I want to head to D.C., see if we can get in to see Holbrook," he stated as he took the I-70 interstate exit. "Foreman had to have been in close contact with him if he had his home number."

"Holbrook Construction doesn't have the reputation Nelson does, either," Mikayla mused as he glanced at her. "There's been several charges leveled against him for attempting to sabotage other jobs, bribing employees of other firms, and finding ways to force companies out of their contracts so he could pick them up. Nothing was proven, but the accusations are there."

"Then he could have been bribing Eddie Foreman," Nik guessed.

"Which gives Maddix Nelson a perfect motive for murder," she concluded

sweetly.

Nik grimaced. He couldn't argue the point; if he didn't know Maddix, he would be

at the top of Nik's suspect list. Hell, if he didn't know Maddix, then he would have been investigating everyone supposedly at that meeting.

When had he begun allowing personal associations to interfere with his job? Nik

asked himself as he made a mental note to put Kira and Bailey on the chief of police and two council members. As Mikayla stated, Maddix had the perfect motive and his friends had some damned good reasons to lie for him. They were in bed with him where business was concerned, and that often made for damned fine alibis.

"If Maddix killed Eddie Foreman, then the best way to prove it is to follow the 151

evidence trail," Nik told Mikayla. "It will lead us where we need to go. We'll talk to Holbrook, see what happens there; then I want to check Jarvis Dalton's alibi. He was lying; I'm just not sure what he was lying about."

"I don't think Jarvis is smart enough to pull off a murder, even one that simple."

She shook her head before turning hurt eyes on Nik. "But Nik, I saw what happened. I saw Eddie die. I saw who killed him. Why can't you believe me?"

"It's not a matter of belief, Mikayla," he breathed out heavily. "It's a matter of evidence. But you're right: Maddix may have a hell of a motive. One thing is for damned sure. If he did it, I'll find out. And I'll make sure he pays for it."

"How could he not have done it?"

Nik shook his head. "Trust me, amazing things can be done with makeup and

latex now. I know. Everyone knew you were coming to pick up Scotty. Anyone could

have been waiting for an opportunity to kill Eddie and place the blame on Maddix." He held his hand up. "I'm not saying they did. I'm saying it's possible. I'll have Maddix checked out deeper, as well as his friends and neighbors. I won't overlook him. I'm following rumor and evidence at this point, which has to be done no matter who killed him."

"There were no attempts to kill me when no one believed me," she stated soberly.

"The first attempt came after you began investigating me."

He nodded. He knew that, and it enraged him. The thought of one of those bullets

actually striking her fragile body was enough to send terror racing through him. The world couldn't bear to lose Mikayla, he thought. Too many fairies had already been destroyed.

Hell, he couldn't keep thinking this way. She wasn't a fucking fairy; she was a

tiny, independent, too-trusting woman, not some mythological creature of innocence.

That's what his head said; other parts of him, such as his heart, his soul, were

saying something entirely different. Mikayla was the epitome of everything a woman shouldn't be in this day and age. Innocent, sweet, trusting, caring. Her very nature was going to end up getting her destroyed, and he was terrified there wasn't a damned thing he could do to stop it.

"Nik?" she interrupted his musings softly. "You didn't answer me. Why else would anyone try to kill me if it isn't Maddix?"

"Why would Maddix hire me if he didn't want the truth learned?" Nik countered.

"I can't overlook that one, Mikayla. Maddix knows what I am, what I'm capable of, and he knows if he killed Eddie, then I'll find out. And he'll suffer."

It was a warning he'd already given the other man. It was a warning he would

follow through with.

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Chapter 16

Reed Holbrook refused to see them and Jarvis Dalton's alibi was a lie.

Mikayla watched Nik as the day progressed into evening and they returned to the

house. Not long after Bailey and Kira arrived for measurements and the final decisions on the dresses they wanted. This only delayed Mikayla's chance to figure out his attitude.

He was stone cold. So cold, so icy, that the chill enveloped her and left her

wishing she'd worn a jacket, despite the summer air.

From the moment he had made his statement concerning Maddix Nelson, Nik had

only grown colder. She was walking in her home with Frosty the frickin' Snowman.

She stood in the foyer after his friends left, watching him silently as he watched her from the kitchen. She was tired. The drive to and from D.C. had been filled with enough tension to thicken the air and make breathing seem like work. Bailey and Kira's concerned curiosity while they were here hadn't helped matters in the least.

The colder Nik became, the more it hurt. He was blocking her out, distancing

himself from her. It felt like a breakup, except she'd given Nik far more than she had ever given another man. And it wasn't a breakup, because he was still here, tormenting her with his presence and the remembered feel of his hands against her flesh. The warmth of his body shielding her own.

What happened? The need to ask, to demand an explanation, was on the tip of her

tongue, but the words wouldn't fall from her lips.

He was, at this moment, completely unapproachable.

