Between Love and Duty (18 page)

Hell of a guardian he was.

Of course, there was no chance for him to be alone with Jane in the parking lot where they all parted ways. Tito went with her, and Duncan had to stifle his frustration and go home alone.

He got a lousy night’s sleep. There were noticeable bags under the eyes peering at him from the mirror when he shaved. He nicked himself painfully and had a blob of tissue blotting the blood when he went to the kitchen for a quick bowl of cereal. The coffee he could take with him.

He was thinking about his morning when his cell phone rang. He had a meeting scheduled with his counterpart in the county sheriff’s department to schedule some joint training. He wanted to talk to him about their mutual participation in a regional task force, too.... Swearing, he had to hunt for his cell phone, which he hadn’t yet hooked to his belt.

“MacLachlan,” he barked when he’d finally found it.

The voice was very small. “Duncan?”

Fear hit him hard, a linebacker slamming a shoulder into his solar plexus. “Jane? What’s wrong?”

“I, um, I’m fine. It’s… There’s something really awful on my doorstep. I was going to grab my newspaper and…” She made a gulping sound. Controlling tears, or nausea? “I should have called Niall and not you, huh? I’m sorry. I don’t know what I was thinking. I’ve got his number.”

She’d thought of him first. Wanted
him.
The realization was almost as powerful as that first rush of fear.

“I’m on my way.” He stuffed his tie into his pocket and grabbed his gun and badge. “Do you want me to call Niall for you?”

“You don’t have to come. Really, I’m not hurt or anything.”

“Don’t be ridiculous. Of course I am.”

He expected her to keep arguing. When instead she said, almost meekly, “Thank you,” Duncan felt a weird cramping sensation in his chest. “If you wouldn’t mind calling him…”

“No,” he said gruffly. “Are you in your house? Door locked?”

“Yes. After screaming. I don’t think I ever have before.”

“What’s on your porch? No,” he decided. “Don’t tell me. I’d rather see it fresh.”

“Fresh…” Her voice wavered. “I’ve got to go.” And the silence told him she’d abruptly ended the call.

He drove too fast, using the time to call Niall. Should he reschedule his morning appointment? No, wait; this might not take long.

He barreled up in front of her house, set the brake and leaped out. He should have asked her more, he realized. Was this a crime scene of some kind? Would they need to preserve forensic evidence?

Out of habit he crossed the grass rather than approaching Jane’s porch via the paved walkway. Standing to one side, he looked through the railing.

A blistering obscenity escaped him. There was a dead animal on her welcome mat. He wasn’t positive what it was from here. A cat? No, maybe a rabbit? Whatever, it had been beheaded, and a huge butcher knife, glistening with blood, was stabbed into her coir mat.

Furious, he circled her house to the back door. When he pounded on it, her cautious face appeared at the window, and then she rushed to open the door and let him in.

“Did you see…?”

“I saw,” he said roughly. “Damn it, Jane.” Operating on instinct and
need,
he pulled her into his arms. She didn’t resist. In fact, she wrapped hers around his waist and held on tight. He laid his cheek on top of her head, kneaded the nape of her neck and murmured God knows what into her hair until, finally, her muscles began to loosen.

Against his chest, she mumbled miserably, “That poor thing.”

Beheading was probably a quick way to go. Wasn’t that how farmers killed chickens? But he didn’t point that out to her.

“Did you call Niall?”

“Yeah, he’s on his way.”

They kept standing there, neither apparently ready to let go. Her hair was damp, Duncan realized. It smelled deliciously of something citrus. Grapefruit or lemon, he thought. Her hair was tucked behind her ear, and he found himself fixated on the sight of her earlobe, naked where she usually wore a pretty post earring of some kind. Pearls, last night. He’d been amused by the idea of a lady in pearls doing battle with aliens in an arcade game.

So she was barely out of the shower, not yet fully put together for the day. Had she had breakfast yet?

He asked, and she shuddered.

“Coffee, at least?”

“Um…not yet.” Still she didn’t move, and he was glad. Her body felt perfectly proportioned against his.

The knock on the door took them both by surprise. She jumped, and Duncan turned swiftly.

It was Niall, who greeted Duncan expressionlessly but Jane with sympathy. Her face was strained, but she hadn’t cried.
Not my Jane.

Hell. He had to quit thinking that.

She chose not to follow the two men to the front door.

Niall opened it, and they both studied the exhibit so carefully arranged to terrorize her. Once past the first sickening sight, Duncan frowned, wondering how he—whoever
he
was—knew that she wouldn’t have left through the garage without ever seeing this. Or at least not seeing it fresh.

Fresh.
The poorly chosen word knocked at his consciousness. Oh, damn. Her stomach had probably heaved when he said that earlier, on the phone.

Niall speculated aloud. “Did he ring the doorbell or knock? Is that how she found this?”

“She came out to get the newspaper.” Which still lay on the porch, a few feet from the bloody tableau.

Niall made an acknowledging noise. After a minute, he said, “Do you suppose he’s been watching her and knows she comes out every morning to get her paper?”

It was an ugly thought.

“Interesting timing,” Duncan said.

Niall glanced at him. “Following the scene at the courthouse, you mean? Yeah, but that doesn’t necessarily mean anything. If she had her dates right, she’s getting approximately a message a week. This one is right on time.”

Duncan swore.

Niall had lowered himself to his haunches, where he could inspect the knife more closely. “They’re getting more explicit.”

