Smoke and Mirrors (12 page)

Out of the darkness came a low growl, followed by a mammoth creature slamming into Derek's chest. He staggered backward, fell on his butt.

The furry beast straddled him.

"Barney!" Horror and laughter collided in Cass's voice. "No, boy. No! Down!"

The dog immediately ambled away from Derek. Darkness gave way to light, a tall lamp revealing a contrite looking St. Bernard sitting complacently on the floor, his tail swishing back and forth, eyes wide and beseeching.

"Well, then." Derek pulled himself to his feet. He'd long prided himself on his uncanny ability to sense danger, yet he'd had no clue about Barney until the dog was on top of him.

"Now you understand why I was trying to go inside first." Cass breezed by him and laid her hand against the dog's head. "That's a good boy, love, but Mommy's okay now."

Mommy.
The word stabbed into Derek's erratically beating heart. "You could've said something," he pointed out. "A simple 'watch out for my killer dog' would've worked fine."

The chill remained in her eyes, the distant, polite smile on her lips. "You never gave me a chance."

The quiet reprimand stung more than it should have. He watched her standing there, his coat hanging limply from her shoulders, and wished like hell he could rekindle the fire in her.

He wanted the sunshine back, damn it.

"You're freezing in those clothes. Why don't you go change into something warmer? I don't want you to catch cold."

"Concerned about your employee's welfare?" The retort lacked her usual panache.

"I already told you—I look after those in my care."

"Look, Derek, I appreciate your concern, but it's really not necessary."

"Sure it is."

"I'm a grown woman. I can take care of myself."

He frowned. "That's why you were standing outside in freezing temperatures without even a coat. If I didn't know better," which he wasn't sure he did, "I would think you were purposefully trying to hurt yourself."

In another time, another place, with anyone else, the stricken look on her face would have delivered great satisfaction. He lived to outwit his opponents. But now, in Cass's cozy kitchen, the look only brought shame.

"You don't know anything," she said very calmly. "Nothing."

"Then tell me." Backing her into a corner didn't deliver pleasure, but like
a snakebite
, the past was poisoning her. Unless he could pull it out of her, she would continue to suffer.

And that was something Derek could not abide.

So he was left with no choice but to force the truth out into the open, even if that meant ruthlessly stripping away every shred of protection.

"I find you standing in the freezing cold park," he reminded, "crying for God's sake, without even a coat. You call that nothing?"

She looked past him. "I don't want to talk about it—my life is none of your concern."

He couldn't stand seeing her like this. In the short time he'd known her, he'd come to count on her for fire and honey, not ice and blandness. "As long as you work for me, it's my concern."

"Then perhaps it's time I resign."

Not quite fire, but at least a spark. "Is that what you want?"

"I…" The color in her cheeks heightened, glowing against the pale ivory of her skin. "I want to change clothes." With a flick of her eyes, she dismissed him. "Please, Derek. Just go. I'd like to be alone. Don't make this any more uncomfortable than it already is."

She vanished down the hall. Her exit would have been eloquent and scathing, had it not been for the devoted St. Bernard bounding after her.

Derek reveled in the small victory. Cassandra LeBlanc no more wanted him gone than he wanted to leave. If she had, she would have personally booted him out the door, not left him alone in her kitchen.

And what a kitchen it was. Most men would never notice the subtleties that provided insight into the home's owner, but Derek's years in the merchant marines had taught the importance of observation. Detail. Where the truth lay.

Cass's kitchen sprawled, spacious and functional, an array of white cabinets giving way to ample counter space, a handy island in the middle, a large bay window overflowing with
a bushy
ivy. The copper pots and pans on the wall gave the illusion of hanging haphazardly, but Derek suspected Cass had hung each one with precision, carefully creating just that illusion.

He turned to explore the rest of her house,
then
froze dead in his tracks. There, directly across from him, stood the refrigerator. A typical cream-colored refrigerator with ice and water in the door of the freezer, and like a typical refrigerator, it sported magnets. Pelicans and alligators, plantation homes and whimsical French Quarter scenes, each magnet clung tenaciously to pictures. Not photographs, but pictures drawn by hand.

Or in this case, scribbled.

The pictures of a
child,
made expressly for a mother. Cats and dogs. Hearts and flowers. A house with trails of smoke curling from its chimney. A stick figure child standing between a stick figure man and woman, hands
clasped,
smiles firmly in place.

I had a son.

Derek swore softly. From the look of the refrigerator and the kitchen and breakfast nook for that matter, Cass still had a child, and he could burst through the door at any moment.

Derek stalked from the kitchen and entered the adjoining room. A quick flick of a lamp revealed what looked to be a family room—an overstuffed sofa, two well-used recliners, several scatter tables, a large television next to a stereo.

A fireplace stood dark and empty.

Derek strode across the plush beige carpet and began building Cass a fire. He hadn't known what to expect from her, but certainly not this cozy home. Seated on the mahogany scatter tables, pictures stared back at him. Cass and a handsome brown-haired man standing in front of a street pole that simply said Bourbon. The same man stood by Cass in countless other pictures, some crowded with other smiling faces, others just the two of them. And several more with a child. As an infant. A toddler. A little boy.

Coal-black hair. Laughing eyes. A wide, inviting smile.

Cass's son. And by his side, her husband. The man she'd sworn to love and cherish for all the days of her life. Yet she'd never mentioned him.