"I'm going to shower."

She had to get away from him before she made a fool of herself. Before she

demanded answers she had no right to demand. Before she cried, where she had no right to cry.

She had walked into this with her eyes wide open. He had warned her he couldn't

love her, and she had promised herself she wouldn't love him.

As the hot water from the shower washed over her body, she reminded herself of

that promise. She wasn't in love with him, she told herself. But if she wasn't in love, then why the hell did it hurt so bad? Why did her chest feel tight, her body heavy from the ache inside?

She leaned her head against the wall of the shower and fought back the tears. Two

nights he'd spent apart from her, and she missed him to the point that sleep had been almost impossible the night before. She could feel another such night coming on.

She'd never imagined it could be so easy to get used to a man sleeping in the bed

with her. She'd slept alone all her life. But sleeping with Nik had seemed as natural as breathing. And she missed him.

Sniffing back the tears that would have fallen, Mikayla finished her shower, dried her body and her hair before dressing in summer cotton lounging pants and a loose, sleeveless T-shirt.

Moving into the kitchen, she paused at the doorway, watching as Nik pulled out

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the casserole she'd put in the oven that morning and set the oven's timer back on.

It was still warm; the cheese, hamburger, and macaroni casserole scented the air

and reminded Mikayla that they had eaten very little that day.

Within minutes they were sitting apart from each other, still silent, as they ate.

The tension was only growing between them. It wasn't an angry tension, but one

thick enough to cut with a knife. Secrets shrouded it; silence intensified it.

It was a silence that wore on Mikayla's nerves and left her struggling to hold back the resentment she could feel growing inside her.

"What do we do next?" she finally asked as he sat back from his meal and appeared ready to leave the table.

His gaze flicked back to her, and what she saw in those few seconds rocked her to

her soul.

The ice was there, but beneath it lurked a bleak sorrow, a dark agony that had her chest clenching in pain for him. As though the silent battle between them was touching shadows inside him that he had no desire to revisit.

The deaths of his wife and child?
Mikayla wondered.

Had something renewed that nightmare inside him and left him remembering the

pain he must have felt at their loss?

"Next we see about revisiting Jarvis and politely inquiring as to why his alibi didn't hold up. Then I'll need to see why Reed Holbrook preferred not to speak with us."

There was a flash of predatory determination in Nik's gaze that sent a shiver up her spine.

And she hadn't missed the adjustment from "we" to "I." He had no intention of taking her with him when he discussed this with Reed.

Mikayla could only shake her head. "I understand your reason for following the trail as you are, but you're not mentioning what part Maddix may have played in this."

"For the sake of argument we'll say Maddix did it." Nik leaned forward as he stared back at her implacably. "Right now, he's getting away with it. His alibi is solid. If you want to break that alibi, you follow the trail. It's that simple."

"Then there's a chance he killed Eddie because Eddie was working with Reed

Holbrook?"

"And the fact that Reed is refusing point-blank to speak to us tells me there's a chance he has something to hide. It's beginning to appear as though that something could be the fact that he was paying Eddie Foreman to sabotage the job."

Mikayla stared back at Nik thoughtfully. "I think I remember something in the paper last year. There were several delays on the job because the foundation of the building had to be redone when the building inspector found a crack in the cement. I heard Maddix fired the entire cement crew when that happened."

Nik nodded. "We follow the trail and see where it goes."

"But you still don't think it's going to go back to Maddix," she guessed.

Nik shot her an irritated look before propping his arms on the table and staring

back at her. "Mikayla, I believe you think you saw Maddix. I truly do. But Maddix Nelson is not a stupid man. He knew when he hired me I'd get to the bottom of this. He laid down a hell of a lot of money to ensure that I did. So no, I don't think he did it."

"Maybe he's smarter than you're giving him credit for," she suggested, trying to ignore the twinge of hurt the explanation sent rushing through her. "Maybe he knew what you'd do and he's planned for it."

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Nik shrugged at that. "That's always possible. Not likely, but possible." The smile that crossed his lips had nothing to do with amusement and much to do with potential lethal intent.

It still left Mikayla confused. Personally, she thought questioning Maddix until he broke was a good idea. It worked on
CSI,
right? Though she knew it wouldn't work on Maddix, at least she would gain a measure of satisfaction.

"I need to take care of some things." Nik rose from his chair, pushed it in carefully, and stared back at her. "I'll be in the guest room working."

In other words, he intended to use work as an excuse not to sleep with her.

Mikayla watched as he left the room before rising and cleaning the dishes silently.

She felt off balance now, uncertain what to do. She wanted to touch him, to hold him, to ease the bleak pain from the far corners of his gaze, but she had no idea how to do it. That left her alone, and she'd never realized how lonely alone could be until now.

Nik was on the verge of throwing something. It had been almost a decade since

he'd put his fist through a wall, but the urge to do so now crawled through his system like a potent disease.