“What do you think you would have done in his place, Mikel?”
The boy in the video window grinned. “I would jump right on that dragon’s back!”
“What if the dragon didn’t like that? Of all creatures, you don’t want a dragon mad at you.”
Mikel looked thoughtful for a moment. “I’d hafta make friends with him first, then.”
“How would you do that?”
The thoughtful look again. Then a wide grin. “Hey! He likes cookies!”
Lacy grinned back at him. “Why don’t you read that next chapter tonight and find out if our hero is as smart as you are.”
After she’d closed out the video chat program, Lacy leaned back in her chair. She let the warm feeling of success flood through her.
“So that’s how it works?”
She nearly jumped at the unexpected sound. She spun in her chair to see Tate leaning on the lower half of her back door, his elbows propped on the narrow shelf, the rest of him framed by the open upper half.
“Didn’t mean to startle you. I tried to be quiet once I saw you were working.”
“You certainly were,” she said as she got up and walked over to the door. “I didn’t hear you at all.”
“Who’s the kid?” he asked, nodding toward the computer.
“Mikel. He’s quite fluent speaking English, but not so much reading.”
“Second language?”
“Third, actually, which puts him above me. He’s a smart kid.” She hesitated, wondering what had stirred him out of his standard avoidance and brought him over here.
“I bought paint,” he said.
She was fairly certain this wasn’t it, either, but said only, “Did you? What did you settle on?”
He dug into his back pocket and brought out a strip of paint chips. One was circled. It was exactly the shade of slate blue she’d imagined. She smiled.
“I looked at some stuff online at the store. Rooms like you described, with one wall painted a darker color. I liked it, so that’s what I’m going to do.”
She couldn’t help feeling flattered. “Well, the good thing about paint is it’s fairly easy and cheap to change if you decide you hate it.”
He nodded. And for a moment there was an awkward silence. He shifted on his feet. Normally she would have invited him in right away, but he had that tendency to misinterpret simple courtesy as having other intentions, which she did not. She most certainly did not.
No matter how damned sexy he was.
And there it was, what she’d been successfully denying until this moment when her guard was down, lowered by the ordinary, normal conversation. It certainly wasn’t something she could deny any longer, not with him standing there framed in her doorway with his broad shoulders and tanned, strong arms crossed as he leaned at an angle that was somehow made even sexier by the way the cords of his neck stood out as he tilted his head to look at her. In that instant, she thought that she would carry this picture in her head forever.
Fine. So he’s sexy. And then some. That doesn’t mean you have to do anything about it. Besides, what would you do? Invite him in and jump him? Not your style, and you know it. Not to mention he’s not the slightest bit interested.
She gave herself a mental shake.
“I had a meeting at Foxworth this afternoon.”
She seized on the distraction. “Oh? Did they turn something up?”
“No, but some things are happening.”
When he hesitated she said, “I have coffee on,” leaving him to interpret that however he wanted. She assumed he had more to say or he would have left by now, but she wasn’t going to prod him. She’d learned that much, at least.
“I... Sure. Thanks.” He accepted the implied invitation. In fact, for an instant he almost looked eager, although she was sure she must be wrong about that.
She opened the bottom half of the door and he stepped inside. And told herself that he couldn’t really, by that simple action, have sucked all the air out of the room. But when they almost brushed as he passed by her, it certainly felt that way. And when he paused for just a fraction of a second, within what seemed like an even smaller fraction of an inch of her, she wondered if somehow he’d felt it, too.
Chalking that thought up to temporary idiocy—at least she hoped it was temporary—she turned and walked into the kitchen. She got down a couple of mugs and filled them. She was trying a new brew, and so far quite liked it.
“I have a couple of flavorings if that’s your preference.”
“No, thanks. Strictly black.”
She nodded; she’d expected that. “Outside?”
“It’s nice,” he said, apparently agreeing.
“Your place really is amazing,” he said when they were seated in the chairs looking out over the garden. “You put in a lot of work.”
