In Bed With the Badge (14 page)

Except maybe out of a sense of guilt.

No, Wyatt wasn’t the type to do anything because he felt guilty. There wasn’t even a token “I love you” in her future and she knew it.

Riley sighed. She needed to put a stop to this romance, to back away before she couldn’t. But even as she gave herself the pep talk, she knew it would be more than difficult to end things between them. Still, she knew she had to make a concerted effort.

So much easier said than done.

Even as she tried, she found herself blocked at every turn. Each time she wanted to offer an excuse, to say no, that she couldn’t go with him to pick up Lisa, the words never emerged.

Instead, she said, “Sure,” and went along, basking in the bright light she saw in Lisa’s eyes every time the little girl saw her.

After that, staying for dinner was a given. Besides,
there were cooking lessons involved. She wasn’t even sure how it started, but somehow she gave Lisa simple cooking lessons and the two of them would prepare dinner together.

That had to stop, too.

Soon.

This time, on the trip home, Lisa was fairly bursting with news, but she kept it in until they walked into the apartment.

“Tonight,” Lisa declared the moment the door was closed, “you don’t have to cook, Riley. We’re having pizza. My treat,” she declared proudly, beaming.

“How is this going to be your treat?” Riley asked, looking toward Wyatt. But he indicated that his lips were sealed.

“I get an allowance,” Lisa informed her with a little toss of her head. “Daddy gives me money and I saved it up, so this is my treat,” she repeated, her eyes dancing with glee.

Riley exchanged looks with Sam. Lisa had just called him Daddy. Not Sam, but Daddy. Was this the first time? One glance at the surprised expression on his face gave her the answer. She had intended to begin the weaning process tonight, begging off from dinner and then, within a few days, from the ritual of picking Lisa up at Brenda’s. But how could she say no after this? Lisa had just called Wyatt something other than his given name and offered to pay for the dinner with her own money. Turning the little girl down would be heartbreaking. For both of them.

So she said yes and she stayed.

But Riley promised herself that the moment the little girl was tucked into bed, she was going home. Tonight, there would be no lovemaking, no getting lost in Sam’s arms. Tonight was going to be the beginning of the rest of her life. Without Sam.

Much as she didn’t want to, Riley knew she had to take a stand somewhere. And this was somewhere.

Bedtime came all too quickly. She followed the ritual, getting Lisa ready for bed, then reading to her. She’d stumbled a few times. The lump in her throat kept getting in the way. But finally, Lisa drifted off to sleep.

The moment she did, Riley crept out of Lisa’s room. She made her way to the living room. Expecting to see Sam, she was relieved when she didn’t. Grabbing her purse, she quickly made her way to the front door.

“Where are you going?”

She froze when she heard his voice behind her. Without turning around, she answered, “I’ve got to go home.”

Walking around to face her, Sam took the purse from her hand. That smile that always burrowed into the pit of her stomach, creating a squadron of butterflies, was on his lips. “No, you don’t.”

Telling herself to be strong, Riley reclaimed her purse, pulling it out of his hand. “Yes, I do,” she insisted.

The teasing expression on his face faded. Concern entered his eyes as he searched her face. “Something wrong?”

“No. Yes.” Damn, why did he always make her feel so tongue-tied? No one else ever did.

A hint of steely amusement curved his lips. “I didn’t realize I asked a multiple-choice question.”

“You didn’t.” Sighing, she tried again. “Look, this has been great—”

Has been. As in the past. Something
was
wrong. Sam braced himself. “But?”

Taking another breath didn’t help. The ache she felt kept growing. “But it has to stop.”

He wanted to grab hold of her shoulders and shake some sense into her head. It took extreme restraint just to stand there and ask, “Why?”

Such a simple word, so fraught with intense repercussions. “Because it’s not going anywhere.”

Was she pressing him for a commitment? Or trying to find a way out? Or was she just testing him? “Why does it have to ‘go’ somewhere? Why can’t it just be?” he asked. “Sometimes things just have to remain the way they are in order to go forward later.”

“Later” was a vague word that kept company with “never.” This had to stop now, before the disappointment got too big for her to handle.

“Maybe,” she allowed, letting him think she might agree with him. “But right now, I need to sort things out, think them through.”

