Tempted in the Night (2 page)

Screaming like a banshee, she raced toward him, showing no signs of slowing.

"Police—stop right there!" John shouted, pulling his badge from one pocket at the same time he reached for his gun. The woman merely glanced at him as she continued to run. He realized then that her target was the dark stranger, who seemed to come to the same conclusion, because he turned and raced off, the banshee hot on his trail.

Knowing he couldn't shoot her in the back, John shoved his badge into his coat pocket and raced after her. He was almost close enough to tackle her when she suddenly whirled around, slashing her sword through the air.

"What the fu—" John stopped short, arching his body into the shape of a
C
so the sword barely missed slicing open his midsection.

"Stay out of this," she yelled at him, turning again to race off.

John shot after her and, praying she didn't turn around, launched himself through the air and tackled her to the ground before she could race past the next stand of bushes. They landed with a painful jolt that should have knocked the wind out of her, especially with his added weight on top of her. She recovered quickly and immediately began trying to buck him off, all the while shouting at the top of her lungs.

"I'll kill you, you bloodsucking—"

"Settle down," John ordered, noting the British accent even as he ripped the sword from her hand and tossed it a safe distance away. "Don't make me hurt you."

She continued to straggle, bucking her hips to throw him off balance. Her efforts were distracting, drawing his attention to the gentle swell of her hips and her pert, round butt as it came in repeated contact with his groin. It'd been too damn long since he'd been with a woman, he thought, almost groaning aloud.

Get a grip,
Boehler
. Cuff her, read her
her
rights, and haul her hot ass to jail.

She bucked again, and a part of his anatomy stirred to life. Reacting like he'd been hit with a hot brand, he shifted his body enough to be able to shove a knee into her back, pinning her to the ground.

"
Oompf
!
Bloody hell," she swore. Her long hair spilled about her head as she twisted this way and that, trying to look at him. "What are you doing?"

"I would think it's obvious." Trying to remain professionally detached, he ran his hands along her body, searching for hidden weapons, enjoying the feel of her even as he resisted the urge to take advantage of the situation.

"You're letting him get away! Let me up now before it's too late!" she demanded, breaking into his thoughts.

John glanced up and saw that the other man had, in fact, disappeared. "Who was that?
Your boyfriend?"

She huffed at him in anger. "Not bloody likely."

Yeah, right. Not anymore
, he thought.
A woman like
this—hot body, spirited, probably great in bed—there was always a catch. In this case, the poor bastard had gotten involved with a woman who thought nothing of racing through the park at night with a sword, no doubt intending to execute her own "Bobbitt"
maneuver
. She was clearly psychotic, and the man was lucky to have gotten away.

Pulling handcuffs from his belt, John secured her wrists behind her back. Then he flipped her over and helped her to sit. "You want to tell me why you're running around the park at night with a sword?"

When she glared at him, he got his first good look at her face. She was stunning. It was too dark to see the
color
of her eyes, but her lashes were long and full. Her eyebrows were like dark accent marks above her eyes, and her oval face tapered to a delicate but firm chin. A slender nose with a slightly rounded end gave her an impish look, and her full lips, slightly parted now, were a temptation all their own.

John cleared his throat. "Look, you're in serious trouble. A little cooperation would go a long way. Who are you?"

Still, she refused to answer him.

He tried to read her expression as she looked up at him through
disheveled
hair. When she spoke, her words were soft and beseeching. "Please, you have to help me. People are going to die if we don't stop him. You have to let me go."

She sounded so sincere, he almost found himself believing her; wanting to help her.
Almost.
"I don't think so."

She immediately renewed her struggles to break free, cursing and issuing threats of violence. John stood and picked up her sword. Then he reached down to grip her arm and hauled her to her feet. This was a deeply disturbed, possibly psychotic woman in desperate need of a seventy-two-hour lockdown and a
Thorazine
drip—and John knew a judge who owed him a
favor
. He'd get Zorro checked in and then would go home where, if he was lucky, he might still grab a couple of hours of sleep.

Hours later, John was jerked from a deep sleep by the sound of his home phone ringing.
As he lay there debating whether or not to answer it, the ringing stopped.
He held his breath, waiting to see if it started up again, and when it actually seemed that it wouldn't, he closed his eyes and let his mind drift…

He came awake at the sound of his cell phone ringing.

Glancing at the clock on the bedside table, he saw that it was almost
noon
, which meant he'd had maybe two hours of sleep. Throwing back the covers, he half-rolled, half-fell out of bed, still fully clothed in yesterday's wrinkled outfit, and stumbled across the room to where his coat lay draped over the back of a chair.

