recommended that he make the range available to the public. He couldn’t afford to maintain the house just on his pension and his teaching salary. “But this range is primarily for my personal use and for the use of the Nashville P.D.”
She shrugged. “Well, your day manager, Frank, took my money quickly enough and assigned me a firing lane. You let me know if I’m taking up valuable space that your police buddies could be using.” She started to turn back to the range, but he caught her arm.
“You came here because of me, didn’t you?” He glared at her.
Resa swallowed and tried to look innocent. She hadn’t realized it herself at first. She’d convinced herself that she needed her days free for designing, sewing and client fittings.
She’d made friends with Frank, and through their conversations she’d found out that Archer spent his mornings at Tennessee State University where he taught two graduate courses in Criminal Justice. Then he drove to Vanderbilt Medical Center for two hours a day of physical therapy on his hand.
It had taken her a few days to admit to herself that she’d changed to evenings so she could see him.
All those thoughts rushed through her head in the few seconds while Archer took a deep breath.
“Don’t give me that wide-eyed look,” he said. “If you think I’m going to help you because we’ve both been affected by the Lock Rapist, you can get that out of your head right now.”
“Affected?” She stared at him. “Mr. Archer, people are affected by a sad movie or an unexpected compliment.”
Archer felt pinned by her dark-green eyes. “What do you want me to say? That he ripped our lives to shreds?” The words rasped in his throat. “Okay. I’ll give you that.”
She glanced down at his right hand, which was aching with the effort to hold on to her arm. When she looked back up, he saw that same soft, dark flicker in her eyes that he’d seen before. He jerked his hand away.
“You haven’t told me why you came here. Why me?”
“If you know who I am, then you know why I’m here.” She wrapped her arms around herself and looked at a point beyond his shoulder. “My sister left her husband in June of last year. She’d had enough of his drinking and violence. She came to stay with me to—as she put it—absorb some of my strength.” She laughed shortly. “If she only knew.”
He waited.
“Anyhow, she was doing really well. By December, she’d decided to file for divorce. But—”
“But she was attacked.”
She nodded, looking down. Her fingertips whitened as she tightened her grip on her arms. “It destroyed her. She was never strong—” Resa raised her gaze to his. “She depended on me to keep her safe. And I didn’t.”
Pain sliced through Archer’s chest. She depended on me. How many times had he thought the same thing? Resa’s sister sounded a lot like his wife. Fragile. Fearful. She’d depended on him to protect her. And he’d failed.
He and Resa were more alike than he’d realized. And he hated it. He didn’t want to be like her. He sure as hell didn’t want to know how she felt, or recognize how badly she hurt.
Resolutely, he pushed his own pain and regret back where it belonged, in the lockbox where he kept his heart. “So what now? You’re going to become a one-woman vigilante force and go after the guy the Nashville P.D. hasn’t been able to catch in three years?”
Her face turned bright pink, but she lifted her chin and met his gaze. “I want to learn how to protect myself.”
Archer felt something break inside him. He tried to ignore it, but it was too late. The box around his heart had developed a crack, and compassion was leaking out and taunting him with his failure.
He hadn’t been able to save his wife. Hadn’t been able to stop the attacks. Could he leave Resa alone to face the monster who’d destroyed both their lives? He knew he couldn’t.
“Put your ear protectors on,” he said. He dug in his jeans’ pocket for a pair of earplugs and stuck them in his ears. “Can you hear me?”
She nodded. “Barely.”
“Good. Pick up the gun.”
Her head turned toward him. “You’re going to teach me? I thought you said—”
He shrugged. “I’d have a mess to clean up if you blew off your toe, or someone else’s.”
He heard a quiet huff. It almost made him smile.
She picked up the Glock 19 9mm. It was a compact gun, ideal for carrying as a concealed weapon.
“First thing—every time you pick up your weapon, check to see if it’s loaded.” His voice cracked. Self-loathing blanketed him. He knew better than to leave his gun loaded. Knew better than to leave it in plain view on his dresser. But it was too late now.
“It’s loaded,” Resa said. “I loaded it a little while ago. For the first time.”
“Check it. Check it every single time. Do you know how to eject the magazine?”
She pressed the release and the magazine dropped into her left hand.
“Now inspect it. Make sure the rounds are straight and ready to feed.”
“What if I’m being attacked or carjacked? I can’t tell the guy ‘Hang on while I check my weapon.’”
“This is basic maintenance. You check it twice a day. And once a week, you clean it, whether you’ve fired it or not.”
She glanced at the top of the magazine and ran her thumb across the bullets. She had sixteen rounds. Archer would bet money she wouldn’t get a single shot off if she were in a desperate situation. “Good. Slap the magazine back into place.”
She followed his instructions, her hands shaking a little.
“It’s okay. You’re doing great,” he murmured. “Now, rest your right hand in your left palm.”
She complied clumsily. “I don’t know about this. It feels awkward. Can you show me how?”
He grimaced. He could, but it would be hard, in more ways than one. Even after spending months in physical therapy, and doing strengthening reps on his own, he still had trouble grasping anything heavier than a wine bottle. His buddies on the force, with the exception of Clint, didn’t know how bad the damage to his hand was.
But there was a second problem. It had been months since he’d talked to anyone other than Frank or Clint or his students. He’d had his basement enlarged into an indoor range so he could practice shooting. But after Natalie’s funeral and his surgeries, the cavernous below-ground range appealed to his need to hide out and lick his wounds. He’d forgotten how to talk to people.
So, whether he tried to shoot the gun himself or got close enough to her to show her how, he’d be revealing his weakness to her. He weighed his two options and