None of it made sense. Where the hell was her husband, Derek couldn't help but wonder. She wore no ring. Had he died, as well? Or maybe he'd walked out following the death of their son. Had Cass loved him—

Cass's relationship with her husband didn't matter. It was in the past, and what Derek wanted had only to do with the here and now. With making sure she was safe and warm, making sure the past didn't steal her future. Odd, in using aggression to push her away, he'd only pulled himself in deeper.

He struck a match and shoved the flame against the kindling. Soon fire spread throughout the grate. But the heat didn't kill the chill in Derek's gut. He raked a hand through his hair. It was long again, hanging down to his shoulders. Marla hated it that way—unruly, she called it. Wild. He'd never let himself think that's why he preferred it that way, but a small smile touched his lips as he realized, then relished, the truth.

"What's the matter? Seen a ghost?"

Derek found Cass studying him from the doorway. An oversize New Orleans Saints sweatshirt hung down to her thighs, giving way to baggy black sweats covering her legs. Plush slippers adorned her feet. Her ebony hair clung to the remains of its French braid, leaving her eyes bare and exposed.

She'd gone from looking lost and vulnerable to looking completely at home. Yet still vulnerable.

But she did look warmer, he noted, all except for her eyes. There, the bleak chill remained. The contrast reached out and grabbed him, sinking its claws so deeply into his soul that he needed every scrap of willpower to stay where he was and not stride across the room and crush her in his arms.

"You look warmer," he commented.

Her eyes remained on him. "You don't."

How could he when he sat in a room surrounded by pictures of her husband and son? Judging him. Protecting her.

He was sorely tempted to give the man who'd once owned Cass's heart a show he'd never forget, "Show some compassion then. How about a drink to warm me up?"

A ghost of a smile tugged at her lips. "How about you leave?"

Still crouched on the hearth, he picked up the poker and stoked the fire. "Not until I'm sure you're all right."

"So gallant," she commented. "But I don't need a hero, Derek. I'm fine. Really."

He turned toward her. "Yeah, right, that's what you are. Guess you think I'm deaf, dumb and blind, too."

She stiffened. "I should be so lucky."

"You're scared," he challenged. "Scared of me, scared of what happens every time we're within a hundred feet of each other."

She lifted her chin. "I'm not scared."

He stood. "Then prove it."

Chapter 7

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A
dangerous combination of excitement and caution twisted through Cass. Derek was right. She hadn't really wanted him gone, or she would have escorted him out the door herself. Thank goodness she was cautious enough to have nothing of her years of service with the Chicago P.D. visible. No pictures in uniform. No commendations. No files. They were all kept under lock and key.

"Prove it?" she asked.

A challenging light glinted in his eyes. "Prove you're not scared. Don't ask me to leave. Not yet."

That's exactly what she should do. But the words wouldn't form, not after the way he'd looked at her in the park. Held her. Made the chill go away.

"Scotch?" she asked, glancing toward him.

A slow, appreciative smile lit his face. "Perfect."

The way he muttered the word, with a little too much male appreciation, sent a rush through Cass. Instinct told her he wasn't speaking of the drink, but the fact she hadn't backed down from his challenge.

Drinks poured, she turned back toward the fire, only to find Derek sprawled out on her sofa. He leaned against the armrest, his legs stretched out before him. There was something intimate about seeing him lounging on her sofa, something entirely too seductive about the openness of his pose. It looked perfectly designed for her to sink into.

She strolled over and offered him a tumbler of Scotch. "Drink up, boss," she ordered with a ghost of a smile, "then you can be on your way."

He downed half the glass in one greedy gulp. "It's going to take more than your pretty smile to convince me you're okay, honey. You should know that by now."

"Can't blame a girl for hoping," she said with a wry laugh,
then
stepped toward one of the recliners.

His hand snaked out and nabbed her wrist. "Uh-uh," he said, shaking his head. Positioning his glass between his knees, he patted the sofa next to him. "Right here, doll. Next to me."

Cass took in the blatant challenge in his eyes, the same challenge that hardened his voice. A game, instinct warned, but at the moment she was too weary to compete. The tide of grief had subsided, but she knew how quickly it could return.

She sat next to him. "Happy?"

"Not especially."

She laughed. "You sure know how to shatter a girl's confidence, don't you?"

His eyes gentled. "That's not what I mean, and you know it. How can I be happy after what went down at the park?"

Again, she shivered. She didn't want to talk about what he'd seen, what he now knew about her, but she couldn't forget the feel of his arms encircling her, cradling, rocking and stroking, comforting.

Even more abominable, some place deep inside hungered for more. "Why were you there? Were you following me?"

He looked her dead in the eye. "I couldn't let you just walk away after what happened at the hotel, not when I knew something was wrong."

"Sure you could have."

A flash of naked emotion streaked through his eyes. "It was my fault you ran out the way you did—I had to make sure you were okay."

"Had to?" Annoyance flooded through Cass at how quickly he'd unraveled her that afternoon, caution at how skillfully he'd fitted the pieces back together. "Because I'm your employee?"

"Fearless." He used his index finger to turn her face toward his. "You know better than that."

"Do I?"

"You tell me."

His nearness squeezed every molecule of oxygen from the room. She could barely breathe, much less think coherently. "I don't know what you want me to say."

"Say whatever you want, just
don't
lie to me."

A blade of regret stabbed through Cass. His words sounded sincere, yet the entire foundation of their relationship rested on one colossal deception. Of course, the cop pointed out, if he realized that, he could be trying to draw the truth out of her, like the poison it was. But if he didn't…

That didn't warrant considering.