stranger was flashing a shield at the clerk. A sense of déja` vu hit Meghan in a nauseating wave, and for a moment she was deaf to Danny’s words. Flight was the most primitive instinct known to man, and the urge to flee nearly overwhelmed her.
“…and then the first guy ran to the car…”
“We’ll talk about it when we get home.” Meghan’s voice held an unusual edge, and the boy sent her a startled glance before falling silent. She didn’t notice. Her focus was on the man, the cop, who’d just engaged another customer in a conversation she was too far away to overhear.
Placing one arm on Danny’s shoulder, she guided him toward the door, disguising her haste behind a barrage of words. “We’d better check on our cab. We told the driver to come back in an hour, and I doubt he’ll wait for long. Rush hour is the worst time to find another taxi.”
She inched the boy closer to the door as she spoke. With every additional measure of distance placed between them and the policeman, the vise on her lungs eased slightly. Breathing a silent sigh of relief, she reached for the doorknob. Her fingers turned nerveless when a gravelly voice sounded behind her.
“Could I ask you a few questions before you leave, ma’am?”
Forcing herself to turn around she looked up, farther than she’d expected, to meet the enigmatic gaze of the man who’d stopped her. “I’m sorry.” She managed, somehow, to keep her voice dispassionate. “We’re in a hurry.”
“This will only take a moment. Detective Connally, ma’am. CPD.” The silver badge imprinted with the telling star was held out for her perusal. She didn’t need the badge or his words to accurately guess the man’s profession. There was cop in his eyes, in his voice.
The man’s low bass somehow matched his brooding features. His short-cropped haircut accentuated the brutal lines and hard angles of his face. But it was his eyes that compelled attention. A pale color reminiscent of fine whiskey, they were trained on her now with the unblinking gaze of a hawk focused on prey. The utter lack of expression in them sent a chill chasing over her skin.
“A man wanted for questioning disappeared near here after some shots were fired. I want to talk to anyone who might have seen him.”
Out of the corner of her eye, Meghan saw the cab pull up to the curb out front. Turning to her nephew she said, “Go tell the driver I’ll be out shortly, will you?”
The boy opened the door and sped toward the vehicle. Gabe focused on the woman before him. It was no hardship. The bulky down coat she was wearing couldn’t disguise the femininity of the form it enveloped. If he’d been a sucker for big blue eyes and delicate bones his professional objectivity might have suffered. As it was, he allowed himself only one brief mental lament over the capricious weather that still caused sensible people to bundle up, and kept his gaze trained firmly on her face.
“I don’t think I can help you, Officer. I didn’t notice anything.”
“Detective.”
“Pardon?”
There was confusion in her wide blue eyes. He noted that her nose was a trifle upturned, her lips perhaps a fraction too full, as if nature had been compelled to stop just short of sheer perfection. A wise move on Mother Nature’s part, Gabe approved. Perfection was boring. Something told him that this woman was anything but.
“It’s Detective Connally.”
“Of course.” The woman’s smile appeared strained.
“But as I said, I didn’t see anyone. I was too involved looking at the merchandise.”
Gabe nodded and raised his notebook, flipped a page. “And your name, ma’am?”
“My name?”
Pen suspended above the paper, he explained, “In case we should have additional questions to ask you at a later date.”
Those full lips curved in a smile that tried to look casual. “Of course. It’s Tina Wilder.” He jotted down the name, as well as the phone number and address she gave him when pressed. And he wondered what possible reason this woman would have to lie to him.
A cop’s experiences, hell, a lifetime of experiences had trained Gabe to recognize the subtle signals people gave off when they were straying from the truth. A tremor in the hands for some, eyes too fixed and bright for others. There were thousands of tell-tale signs, as individual as the people themselves. He wasn’t even sure what tipped him off that Tina Wilder wasn’t being completely forthcoming. Maybe it was her tone, just a trifle too polite, or her expression, just a little too impassive.
But then he looked into those big blue eyes of hers, eyes that could scramble the senses of a less wary man, and there he found his answer. Because behind her deliberately blank expression flickered an emotion much stronger. Even more intriguing.
Desperation.
Recognizing that emotion, he took his time drawing a card from his pocket. He handed it to her, watched carefully as she visibly tucked back her reluctance and reached for it. “In case you remember something later, ma’am. You can reach me at that number or leave a message if I’m not in. I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.”
When she nodded, he added, “I’d like to speak to the boy before you leave.”
Her back stiffened, one vertebrae at a time. “He can’t help you, either. He was much too interested in the toys to observe anything else.”
He tried for a rueful tone, tough for his low timbre, to soothe the nerves he suspected she was hiding. “You’re probably right, but I have to be thorough.”
Her lips curved, and he mentally revised his earlier estimation. They weren’t too full. They weren’t too anything. They appeared to be…just right.
“I’ll get him.”
“Detective.” The clerk’s voice distracted him from her retreating form for a moment. “This gentleman thought he heard something earlier.”
Gabe looked in the direction of the man the clerk indicated and said, “I’ll be right with you, sir.” Sending another glance outside, he gave a silent curse and yanked the door open, ran to the curb.
The cab was already pulling away.
“You gotta give me an address sometime, lady. This is costing you a fortune.” The driver adjusted the mirror, his eyes meeting Meghan’s. She hesitated, then recited her address. Her real address, of course. Not that of the fictitious Tina Wilder, which she’d manufactured for the detective.
She took a deep breath to calm her jangled nerves. Was there some sort of law against giving a false identity to a police detective? She was certain there must be. But like it or not, she was the only one Danny had left to protect him. And although the idea of her newfound guardianship could still lace her with mind-numbing fear, she’d do whatever it took to give the boy the stability that her own childhood had lacked. The stability his mother had failed to provide for him.
“Aunt Meggie?” She looked at her nephew, forced a reassuring smile, one that faded as he continued. “You ’member that guy I told you about? The one in the alley?”
“Hey,
