Dangerous Kiss (7 page)

Once inside, Claire stifled a scream.

The sicko’s tornado of evil had left a destructive wake through the 1900s-era farmhouse. She wanted to pitch a fit and throw things. Too bad the Voice of Doom had already done the job for her.

He’d thrown open the kitchen drawers and tossed the spoons and forks onto the tile floor. She found books that had been thrust off shelves and thrown across the living room. In the dining room, broken family pictures lay whatever they’d landed, glass shards decorated everything. She couldn’t take more than a few steps into the office because of the wreckage there. Dresses, shirts jeans, tank tops and socks littered her bedroom floor. A pair of hot-pink lacy panties hung from the ceiling fan. If she wasn’t so mad, she would have been embarrassed about Jake seeing that.

“Claire! Get in here.”

She hustled back into the kitchen. Jake stood in the pantry’s open doorway, his back to her. His bulk blocked her from seeing inside and she nudged him with her elbow. Without looking her way, he shuffled sideways.

A gas canister sat in the middle of the pantry floor, its fumes wafting out of the doorway. A bright blue bow was stuck to the handle. The killer had left a message in Easy Cheese next to the gas can.

See you soon
.

She hated the fear growing inside her. Being frightened never helped anything. It got in the way. Stopped her from doing what needed to be done. But not this time. Too much was at stake for that. She’d have this guy’s head on a pike.

“The bastard is going to fry.” Her trembling lip betrayed the bravado in her words. “No way is he burning down my house. I’ll be waiting when he comes back. ”

“Want company?”

Claire took stock of Jake’s muscular frame. This fight required more than brawn. “You any good with a gun?”

“You bet.” His cold grin didn’t reach his eyes.

“This asshole already threatened my family.”

“Good thing I’m not family.”

She chewed her sore bottom lip. “One condition. You can’t tell Hank about the gift in the pantry.” She nodded toward the gas can.

“He’s the sheriff. He should know.”

“He will, but not now. Hank has to play by the rules. This psycho doesn’t. I don’t.”

Jake didn’t speak for a minute. “Fine.”

Relief flooded her body. She didn’t want to face off against the Voice of Doom alone.

“OK. Let’s see what else the jerk left behind before you call Hank. But when you do, leave this part out.”

“Shouldn’t you call him?”

She eyeballed him. “If I call, he’ll pester me until I tell him every little detail. I haven’t been able to keep a secret from him for longer than twenty minutes in my whole life. You need to call.”

“Yes ma’am.” He gave her a mock salute. She huffed out a breath that sent a few tendrils of hair flying from her face and left to assess the damage in the rest of the house.

Claire’s fury swelled each time she heard a crunch underfoot or felt the ragged edge of something that used to be whole. The psycho was lucky she didn’t find him crouched behind the shut shower curtain because she would have beat him with the curtain rod.

She couldn’t remember when anger had become her default mode when faced with adversity. Probably soon after she’d found Brett and some tall blonde passed out naked in her bed. In response, she ran. She stayed busy. It worked. Mostly. She picked up the shattered frame that held her college graduation photo and wondered if somewhere inside her that trusting, optimistic girl still lived.

“All clear,” Jake hollered from another part of the house.

Today was not the time to find out. She stalked out to the porch and armed herself with a broom and a sour attitude. Picturing the killer’s face in each glass splinter and particle, she swept the sharp pieces into a mound.

Granny Marie’s grandmother had gotten that door shipped all the way from Kansas City. Four generations of Layton women had basked in the jewel-colored light streaming from it. Claire use to play Barbies in its colorful shadow. A few years later, she’d had her first kiss sandwiched between the door and Bobby Carr’s lean, teenage body. When she came home with her heart shattered by Brett, seeing that door had made everything better somehow.

Firebombing her Jeep was one thing. Destroying Granny Marie’s stained-glass door was something else.

A shadow fell across her path. Jake pried the broom handle from her grasp and held out his cellphone.

“Hank wants to talk to you.”

She backed away as if he’d pointed a lit firecracker right at her. Despite the phone being a foot away, Hank’s cursing came through loud and clear on the phone’s tiny speaker. She swiped it out of Jake’s hand and held it away from her ear.

