Читать книгу Daddy With A Badge - Paula Riggs Detmer - Страница 8

Portland, Oregon—Six months later.

As soon as Dr. Daniela Fabrizio picked up her office phone and heard the tobacco-ruined voice of the repair shop mechanic on the other end, she’d expected bad news. In fact, it was worse than bad.

“Did you say eleven hundred dollars?” she forced out when breath returned to her body. “To fix that…that lemon?”

On the other end of the line Bruno of Bruno’s Economy Automotive Repairs cleared his throat. “Uh, yes, ma’am. ’Leven hunnert it is. ’Course that could be a mite high on account of we might be able to get some of the parts used. I got my parts girl callin’ around, but it bein’ the start of the holiday weekend and all, it’ll prob’ly be Tuesday or Wednesday before I know for sure.”

“But you said it was just the transmission.”

“Lady, there ain’t no just to it when it comes to them foreign jobs. This here model of your’n is especially wonky.”

“Wonky. I…see.” Danni squeezed her eyes shut and tried to find that safe place in her mind. Unfortunately, it seemed to have disappeared, along with darn near everything else she and her late husband Mark had accumulated during twelve years of marriage. Like the silver Lexus Mark had given her four years ago on their tenth anniversary and the healthy nest egg from his insurance settlement that she’d put aside for Lyssa’s college education.

This morning on the way to the restored Victorian white elephant on the edge of Portland’s historic district that she shared with two other psychotherapists, the nine-year-old hatchback that was now her only mode of transportation had started bucking like a deranged bronc.

By the time she’d made it to the nearest off-ramp, narrowly averting death by collision several times, her entire thirty-six years on earth had passed before her eyes. She’d barely made it to the ramp’s shoulder when smoke had started pouring out from under the hood. The driver of the tow truck she’d called on her cell phone had recommended Bruno’s.

“Couldn’t you just fix some of the gears? I mean, I only need Drive and Reverse and Park. The others are just superfluous.”

This time Bruno snorted something approximating a belly laugh. “That’s a good one, Miz Fabrizio. Yes, ma’am, it surely is. But no can do.”

“In other words, it’s all or…nothing. Transmission-wise.”

“That’s about the size of it, yep.”

She drew in a lungful of air. The pink hybrid tea roses she’d brought from home yesterday morning gave off a cloyingly sweet smell, and her stomach did a slow, clammy roll. The Cajun chicken salad she’d forced down at her desk five hours earlier had clearly been a mistake.

“So worst-case scenario, if I want it fixed, I have to come up with eleven hunnert—hundred dollars?”

“Yep. Like the man says, cash on the barrelhead.”

No one said that these days. No one had said that for a hundred years at least. Nevertheless, the meaning was all too clear. No money, no car.

Like it or not, Lyssa would have to transfer to a middle school closer to the house they were currently renting on Mill Works Ridge. It would break her daughter’s heart to leave her friends in Lake Oswego, but even with a student pass, the bus fare was more than their already whisper-thin budget could handle.

She took another breath, fighting a sick feeling of helplessness. The phone rang twice in Paul Baxter’s office next door before the service picked up. Outside, a MAX train swooshed past. A horn tooted cheerfully. It was the start of Memorial Day weekend, and downtown was emptying fast. Happy people rushing out to have fun despite the gray skies and icy wind.

The weather was due to break late tomorrow night, however, with the promise of sunshine for the rest of the long weekend. As a special surprise, she’d planned to take Lyssa down to the family vineyard near Ashland on Sunday. Fortunately Danni hadn’t told her yet. Her little girl had already had too many broken promises in her twelve short years.

“Okay, say you can get those used parts,” she said with determined cheerfulness. “What’s the best I can hope for, cost-wise?”

“Hmm. Let me do some calculatin’ here.”

“With a sharp pencil, okay?”

“Ain’t no need for a pencil. I got me a knack for figures, do it all in my head.”

Which, as she recalled, was shaped exactly like a bullet. With a greasy “gimme” cap on top.

