Twice a Hero, Always Her Man Read online

  Picking up the conversation’s thread, he said, “I figured if the woman was actually offering to clean my place for free, it had to be really bad. So Heather and I got busy and cleaned it up.”

  Not wanting to be left out, Ellie joined them on the floor. They looked like they were having a great deal of fun.

  Colin’s self-discipline in the face of his neighbor’s offer impressed her. “Most men would have just taken her up on her offer instead of doing what you did,” Ellie told him.

  Reaching out, she scratched Pancakes behind her ears. The puppy whirled around to look at her and tripped over her own oversize paws. The next moment, she was picking herself up as if nothing had happened, her boundless energy still very much intact.

  “Wouldn’t seem right,” Colin said truthfully, going on to say, “I don’t know why I let it get out of hand like that.” He shrugged. “Sometimes it just takes seeing a thing through someone else’s eyes to make you realize what’s wrong.” As he said it, something seemed to click in his head again. And then, just like before, it was gone.

  Ellie saw the pensive expression that momentarily came over his face. “You’ve got a strange look on your face,” she observed.

  “You ever have a thought that insists on playing hide-and-seek with your brain, turning up and just as you try to catch it, it vanishes?”

  “Sure. Some people claim that’s evidence of a past life,” she told him, wondering if something was causing him to make the connection between the past and now. Not a past life, but just the past, as in two years ago.

  Not wanting to get into it tonight—they’d all had a very nice evening and she didn’t want it to end on a bad note—she added flippantly, “Me, I just call it stress. There’s only so much you can crowd into your brain and hope to retrieve it.”

  Colin wasn’t up to any deep soul-searching tonight, so he shrugged. “You’re probably right.”

  Ellie smiled, more to herself than at him. “I usually am,” she replied. And then she glanced at her watch. It was late. Later than she’d anticipated.

  She quickly got to her feet. “I’d better go—it’s getting late.”

  Heather scrambled up with ease, all while clutching the puppy against her.

  “Oh, do you have to?” she cried. “Can’t you stay longer?” she begged.

  “I stay any longer and I’ll have to move in,” Ellie quipped.

  Heather took the remark and ran with it, turning to her uncle to ask, “Can she, Uncle Colin? Then she could be the one to bring me to school and—”

  “No, honey, I was just kidding,” Ellie hurried to say, setting the record straight.

  The little girl sounded as if she could just keep extrapolating on the topic until she was adopting her by evening’s end. Ellie wanted to save the detective from the awkward situation of explaining why he couldn’t have an almost perfect stranger moving in. That “talk” was something she assumed the detective would save until such time as he had a girlfriend who wanted to move in with him.

  Where the hell had that come from? Ellie silently demanded. And why in heaven’s name was she even thinking of something like that? It wasn’t any business of hers what the detective did—and with whom.

  This was all just a short interlude in their lives, in her life, nothing more, Ellie insisted. There was no reason to make anything more of it than it already was—which was nothing. They were barely friends, much less anything more.

  “Sorry,” she said to Colin, apologizing that her thoughtless comment had caused what she assumed was a moment of discomfort on his part. “Now I’d really better be going.”

  Colin looked a little perplexed. “Nothing to be sorry about,” he told the woman, puzzled as to why she would even say something like that. “I’m the one who probably should apologize. We’ve kept you much too long,” he said.

  Some of the tension drained from her. Ellie laughed, then held up her wrists.

  “Yes, please remove the chains so that I can be on my way.” The next moment she told him, “Let’s just call it even. Nobody kept anybody and a very good time was had by all.”

  “Actually, you’re right. Heather had a ball and I had a good time, too,” he said, realizing that it was true. He looked down at the puppy, who looked like trouble that was about to happen. “Of course, if Pancakes winds up destroying anything really important, I’m sending you the bill.”

  Ellie nodded her head. “Fair enough.”

  They were at the door but something within Colin was reluctant to have it end just yet. He wanted a few more minutes with the woman.

  He glanced over his shoulder toward his niece. Heather was back on the floor, bonding with the puppy, who was finally losing a tiny bit of her steam.

  “I’m just going to walk Ellie to her car,” he called out. “You two will be all right?”

  “Sure,” Heather piped up. “Pancakes’ll take care of me.”

  “I’m not so sure about that,” Colin confided to the woman next to him. “If anything it’s the other way around.”

  “You’re probably right,” Ellie agreed. Then, because she didn’t want to put him out, she said, “You don’t have to walk me to my car. I’m parked just a few feet away.”

  “Then it’ll be a short walk,” he replied.

  Ellie had always been one to choose her arguments. Arguing over something so minor seemed pointless, so she just went along with him.

  Checking his pocket for his keys, Colin pulled the ground-floor-apartment door closed behind him. Looking around the immediate parking area, he asked, “Where’s your car?”

  She pointed to her light blue sedan. It was parked right in front of the rental office.

  “It’s not that close,” he commented.

