She and Daniel made a stop for a man driving with illegal plates on Tuesday afternoon and answered a call to a local dealership with a broken security gate and missing brand-new Mustang convertible—which they found, while out canvassing the area, nose down in a ditch a few miles away. There were no bodies in the car, no arrests to make, so they left the scene to the detectives, to see about a report of indecent exposure on the beach. She and Daniel were just pulling into the precinct house, a naked perp wrapped in a blanket in their backseat, when Johnson’s cell phone rang.
Leaving Daniel to get the perp dressed and turned over to the jail, she took the call outside in the parking lot. Colin wanted to meet for breakfast.
And her heart leaped. Because he had breakfast with Julie every morning and she needed a chance to speak with his sister without library committee members present.
She accepted his invitation eagerly, and asked, “Will Julie be with you?”
“No.”
Of course not. He was attempting to date her.
As aggressively as she was trying not to fall under his spell.
A small snag in her plan. An added challenge to the assignment. Not a road block.
“I just... You said you two have breakfast together every morning and she missed this morning, and I don’t want to impinge on that time. I understand how important it is.” She slowed herself to a more refined Johnson level. “I liked her, Colin. I just want you to know that I don’t mind...if she joins us.”
“Thank you.” He gave her that intimate tone again. The one that slid through her ear and down to her toes. “But Julie’s otherwise engaged in the morning.”
“Again?”
“Apparently.”
She frowned, leaning against the brick wall of the building, enjoying the cool night air. She watched as another cruiser pulled in, and Dave Butts, an officer she’d worked with a few times, pulled a purple-haired teenager with a tattoo down his neck out of the backseat.
“You still haven’t seen her?”
“No. Which isn’t all that unusual, except for breakfast. When she’s working, she locks herself in her room and doesn’t want to be disturbed.”
“She has to eat.”
“She has a refrigerator in her studio and a hot plate—not that I’ve ever known her to use it for anything but making tea.”
“Her studio? I thought she was like Patricia Reynolds. Occupied full-time by charitable work.”
“She spends a lot of time with committee work, but nothing like Patricia. Julie’s actually quite talented...with pencil drawings mostly. She has an art degree from UCLA with a dual minor in finance and early childhood development.”
Smiling, Chantel put one booted foot up against the wall. He sounded like a proud papa. And, she supposed, in some ways he was one.
In that moment, he reminded her of Max. And she told herself not to care. She was on the job.
“So you’re certain she’s okay?” she asked, getting back to breakfast the next morning. And the possibility of him asking Julie to join them.
“Of course. I knock on her door. She tells me to go away. I text. She answers.”
“But breakfast...you said that was a given.”
“I think she’s avoiding me.”
Dave Butts was back in his car. His partner had yet to return. Daniel would be back any minute. Her time was running short.
And all Chantel wanted to do was stand there and chat. “Why would she be avoiding you? Not because of that Patricia thing. Is it? Is she really that upset about it?”
“I don’t think so.”
“She hasn’t told you?”
“No.”
“Have you asked?”
“Of course.”
“Do you want me to invite her to join us for breakfast?” she finally asked.
“That would please me very much. However, I think I need to have one more try at her myself. I just heard a scrape of a chair on the dining room tile. I should go.”
“Text me if you want me to call her. I’ve got her number from the library committee roster.”
“You got it. And, Chantel?”
“Yes?”
“Thank you.”
“Of course. I’ll see you in the morning.”
It wasn’t until after she’d hung up that she realized they hadn’t said when or where.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
JULIE WAS AT the dining room table—in colorful flannel pants and a cami top—a cup of tea and a plate of peanut butter toast in front of her. Colin stood back, watching her for a minute, missing his folks. They’d know more what to do with this shadow of the spirited child they’d raised—how to bring her fully back to life.
If his father had been alive, the rape would not have gone unpunished. Of that Colin felt certain.