“Stop cussing at me, Hank, or I’ll hang this phone right up.”

Silence greeted her declaration. It lasted so long she feared he’d hung up on
her
. “Hello?”

“Fine.” He snorted. “You have to get out of that house now.”

“No.”

“No?”

She yanked the phone away from her ear. People in the next county must have heard Hank’s booming rant that followed. Jake cocked his head to the side. She shrugged her shoulders.

“Hank,” she hollered into the phone. “He’s not here. It’s okay.”

“No, it’s not okay.”

“Look, I won’t let this nutcase turn my life upside down anymore. Come out and take a report if you have to, but I’m staying put.” She fumbled for the end-call button on the unfamiliar phone.

Taking in a deep breath, she closed her eyes and counted to twenty. Then she counted to forty. By the time she’d gotten to sixty, she felt better. She lowered her body down to the top step next to Jake and handed him his phone.

Gazing out at the neighboring field, she watched the corn’s yellow husks dancing in the wind. A year ago, she’d returned home heartbroken with her self-confidence obliterated. Granny Marie, already ailing, fixed up Claire’s old bedroom and nagged her until she finally ate. She’d brought Claire back to the land of the living right before Granny Marie left it. On her deathbed, Granny Marie made her promise to keep the family home.

She’d done a hell of a job.

“You know he’s only trying to keep you safe.”

“Yeah, I know.”

Onion wriggled in under her arm, squeezing his big body onto her small lap. She stroked the stressed-out dog’s head and enjoyed the silky smooth fur against her fingers.

The killer wanted that phone and flash drive. He thought she had them. She wished like hell she did. She’d give him the damn things in a heartbeat, just so he’d go away. Groaning, she laid her head on Onion and inhaled his scent of dirt and dog sweat.

“You know, you really might want to consider a maid if you’re too busy to pick up after yourself.”

Jake’s face gave nothing away. No smile crinkled the corner of his eyes. His lips never twitched upward. He didn’t even look at her.

It took a second for the deadpan humor of the statement to filter through to her. When it did, she laughed. Loudly. The sound roared out of her body with such gusto, it released the pent-up anger and anxiety formerly settled like concrete in her stomach.

“Thanks. I needed a laugh.” Without thinking, she gave his shoulders a quick squeeze. She meant it to be a friendly gesture, but when they touched, something inside her clicked into place.

“Yeah, I picked up on that, being a crack investigator and all.” He patted her leg, and left his hand resting on her thigh. His calloused thumb sent tingles shooting through her body.

His hand captured her attention. Long, lean fingers. Close-clipped nails, except for the thumb. That nail looked as if it were a regular afternoon snack. His tan palm covered the width of her leg. Warmth surged through her limb to the rest of her body.

“You sure do make it hard not to like you.”

His finger traced tight circles on her thigh. “Well, they say everybody has a talent.”

Onion crawled across her lap and squashed Jake’s hand to her thigh. The dog laid his front paws on Jake. He rubbed his wet snout across Jake’s free hand, demanding a pet. When Jake obliged, Onion whapped Claire in the face with his wagging tail.

“Guess you can’t be all bad. Onion likes you.” She pushed down Onion’s dancing tail. Her gaze caught Jake’s.

The silence sizzled. There might be more to this man than she first thought. Maybe her body knew something her mind had yet to grasp.

She lost her train of thought when Onion’s back paws dug painfully into her stomach. He leaped down and barked at the dust cloud kicked up by two vehicles traveling the dirt road to her house. As they rolled closer, her gut tightened.

Onion barked incessantly as if his mortal enemy, the UPS truck, had pulled into her driveway. But instead of the big brown truck, Hank’s cruiser led the way for a Volvo sedan.

“Just great.” She walked down the steps. “Follow my lead.”

Hands on her hips, Claire scrutinized the trio of Layton men in her driveway. If Hank was the bossy brother and Chris the big-hearted goof, then her middle brother, Sam, claimed the title of most uptight. A history professor at Cather College, he smiled little and laughed less. It did not bode well that all three brothers had joined forces on her front lawn.

She fired the first volley. “I already told you on the phone that I’m staying here. I’ll be damned if I let this guy scare me out of my own house.”