  “But it’s not in the next state, either,” she countered.

  “Humor me,” he told her, shortening his gait until it matched hers. “I’m a cop. Most cops are obsessed with safety.”

  “South Bedford doesn’t strike me as being a very dangerous area.”

  As a local reporter, she would have heard something to the contrary if that was the case. As it was, the city was known as one of the very safest of its size in the country.

  “It’s not,” he agreed. “But there’s always a first time.”

  Ellie merely nodded as she said, “Uh-huh.”

  “Now you’re humoring me.”

  “It’s what you told me to do, remember?” she reminded him.

  A minimum of steps, no matter how slowly taken, brought her to her sedan.

  “Well, here we are,” she announced, “at my car. Nice and safe,” she added.

  The rental office was closed for the night; all its lights but one were turned off. Night, with its autumn chill, had descended. She should have brought a sweater, Ellie thought. The temperature drop at night this time of year could be drastic.

  “Cold?” he asked, noticing that she was trying unsuccessfully not to shiver.

  “I’ll be inside my car in a second,” she told him.

  He took that as a yes and was tempted to put his arm around her for momentary warmth.

  Colin refrained and instead stepped back as she unlocked the driver-side door.

  “You’re still using a key,” he observed.

  She laughed at herself, admitting, “I’m old-fashioned. A key makes me feel like I’m in charge.”

  “Is that important to you?” he asked. “Being in charge?”

  “Sometimes,” she acknowledged. “Other times,” she allowed honestly, “not so much.”

  “I’m sorry if the conversation got a little too personal back there,” Colin apologized, referring to the questions his niece had asked. “Heather tends to ask a lot of questions.”

  “Yes, I know, but that’s all right,” she said a littl
e too quickly. “She has an inquisitive mind. Maybe she’ll make a good reporter someday,” Ellie speculated.

  The conversation faded, its last strains drowned out by the sound of crickets making noise, each searching for a mate to spend the long night with.

  There was a full moon out and as Colin looked on, it bathed Ellie in its light. As she turned to tell him good-night, Colin felt a very strong pull in the center of his gut.

  At one point in his life, he would have just gone with it rather than trying to analyze it. But those times were behind him.

  Or so he’d thought.

  Despite Ellie’s bravado, he couldn’t shake the impression she gave him of a delicate, frightened doe that had to be approached with caution. Otherwise she’d take off.

  The last thing he wanted to do was scare her off.

  But the first thing he wanted to do, he realized with unmistakable clarity, was kiss her.

  Chapter Ten

  It was as if the world had suddenly, inexplicably slowed down to a crawl and everything from that point on was happening in slow motion.

  There were only a couple of feet between Ellie and him, but they were eliminated not rapidly but almost a fraction of an inch at a time.

  Colin drew closer; their faces drew nearer, ever nearer. Maybe he was imagining things, but he was almost certain that some of the distance between them, small as it was, was dispensed with by Ellie.

  And then, at the final moment, just before his mouth came down on hers, Colin gave up thinking altogether. He just surrendered to the ever-growing attraction that had been between them all along.

  He gave her ample time to stop him or turn away if she wanted to.

  She didn’t.

  When Ellie didn’t pull away or protest, he deepened the kiss and then put his arms around her to draw her even closer to him.

  Colin hadn’t fully realized how much he’d wanted this until just now, until it was actually happening. And it wasn’t that he missed the experience and just wanted to kiss an attractive woman. He really wanted to kiss her, Elliana King.

  When he felt Ellie threading her arms around his neck while they were still kissing, something within him cheered and he could have sworn he saw fireworks going off in his head.

  At least it seemed that way.

  * * *

  It had been so long, so very long, since she’d let herself feel like a woman. She’d forgotten how really wondrous it could feel. Adrenaline raced through her, heightening her reaction. Everything within her pleaded “More” as she felt Colin deepen the kiss, making her literally ache.

  Making her remember.

  Everything inside Ellie sped up. Her breathing, her pulse, her reaction. Colin’s arms enfolded her, pulling her closer, all but making her a part of him.

  Colin’s arms felt strong.

  He made her feel safe.

  Her defenses melted away.

  And then the alarms in her head went off.

  She was wrong.

  She wasn’t safe. She’d never be safe—she knew that. Pain was always just a heartbeat away, waiting to dismantle her, to consume her. Her only defense was not to allow herself to feel anything, not ever again. She couldn’t set herself up for another fall, another heartache. This time, when, not if, it happened, it would completely destroy her.

  At the same time guilt flooded through her, guilt over betraying Brett’s memory. Brett was gone and she was alive. After two years it still made no sense to her. She didn’t understand how she could keep on drawing breath in a world where he no longer was.

  Appalled at what she’d just allowed to happen, what she was guilty of doing, Ellie suddenly braced her hands against the muscular chest that had been only a moment ago pressed against hers and she pushed Colin away with all her might.

  “No,” she cried, pulling her head back. “I can’t. I’m sorry. I can’t.”

