to my car? Demanded to know who I was and what I was doing?
Not for a second did I dare take my eyes off him. Above the dash I saw him pause at one of the cars parked farther up, four vehicles past my position. Every mistake I had made in my calculations of how this little operation would go down flashed before my eyes. I hadn’t considered that he might have extra security, though I hadn’t seen hide or hair of anyone as of yet. Or that Barlow would give me any grief when I told him I’d solved his case for him. I also hadn’t given any thought to what I would do if a moment like this transpired.
If Sawyer moved toward my vehicle…what would I do?
My fingers itched to reach toward the ignition and turn the key. With nothing parked behind me, I could throw the transmission into Reverse and barrel all the way down the block before executing a quick turn to get the hell out of here. But if I did that, he would know. The whole operation would be blown and then my efforts would be for nothing.
And Barlow would know what I had done. Not to mention that Sawyer would likely get my license plate number as I rushed away and he would not rest until he tracked me down. My new career, such as it is, would be over, but far worse, my life likely would be as well.
So, I forced myself to remain perfectly still. To keep my breathing slow and steady. To stay as calm as anyone could in this situation.
The top of his head disappeared from my line of vision and I felt my insides go cold. Was he moving toward my car now? Keeping low so I wouldn’t see him? I balled my fingers into fists and fought the need to run.
I resisted the near overwhelming urge to close my eyes and wait for death to descend. Good thing, too, because a gray sedan suddenly drove past my position. Sawyer was behind the wheel. He didn’t even look in my direction.
Profound relief washed over me. As difficult as it was, I waited three more seconds before I eased back up in the seat and started my car. By the time I backed up and turned around he had stopped at the end of the block to wait for the traffic signal to change. In my peripheral vision I noted that one of the parked cars was missing. Why did he keep a car parked on the street when he had a lot in front of his building?
The answer was simple, I realized. He, unlike me, had contingency plans.
Though it was dark now I didn’t turn on my headlights. I rolled slowly forward, giving the signal time to change so that he would be focused on moving through the intersection rather than on what came up behind him. As he pulled out onto the main street, I followed. He merged into traffic on the cross street, which facilitated my ability to tail him and allowed me to turn on my headlights. This new vehicle he drove was a late model, four doors. Much harder to keep in sight since it blended in with the other vehicles rather than rising above them as the SUV had done.
I felt damned proud that I’d managed to keep my head about me during that last minute or so. If I’d ducked down too far in my seat or closed my eyes, I would never have seen him leave. I would still be parked on that street in front of his office wondering where he’d disappeared to. I prayed my good luck and my nerve would hold out for another hour and forty-five minutes.
Steven Barlow had worked murder cases for too long to talk about. He shook his head as he allowed his mind to traverse the files and faces of his professional past. That was never a good idea. Too many ugly reminders of the evil that men and women alike could do.
With hard work he managed to bring the killer to justice most of the time. Hardly ever failed, to be quite honest. But three years ago, he had. Failed, that is.
Brett Sawyer had gotten away with murder and Steven knew in his gut the man was guilty as sin. But he hadn’t been able to prove it. Whether Sawyer was that smart or just damned lucky, he still couldn’t say. And it really didn’t matter. All that mattered was that the bastard had gotten away with it.
Steven plowed his fingers through his hair and stared at the phone on the table next to his couch. What the hell was Merrilee Walters doing? How did she think she could pull this off? Not that Steven considered himself infallible, but at least he had the gold shield that gave him license to track down killers. This woman was a file clerk, for Christ’s sake!
Worry gnawed at his gut. Did the woman have a death wish? He put in a call to dispatch and had all calls to his home forwarded to his cell phone in the event he had to leave the house any minute now. Then he requested a trace on Merrilee’s cellular. Just to be sure he got her, he put out a silent APB on her car. He didn’t want her name going out over the airwaves just in case anyone who owed Sawyer was listening and…
“Just in case she’s nuts,” he muttered.
After the initial call it had taken a moment, but he’d remembered the woman. She worked in the archives. Cute. Flaming red hair. Pretty green eyes. Shy.
She’d never spoken to him, nor had he to her.
But then, his social life pretty much sucked. He stared at the bowl of popcorn on the coffee table that he’d been devouring before her call. Hell, it was Saturday night, and since he wasn’t hot on the trail of some killer, he sat at home, alone, watching a made-for-television movie.
Refusing to be disgusted with his own choices, Steven hauled himself up from the couch and followed his instincts. Might as well get dressed for business.
That old sixth sense—cop sense—was telling him to get ready. Merrilee Walters had gotten herself into a whole shitload of trouble, and if he didn’t do something about it she would most likely end up dead.
No way in hell was he going to let Sawyer get away with murder again. Even if the victim had brought it on herself.
Steven shook his head again. What the hell was this little file clerk up to?
Chapter 3
That’s the problem with being deaf. You can’t hear a damned thing. My impairment is commonly called profound loss. You don’t hear anything at all. I hadn’t heard Sawyer open the car door or slam it shut. Hadn’t heard the engine start or anything else.
I’ve learned to live with the lack of that crucial sense. What else could I do? But it had been devastating at first. Even now a slice of pain went through me at the memory. A few months before my twenty-eighth birthday I’d suffered a typical sinus infection. Nothing major, the usual nuisance. But the infection wasn’t just any old bug, it was a rare strain that would evolve and spread and do serious damage before the doctors, including the best ENT to be found in the whole state, could recognize and stop it. In the end, I survived, but my hearing was gone. A mixed hearing loss, functional as well as neurological.
What on earth did a twenty-seven-year-old woman do when she suddenly found herself deaf? Who wanted an elementary school teacher who didn’t know how to be deaf? One who no longer knew how to teach without the ability to hear? Needless to say, the school board did the only thing they could, they gave me a disability pension. And my fiancé, the very one I was supposed to wed in a mere three months, walked away from our relationship with no real explanation. I could only deduce that, as a songwriter, he felt that the woman with whom he would share the rest of his life needed to be able to hear and appreciate his music.
So, here I was, two years later, venturing out on my very first unsafe limb. Diving into my very first adventure as a handicapped woman.
I hated the term, but I couldn’t deny its accuracy.
I moved into the right lane, two cars