He would never force her to do anything she didn’t want to do, be anywhere she didn’t want to be. But letting her walk away, even for an evening, wasn’t easy. “All right,” he finally said. “If that’s what you want.”

No, that wasn’t what she wanted. She wanted him. And Lisa. She knew that wasn’t going to happen, not in the way she needed it to. Squaring her shoulders, she murmured, “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

As she put her hand on the doorknob, he asked, “No goodbye kiss?”

She looked at him over her shoulder, still holding onto the doorknob, as if that could somehow ground her. “If I kiss you goodbye, I won’t leave.”

“Sure you will.” Sam turned her around and drew her into his arms. “You’re stronger than that.”

But she wasn’t.

S
am Wyatt was a dirty fighter. There was no other way to view what had happened but that, Riley thought several hours later when she finally got into her car and drove home. Once Wyatt kissed her, it was all over.

She and Sam made love. But even though every fiber of her being wanted to remain, locked tightly in his arms, she forced herself to leave after only a heavenly two hours had gone by. The earliest she’d left his apartment since they had begun sleeping together—or not sleeping together as the case was.

She should have been stronger than that, Riley upbraided herself. She
used
to be stronger than that. What was wrong with her?

Tomorrow, Riley solemnly swore. Tomorrow she
was going to be stronger. Tomorrow she’d leave right after Lisa went to bed, no wavering, no second thoughts, no side glances at Wyatt that only undermined her resolve. She’d make Wyatt read the bedtime story to his daughter instead of her and then slip out while he was busy.

It sounded like a plan.

Well, she tried to console herself, at least Howard would get to bed earlier tonight. Howard. Funny how her eccentric neighbor had taken her under his wing like that, appointing himself her guardian angel. Lately it seemed like most of their exchanges took place just before she walked into her house.

She would invite him next time the chief held another party at his place. With work—and Sam—taking up so much of her time, she’d gotten out of the habit of extending invitations to the older man. She needed to remedy that, remembering how difficult it had been the first time around. Riley turned off the main drag and into her development. For the most part, despite his apparent adoption of her, the retired engineer liked to keep to himself. In the three years she’d lived next door to him, she’d only seen one visitor enter the house and that had been his other son, Ethan, visiting from back east.

As she approached Howard’s house, she saw that, as usual, he’d left his porch light on. Riley smiled. A beacon on the runway to guide her home, she mused.

She began to slow down to almost a crawl, giving Howard a chance to get up from the window seat where he had kept vigil lately and open the front door.

But the front door didn’t move.

Odd. Howard never failed to come out, even that time he was fighting a cold. It was as if all the pieces of his world weren’t in place until he bid her good-night and saw her go into her own place.

Pulling up into her driveway, Riley turned off her ignition and waited a moment before getting out. There was still no movement at the other house.

Maybe Howard had finally decided she was a big girl, Riley thought with a smile. Or gotten what his son had called his obsessive-compulsive disorder under control. Whatever the reason, it didn’t look as if she’d be saying good-night to him tonight.

Key in hand, Riley was about to insert it into her door when she sighed, pocketed the key and doubled back down the front path. Moving around the plum tree that separated their two properties, she walked up to Howard’s porch.

Something wasn’t right, she could feel it. Howard wouldn’t just leave the porch light on and go to bed. It wasn’t like him. Though leaving an outside light on was considered a deterrent against amateur burglars, she knew that Howard stubbornly considered it a flagrant waste of electricity and money.

When ringing the doorbell twice got no response, Riley knocked on the man’s door. Hard. Head cocked, she listened intently for the familiar shuffling sound that meant he was approaching.

Nothing.

“Howard?” she called out, knocking again. Her un
easiness growing, Riley tried the doorknob. It gave under her hand.

Howard
never
left his door unlocked.

Training had Riley pulling out her service weapon and taking off the safety.

“Howard?” she called again, slowly pushing open the door. Light not just from the porch but from the city street light that was situated directly behind Howard’s mailbox illuminated the dark living room. It took her a moment to focus.

Riley’s heart slammed into her chest the second she saw the slumped figure on the floor. Howard was tied to a dining room chair and the chair was over on its side. Howard’s mouth, arms and legs were bound tightly with duct tape.