  The words tumbled out over each other. She struggled not to break down in sobs as she quickly got into her vehicle.

  In her hurry to escape, Ellie didn’t even buckle her seat belt when she drove away. She left a stunned Colin in her wake.

  “What the hell just happened here?” Colin murmured to himself, completely confused.

  He hadn’t a clue.

  But he damn well intended to find out. He stood there for a moment, trying to figure out what had just transpired. Trying to understand why she’d been so warm and pliable in his arms one moment and then bolting like a bat out of hell that had been set on fire the next.

  Turning around, he headed back to his apartment. Someone else would have just chalked up what had occurred to flaky behavior, but Colin wasn’t the type who put much stock in those kinds of one-size-fits-all labels.

  And even if he were, Ellie King just wasn’t that kind of person. By no stretch of the imagination could she be regarded as “flaky.”

  Something else was at the bottom of this.

  * * *

  The whole incident was still very much on his mind the next morning.

  Could he have misread the signals she’d been giving off, he asked himself. He wasn’t usually wrong when it came to making judgment calls about people, either on the job or off.

  No, something else was going on and he needed to find out what if he was to ever have any peace of mind about this.

  He needed to get to the station to do some research.

  To that end, he wanted to leave early. As with everything else in his life since he’d become a guardian, it required multiple steps.

  He convinced Heather to hustle, not an easy accomplishment when all his niece really wanted to do was stay home and play with her new pet, all the while talking about what a great person Elliana King was.

  Even as he got his niece out the door early, it didn’t end there. He had the puppy to consider. For the sake of the rest of his furniture, he put a bowl of the dog food that Ellie had brought plus a bowl of water into the bathroom and closed the door.

  Pitiful whining began almost instantly.

  “Pancakes is going to think we’re punishing her,” Heather lamented even as he steered his niece through the doorway and out of the apartment.

  He’d already noticed teeth marks on the corner molding by the kitchen.

  “No, I did that so we don’t have to punish her when we get home tonight.” He opened the car’s doors. “I’ll pick up a puppy crate today,” he promised. “Problem solved.”

  Heather climbed into the car, automatically reaching for her seat belt and buckling up.

  “A crate?” she cried in dismay. “You’re going to lock Pancakes up in a box?” she wailed indignantly.

  “Actually, I heard somewhere that dogs like being in a crate—it’s like their own little cave, their own space to defend.” Backing out of his parking space, Colin saw the dubious way his niece looked at him. “I’m not making this up, Heather. It’s on the internet,” he told her. “Look it up.”

  Since they both knew that she was far more proficient on the computer than he was and could easily check out what he was telling her, that seemed to placate her, at least for now.

  He only wished that the problem with Ellie could be so easily resolved, Colin thought ruefully.

  * * *

  The root of the problem, he decided after he’d dropped Heather off at school, had to be with Ellie’s husband. She’d told Heather that he’d died. Maybe the woman had unresolved feelings about his death, or even more likely, she felt disloyal being attracted to another man.

  No ego failing to thrive here, Colin thought, mocking himself.

  In order to begin to understand why things had suddenly gone south last night, he would have to educate himself about the woman he found himself so attracted to.

  The good news, he thought as he
walked into the squad room, was that everyone’s life was an open book to some extent these days. While he himself had little time for that—the tools of social media just did not interest him—he knew that others did.

  Nowadays everyone in the public eye, celebrities, politicians, actors, newscasters, all of those people, depended on having a following—obviously the more the better for the purposes of their careers. Which in turn meant that Elliana King’s life had to be accessible to him.

  Colin decided, at least to start with, to go the easy route, so he just did a search on her name.

  There was no shortage of sources.

  He highlighted the first websites in the list, forgoing various videos, reviews and the comments written in by others. He wasn’t interested in what anyone else thought of her. What he wanted to find out about was Ellie’s background. Not the name of the station where she got her start, or what schools she graduated from—that was information to look into on possibly another day. He was specifically interested in the fleeting comment Ellie had made to his niece when Heather had asked her if she was married.

  He had a feeling that the answers he was seeking and her abrupt about-face last night could be found there. Unearthing her bio didn’t take him long. He waded through paragraphs of information until he got to the crucial part.

  As he was reading, the muscles in his jaw slackened. He read the pertinent paragraphs he’d found several times to make sure he hadn’t misread them.

  And then he went into his own back files. Specifically, the last case he’d had as a uniformed officer.

  It all came back to him.

  “Damn it, that’s why,” he muttered.

  “Why what?” Sanchez asked, looking up. Coming in late, Al Sanchez had just put down his coffee container and pulled up his chair.

  Their desks butted up against one another and Colin now looked across that expanse. He hadn’t realized he’d said anything out loud. Glancing up, he locked eyes with the man he’d only recently been partnered with. His old partner had switched departments at the same time that Sanchez’s partner had retired. Theirs was not a marriage made in heaven, but it was comfortable enough and growing more so.