“Being predictable is a good way to end up dead.”
“Appearing predictable while we work behind the scenes to be otherwise, keeps the focus on me with the idea being that no one else ends up dead.”
“My job,” he says, “is to keep you alive first, and everyone else second.”
“You can’t protect someone first who protects others first.”
“And how will you protect anyone else if you’re dead?” he challenges. “I’m not leaving.”
“Keep your field people in place,” I say. “But you can’t stay.”
“Call the police and have me hauled out of here,” he says. “That’s the only way I’m leaving and for all we know this ‘butterfly slayer’ thinks we’re fuck buddies, detective.”
“How does that help us? You’re still unexpected. You’re still working for Walker Security.”
“I’m not leaving,” he replies stubbornly.
“Just tonight,” I negotiate. “Until we can analyze this problem more closely.”
“We can analyze it more closely together, here, tonight.”
“You’re making me crazy,” I bite out this time.
“Ditto, detective,” he assures me, before he perches on the edge of the barstool to his left and pulls his phone from his pocket. “Right now,” he says. “I’m going to get us the security footage for the apartment we setup so we can look for our butterfly’s arrival.” He places the phone to his ear.
I stare at him for several anger-charged beats and consider my options. I really could arrest him. I could get him out of here, and maybe that would please what might be my real stalker. Even keep my real stalker away from my father and other innocent people. Or not. There really isn’t a good option right now, other than information gathering, that either brings me to his position or him to mine. That decides if he stays or goes.
“Hey Ash,” Jacob says, while I find myself staring at the broken wing of the butterfly, which is too precise to be accidental. “I need all the security footage for Jewel Carpenter’s residence,” Jacob continues on his call. “Also, my overnight bag and my MacBook.” There is a pause before he adds, “Tonight,” and I have no idea why but that one word, “tonight” shoots my gaze to his, and his to mine, a punch of awareness rises between us, followed by a charge that screams with possibilities. Possibilities that will distract us both from catching the butterfly slayer, therefore I rejected them and him.
I rotate and present him with my back, closing the space between me and the counter, next to the gray wooden finished fridge, where I grip the counter and will any attraction to Mr. Green Beret to go away. While I fail, he continues his conversation. “The clothes can wait, if necessary,” he says, which has me wondering what he plans to sleep in, if anything at all. “But,” he adds, “the sooner the better on that MacBook and the footage.” He must disconnect the call because the next thing I hear is, “Thirty minutes, detective.”
I let out a heavy breath and grab two wine glasses from the mounted shelf under the kitchen cabinet, along with the bottle of red wine I keep ready in the way I hope to always be ready. Turning, I set the glasses and the bottle on the island. “Because I don’t have whiskey,” I say, “which at this point, I’m considering a misstep despite the fact that I hate the stuff.”
“Then why is it a misstep?” he asks, shrugging out of his leather jacket, and in the process, subjecting me to ripped, powerful arms, and a broad chest.
A view of which frames my reply. “It’s as good a night as it is a bad idea to drink myself silly,” I say.
“You’re too much of a control freak to drink yourself silly,” he comments, settling his jacket on the empty barstool beside him.
I uncork the bottle. “Sounds like you’re talking about you, not me,” I say, indicating the bottle in my hand. “Do you drink wine?”
“I was stationed in Italy for six months and yes, I learned to love the grape.”
“Well then,” I say, filling our glasses. “You should love this. It’s Italian and expensive, compliments of my father.” I set the bottle down and claim the stool directly across from his.
He lifts his glass, while his lashes lower, and he smells the ruby red liquid, and then sips. “Excellent,” he says, offering me an approving stare. “Your father knows how to pick, because price alone does not make a drinkable wine.”
“Agreed,” I say, resealing the bottle, surprised by the knowledge behind that comment, while wondering why the hell I’m noticing that he has wine on his bottom lip.
