Sizzle and Burn (12 page)

“I’m what went wrong. Bradley and I had a nice little friendship thing going on. I made the mistake of thinking it had the potential to blossom into something else.” She paused. “He knew about the voices, you see.”

Zack nodded, comprehending immediately. “So you figured he was okay with your psychic side?”

“One night after a case I invited him to my place. I had a bottle of wine waiting. A little chocolate fondue. A fire. Not to put too fine a point on it, I tried to seduce him.”

“I sense a bad outcome here.”

She flushed. “It was extremely awkward for both of us. In the end he finally had to tell me the truth.”

“Which was?”

“That the thought of making love to a woman who hears voices really creeped him out.”

“What do you know?” Zack shrugged. “Gets me hot.”

Nonplussed, she just stared at him.

“Go figure,” she finally managed.

He gave her a quick, wicked grin. “Yeah. Go figure. So where do things stand with you two now?”

“Nowhere. The debacle in my condo happened last month, shortly before Aunt Vella died. I’m surprised to see Bradley here today. I thought, given our mutual embarrassment, that he would want to avoid me just as much as I want to avoid him.”

“What about your working relationship?”

“It would be extremely difficult to go back to being just friends or colleagues after what happened. At least it would be for me. I was humiliated beyond belief.”

“Not to mention hurt?”

She winced. “Okay, I’ll admit that being told I gave him the creeps was a little hard on the ego.”

“Wonder why he drove up here today?”

“I have no idea. Last I knew he was fixing to become famous.”

Zack raised his brows. “How’s that?”

“Ever hear of Cassidy Cutler?”

He narrowed his eyes very faintly. “Why does that name sound vaguely familiar?”

“Probably because you’ve seen it on the best-seller lists. She’s a true-crime writer.”

“Right.” He nodded. “She’s the one who did the book about the freak who was stalking and killing members of a family in Florida. The cops couldn’t figure out why he had targeted them. They finally arrested a cousin, I think.”

“Did you read it?” she asked.

“Hell, no. I don’t read stuff like that. Got enough nightmares of my own. I just know what I saw in the papers.”

She smiled wryly. “Sounds like we have something in common when it comes to our bedside reading. Be that as it may, evidently Cassidy Cutler has decided that her next best seller will feature a certain small-town homicide detective who has recently closed a string of cold cases.”

Zack laughed. “She’s writing a book about Mitchell?”

“Bradley called me a few days ago. He was very excited. He told me that Cassidy Cutler had arrived in town with an assistant and had started background research.”

“Interesting. I wonder if Mitchell plans to tell her that the reason he was able to close those cold cases was because he worked with a psychic?”

She shuddered. “I sincerely hope he never says a word about me. As far as I’m concerned, he can have all the credit.”

“Because the last thing you want is to have your name appear in one of Cassidy Cutler’s books?”

“The very last thing.”

Fourteen

B
radley downed a long swallow of coffee, lowered the dainty china cup to the saucer and glowered across the table.

“What’s wrong with you?” he asked. “Are you sick?”

“Good grief, no. Never felt better, in fact.” Raine poured tea for herself from the pretty yellow-and-green pot. “Why do you ask?”

“I don’t know.” He searched her face, frowning. “You look like you’re running a fever or something.”

She stifled a smile. “Must have been the shower.”

The inn’s small dining room was packed with the same media-heavy crowd that had filled up the restaurant the night before. The din of cell phones and conversation assured privacy.

“It’s not the damn shower,” Bradley muttered. “There’s something about you this morning.”

“Well, I did get a good night’s sleep last night,” she said smoothly.

Bradley’s jaw hardened. “How the hell did you meet Jones?”

She was seated facing the entrance to the dining room. Zack was at the front counter, collecting a cup of coffee in a plastic cup and a muffin from the harried-looking woman at the cash register. He saw her watching him and raised a hand in a casual greeting. She wriggled her fingers at him and then turned to Bradley.

“I’m sorry, what were you saying?” she asked.

He scowled. “Where did you meet Jones?”

“Good grief, you don’t actually expect me to discuss my personal life with you, do you?”

