Talk Me Down (25 page)

He’d almost given in to the twisting-tight impulse to kick down the door when he heard a thud from inside the house, followed closely by a shouted curse. Hard footsteps actually shook the wood floor of the porch just before the doorknob twisted and the door swung open.

“What the hell do you want?” Cameron yelled.

“I’d like you to step outside for a moment.”

“No!” He started to slam the door, but Ben caught it with the palm of his left hand and rested his right hand deliberately on his gun.

“That wasn’t a request, Sergeant, that was an order.”

Cameron’s face mottled red with rage. Even his hair slipped slightly out of place. “Fuck! You!” the man shouted straight at Ben. “I’m busy fucking your girlfriend,
Chief.
”

It suddenly all seemed very simple. Ben reached past the threshold, wrapped his fingers around Cameron’s throat, and pulled him out the door at the same time he drew his weapon from its holster. He had Cameron against the wall, the gun tucked under his chin, before he’d even stopped shouting.

“Do you have a weapon on you, Sergeant?”

“I’m gonna sue your ass three ways to Sunday!” He didn’t look the least bit frightened which made Ben want to slam the butt of the gun into his straight nose, but there were witnesses, unfortunately.

“Your weapon,” he ground out instead.

“The one I use on the job or the one I just used on Molly?”

Ben supposed he should have been glad when Frank said, “Chief,” from just behind his back, but he was exceedingly resentful of the warning.

“Pat him down,” Ben said instead of “Hold my gun while I kick him into mush against the wall.”

Cameron sneered as Ben pressed the muzzle harder and Frank began to pat him down. “You’re pitiful,” the bastard growled. “She wants a real man. Just accept it.”

“Gun,” Frank called, confirming what Ben had suspected. As the officer was removing the magazine and ejecting the cartridge, Ben spun Cameron around and slapped him into cuffs before the first curse had left his lips.

“That’s my service pistol, asshole. I have a perfect right to carry it.”

“And you’re legally obligated to reveal its presence to a police officer. I’ll read you your rights in a few minutes, Sergeant. Frank, stick him in your truck. Andrew, come with me.”

“Chief,” Andrew said softly as they stepped into the house. “We’re gonna be in a world of hurt if there’s nothing going down.”

“I know,” Ben breathed, not caring in the least. He knew something was wrong with every ounce of instinct he’d developed over his career.

He strained his ears, hearing nothing, wanting to rush through the house and not daring to. For all he knew, Cameron had brought his whole gang with him. It seemed unlikely and unthinkable, but his job was to suspect the worse.

“I’ll take upstairs,” he said. She was up there. He could feel her as he took the stairs in a slow rush. Her door was second, just after the bathroom. He had the bathroom cleared within a few quick moments and then he was turning, sliding up to the closed door of Molly’s room, and there was no sound, none at all, and what did that mean?

Twisting the knob, he breathed deep and slow before he flung it open and entered on a crouch, gun drawn, eyes flying over every inch of the big room.

His gaze caught her even before he heard her muffled squeal. “Oh, Jesus,” he croaked. He hadn’t known what to expect, but it hadn’t been this. Molly tied up and half-naked, eyes pleading and terrified over a white gag.

“Molly, is there anyone in the house besides Cameron?”

She shook her head, and that was the only signal he needed to sprint across the room and kneel at her feet.

“Oh, Molly. Oh, God.” He fumbled at the knot of the gag while her eyes filled with bright tears. “I’m sorry,” he choked. “I’m so sorry.”

He finally got his useless fingers into a crease of the knot and managed to tug it loose. She gasped when he pulled it free, pressed her swollen lips together as she tried to swallow.

“Molly.” Framing her face, he met her wild gaze with his own. “We’ve got him. You’re okay. You’re safe.”

“Take…” She shook her head and tried again to make her broken voice work. “Take these damn shoes off.”

Ben shook his head and swallowed the growing lump from his throat. She’d gone over the edge, didn’t know what was real. “Shh. It’s okay, Molly. I’m here.”

“Take these goddamn heels off me, please!
Please!
”

“Okay.” There was no point arguing with her in this state, so he reached down and slipped off one red heel and then the other.

“Oh, thank you, Ben. Thank you. Oh, my God, I can’t believe you’re here. Thank you. I love you. I do. I really do. I’m not saying that because—”

“Just doing my job, ma’am,” he said, just to stop all those arrows piercing his heart. He managed to cut through the plastic restraints quickly, but the cuffs were going to be a problem. “I’ve got to find the keys, Moll. I’m just going across the room to look. I’ll be right back.”

