Shielded In The Shadows

There’d been a lot of blood. She’d been unconscious.

“It was Bill,” she told him.

“He had an alibi.” He wasn’t going to lie to her about it. Knew that he’d probably never convince her the man wasn’t after her. “He was picked up pulling into his driveway before they even got you to the hospital, but has already been released. He was at group all evening and several people there have verified the information.”

“They could be lying. They’re all ex-cons, rememb—” She stopped suddenly, a memory surfacing from her earlier meeting with Suzie Heber. “When I was leaving the Stand, Suzie asked me to please ‘leave it alone.’ Those exact words.”

He knew Chantel’s team had been through all of Emma’s current case files, anything that someone might want her to “leave alone.” They were calling a couple of people in for questioning about their whereabouts, both on the night her back door had been vandalized and for that evening, as well, and he told her so.

She nodded. Frowned at him. He didn’t want anything worrying her. Didn’t want her bothered.

“What?” he asked.

“Is it wrong for me to be glad you’re here?”

“I don’t know.”

“You think you should go? I can get one of the girls to come stay with me if I need help when I get out of here. Marta would do it.”

“I’m not going anywhere.” That wasn’t debatable, as far as he was concerned. “Whether it’s Bill or some other maniac, right now you’re in danger. And speaking of which, I should probably have the numbers for your friends. The accident’s going to be on the news. A prosecutor being targeted, twice in one week... I had a call from Chantel and they’re going to be asking for the public’s help in finding this guy.”

He’d keep it about business, no matter how much he struggled with needing more.

“Thank you.” She didn’t smile. Didn’t reach out a hand to him. But the look in her eye sent another bout of emotion surging through him.

“I’m just glad you’re okay,” he told her. Praying that’s that all it was. That he wasn’t starting to need more from their association than he could have. And that she wasn’t, either.

He didn’t say that, though.

He also didn’t tell her that Bill said there was no teenage boy in his old neighborhood. In the morning he’d be checking with the two names the man had given him, Bill’s former neighbors and current clients, to see what they had to say.

And he was going to be checking in with Bill way more than the man would like.

But for the most part, he was sticking to the prosecutor like glue.

Just until the danger had passed.

Chapter 20

Jayden stayed at the hospital until Emma was settled in her room for the night. A couple of her law school friends were on their way in and he didn’t want to run into them—didn’t want to just be a work associate, couldn’t be anything else. Officers were stationed at her door. A precaution and maybe overkill, but he didn’t think so. And was glad that Chantel was taking the situation as seriously as she was.

No doubt about it, if not for Emma’s quick thinking in gunning her car and pulling left, she’d have been over that cliff and gone.

He tried all night long, as he tossed and turned, to get over that thought. Her coming so close to death: stark fear shot through him yet again. It kept happening. Over and over. He’d finally fall asleep, only to wake up with a stab of fear. By morning he was pissed.

Mostly with himself.

If all her morning tests went well and everything else remained stable and responsive throughout the day, she’d be ready for him to take her home late that afternoon. He was stopping by her place to pick up some clothes.

“Marta and Stef offered to stay with me,” she told him when he called from his car just after seven to see how her night had gone. He’d just come from Bill’s old neighborhood, catching his neighbors before they left for work, and heard from both men that neither of them could remember a teenage boy living in their neighborhood, or e

ven staying over the summer. “They offered to pick up clothes and things, too.”

So she was telling him he wasn’t needed? He, after all, wasn’t even a friend.

He was a cop whose offender might possibly have tried to kill a prosecutor. He didn’t think so. Bill’s alibi was strong.

But something wasn’t adding up. Clearly someone was hurting Suzie. Doctor’s reports didn’t lie about such things. But he didn’t think she was being completely honest, either.