“I do like control,” he says, jerking my gaze upward to the smoldering heat of his stare. “In all things. It’s power. It’s protection. It’s necessary.”
Suddenly I don’t know if we’re talking about work anymore. “Is that supposed to surprise me?”
“Simply laying the groundwork,” he comments.
“The groundwork for what?”
“My decisions,” he says. “My actions. My motivations.”
“We may have problems then,” I say, suddenly hyper-aware of him. Of his size. Of his scent that I now believe to be dashed with cinnamon. His piercing gray eyes that tell so little but say so much. “Control is like a bag of chocolate to me. I can’t get enough.”
“And yet you want to drink yourself silly?”
“Want and do are two different things.”
“Sometimes you have to let it go,” he says.
“Never going to happen,” I reply. “Not where you’re concerned.”
His lips don’t give me the smile I watch for, but his eyes light with mischief. “Nice apartment, by the way,” he says, lifting his glass to indicate the space behind him, changing the subject.
“If that was a question,” I reply, the air softening, the mood shifting, a degree of formality returning, “the answer is yes,” I add. “It belongs to my father and I rent it out for a ridiculously low price tag that would be zero if I left it up to him. Actually, if I left it up to him, I’d be in a high-rise, and living in luxury.”
“Most people wouldn’t turn that down,” he comments, studying me with those gray eyes of his that always appear cool when he looks elsewhere, and hot when he looks at me. Like now.
“I’m not most people,” I say, “much to my father’s chagrin half the time. But I also wasn’t foolish enough to turn this place down, when I’m living on a skimpy detective’s salary.”
“Then why not upgrade to the mansion in the high-rise?”
“I can’t stay in touch with a detective’s world while living in my father’s. And my father didn’t earn his money to make it my money. I chose this life. I make my own money.”
“But he obviously supports your decisions, or you wouldn’t have this apartment.”
I snort. “He hates my job. He’d lock me away in a safe house if I’d let him, a detail of which I’m certain to regret, as it’s certain to fuel your caveman nature.”
“I came by the caveman thing naturally,” he says. “Inherited from the likes of my own father, just like my insistence on control. Your father told me to keep you safe, but all methods and actions are my own. And speaking of your father.” He sets his glass down and grabs his phone from where it rests beside it. “We need to give Savage a heads up on your little gift.” He hits auto-dial and then places the phone between us. “Ask whatever questions you want.” He hits the speaker button.
The line connects almost instantly. “What’s up, asshole?” a man I assume to be Rick Savage answers.
“Way to make an impression, Savage,” Jacob says. “I’m here with Detective Carpenter.”
“Oh fuck,” Savage murmurs, and then quickly adds, “I mean—my apologies, detective. Nice to meet you.”
“Nice to fucking meet you,” I say, because I hate being treated like a delicate flower. “I’m a detective, Savage. If the word ‘fuck’ offended me I couldn’t have half the conversations I have in any twelve-hour window. Speak how you speak, just take care of my father.”
“Nothi
ng is going to happen to your father, detective,” Savage vows, proving he knows when to set aside all his bullshit yack, of which, he has plenty. “You have my word.”
“What we have,” Jacob says, “is reason to believe that a gift from our note writer may have been left here at Detective Carpenter’s apartment. One that took significant planning and that means we’re dealing with someone with a degree of skill and intelligence. Tighten the reins on Carpenter Senior.”
“What kind of gift?” he asks, just as I would in his shoes.
“Nothing we’re going to talk about right now,” Jacob replies, his eyes warm when they meet mine, his actions honorable, loyal in fact, when I didn’t expect loyalty from him. “Just tighten the reins,” he adds.
“The gift was a dead butterfly,” I supply, letting Jacob know he has a thumbs-up. “My best friend in college, who was murdered, loved butterflies.”
“Are we dealing with her killer?” he asks.
“It can’t be,” I say. “He’s in jail. I know this because I keep tabs on him.”