He radioed his officers as she nodded, to let them know that he’d found Ms. Jennings and the house was likely clear. “Give me a minute up here,” he added, wanting to spare Molly the embarrassment of an audience until he could get her uncuffed and covered up.

Almost calm now—she wasn’t dead or unconscious—Ben turned toward the bed to search through the mess there for the tiny key. But when he registered the individual items laid out on the comforter, his gut jumped so hard he thought he might actually puke. Hand shaking, he pressed a palm to his eyes until he felt steady enough to open them again.

A whip, a paddle, a blindfold. Another pair of handcuffs, a black length of tightly woven rope. And that very shiny, very sharp pair of scissors on the floor by her chair.

His gaze touched on each object and then started over again, spinning his brain into a dizzy circle.

“Ben,” Molly whispered behind him. That small word snapped him from his daze and he nodded. There. On the bedside table, the handcuff key glinted beneath the lamp.

“It’s okay,” she was saying as he retrieved the key and returned to her side.

“I’m so sorry. I should never have…” He had to stop talking in order to calm his breath enough to fit the key into the lock. “I’m sorry, Molly. I let him hurt you.”

The lock freed with a snick and her arms fell free, the cuffs still jangling from one wrist. “Oh, shit,” she gasped. “That
hurts.
”

Ben carefully rubbed each shoulder, kneading his way over the muscles of her back and down her arms until she sighed. As soon as she was able to move her hands to her lap, he stood and grabbed a blanket from the bed to gather her into his shaking arms.

“We need to get you to the doctor.”

“No, I’m fine.” She pressed her face to his chest, eyes squeezed shut.

“Molly…You’re not…He didn’t hurt you?”

“Nope. You got here in the nick of time, Chief.”

“Oh.” He shifted a little closer to the bed. “Oh, thank God.” When his knees gave way, he sat hard on the paddle and the other pair of cuffs, and didn’t care in the least. All the blood in his body had drawn in, filling up his heart until it felt five times its normal size, beating a giant, broken pulse in his chest.

“Is this all I have to do to get you back in my bed?” Molly whispered. “Get kidnapped and tortured?”

He groaned, “Shut up,” and held her tighter, thinking if he got her close enough the fear would retreat.

“Chief,” his radio squawked. He just wanted the world to go away, leave them alone, but he was supposed to be a professional, and he’d be damned if was going to screw this case up.

He gave the men the go ahead to come upstairs, then kissed Molly a dozen times on her hair, her forehead. “Sorry, but they’re gonna need to process the evidence. Interview you.”

“It’s fine, as long as I can do it without heels or handcuffs.”

“I think that can be arranged.”

Despite her jokes, she suddenly started to cry, weeping quietly into his chest while Ben rocked her back and forth.

He’d let this happen to her. His jealousy and anger had caused this as much as anything else. Instead of believing in Molly—bright, warm, joyful Molly—he’d trusted in his fears and the words of a psychotic asshole. He’d never forgive himself for that. Maybe she wouldn’t, either.

He could hear his men moving around downstairs, making their way up to the second floor.

It’d be easy to avoid this right now, but he needed to give her the truth. “Molly, I saw Cameron in town, and I didn’t stop him.”

“I know.”

“I listened to his lies, and I bought them.”

“Only because of the game I’d been playing, Ben. Pushing you. Trying to make you jealous.”

“That’s not an excuse,” he insisted, but Andrew came through the door then, flinching at the sight of the paraphernalia on the bed, and their conversation was over. Or so he thought.

Molly didn’t seem to mind the audience. “You came for me.” She pulled slightly away so she could meet his eyes. “Despite everything, you came here and you weren’t fooled.”

“Almost too late.” He lifted her off the bed and carried her out to the second bedroom so that Andrew could begin taking notes and pictures.

“I’m totally going to use this to get you back. What’s the point of being tied and gagged if you can’t use it for sympathy?”

“Stop it.”

“Seriously. I’m gonna have nightmares. Anxiety. I’ll need you here to take care of me.”

“Molly—”

“Okay, I don’t really want your sympathy lovin’. Or maybe I do. I don’t know. But please stop being mad at me. I didn’t mean to hurt you and, Ben, I need you—”

“Hush. You’re being ridiculous.”

