Читать книгу Code Wolf - Linda Thomas-Sundstrom, Linda Thomas-Sundstrom - Страница 15

Riley hesitated before turning toward the door, annoyed by the interruption. The glass was still in her hand, though she had only managed one more sip.

There was a cop in the hallway. The front-desk guard wouldn’t have let him in without showing proper identification, which meant she didn’t have to worry about that. She could either respond and let him in or ignore him. He wasn’t going to break down the door if she stayed where she was. Eventually, he’d go away.

Riley found herself heading to the door, hoping that this would all be over with sooner, rather than later, and then she could get on with her life.

She paused with her hand on the knob. “What’s your name, Officer?”

The same deep voice that had requested a minute of her time said, “Miller. Detective Miller.”

“I’m quite busy, Detective.”

“I won’t take up much of your time, Dr. Price.”

Riley took a deep breath to settle down and opened the door. The man in the hallway appeared to be as surprised as she was when their eyes briefly met. There was something familiar about him.

“Do I know you, Detective Miller?” she asked, breaking the silence that had stretched for several seconds. “You seem familiar.”

“I’m sure we’ve probably passed on the street. I get around on the job, as you can imagine.”

That could have been true, Riley supposed. But besides the eyes, there was also something distinctive about his voice that caused her to tighten her grip on the glass in her hand.

His gaze drifted to the glass.

“For my nerves,” Riley explained.

The hunk in the hallway nodded. “You’ve had quite a night.”

Detective Miller truly was a hunk. He was tall, dark-haired, and obviously more badass than desk jockey in his worn leather jacket and fitted white T-shirt. He said, “Can I come in, or would you prefer answering questions like this?”

Her sudden interest in guys who looked as good as this detective surprised her.

This guy, at first glance, hit most of her attraction buttons. She liked the shaggy hair, his height and the shape of his face. Action and adventure were probably his middle names. But he was a cop, and she had vowed never to put herself through what her mother had suffered, never really knowing whether her husband would come home at night or be killed on the job.

With that thought firmly in mind, Riley stepped back, opened the door wider and gestured for him to come in with a wave of the glass.

The room was dim, lit only by a lamp on her desk, and yet she easily saw every move this detective made. She was glad the dimness wouldn’t allow him a closer look at the paleness of her face. Putting the desk between herself and the detective, she said, “What do you need from me?”

He hesitated for a few beats too long for her not to notice. “You’re a psychiatrist?” he asked.

“Psychologist. And very new to the business.”

“That’s good.”

“Why?”

“Maybe you can better manage what happened tonight and put it in perspective.”

He again glanced at the glass she was clutching.

Detective Miller’s voice was deep enough that its vibration quietly filled the room. His eyes, however, told another story, and made Riley imagine he was on good behavior and playing nice at the moment.

“What is it you need?” Riley repeated.

She set down the glass.

The detective had only walked far enough into the room to get a distant view of the window, but he looked there. “Will you be able to identify your attacker?”

“I’ll never forget his face,” she said. “I have a knack for remembering faces.”

More beats of silence passed and the detective still hadn’t said anything to warrant this visit. She had already told this same thing to the officers at the scene.

“I just needed to corroborate your place of employment, Dr. Price, and to make sure you’re credible,” he said.

“Credible how? What’s my job got to do with anything?”

“It makes things easier for us all if you are believable in your statements.”

Riley pointed to her throat. “Want to see the bruises that guy inflicted?”

She flushed when his gaze landed on her neck, and began to think this detective might have had another reason for coming here. However, since she had already allowed her imagination to run amok once tonight and had landed in trouble because of it, Riley waited for whatever he’d say next.

“I’m sorry to have brought this up so soon and to have disturbed you,” he said. “Tonight’s attack must have been terrible for you. So how about if I apologize for the intrusion and let you get on with whatever you were doing? You can answer more questions tomorrow.”

Riley nodded. “Thanks for showing some concern.”

She wasn’t going to vocalize how Detective Miller’s presence lent an air of safety to a truly awful night, or how knowing that guys like this were on the streets doing their job made her feel slightly better.

There was no way in hell she was going to submit to fanciful thoughts about this guy, or let herself believe he was strikingly similar in size and looks to the man that had come to her rescue on the street...because that would have been pathetic.

“Well, I’m glad to see that you’re going to be okay,” he said.

“Yes, thanks to two of your guys out there.”

The detective’s inquiring gaze returned. “Did you mention anything concrete about them to the officers who took your initial statement? Descriptions? Conversations?”

“It happened so fast, I’m afraid I wasn’t in good enough shape to speak or to note many details about who those guys were. One of the officers later suggested some ideas about who my rescuers might have been, though.”

“So you wouldn’t be able to identify them?”

Riley eyed her glass on the desk, wishing she actually liked whiskey and that she’d taken another sip if there was going to be much more of an interrogation.

“I was just glad they showed up in time to save my ass,” she said.