“Then a connection to him, perhaps?” Savage suggests.
“Maybe,” I say. “It’s worth exploring.”
“And we will,” Jacob offers. “And quickly.”
“Does your father know yet?” Savage asks.
“No,” I say, “and there is no ‘yet’ to this. In fact, if he finds out, I will personally come and emasculate you, ex-Green Beret or not. He worries enough. We’re doing what we need to do without him knowing more than he has to know.”
Jacob gives me a deadpan look, because that’s what’s carved on his handsome face, I decide. There’s nothing more. “Well then,” he says. “I’m not sure you got the point across. Savage? How’d she do?”
“Emasculate,” he says. “I’m pretty sure I learned that word in ‘Don’t Piss Off A Woman 101.’ We’re clear here. And as for the security levels, we’re as tight on your father as a skin on a banana, but I’m going to alert my team to give it an extra squeeze.”
Jacob glances at me and asks, “Anything else?”
“Are you with him around the clock, Savage?” she asks. “And if not, who is?”
“Durk Keifer is with him,” he says. “He’s ex-FBI and damn good. He’s also about half my size and looks mighty fine in a suit, like that pretty boy daddy of yours. Must be why your father likes him and announced him as his personal bodyguard. Blake, ex-ATF and hacker extraordinaire, is setting up the company security. There’s four more on the team.”
“I have an outline of the team I can give her,” Jacob offers and motions to the phone. “Last call. What else?”
“I want to see the letters sent to my father.”
“I can get those for you,” Jacob replies, picking up the phone. “We’ll be in touch, Savage.”
“One last thing,” he says. “Detective?”
“Yes?”
“No one dies on my watch. You can take that to the bank.”
That vow, obviously meant to comfort me, isn’t comforting at all. It’s that reality check that the only person in my life that hasn’t been murdered is now quite possibly in danger of being murdered. I see a lot of things in this job, but this…I don’t really even know what to do with this.
Jacob notices my reaction. I see it in the sharpness of his eyes. I don’t want him to see it and I pick up my wine glass and walk out of the kitchen. “We’ll be in touch, Savage,” Jacob repeats, and I can feel him turn and follow my progress to the living room where I sit down on the cushy gray couch. The one thing that I’d bought with my annual payment from my mother’s estate, before investing the rest with my father’s investment banker because as my father has said, “One day you’ll be glad you did it, even if you decide to donate it all. The more to be generous with.”
Jacob picks up his wine glass and walks in my direction, and I’m once again struck by his grace coupled with a lethal quality. I’ve called him arrogant and it’s true, but I’m comforted by my growing impression that he can back it up. By the fact that I believe him to be a skilled killer in his own right, and as my uncle told me many times, when you chase a killer, you have to be willing to become one yourself. I am willing, but in all things, practice makes perfect, and Jacob King has had practice.
He stops at the chair with the fluffy blanket, and picks it up to sit. One look at the small, sunken center and he drops the blanket while I laugh. “I really want to see you in that chair with the blanket over you.”
“That’s not happening,” he says, stepping to the other side of the table. “I’m joining you.”
“Okay,” I say, scooting over. “Join me.”
He rounds the stone coffee table and sits down on the opposite end of the sofa. Both of us face forward, sipping our wine for a good three minutes, before he says, “I don’t tell anyone about my family.”
I glance over at him and the minute our gaze collides, the air thickens. “You said that,” I say.
“It seemed worthy of repeating,” he replies. “I need you to trust me.”
“Then don’t burn my files.”
He sets his wine down. “You need me.”
“I need you?” I set my wine down and face him. “Because you don’t want me to touch the Jesse Marks case?”
“Because you need me.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“There’s a dead butterfly on your kitchen counter. That’s your answer.” There’s a knock on my door. “And so is that,” he adds.
“Because I didn’t buzz anyone up,” I say. “But you know that’s your man.”