Torn between laughing hysterically or pleading piteously, Danni clamped her mouth shut and leaned back against the high back of her cushy executive chair. One by one she toed off her low-heeled pumps, then closed her eyes.

She’d been up since six, with scarcely a moment to herself since she’d dropped Lyssa off at school. Her calendar had been packed, with only a hurried twenty minutes for lunch. Her last session had been highly emotional, and she’d been drained by the time Cindy Habiz had left, calmer, finally, but still dangerously volatile.

Now it was nearly 5:00 p.m. and she still had patient notes to dictate so that their part-time medical assistant Ruthie could transcribe them over the weekend. Friday was also her night to stop at the market for groceries. Did taxis charge extra to carry groceries? she wondered, feeling a little giddy.

“Well, near’s I can figure, the best we can do even with used parts would be a thou.”

Sharpen the damn pencil again! she wanted to shout. Instead, she dropped her head and rubbed her forehead with her free hand. The spot above her right eyebrow was beginning to throb and her stomach was growing more iffy by the second.

“I can pay you a third now and the rest over the next three months.” It would mean more belt-tightening, but—

“Sorry, little lady, I don’t give credit. Got burned too many times by deadbeats, y’know?”

“Yes, I suppose you have.” Danni felt truly queasy now. Humiliation had a taste, she’d learned. It was beyond bitter. She cleared her throat, but the bitterness remained. “Uh, let me see what I can do and I’ll call you Tuesday morning.”

There was a momentary silence before Bruno said in a softer tone, “Tell you the truth, I don’t like takin’ plastic on account of the service charge, but I s’pose I could make an exception, seein’ as how you’re expecting a little ’un and all.”

A sudden wash of tears blurred the outlines of her mauve-and-blue office. The kindness of strangers, she thought. “I’m afraid that won’t help, but thank you for the offer,” she said in a wobbly voice.

Both of her platinum cards had been cancelled. In the bottom drawer of her filing cabinet was a thick file folder full of overdue statements and threatening letters. While she’d been basking in newlywed bliss—and her adoring husband’s constant attention—Jonathan Sommerset, may he rot in the hottest bowels of hell, had managed to steal every cent of her liquid assets, sell her beautiful home on a bluff and all the furnishings before destroying her credit rating.

The damage he’d done to an innocent young girl desperate to feel a father’s love again was his greatest crime, however. For that alone, the lying weasel deserved to spend the rest of his worthless life in a particularly nasty prison.

There was one bright spot however. Her own silver lining. A tired smile curved her lips as she pressed her hand to her swelling tummy. Jonathan had given her a baby.

Her baby, and Lyssa’s, not his. Never his.

As desperate as she was financially, she had still gotten the best of the bargain. Perhaps that was the best revenge, she thought with a small measure of satisfaction.

“Miz Fabrizio, you still with me?”

“Still here.” Barely. “Uh, tell you what, Bruno, let me see what I can do about raising the money, and I’ll call you on Tuesday.”

“Yes ma’am. I’ll be waiting.” He cleared his throat. “Uh, Miz Fabrizio, say you wasn’t able to come up with the money, I’d be willing to take that old hatchback off your hands for…say, four hunnert.”

She sucked in a breath. “Cash on the barrelhead?” she couldn’t resist asking as her headache suddenly increased exponentially.

“Why yes, ma’am.” He chuckled. “You might do you some askin’ around before you accept, but I promise you, it’s a right fair offer. You’re not gonna get a better one.”

Her throat was suddenly clogged with tears. Somehow she managed to thank Bruno before putting down the phone. And then, alone in the office that was the only thing Jonathan hadn’t been able to steal, she buried her face in her arms and cried.

Finally, after frustrating months of mistaken identities and dead ends, they’d scared up a lead. It was thin, little more than wishful thinking but even that was more than they’d had in weeks of chasing down dead-end leads.

Rafe had been running on the treadmill in the Treasury Building’s basement gym when Gresham had come charging in, waving a fax from the Portland, Oregon office. The local authorities had put out a “wanted for questioning” alert for a man using the name Jonathan Sommerset who matched Folsom’s description.

