Not Without Her Child, page 7
“You ever hear of Lincoln, Arkansas?” he asked, all business as soon as she said hello.
Heart pumping faster for real, she told him, “Noooo.”
“It’s a two-road village on the way to one of Redmond’s last-known addresses. I’m just passing through again, on my way back to Fayetteville.”
“I thought you were back already.”
“I was, but I got a call from someone with whom I’d left a card and made a trip back.”
“Did you find Redmond?”
“No, but I found out that he’s still driving a truck, just no longer for a company. He’s got his own rig now. Purchased used, with money he got when his grandmother died. It came with a bed area behind the seats, has a fridge, a small counter. He lives in it. And rents himself out to any company that hires independent truckers.”
Her mind jumped ahead to where he and Anderson were going to go with that one. Redmond probably wasn’t just driving legal goods. He used the truck to sell and deliver guns. Maybe drugs, too. She watched television. Knew how things worked.
“I’ve been told I’ll get a call as soon as he’s back in town.” It took her a second to catch up with the fact that Brian wasn’t going all illegal-arms dealer on her.
“In the meantime, driving back, I’m on a different road and just passed a small sign, visible only from one direction, that’s an advertisement for the Birds of Paradise café...”
Her breath caught. One of the clues.
She tried to suck in air. Dropped the pen she’d been holding.
“I followed the directions and am sitting outside a small boarded-up place—”
A café. Is that where Clint met whomever he’d given their baby to? Was it a woman he’d known? Dated? Someone who’d worked there who was loving Brooke and keeping her safe? Oh God. Did she live close by? Was Brian within a mile or two of Brooke?
“—and the sign on the building is decorated with painted butterflies.”
Butterflies are free.
Tears blurred her vision. She didn’t need to see what was in front of her. “She’s there. In that town?” She wanted to be more firm. To state something that she suddenly knew to be true.
Her instincts weren’t talking to her at the moment.
“I have no way of knowing, but I was going to suggest, since I’m waiting on a call regarding Redmond, rather than spending a day tracking hundreds, maybe thousands, of companies that use independent truckers, hoping to find anyone available to talk to on a Sunday, maybe we should take the day to explore the village of Lincoln.”
Lips trembling, she smiled. Didn’t bother to wipe the tears streaming down her cheeks. “Okay,” she said, trying her best to maintain a calm tone in her voice at least.
“I’ll pick you up at dawn?”
“How about I pick you up?”
“I’m not a good passenger. Most definitely not when I’m working.”
“Being in Clint’s truck makes me sick to my stomach.”
“I’ll be there at dawn. We leave the truck in the driveway, and I drive your SUV.”
Grinning from ear to ear, she didn’t care that tears were dripping off her chin to her keyboard. Another compromise that left no losers...
“Or I could rent a vehicle...”
“No.” She had to be able to afford him for as long as it took. “You drive my SUV. I have no problem being a passenger.”
Not when she trusted the person driving her.
That meant...she hadn’t trusted the man she’d married—the man who’d fathered her child—for years, but she trusted a virtual stranger?
Something she could look at in the future. Until she had Brooke home, there was no room for anything else.
Chapter 9
What Jessica hadn’t counted on were the long minutes into hours spent strapped in the passenger seat of her vehicle on their way to wherever Sunday was going to take them.
Most particularly when they kept her in such close proximity to the jeans-clad man in his black short-sleeved pullover, looking...like someone you didn’t want to mess with. The gun he was wearing—the first she’d seen it—added to the effect.
At least the sun was shining. And in early May, wasn’t too hot yet.
Keeping her gaze peeled for any sign of her daughter—something she did every single time she was out of her house and was easier when she didn’t have to pay attention to the road—she stared at miles of seemingly unending grass, trees and farmland. Having no idea what she might see that could lead her to her daughter, but knowing if she wasn’t out there, looking, nothing would present itself.
And as she sat, aware of Brian’s kind of musky scent—though it didn’t appear he’d shaved that morning—questions infiltrated her thoughts. One or two at first.
Then they seemed to breed.
Half an hour from their first stop, the Village of Lincoln, she allowed herself to voice one of those questions. Because it pertained to the moment.
“Are you licensed to carry a gun in every state?” He’d just flown into Arkansas on Friday. Had been with her all day. And then there was only the weekend with governmental offices all closed. She didn’t doubt the gun was legal. Not solely because he was working so closely with Detective Anderson, but because...she just didn’t doubt his correctness.
“All but Hawaii,” he told her. “But in Arkansas, you don’t have to be licensed or even have the gun registered to open carry as long as you’re over eighteen and can legally own a gun.”
She hadn’t known that.
Had never had cause to know it.
“So Clint having that gun...there’s absolutely nothing wrong with him having purchased it, just like he said.”
“Right.”