The home invaders had been here, right here, on her home territory!

Riley felt sick to the bottom of her stomach and incredibly violated.

Her first impulse was to untie Howard, to remain with him and assure herself that he was all right. But the cop in her knew that she needed to clear the area first because if the robbers were still here, it could go badly for her, not to mention Howard.

They didn’t kill their victims, she silently insisted, trying to comfort herself as she began to sweep through the rooms. Moving as quickly as she could and exercising just the barest minimum of caution, Riley swiftly swept through the rooms as best she could. It was harder than she’d expected.

Howard had done some really heavy-duty collecting since he’d last had her over, she noted. Books of all kinds, magazines, record albums were piled from floor to ceiling in several of the rooms, challenging anyone to get through or even access certain areas. The man was a serious pack rat—and she prayed that he would be able to spend a great many more years feeding his compulsion.

Done, Riley hurried back to her neighbor, pausing only in the kitchen to get a pair of scissors out of his utility drawer.

That, too, proved to be a challenge. All sorts of things were jammed into the drawer, as well as all the other drawers. Howard had never come across anything he wanted to throw out.

Finally finding the scissors, Riley rushed back into the living room. Dropping to her knees, she carefully began to cut apart the duct tape wound around him as tightly as a cocoon.

She was only halfway through when Howard groaned, sounding like a man struggling to wake up from a bad dream. There was the distinct odor of chloroform about him.

The irony of the situation was appalling to Riley. There she and Wyatt were, methodically trying to track down the home invaders and meanwhile, the larcenous duo had struck right under her nose. The worse part of it was that it had happened while she and Wyatt were busy making love.

But if she’d come home earlier, the invaders might not have struck yet and she’d have gone to bed, she
realized. She wouldn’t have known anything was wrong until the following night. She hardly even saw Howard before she left in the morning.

Something about the scenario didn’t feel right, but she wasn’t sure what it was.

Removing the last of the tape, she sat back on her heels, waiting for Howard to come around. His breathing was normal, and when she pressed her fingers to his throat, she found that his heart rate was only slightly elevated. At least the bastards hadn’t given him a heart attack.

She placed a call to the firehouse located three miles from her development. After identifying herself and giving her shield number, she asked the person on the other end of the line to send a couple of paramedics over. She wanted them to check out Howard just in case.

And then she called Wyatt.

“You’re sure they were the same ones?” Sam asked half an hour later. He’d just left Lisa, along with his apologies, at Brenda and Dax’s house. The couple had assured him that there was nothing to apologize for, they understood the erratic life police detectives were forced to lead. Now that he was here, Sam could hardly believe what Riley was telling him.

The paramedics had arrived five minutes after she’d placed her call to them and, despite Howard’s protests, had checked out the man from top to bottom. Except for the bump on his head, sustained when the chair was knocked over, the only thing that was wounded was Howard’s pride.

“I should have been able to fight them off,” he complained to Riley as the paramedics withdrew. “I placed second in my weight class at the gym.”

Riley had heard the story more than once. “No disrespect intended, Howard,” she said softly, gently rubbing her hand along his back, trying to soothe away his agitation, “but you did tell me that was almost fifty years ago.”

And then it suddenly hit her. Riley realized what had been bothering her since she’d come on the scene to find him unconscious and bound to the chair. “Wait a minute, were you in bed?”

“No.” He tried to rise to his feet from the sofa but his legs were a little wobbly. He sank back down again just as Wyatt and Riley reached out to catch him. “I was waiting up for you. Like always.”

Wyatt looked to Riley for elaboration.

“Howard likes to make sure I get home in one piece,” she told him. “He’s my self-appointed guardian angel. Long story,” she added before turning her attention back to her neighbor. “But if you weren’t in bed—why would they have come in? They
always
come in when their victims are in bed.”

“Did you have the lights on in the house?” Sam asked the man.

“No, why waste it?” Howard asked defensively. “It’s not like I’m reading.”

It still didn’t make any sense to Riley. “But they would have seen you—and you would have seen them if you were by the window.”