That stopped the men’s approach. Jake remained silent on the porch. Onion, oblivious to the tension, sniffed every last scent out of her brothers’ pants. She stood her ground.

“You mean you’re staying to guard the house with the broken front door?” Sam nodded toward the few stained-glass shards still clinging to the splintered door.

“That can be fixed. I have plywood in the garage. Anyway, Jake’s staying with me.”

Sam pinched the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger. “Oh, that is so much better. The two of you are going to stay here, with an oh-so-secure plywood front door while some…some…psychopath is out to get you?” He took a step forward. “That’s a great plan. A perfect plan. Why don’t you just let us know where your will is, so we can take care of things after this guy kills you.”

That stung. She’d always sought his approval above all others. The hurt bubbled up, her throat tightened and her stubborn streak widened at least a mile.

“Samuelson Aaron Layton, that was a mean thing to say.” Something in her quiet voice must have called out to Onion. He lopped over and sat with his body pressed against her leg. “I’ve made my decision and I’m sticking to it. I won’t concede victory to the Voice of Doom.”

“The Voice of Doom? What is he, a cartoon supervillain?” Sam looked heavenward. “I swear you’re more obstinate than is good for you. For once in your life, think, don’t react.”

Chris, ever the peacemaker, strode up to Claire and blocked her line of sight to Sam.

“Claire, I think what Sam is trying to say is we can’t sit by and watch you risk your life. We love you.” Chris paused for a breath. “Anyway, Mom would force-feed us nothing but steamed broccoli for a month of Sundays if anything happened to you.”

She chuckled at that. She didn’t know how he managed to do it, but Chris sucked the tension out of a situation better than anyone else in the world. God, she loved him.

Really, she loved all of them. But they had to learn she could take care of herself. She’d graduated from college, earned her MBA, had her heart pulverized and started her own restaurant, a successful one at that. Was it a baby sister thing? Was it a girl thing?

Who knew and who cared. It ended now. Today, she took care of
them
.

Her fingers trailed through Onion’s fur, causing his tail to thunk on the ground.

“Thank you all for coming out. I appreciate your concern, but I’m fine. Hank, let’s get that report over with.” She glanced back at Jake still sitting on the porch steps. “My fridge is empty. Do you mind going into town to grab a pizza?”

Jake ambled over to her side. “Sure. What do you like?”

“Everything.”

The smirk returned. “My kind of woman.”

J
ake had no clue how he’d ended up as the pizza delivery boy. He’d started off the afternoon as the valiant protector. Now he sat in the King Pizza parking lot waiting for a large pepperoni. The scent of warm grease did little to distract him from the redhead who had somehow submarined his free will.

Claire said jump and he asked how high. And he liked it. Damn. The old man would be calling him six kinds of a wimp if he knew, but he couldn’t put off checking in with his father any longer.

“’Bout damn time you called.” The old man coughed. “Damn cigarettes. I quit two years ago, haven’t stopped hacking up a lung ever since.”

He nodded as if his father could see him. “If you quit, how come you have a pack in the freezer?”

“In case of emergencies.” The old man wheezed in a breath. “Enough with the pleasantries, what’s going on there?”

“Ran into a bit of a snag here.” Jake relayed the case developments to his father. “What the hell could be on that phone and flash drive?”

“This is crazier than a raccoon on meth.” The old man paused. “Let me do some digging on this end. In the meantime, you play it cool.”

“Will do.” He paused, chewed his thumbnail and spit it out the window. “You eat today?”

“Little of this. Little of that. You know chemo can’t kill my appetite.”

Jake pictured the Francis Warrick of his youth. Tall. Strong. A Lucky Strike always dangling from his lip. Contrast that with the wisp of a figure he cut today. Damn. Cancer was a bitch. Lung cancer? The queen bitch.

“Glad to hear it.”

“Don’t need you to be glad. Need you to get this case in your rearview and get your ass back here. I can’t do it all, you know.”

“I know.”

“Good. Now give Burlington a call. He wants a progress report.”

“Will do. Bye.”

“What, you’re too big to tell your old man you love him?”

“No, sir” Jake grinned into the phone. Dad had been all huff and puff as long as he could remember. “Love you, Dad.”

“Love you too.” A cough rang through the phone. “Now get your ass back to work.”