Based on his search for Blake Redmond, she knew he had more thoughts on the matter, but didn’t push him to share them all with her. She’d already gotten the gist of it.
And almost thanked him for not pushing the matter.
The lack was...a relief. A breath of fresh air.
Because she knew Clint hadn’t killed their daughter, and just wanted to move on. To focus on things that would lead them to Brooke.
And yet...there was more.
It took her a second, sitting there staring out her window, to realize why she was particularly appreciating the way the man at her side had handled the conversation.
With her question about Clint’s lack of wrongdoing in owning the gun, she’d given him an opening to warn her, again, about what that hidden gun could mean. To cram his opinions and hunches and gut feelings down her throat. He hadn’t done so.
Clint would still be going on with her if he’d been the one in Brian’s position. He’d repeat himself, find every opening to bring up the topic again, and continue doing so for as long as it took to get Jessica to doubt herself and see that he was right.
Or at least do his best to get to that point.
That last year they’d been a couple, maybe even before that, she’d begun to fight back. Mentally, at least. To have her own internal conversations that rebutted his, to take back whatever control of her mind he’d stolen from her.
Not that she’d had any conscious realization that’s what she’d been doing. Counseling from a kind and talented therapist had pointed it out to her.
She’d been helping herself before she’d even known she’d needed the help.
The man beside her drove silently. She didn’t look over at him, but could feel him there, strength and ability wrapped in an overly attractive package.
Guilt sluiced instantly through her at the thought. Because of Clint. His reaction if he knew, the quick and debilitating punishment he’d shoot at her. She turned away thoughts of him. And still felt like she was failing her daughter...sitting there having pseudo sexual thoughts, awareness, for a man with Brooke lost out in the world.
Curiosity killed the cat.
But if she just asked a couple of questions, his mysterious aura would disappear. He’d become like any of the hundreds of good, decent men who’d been her clients over the years.
She had a plethora of healthy, business relationships with men who belonged to other women.
“You being on the road so much of the time...is your wife into investigation as well?”
Not at all what she’d meant to say. But how did a guy have a home and family if he was never there? His job with her was open-ended. He could be there for months. And...
“I’m not married.”
She’d noticed the lack of wedding ring, of course.
“Girlfriend, then.”
His glance seemed to touch her—her cheeks, which grew warm, and other parts of her, too. A soft, tender touch. Sexual, maybe, or appreciative, but more empathetic than anything else.
When he turned his eyes back to the road, she realized she’d been holding her breath. Took a deep one.
“As you say, with my job, me being gone so much, there’s never been time for anything else.”
Okay, well, so much for diminishing his mysterious aura. Shoot him a question, his answers just led to more questions.
That she most definitely was not going to utter. She might be internally vulnerable, but she was not lacking in intelligence.
“You have no cause to worry.” His words, their kind but respectful tone, as though he considered her someone to reckon with, grabbed her complete attention.
Frowning, she looked at him. “No cause to worry about what?” About her curiosity? Did he know?
About Clint?
Because she most definitely had cause to worry, every single second of every day, about her baby girl.
“If I’ve inadvertently sent off any vibes...you know, making you uncomfortable or—” he cocked his head to the side, his gaze facing straight ahead as though glued to the road “—giving you some sense that made you hope I had a wife...”
Oh God. He knew. Had noticed she was kind of attracted to him—was trusting him too much. He felt sorry for her. And was giving her an out.
How embarrassing.
Humiliating.
Mentally scrambling for a good, strong blurtation that shut him down on any noticing of each other between them, needing to grab firm hold of the out he’d given her, Jessica was still coming up blank when Brian continued.
“I’ll be honest with you. I...notice you...in a way I’ve never done before on a case. Added to that a guy would have to be dead not to find you attractive...”
She was trembling. But not in a bad way. Or rather, it was horribly bad because she wasn’t feeling at all like she wanted him to be quiet. Or to go away. What the hell.
She didn’t know what to say. Couldn’t even think...
“I’m alive,” he continued. “But I have never, ever, behaved in an inappropriate manner, at work, or not. And yeah, I know anyone can say that, but if you’d like to call Sierra’s Web, have me replaced, or have them release my background check to you, feel free to do so. Hell—” he grabbed his cell phone out of his pocket “—I’ll even do it for you.”
“Stop.” Whatever the hell was happening, she most definitely did not want to speak with anyone at Sierra’s Web about him.
For the first time since he’d started talking, he gave her a quick glance and then returned his gaze toward the road.
Unending pavement in the middle of unending nowhere. This early on a Sunday, there weren’t even other vehicles about.
“This case...it’s hitting me more personally than any other...” he said then, almost as if to himself. Shaking his head.
“Why is that?” The question shot up out of her before she had time to analyze or reject it. Because, heart hurting, something occurred to her. “Did you lose a child, Brian? Or a sibling?”