Hauling it up, he dug in the pocket for his phone and answered it just before it rolled over to voice mail.

"
Boehler
here."
His voice sounded like wet gravel under rolling tires.

"I want to see you in my office. Now," Gamble ordered.

"Yes,
si
—" The line went dead. John stared at the phone in dumb fascination for a minute. "Good morning to you, too," he mumbled, wondering what he'd done wrong this time.

The events of the prior evening came racing back—the dark figure in the park, the sword-wielding, screaming banshee—whose name he still didn't know because she'd had no ID on her and had refused to talk to him, even when he'd checked her into the psych facility for observation.

John remembered the look of hate and betrayal on her face when he'd dropped her off—it had bothered him. It shouldn't have. His rational side argued that she was just another psychotic criminal, no matter how attractive a package she came in. Yet, even now, he remembered the details of that package much too vividly—the curve of her waist, the flare of her hips.
And that ass.
He felt a groan building deep inside and quickly reined in his thoughts.

He'd hated leaving her in lockdown, but told
himself
, again, that leaving her in lockdown was better than the alternative—jail. But what was he to do with her?
Unbidden, another memory rose, this time of him straddling her at the park; of her ass, round and firm.
He imagined her on all fours while he knelt behind, naked from the waist down and burying himself in her, time and again.

He shook his head and remembered her last lover—the man he'd seen in the park; the one
who'd
barely escaped with his body parts. No, he needed to keep this situation strictly professional, which meant that in seventy-two hours, he had three options: file charges against her and throw her in jail, have her committed for a full psych-
eval
, or let her go.

He was hoping her short stay in lockdown would make her more forthcoming with information about her: self so he could make the right decision. His plan to pay her a little visit as soon as he woke up today would have to wait, though, and he felt an inexplicable twinge of disappointment.

Not bothering to change clothes, John ran his fingers through his hair and put on his shoes. His holster was slung over the bedpost, so he shrugged into it and then, out of habit, checked the gun to make sure the safety was on. As he left the bedroom, he grabbed his coat and pulled it on as he walked. He was almost to the front door when he shoved his hand into his coat pocket and it slipped through to the other side. Wondering how it could possibly have a hole in it, he remembered the sword slicing the air and just missing him. The blade must have caught the inside of his coat instead. He tried to remember what had been in that pocket and suddenly recalled shoving his badge in there just before racing after the woman.

Swearing, he checked his other pockets, but the badge wasn't there. On the chance that he'd lost it after getting home, he retraced his steps from the front door to the bedroom, even going so far as to examine the bed. Next, he ran out to his car and searched it. No luck.

Heaving a sigh, he started the car and headed for the station. As he drove, he pulled out his cell phone and called the main desk.
"Hi, Joyce.
I need to report a lost ID. Yeah—mine."

The call took about ten minutes and by the time he clicked off, he was already halfway to the station. Traffic wasn't a problem and fifteen minutes later, he was walking through the building, headed for Gamble's office.

His cell phone rang again and he recognized Joyce's number. Hoping someone had turned in his badge, he answered the call. "Tell me you have good news."

"Sorry, John, not the kind you're hoping for," she replied sympathetically.
"Billy, over at Impound, called.
He said to tell you they just brought in a car you might be interested in—a rental."

John knew that his sword-wielding Jane Doe hadn't materialized out of thin air. He figured she'd left her car close enough to the park to have walked there—or run there, as the case might be—so he'd asked to be notified of any cars towed in from inside a two-mile radius of
Thompson
Park
.

He glanced at his watch and saw that it was almost one. "Joyce, Gamble's expecting me to walk in the door any second. Can you call Billy back and tell him I'll be there as soon as I can?"

"Will do."

"Okay, thanks. I owe you."

Once he reached Gamble's office, he took a bracing breath and then knocked on the closed door.

Gamble's voice erupted from the other side. "Come in."

John hadn't even made it to the chair in front of Gamble's desk before the assistant chief started in on him. "Were you in
Thompson
Park
last night?
South side?"

Warning bells started pealing inside his head. "Yes."

"What were you doing there?"

"Walking."

Gamble stared at him, his hard glare boring through him. After a second, he opened his middle desk drawer, reached in to grab something, and then tossed it onto the desk.

John stared down at his badge. Resisting the urge to snatch it up, he raised his gaze to meet Gamble's.

"We found that at the park last night," the assistant chief said. "It was under a bush, less than a foot away from Simon Brody's dead body."