“That’s right. Because anyone who wants to get to you, can, and you know it.” He stands up and walks toward the door, where he’ll be given an overnight bag. In other words, he’s staying here tonight unless I forcibly kick him out. And I could, but he’s right. Anyone who can get to me, will, and just because that butterfly didn’t make it to my front door doesn’t mean the person who delivered it won’t.
Jacob crosses my living room, opens my front door, and in about thirty seconds shuts it again. Just that fast, his sexy, arrogant, big-ass self, is closing the space between me and him again, all loose-legged swagger with his overnight bag in his hand. The bag that says he’s not leaving because he doesn’t believe the butterfly slayer is going away. I wish I could argue. I wish I could say that he’s wrong. I wish I could send him away or keep him here for the right reasons—he’s hot and we’re hot together—because it’s been a long time since I’ve been hot with anyone.
He stops on the other side of the coffee table and pats his bag. “We should have everything we need now.”
“Including your overnight boxers?” I ask, because I just want the man to blush, or smile, or react in some human way.
“I’m a tighty-whitey kind of guy,” he says, which might seem like a joke from someone else, but from Jacob, it sounds like a fact check.
But I’m not ready to give up. “I think you should know,” I say, as he rounds the coffee table to join me on the couch again, “that our conversation about your tighty-whitey underwear means that I’m officially in the most committed relationship of my adult life. With a man I still haven’t decided if I like.”
“We already covered this,” he says, pulling his MacBook from his bag. “You like me. You said so.”
“I don’t hate you. I’ve committed to nothing else.”
“And this is the most committed relationship you’ve ever had?”
“In what I consider my adult life. Okay, no. Actually, that’s really not true. There’s David Rodriquez.”
“The detective?”
“Yes, and I don’t like that you knew that.”
“I told you. I have to know you to protect you, but I didn’t find any evidence you were dating him.”
I grimace. “I didn’t say I was dating him, or fucking him, for that matter.”
“Then I’m confused. How is he your most committed relationship?”
“We’ve stared at each oth
er across our desks for all of my four years as a detective and for the past six months of that time, we actually said real sentences to each other. He even brings me chocolate on occasion, in an effort to keep me from being bitchy. Now that I think about it, we might be in love.”
He gives me a three-second deadpan look. “You win. You’re more committed with him than I’ve ever been with anyone. Ever.”
“Do all Green Berets have commitment issues?”
“I own my commitment issues,” he says, and obviously eager to get off topic, which we both know is headed toward my cold-case Green Beret, he pulls his MacBook from his bag. “I need a few to pull up the feed,” he says.
“Speaking of the feed,” I say. “Is Asher shy? He sure ran off quickly.”
“The minute we hung up with Savage, he called Asher and asked him for security footage to review as well,” he says. “He’s taking it over to him. And before you ask, yes, we watch the feed in real time, but Savage wants to do what we’re doing. Look for what he might have missed.”
It’s exactly what I would have done, if I were Savage. “I approve,” I say. “Is that what you want to hear?”
“Yes, actually,” he says. “And not because I’m arrogant, detective. Because I want you to feel confident that your father is as protected as you are.”
Detective.
I am kind of sick of him calling me that, when I should approve. It’s formal. It’s a wall.
I stand up and head toward the kitchen. “No reply?” he calls after me.
“No reply,” I say, and not because I’m being an asshole now myself. Because at that very moment I’m at the island, reaching for the wine bottle when my attention lands on the butterfly. On the broken wing, the warning and threat in that break cutting through me. And while I make a habit of forcing myself to look at crime scene photos, I can’t look at that butterfly one more second. Snatching up the bag, I stuff it in a drawer under the island before returning to the living room with my briefcase, my glass, and the bottle of wine.
“Detective,” he says softly, only to amend to, “Jewel” and I can feel the way he’s looking at me, willing me to look at him, seeing too much, and yet I find myself giving in. I don’t fight him.