It made sense if he had...the connection she felt with him. Yes, that could explain it all. The attraction...that was just as he’d said, you’d have to be dead not to notice someone gorgeous in her midst.
Did not explain why she didn’t have such intense physical reactions to other good-looking men she knew. It wasn’t like Brian was the first heartthrob she’d met...
He hadn’t answered her—allowing her mind to run away with her, while, still, she watched the barren landscape, the shoulders and ditches on the sides of the roads for any aged, weatherworn piece of cloth that resembled the onesie she’d dressed Brooke in just minutes before her disappearance. For the blanket that had been wrapped loosely around her butt and legs in the swing.
“My mother.”
The two words, so out of the blue, had her mouth dropping open. What had she missed? Or...
“What?”
“It’s personal because of my mother.”
He’d worked hundreds of cases. His bio said that. Spent a lot of time on missing persons. What about Brooke’s case reminded him, when other cases didn’t?
“She was kidnapped?” she guessed, her heart aching deeply for this man she barely knew. Hoped to God his mother had been found in time.
He shook his head. Seemed to be done talking. And then, eyes facing only the road again, said, “She was a cop. Had had multiple calls to the same house—the guy was beating up his wife and, my mom was sure, had hurt his little girl, too. Mom gave the woman her personal cell number. The wife would call, Mom would go running, no matter what time of day or night, or what else she might have been doing, but the guy would scare his wife out of pressing charges. Every time.”
Jessica had gone cold. And then hot. If Brian thought she was that woman...
She wasn’t a victim.
But she had been. Not of physical violence. Nothing that could be seen or irrevocably proven. Clint had abused her mentally. Emotionally.
Brian knew.
She didn’t want him, of all people, to know. That made no sense. Everyone involved in her case knew what Clint was doing to her, making her call him every week. And could guess what he’d been doing for years.
“My dad, a detective in another squad, warned Mom repeatedly that she couldn’t solve the world’s problems on her own. But she wouldn’t listen. The case changed her right before our eyes and nothing was ever the same again. In her day, my mother was a great cop. But that one case...she couldn’t see beyond that little girl who was too little to fight for herself. Who couldn’t even talk well enough to testify...”
Like Brooke, when they’d find her.
Brian’s shrug pretty clearly indicated to her that he’d said what he was going to say. She could fill in the rest. His mother hadn’t been able to save the family and the failure had destroyed her own family. Nothing was ever the same again. Brian’s words came at her again.
With a sick feeling, Jessica figured that the little girl had ended up dead.
And it occurred to her. The connection between them...maybe she didn’t just need him. Maybe he needed her and Brooke, too. Needed their happy ending.
For his sake now, as well as hers, she hoped he hung around long enough to help give that conclusion to all three of them. Brooke, her, and himself, too.
* * *
Brian had no idea what had possessed him to spill his guts to a virtual stranger. And a client at that. Spent several minutes trying to figure out how to get himself out of the muck he’d just stepped into.
Came up with a big zero. Figured any more talk would just shine a light on his ridiculous ramblings, and was glad to let it go.
Except that then he was back where he’d started—the sense that Jessica was uncomfortable around him—personally.
As silence coated the entire interior of the SUV, he glanced her way again. “You have absolutely nothing to fear from me.”
There. That was all he’d needed to get out.
He’d taken way too long to get there. Traveled dark roads best untraveled. Not like him at all.
“It’s not you I’m fearing.”
The vehicle swerved for a brief second as his eyes shot toward her. He corrected immediately. Never came close to leaving his lane.
Still...
Could she mean...she feared herself? That she wanted him? They’d clearly been talking about sexual attraction, there in the beginning. He’d as much as admitted to her that he found her hot.
But...
No.
She feared Clint. The man who’d abused her just like the guy in his sad tale. The one who’d killed—
“I won’t let anything happen to you.”
“You might be an expert at what you do, but you aren’t a god, Brian.” Her laconic tone made him smile. In the middle of a tense moment.
With a nod, he said, “Point taken.”
“And that’s not what I meant.”
Oh.
So, the sex thing?
Keeping his visual attention firmly on the long expanse of flat county road stretching out in front of him, he disengaged himself from the conversation.
As best he could with the two of them sitting there confined in a quiet SUV. Alone. Together.
“I probably shouldn’t say this, Brian, but what we’re doing here...what you’re doing here to help me...we can’t let other things...distract us.”
Okay. She was doubting his ability to stay focused on the job. That one he could clear up.
“I know I alluded to—”
“Please,” she cut him off. “Let me say this. Because if you don’t, this isn’t going to work and I so desperately need it to.”
She wasn’t firing his ass.
He drove. Keeping his mouth firmly shut.
Something he generally did naturally.
“I just want you to know that you aren’t alone in noticing something between us,” she told him. “Probably because, like you say, we have intense personal emotions involved in the outcome of our time together...”
