as she swung around to face the newcomer, she took an involuntary step back. She hated the fear instinct that surfaced when someone startled or sneaked up on her. Anna prayed it didn’t show on her face.
“Captain.” The sergeant’s relief was obvious. “I was just explaining to Ms. Grant—”
“—why no one in the Angel Butte Police Department can be bothered to help me find a thirteen-year-old boy who has run away from his foster home and has no place to go that any sane adult would consider safe,” Anna concluded, even as she evaluated the tall man who stood on her side of the counter, but who was evidently a member of the department, and a senior one at that.
He was also an extraordinarily handsome man, his face all angles and planes, nothing soft about it except possibly his mouth, which she was annoyed at herself for noticing. His eyes were... She couldn’t tell. A dark hazel or unusual shade of brown, maybe. A gray suit fit as if it had been tailored for his big body. The knot of the conservative tie he wore was just a little loose, as if he’d given it a tug recently. Only when her gaze lowered did she notice the badge clipped to a narrow black belt and a glimpse of what she assumed was a weapon. At the moment, his expression was mildly curious.
Wait. Captain. Could he possibly be the new hire she’d read about, the one who’d accepted the position vacated by Colin McAllister, who had defeated the incumbent county sheriff in the November election? That would make this man captain of Investigative and Support Services, not patrol.
Still...he was right here in front of her. And if he’d paused only to help the desk sergeant get rid of her, well, screw him. At least she wasn’t likely to encounter him again.
“I’m Anna Grant.” Inexplicably reluctant to touch him, she nonetheless held out her hand. “I supervise foster homes for Angel’s Haven Youth Services.”
His eyebrows flickered as if she’d surprised him, but that was the only change of expression she detected. “Ms. Grant.” He engulfed her hand in his much larger one and squeezed before releasing her. “Captain Reid Sawyer.”
“Unfortunately, I don’t need an investigation. I was hoping—” she darted a look at the sergeant as she emphasized the word “—that I could get the city’s patrol officers to watch for a missing child.”
Captain Sawyer raised those surprisingly expressive eyebrows only a little, but it was enough. “Sergeant Shroutt?”
“He’s been missing three hours!” the sergeant burst out. “He might be smoking weed out back of the high school—”
“Except that he’s an eighth grader, not a high school student,” Anna pointed out. She almost felt sorry for him.
“Or panhandling in the Walmart parking lot. Playing Gears of War 3 at some buddy’s house!”
“Then why did he leave a note saying he was taking off?” she asked.
He glowered at her. “What note? You didn’t say anything about a note.”
“You didn’t give me a chance.”
“What did the note say?” interjected a too-reasonable voice with a velvet undertone.
Pretending the sight and sound of Reid Sawyer didn’t make her quiver, Anna held herself stiff. “That we shouldn’t worry. He knew a good place to go.” Guilt and a shimmer of fear erased her momentary sexual awareness. “His stuff is all gone.”
Captain Sawyer had been reading every expression as it crossed her face. She couldn’t seem to look away from his eyes, which she concluded were an unusual shade of deep green.
“The boy’s name?” he asked.
“Yancey Launders. And no, his name doesn’t help. Kids make fun of it. He was born in Alabama. I’m told Yancey is a more common name in the Deep South.”
“He likely to be heading for Alabama?”
“I’m afraid so,” she said wearily. “He has a grandfather down there. That would be the one who kicked his mother out because she was pregnant and he didn’t want anything to do with her kind of trash. After she died, the grandfather was contacted. In his own words, he refused to have anything to do with some bastard kid whose father could be an ex-con or even racially mixed for all he knew.”
The captain made a sound in the back of his throat. “The boy know this?”
“His mother apparently believed heart and soul that her daddy would relent eventually and let her and Yancey back into Eden. Yancey said she talked all the time about the farm.”
“We’re a long way from Alabama.”
She knew what he was saying. “She drifted. Yancey has been in a dozen schools or more already. I guess there was always a man, and wherever the current one went, she went, too, and dragged her son along. Whoever the last man was, he didn’t want a twelve-year-old boy once she died.”
“So this Yancey became a ward of the court.”
“Yes. This is his second foster home. He has struggled,” she admitted. “The other boys in the home make fun of him.”
The police captain merely looked at her.
“I was trying to find something more suitable,” she said defensively, even as guilt dug in its claws. She’d known that poor, sad boy was ready to crack. She’d just believed she had longer.
The unnervingly emotionless gaze switched to the desk sergeant. “Do I need to involve Captain Cooper?”
Sergeant Shroutt sighed. “No, sir.”
Reid’s pleasant and yet disquietingly inscrutable eyes met Anna’s once again. “You can give a description, I assume.”
“Yes.”
“Good.” He nodded. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m afraid I have a meeting.”
The words almost stuck in her throat, but she got them out. “Thank you.”
His mouth curved into a smile that was oddly sweet, even if it didn’t reach his eyes. “You’re very welcome.”
She watched as he strolled away, seemingly in no hurry but, with those long legs, crossing the lobby quickly and disappearing into an elevator that seemed to sense his approach and open for his convenience without him so much as pushing the button.
Anna turned back to the desk sergeant and realized he had been watching the new captain, too.
She could feel his resentment when he produced a form from behind the counter and said, “Please repeat the boy’s name, ma’am.”
At least he was apparently planning to be polite, probably because he was afraid of Captain Reid Sawyer. Who could blame him? She’d been intimidated, and she was willing to take on anyone to protect the children who were her responsibility. Thus her unpopularity in too many quarters.
“Yancey Launders,” she repeated and began to give a description.
Fortunately, she was unlikely to have anything to do with