“I didn’t know you had a personal life,” Bradley muttered.

“I do now,” she said demurely.

“Does Jones know what you do?”

“Yes. Guess what? It doesn’t creep him out.”

Bradley had the grace to redden. “I said some stuff that night that I didn’t mean, okay?”

“You meant it, all right.”

She watched Zack take his coffee and muffin out into the adjoining lobby.

“Look,” Bradley said, very earnest now, “even if our personal relationship wasn’t meant to be, it doesn’t follow that you and I can’t still work together. We’re a team, Raine.”

The urgency that was vibrating from him was starting to make her curious. Bradley usually did the laid-back, wise-cracking, macho-detective thing very well. For the sake of her ego, it would have been pleasant to believe that he was wildly jealous of Zack but she was almost certain that was not the case. There was no doubt but that he had been alarmed to find her with another man this morning but she was sure it wasn’t because he had suddenly discovered that he wanted her, after all.

“I don’t know about that,” she said quietly. “I’ve been under a lot of stress lately because of my aunt’s death.”

“I know,” he said quickly. “But work can be excellent therapy.”

“I need time to clear my thoughts and consider what I want to do next. Also, something else has come up. What with one thing and another, I’m just not ready to go back to working with you. Not for a while, at any rate.”

He gripped the edge of the table with both hands. “Damn it, Raine, there isn’t time for you to think it over. I’ve got a new cold case.”

She was starting to get curious now. She had never seen him this tense, not even when he was about to make an arrest.

She picked up the teapot and refilled her cup. “What’s the rush? By definition, there’s no great urgency about a cold case.”

“That’s not how the families of the victims look at it,” he said, righteous indignation ringing in every word. “Some people have died waiting for justice.”

In spite of her determination, guilt twisted inside her. “I realize that.”

Satisfied that he had scored a point, his expression softened. “I’m sorry to put pressure on you like this. I realize your aunt’s death hit you hard and that you’ve got your hands full dealing with her estate. But I’m in a bind here.”

Now they were getting to the heart of the problem.

“Define
bind
,” she said.

He exhaled heavily. “Here’s the deal, honey—”

She raised her teaspoon as though it were a magic wand. “Don’t ever call me honey.”

“The thing is, this new cold case is very important. I need your help.”

“What makes this particular case more important than any of the others?”

He glanced around the room a second time to make certain they were not being overheard and then leaned forward again and lowered his voice.

“Cassidy came up with this great idea for the book,” he said.

She put the spoon down on the saucer. It made a nice little clatter.

“Cassidy Cutler,” she said. “I should have seen that coming.”

“Just hear me out, okay?” Bradley pleaded. “She wants to follow me through the process of closing a cold case from start to finish. We took a look at some of the files together and picked one that is tailor-made for you.”

She choked on her tea. “For
me
?”

“Us,” he amended swiftly. “It’s a case that is ideally suited to your kind of, uh, observations and insights.”

Observations and insights
was his politically correct term for the clues she uncovered with her psychic abilities. After working together for more than a year he still couldn’t bring himself to acknowledge that what she possessed was a true paranormal talent.

“Forget it,” she said flatly. “I don’t want to be in your book.”

“Why not?” he demanded.

“For starters, I’d lose my anonymity. Oriana isn’t New York or LA. I wouldn’t be invisible there. The very last thing I want is for people in town to point me out on the street and whisper that I hear voices in my head.”

“It would be great publicity for your business.”

“Are you kidding? People will say that I’m crazy like my aunt. I don’t need that kind of publicity, trust me. I want to be able to shop or attend the monthly meetings of the Oriana Business Association without worrying about what folks are whispering behind my back.”

“Okay, okay,” he said, raising a hand, palm out.

“Do you know what people here in Shelbyville called my aunt? They said she was a witch. And some of them really believed it.”

“Look, I’ll talk to Cassidy. Maybe she’ll agree to give you another name for the book.”

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I’ve got a lot going on at the moment. I do not want to get involved in the book.”

“It’s him, isn’t it? The guy in your room this morning.”