The head had been set to face the door. The animal was definitely a rabbit, with long, velvety ears and now-glazed eyes. Duncan doubted this had been a wild rabbit. It had the fat, plush look of a domestic one, which would further sicken Jane if she thought about it. Not a pet stolen from some kid, he hoped.

God. Please don’t let it have been stolen from a
neighbor
kid.

Niall made the decision not to call for a crime scene tech. He’d come prepared to remove the mat, animal and knife himself, the poor damn rabbit and the mat to be disposed of, the knife to be examined for fingerprints. As carefully staged as this had been, the knife would be clean.

Duncan grimaced, eyeing the thick, vividly red blood.
Well, not clean.

He found Jane sitting unmoving at her kitchen table, a cup of coffee in front of her and gaze fixed on some indeterminate point. It swung to Duncan as soon as he appeared, but she didn’t say anything. She didn’t have to; he saw the horror in her eyes.

“Niall is…removing everything. I’m afraid you’ll have to buy a new doormat.”

She sagged slightly. “Okay, this time, I’d have to say it’s a threat.”

“You think?” he said, deeply sardonic.

Color was seeping into her cheeks. Her eyes flashed at him, and he saw that her hand was almost steady when she lifted the mug for a swallow.

He got the cup she’d poured for him, and they sipped in silence for some time.

When Niall eventually appeared, it was to tell her he’d cleared the porch.

“Knocked on a few doors, too. Lady across the street is pretty sure she heard a car stop out front and then leave again about forty minutes ago, but she didn’t think enough about it to look out the window. No one saw anything. I’ve still got to find the paperboy…”

“Papergirl,” Jane corrected him.

He nodded, dumping sugar into his own coffee and leaning against the counter. “I can’t imagine she wouldn’t have stopped if she’d seen.”

“No,” Jane said dully. “Are there, um, bloodstains on the porch boards?”

Niall shook his head. “If it helps, I don’t think the, er, deed was done there. It would have been way messier if it had been.” Bloodier was what he meant. “Too risky,” he continued. “It would have taken too long, for one thing. And the rabbit might have been…”
Noisy.
He didn’t finish; didn’t have to. He cleared his throat then, after a prolonged silence, said, “I’m sorry.”

She gave a stiff dip of her head and sat staring into her coffee.

“You didn’t hear anything earlier?” Niall asked.

“No. I haven’t been up that long. And I took a shower first. I really hadn’t been downstairs more than a minute. I like to read the paper while I eat breakfast.”

“Is that your habit?”

Her face blanched at the realization that she’d likely been watched. “Yes.”

Duncan reached across the table and took her hand. She gripped tight.

“Do you get up about the same time every morning?”

Her desperate gaze was fastened on Duncan’s face even as she answered his brother. “Yes.”

“First thing I’ll do is see if I can locate Glenn Jones and his mother,” Niall said.

Duncan looked at him.

Niall got the message. “And Ortez.” He shrugged. “Unfortunately, this is a lousy time of day to pin down alibis.”

Hope in her voice, Jane said, “Hector has several roommates.”

Niall glanced significantly at the clock on the stove. “What do you want to bet he was on his way to work right about when this was deposited on your doorstep? Grandpa probably wouldn’t rat out Grandma, and Jones lives alone.” He set his empty mug in the sink. “It’ll be a miracle if any of them can prove he or she wasn’t here this morning.”

The hope died on her face. Niall made his excuses and left with a promise to keep her in the loop. Duncan lingered.

“Are you going to work?”

She nodded.

Okay. Hell.
She wasn’t going to like this.

“I want you to get a home security system.”

To his relief, she gave a slow nod. “I’d rather spend the money on a few weeks on a Hawaiian beach, but…” Her shrug was helpless-looking enough, it kicked up his rage again. He didn’t like seeing her afraid. “Do you recommend any particular company?”

“Yeah.” He found her phone book and circled a couple of ads. “Use my name to get quick service.”

“Thank you.”

“Why don’t you get ready for work?” he said gently. “I’ll follow you there. And home tonight.”

She bit her lip and nodded again instead of arguing.

He wanted to beg her to get mad.

What he really wanted was to take her home with him. He knew without asking that she’d say no, though. Duncan didn’t know how he was going to drive away tonight, leaving her alone.

“Did you get breakfast?” she asked. “There’s…oh, cereal and oatmeal, if you can help yourself while I put on makeup and stuff?”

He looked at her more closely. She must not wear much makeup, he thought, because the lack wasn’t noticeable. She didn’t need it, with that beautiful, fine-textured skin and thick eyelashes a shade darker than her hair. He supposed she’d want to dry her hair, though, and put on earrings....

He saw for the first time that she was wearing slippers, fuzzy and pink. Really girlie.

Pink tutus, he reminded himself, were her business. He found her to be unexpected on a lot of levels, and this was one. A gutsy, stubborn, outspoken woman who was also unashamedly feminine.

Suppressing the new attack of awareness/lust, he nodded toward the stairs. “I’ll have another cup of coffee, if that’s okay with you. Take your time.”

She gabbled a few things about getting the cereal out for him, or maybe cooking, and finally allowed herself to be persuaded that he could take care of it himself. He managed not to say,
I pretty much lost my appetite, thank you.
As she so clearly had.

He called and postponed his meeting, then went out to collect her newspaper from the newly bare front porch. He had time, barely, for that second cup of coffee before Jane reappeared, all put together. Hair a shiny curtain, simple gold studs in her ears, possibly a hint of blush on her cheeks and real shoes on her feet.