“Effect and cause,” she said. Then, with a smile, she added, “And a great neighbor who always let me borrow his tools.”
He smiled at that. “I think he has to every one known to mankind.”
“I had to be careful, though. If I wanted to borrow his shovel, he’d turn up with it and insist on digging the hole for me.”
“That sounds like Gramps.”
She nodded. “And most of the time I let him, if it wasn’t too big a job. It made him feel good, I think.”
He took a sip of the coffee, and leaned back before he spoke again. “Hayley said to tell you she’ll be calling about lunch.”
“Good,” she said, meaning it. “I like her.”
“So do I. I like them.”
“Good neighbors to have,” she said, “in many ways.”
And that was as close as she was going to come to steering the conversation.
“They haven’t found anything suspicious, so they called in reinforcements,” he said after a moment.
She listened as he explained about Sloan Burke and her organization. She couldn’t miss the pure respect and admiration in his tone, and felt a spark of something it took her a moment to recognize. When she realized it was a twinge of jealousy, she quashed it in a rush of self-censure and internal warning. She had no reason—or right—to feel jealous. He wasn’t hers to feel jealous over. The fact that that knowledge made her feel a stab of regret was further warning. Funny how none of her self-warnings seemed to be very effective. They certainly didn’t keep her from thinking of him in ways she shouldn’t.
But then he told her the story behind the founding of Accountability Counts, and she found herself feeling exactly as he’d sounded.
“She sounds remarkable.”
“She is. There’s not a guy in uniform I know who wouldn’t come running if she called. Which is what made Quinn think of calling her in. She has a ton of contacts. And people who won’t talk to anyone else will talk to her.”
“And he thinks what happened is connected to the Army?”
Tate shrugged, clearly still uncomfortable with the idea. “Hayley said it was more that they hadn’t eliminated the possibility yet.”
Lacy nodded in understanding. “It should be a lot easier to trust what they turn up when you know they haven’t gone in with an agenda.”
He gave a slight nod. “Exactly.”
“So I assume she has the same list of names you gave them?”
“And a plan.” His mouth quirked. “Something about a reverse pyramid of amount of contact and time passed.”
Lacy grinned, she couldn’t help it. “An organized woman.”
He grinned back. It nearly took her breath away. She had to make herself focus on what else she was feeling, remorse for that stab of silly resentment. Sloan Burke had been tossed into hell and fought her way through it, and deserved every bit of his regard for her.
“Fortunate that she’s here and that Quinn knew her.”
He nodded. “He knew of her, but only met her through their detective friend. Hayley says they’re serious.”
The jab of relief she felt told her she hadn’t been entirely successful in quashing that inappropriate jealousy.
Which was a yet further warning in itself.
* * *
Lacy savored the last delicious bite of her crab cake, looking across the round table at Hayley Foxworth. The day had been too nice to spend sitting inside the restaurant that overlooked the water, so they had chosen one of the outdoor tables. Besides, this allowed Cutter to be with them. He was currently plopped between their chairs, intently but politely watching the summer tourists pass by. Occasionally a child would run over to see the dog, who bore it all with calm equanimity.
“He’s good with kids,” Lacy said.
“Yes.”
She gave her new friend another look across the table. “Planning on him having his own to play with someday?”
Hayley smiled. “Maybe. Life’s pretty full right now, though.”
In the nearly hour and a half since Hayley had picked her up, this was the first time they had gotten around to the current situation. Lacy counted that as a good sign for the friendship, that they hadn’t had to rely only on work to keep the conversation going. She made a note of this restaurant in the neighboring town; the food had been excellent.
“I really admire what you do,” she said.
“So do I,” Hayley said with a wide smile. “Before I met Quinn I was kind of at loose ends. I needed some purpose, and Foxworth certainly provides that.”
After lunch, as they walked through the waterfront park, Lacy remembered the story of how her new friends had met. It seemed straight out of the pages of a thriller novel, but Lacy didn’t doubt a word of it. She’d met Quinn, after all.