Detective Miller’s gaze was like being caught in a tractor beam. Never one to shy away from a challenge, Riley met that gaze with an equally studious one.

“Nothing?” Detective Miller asked. “You can’t describe them in any way?”

“Other than the fact that neither of them wore shirts, not much was clear...which is strange, when I think about it. So I’d prefer not to think about it and just be grateful.”

When the detective smiled, a further ripple of familiarity returned to her in a flash of repressed memory of the night’s events. Her rescuer had dark hair and light eyes that were a lot like this guy’s. They both had the same kind of unshaven face that highlighted handsome, angular features. She had sensed wildness in the man on the street as well, and both of these men possessed the same kind of male vibration that affected her after only a glance in her direction.

She ran a fingertip down her cheek—the same cheek her rescuer’s lips had illicitly touched. That touch left her feeling breathless.

Detective Miller’s expression was again one of concern, though he didn’t close the distance.

“Are you all right, Dr. Price?”

“Yes. I... I just need time to process this.”

“Did you remember something just then?” he asked.

Rile shook her head. “Nothing that would help.”

The detective nodded, turned and walked to the door. Riley tracked his movement without calling him back, though every cell in her body urged her to ask him to stay. At the door, he paused as if he might have been reluctant to leave her.

“I don’t see myself as a victim,” Riley said.

He looked at her over a broad shoulder. “I can see that you don’t.”

As he crossed the threshold, she added, “Actually, the man who came to my rescue looked a little bit like you.”

He paused again, then said, “I get that a lot. I’m thinking it must be the jacket. Good night, Dr. Price. Maybe we’ll meet again tomorrow.”

As he closed the door, Riley took her first deep breath and headed after him. Changing her mind at the last minute, she leaned against the door and strained to hear the sound of the elevator, but felt as if she were listening for something else. Like the howl of a wolf. Or the velvety growl of a light-eyed, dark-haired, chisel-faced, half-dressed werewolf with the kind of voice that resonated, even now, in her soul.

Just like Detective Miller’s had.

Derek leaned a shoulder against the wall of the elevator and looked up, as if he could see through the ceiling to a couple floors up.

“Good night, Riley Price,” he muttered. “He looked like me, did he?”

He had taken a chance by coming here to speak with her, but at least he now knew the things she did and didn’t remember, and could take comfort in the fact that she hadn’t been able to identify him outright while standing several feet apart.

“I’m no less interested, just so you know,” he added.

She was safe up there in her office with the guard manning the front desk. At the very least, he didn’t have to worry about that. Her memory was another issue altogether. Psychologists were familiar with all sorts of tricks to spark repressed memories. Meeting her again would not be wise.

And yet he wanted to see her again. He wanted to see her again right now and get to the heart of the werewolf remark she’d made on the street. But that would probably serve no purpose whatsoever other than to place his pack in jeopardy.

He signed out and exited the building with a curt wave to the guard. From the sidewalk in front of the building, Derek glanced up at the moon and said, “Fine. Let’s get on with it.” He walked toward the car he had parked near here earlier in the evening, before the night’s antics had begun.

He removed his jacket, tossed it on the seat and took one more look at the street corner from the shadows of the two buildings that hid Riley Price’s building from sight. Then he ducked into the alley, where the subtle scent of werewolves filled the night air like its own brand of dangerous perfume.

From her window, Riley watched the detective turn the corner. He did look a little bit like the man who had rescued her. At least, she thought he did.

Grabbing her jacket and her purse, she locked the door and went down to the street, determined to find the truth of what she now had come to suspect—that Detective Miller and the man who had helped to save her life could, in fact, be one and the same. If not, maybe Miller had a brother on the force. A twin.

He had headed east with purpose, as though he knew exactly where he was going and what he’d find there. His stride had been graceful when viewed from above, and radiated confidence. Miller was a dangerous man in his own right.

Riley gripped her cell phone tightly in her hand as she exited the elevator, signed out and started out after the detective, hoping she’d catch his trail before both sanity and the need to think about her own safety returned. The fact that she wasn’t alone helped somewhat. There were plenty of cars moving in both directions. Couples laughing and holding hands breezed by her, and she had a momentary pang of desire to be like them.

She couldn’t really recall the last time she had shared a light, loving moment with anyone. The flicker of wildness in her nature made her want to find her soul mate instead of settling for anything less, and she had never found that certain someone.

At the intersection, she paused, knowing Miller was long gone and that she was a fool for thinking she could have found him.

But then...

She heard a sound that made her hands quake. Was it an engine turning over, or could it have been a growl?

You know better, Price.

Go back to the office or go home.

She ignored both of those options. As if tonight’s events had never happened, Riley crossed the street. She headed for an area where shadows pooled and moonlight failed to reach the sidewalk, drawn there for reasons that felt insane. If Detective Miller had been looking for trouble, the shadows were where he was going to find it.