“Oh. Oh, sorry. I just…Crap.” She slumped into him, her body melting into his chest, his lap. She was warm and so fucking alive, and he couldn’t imagine that he’d ever given a thought to letting her go.

“I gave up being mad at you a while ago, Molly.”

Her hand skittered nervously over his chest, tracing an increasingly smaller oval. “You did? So what, you’re just over me now?”

“No.”

Her hand stopped.

Ben folded his fingers over hers, noticing the fine texture of her skin, the jagged edges of a broken fingernail. He felt he could spend days touching her, reacquainting his body with hers.

“I can’t pretend I wasn’t hurt by all this,” he started. “We don’t have enough time to talk right now, and there’s a lot to talk about. A lot. But please say you can’t live without me, because…because I’m miserable and I need you.”

There. That hadn’t been so bad. His voice had barely even squeaked there at the end. No, saying it out loud hadn’t been bad.

But when she screamed and pounced on him and slipped her tongue into his mouth just as his men ran into the room with guns drawn? That was pretty bad.

“You still want to go up to the cabin? Because you look pretty excited about trying out all those new buttons.”

“Mmm,” she purred. “Just give me a few minutes. I didn’t expect it to be delivered today.”

“All right,” Ben agreed. “I’ll give you some privacy. See you in about half an hour.” She was too busy laying her cheek against the steering wheel to respond, so Ben hopped into his own truck and drove toward Main. He had a couple things to do before leaving town.

The first errand was easy enough. A quick check of his office computer confirmed that Cameron had been placed on administrative leave from the Denver PD and his bail hearing set for Tuesday. The charges—home invasion, assault, false imprisonment, menacing—were serious enough that Kasten would never work in law enforcement again, even if he pled them down to more minor offenses.

Molly had confessed that she’d be okay with Cameron getting probation as long as it was accompanied by some serious court-ordered therapy. Ben wasn’t feeling quite so generous. In fact, he’d been dreaming of the days when Australia was a penal colony. A few thousand miles seemed a safe distance between Molly and her attacker. But Australia no longer accepted prisoners, at least according to their official Web site, so Ben would have to be satisfied with the few months in jail that Cameron would likely serve. He was also going to do his damnedest to ensure that any probation was served under house arrest, complete with an ankle bracelet locator.

Still, there was nothing to be done this weekend, and Ben was desperate for time alone with Molly. Just one more stop, and then they’d have two days of privacy to renegotiate their relationship. Or just have lots and lots of sex. Either way, he was looking forward to it.

While the computer took its time shutting down, Ben braced himself for his last errand. When he felt in control of his blood pressure, he grabbed a sheet of paper from his desk and headed out the door. A quick walk down Main Street and he was standing in front of the icy steps of Miles Webster’s small blue house.

The enclosed front porch served as the offices of the
Tribune,
so Ben didn’t bother to knock before entering. Miles’s face froze with shock when he looked up at the little bell that chimed, and Ben felt immature satisfaction at the brief flash of nervousness that glinted behind Miles’s glasses.

“I already paid that ticket, Ben. The new stickers are on the truck.”

“I saw that.”

“What do you want then? I had every right to interview Kasten, so I hope you’re not here to try to talk me out of printing the story.”

Though he felt a vein in his temple begin to throb, Ben gritted his teeth and shook his head. He was done with worrying about Miles and his stories. Done with worrying about gossip. He was done with everything except convincing Molly that her messy life would fit perfectly into his careful world.

“I’m here to take out an ad.”

Miles’s eyebrows fell so low they must have obscured his vision. “An ad?”

“Yes.” Ben handed over the paper with only a twinge of discomfort. “I want this in your next edition. Only the paper copy, not online.”

The paper shook a little in Miles’s hands, and Ben was surprised to notice how old he was getting. Close to eighty now, but still working hard at the paper, not to mention watching his granddaughter three days a week.

“You’re throwing a party?” Miles finally said, disbelief clear in his voice.

“That’s right. Molly just landed a huge contract with a new publisher and we’re going to celebrate. Party at The Bar. Everyone’s invited.”

Miles smirked. “These new stories going to be about you, Ben?”

Ben didn’t even blink. No, the stories wouldn’t be about him. Molly had already promised to keep their private life private. But people would think what they wanted. He couldn’t control that, so he wasn’t even going to try. “Just be sure you get that in Monday’s paper, Miles. I’ll see you at the party.”

He’d expected to feel slightly sick walking out of there, but instead he felt almost faint with relief. Light. Free.

And totally ready for a date with Holly Summers.