“No,” she said coolly.

“Bullshit. How long have you known him?”

She was getting seriously annoyed, she decided. She flashed her special smile. “Let’s see, about sixteen hours.”

“
Sixteen hours
?”

“Give or take an hour. I wasn’t watching the clock too closely, to tell you the truth.”

Bradley was dumbfounded. “You mean you just met him yesterday and already you’re sleeping with him? Are you crazy?”

She paused, the teacup halfway to her mouth, and just looked at him, not speaking.

“I don’t believe this,” he continued, oblivious to her sudden stillness. “You must be out of your mind.”

“But then, you’ve always wondered about that, haven’t you?” she asked, keeping her voice perfectly even.

He frowned. “Wondered about what?”

“Whether or not I was crazy. That’s why the thought of going to bed with me creeped you out, remember?”

He grimaced. “Damn it, Raine, don’t put words in my mouth.”

“The word
creep
came out of your mouth, not mine.”

“Look, you don’t hear voices.” His mouth thinned. “You just think you do. What you have is a natural gift for observing things at a crime scene that other people miss, that’s all.”

“I hear voices, Bradley,” she said flatly. “In some circles that’s a working definition of crazy.”

“That guy I found you with upstairs—”

“His name is Zack. Zack Jones.”

“Jones. You really told him that you hear voices?”

“Yes.”

Bradley looked at her with patent disbelief. “And he doesn’t have a problem with that?”

“Says it turns him on.”

“Something’s wrong with this picture.”

“Good-bye, Bradley. Good luck with the book.”

She hitched her purse over her shoulder and started to rise.

“Please.” The word sounded as if it had been ground out of him. “I need your help. This book is very important to me. If it works, I’ll be able to use it to leverage myself straight into the chief’s office. Hell, maybe I’ll go private.”

“Good luck,” she said, meaning it.

“You owe me,” he said.

“Excuse me?”

He leaned a little farther toward her.

“I did you a favor a year and a half ago when you came to me with that wild story about a woman who was kidnapped and murdered by her husband, remember?” he said, his tone low and forceful. “Nobody else in the department was willing to give you the time of day. But I went into the old files and found one that matched the details you provided. I got the chief to authorize the DNA work. I tracked down the husband and got the confession.”

“And you got all the credit for closing the first in the long string of cold cases that will soon make you famous. I’d say we’re even, Bradley.”

“Shit. We should have kept the relationship professional. Why did you try to make it personal?”

She flinched a little and then managed to rally. “My mistake. I thought we were more than colleagues. I thought you understood—” She broke off. “Never mind. I take full responsibility for the failure to communicate. Now, I’ve got to go. Chief Langdon said the detectives from Portland and Seattle may want to interview me this morning. As soon as that’s over, I’m going back to Oriana. I’ve got a business to run.”

He reached up and grabbed her wrist. “Damn it, Raine, we’re a team.”

Zack materialized in the doorway. He started toward the table. She could feel the dangerous vibes from halfway across the room.

She looked pointedly at her captured wrist. “I think you’d better let me go,” she said quietly. “Now.”

Bradley finally noticed Zack coming toward him. Hastily he released her. His expression hardened.

“Wise up, Raine,” he said. “I don’t care if Jones knocked your socks off in bed. He didn’t just appear out of thin air. Whoever he is, he wants something from you, too, doesn’t he? And it isn’t just hot, sweaty sex.”

“That’s none of your business.”

Bradley was in full interrogation mode now.

“I can’t believe you met him yesterday,” he said. “What’s his connection to you?”

“I guess you could say he’s an old friend of the family.”

Fifteen

A
n hour later Zack leaned a shoulder against the inn room wall, folded his arms and watched Raine place a toiletries kit into her small overnight suitcase. She had looked different after that conversation in the dining room, he thought. She was back inside her safe zone.

“The interview with the detectives didn’t last long,” he said.

“Mostly because they weren’t interested in talking to me.” She zipped the small suitcase closed. “They’re too busy working the crime scene. Also, I got the feeling that Chief Langdon had warned them that I wasn’t quite right in the head.”