Cutter, on a leash now in deference to the city ordinance, walked politely at her side. “He has very polished company manners,” Lacy said with a smile.
“He does. He knows when the leash is on it’s time either to behave or work.”
“He acts very differently when he comes to visit.”
Hayley smiled back at her. “You and Tate aren’t company. You’re friends he can relax around.”
Lacy laughed, but had to admit it felt oddly flattering. Well, that or it was Hayley’s linking of her and Tate. She told herself it was a natural way to refer to two people who happened to live next door to each other. And almost convinced herself.
“He’s very picky. He—” Hayley cut off her own words as Cutter stopped in his tracks. She looked down at her dog, a slight frown on her face.
“Something wrong?” In the moment she spoke Lacy heard a low rumble coming from him, unlike any sound she’d heard the good-natured dog make before. “Is that a growl?” she asked quietly, glancing around for anything that might have caught the animal’s attention.
“Yes.” Hayley was watching intently as Cutter, head up, appeared to be sniffing the air in large, deep gulps. “And he never growls without good reason. And that’s no coincidence,” Hayley added as the dog moved from his usual spot at Hayley’s right side to between them. As if he wanted to be close to both of them. Lacy got the strangest feeling it was a protective gesture, and her own senses kicked into high alert. Amazing how much she automatically trusted the dog’s instincts.
There were lots of people around, too many to tell if he was focused on one of them. “I don’t see any other dogs around,” Lacy said.
“This isn’t a reaction to an animal,” Hayley said.
Lacy didn’t doubt her words; it was clear Hayley knew her dog well. Her friend was scanning the people in the direction the dog was facing. Cutter was practically humming, he was so tense.
“Someone you know, maybe?”
“It’s not a reaction to a friend, either.”
That gave rise to ideas that made Lacy uneasy.
“Do you have your phone handy?” Hayley asked.
“Sure, I—”
“Get it out and take a panning video of everything in that direction.”
Even Hayley’s voice had changed. The tone of it made her think of Quinn and his air of command. This wasn’t her friend Hayley anymore; this was a Foxworth operative. And suddenly the crazy story she’d told about how she and Quinn had met, and what she’d done and learned since, didn’t seem at all far-fetched.
Lacy grabbed her phone, activated the camera, switched it to video and started it. Trying to look like merely a tourist like the others she saw taking shots of the picturesque marina and inlet beyond, she began in the spot it seemed Cutter was staring—or rather smelling, which she guessed for a dog was more effective—and panned to each side until she’d covered about a hundred and eighty degrees.
When she’d finished, Hayley nodded. “Keep it out. Ready.” Lacy nodded in turn. “All right, boy,” Hayley said softly to the dog, “lead on.”
Lacy half expected the dog to try to run, but he only set off purposely in the direction he’d been facing, head and ears up, nose flexing rhythmically. It was clearly the nose he was following, for he didn’t look around at all. He trusted those gazillion or so scent receptors Lacy had read about.
She just wished he could tell them what they were telling him.
“There’s too many people,” she muttered.
“I know. Can’t tell who he’s focused on. I doubt even he can see whoever it is, but his nose knows. It’s definitely someone.”
They went on a few more yards, then Hayley stopped.
“Something’s changed... He... Lacy, grab a shot of that white car pulling out from the curb.”
It only took her a split second to find it—it was her own model car, so she’d noticed it earlier—and she snapped the shot. “You think that was the person?”
“I don’t know. It was just the only car leaving after he backed off.”
And Lacy saw that the dog had indeed relaxed, and was back to his normal, polite, public-display self. The difference was obvious even to her.
“Wow. For an animal who can’t talk, he sure does communicate.”
Hayley, too, had relaxed. “That he does.”
“Does he do that often?”
“When we’re out casually? No. Never.”
“I wonder why he reacted to some stranger like that, then?”
Lacy was merely thinking out loud, wasn’t really expecting an answer, but Hayley had one.
“Maybe,” she said slowly as she stroked the dog’s head, “he wasn’t a stranger. To Cutter.”