His cheeks turned a slight shade of pink. “I had to go to the bathroom,” Howard mumbled. “They jumped me right when I came out,” he accused, then shook his head. “I dunno who was more surprised, them or me. It looked like they were on their way to the staircase when I opened the bathroom door. Next thing I knew, the tall one was grabbing my arms, pinning them behind my back and the little guy started punching me. Dunno what
they
were afraid of since I couldn’t use my hands.”

She winced as she envisioned the scene. She could almost feel the blows, but this wasn’t the time to be emotional. She had to be a detective first, not Howard’s friend. This could be the break they’d been looking for. “Howard, this is very important, did you recognize either of them?”

“How could I?” he protested. “They were dressed in black with ski masks on.”

She shook her head. “No, I mean was there something familiar about the way they moved, the way they talked? Was there anything unique to set them apart in your mind? A smell, perhaps. Did either of them call the other by a name?”

At each suggestion, Howard shook his head. Until she mentioned smell. “The little guy smelled like garlic,” he told her. “And…”

That was what one of the other couples had said, she thought, suddenly excited. “And?” she coaxed.

“The tall, skinny one kept dropping his Gs. He sounded a little like that valet.”

Sam and Riley exchanged glances. “What valet?” Sam asked.

“That one at that place—” Howard looked frustrated as he tried to summon the right words.

“Which one at what place, Howard?” Riley pressed gently.

Howard closed his eyes for a moment, regrouping.

All around them were members of the crime scene investigation unit, methodically going about their business, trying to piece together physical evidence. Riley heard one of the men complaining to the woman in charge that he’d almost gotten attacked by a tall stack of books. The stack, one of dozens, that had dislodged when he’d opened the door leading into the room.

“Ethan was here last week,” Howard told her.

“I remember.”

“Ethan?” Sam looked from Howard to her. “Who’s Ethan?”

“His son,” Riley said, not taking her eyes off Howard. “Go on.”

“Ethan’s a doctor,” Howard tagged on. “He insisted on taking me to this fancy restaurant.” He snorted his disapproval. “I used to get weekly paychecks that were smaller than what these people charged for a meal, but Ethan insisted we go there, said he was paying. So I said I’d drive.”

That meant that they had driven to the restaurant in Howard’s secondhand Mercedes. He babied that car, kept it in prime condition. Sundays would find him polishing and waxing the vehicle until it was almost blinding to look at.

Alarms went off in Riley’s head.

One slanted glance toward Wyatt told her they were having a mutual epiphany.

“And you left your keys with the valet,” Wyatt said out loud.

Obviously confused, Howard looked from Riley to her partner. “How else was he going to park my car?”

“Is your house key on the same key chain as your car key?” Riley asked him, doing her best not to raise her voice or allow the building excitement she felt to surface.

Again, Howard seemed puzzled. “I’ve only got the two keys,” he told her. “Why should I keep them on separate key chains? It’s easier to lose one of them that way,” he pointed out.

Everything fell into place.

Oh, God, could it really be as simple as that? The valets had access to the keys and to the client’s address because registrations were required to be kept in the glove compartment of each car on the road. All the valet needed to do was to copy down the address and make an impression of the house key. When his shift was over, he could take the impression to a locksmith who might be bribed to look the other way and have made a key.

Or who knows, maybe the valet could make the keys himself, Riley speculated. Once the valet made a copy of the key, he and his partner could drive to the address, case out the house and its surrounding neighborhood with a minimum of danger to see if a break-in would be profitable.

Wyatt knew what Riley was thinking. But he had a basic problem with the theory. “If the thieves have a
copy of the key, why wouldn’t they just break into the house during the day when everyone’s gone?”

It was the simplest way to go, but simple didn’t always mean best. “Because there’s always a chance that someone might be in the house,” she guessed. “Doing it at night fairly assures them that everyone’s asleep so they can get the upper hand. Besides, I don’t think it’s just about the robbery.”

“Then what?” Wyatt wanted to know.

“I think it’s a power trip. The people they rob have things, can afford to go to fancy restaurants, are most likely better off than our thieves. To them, it’s ‘anything you’ve got, I can take away,’ that sort of thing.”

Riley turned to look at her neighbor. Saying her theory out loud had gelled it for her. She threw her arms around him and hugged Howard as gently as she could, trying not to let her enthusiasm get the better of her.