The charge was credit card fraud, swindling and forgery. The suspect’s M.O. was strikingly similar. A “chance” meeting with a lonely widow on a luxury cruise to Acapulco, a whirlwind courtship ending in a romantic wedding in a chapel on the beach before sailing home.

The honeymoon had scarcely been over before he’d managed to have his name added to the deed to his bride’s house and the title of a nearly new Lexus sedan. Naturally, he had insisted on adding her name to the deeds to his condo on Maui and the flat in San Francisco as well as his brokerage account and savings accounts, all of which existed only on official looking documents Folsom had created on his laptop computer. In turn, she’d given him total access to her bank and savings accounts, both of which were all too genuine.

Then, as was his pattern, he had convinced her to invest in a revolutionary new method of converting sawdust to decking material impervious to weather and pests. The process was real, as were the reams of supporting documentation. Only the stock certificates were phony.

Ten weeks after the wedding Sommerset arranged to take his wife and stepdaughter to England as a birthday surprise for the girl. Two days before departing, he’d pleaded a sudden business emergency, sending them on ahead. Excuse followed excuse until three weeks had passed. By the time the woman had gotten suspicious and flown home, Folsom had systematically emptied her bank accounts, sold her home and all the furnishings and maxed her credit cards before disappearing.

That had been almost three months ago, long enough for the trail to have gotten colder than a hooker’s heart. Picking the victim’s brain for some forgotten detail, some chance recollection that might put them on the scent again was their only hope.

They’d been on the red-eye that same night, landing at Portland just as the sun was rising this morning. The head of the Service’s local office had lent them a vehicle, a no-frills sedan that smelled like a Texas honky-tonk, and drawn a map to the Portland PD precinct that had caught the case.

Even though it was raining steadily, Rafe had cracked the windows, front and back. The breeze that streamed through was flavored with pine and brought back memories of the crowded migrant camp by the river where he’d spent the first seventeen years of his life.

He shifted until his shoulders were wedged against the door. Even then and with the seat pushed back all the way, he couldn’t stretch out his legs far enough to get comfortable.

Damn, he hated this, he thought sourly. Memories were a bitch, especially the mean, gut-twisting kind that snuck under a man’s guard to deliver a sucker punch to the solar plexus. He’d known it was going to be rough being in Oregon again, but he’d figured to handle it fast and dirty, no more than forty-eight hours to find out all he needed to know, then he’d be outta here again. For good, this time.

It wasn’t until he’d met with Detective Sergeant Case Randolph and heard the name of the victim that he’d known just how rough.

Twenty years ago he’d been wildly, blindly in love with Daniela Mancini.

In the case folder had been a photograph, taken of the happy couple right after their wedding. It was like a slice in his heart to see the photo of his adorable Princess looking stunningly happy in a flowing white Mexican wedding dress, her dark eyes glowing as she looked up into the face of Jacob Folsom.

He’d spent a lot of years telling himself she’d probably gotten fat and sour-tempered. Just his luck the young girl who had been a beauty at sixteen had matured into a sensuous, elegant lady with a body that could make a dead man weep.

“Nice neighborhood, this. Real homey like, you know. Almost makes a guy want to settle down and raise himself a couple of kids.”

Jarred from his dark thoughts by the sound of Seth Gresham’s perfect prep-school diction, Rafe opened his tired eyes long enough to shoot his talkative partner a sardonic look.

“Thought you were committed to playing the field.” In contrast to Seth’s cultured voice, his own was strictly blue-collar and inclined toward hoarseness when he was tired, a residual affect of the tube they’d stuck down his throat to keep him breathing. Women tended to consider the gruff texture a turn-on, something he wasn’t above using to his advantage when it suited him.

“I said ‘almost,’ compadre,” Gresham tossed back with a grin. “As long as the ladies keep smiling back, I’m keeping my options open.”

Seth nudged the seat back another notch and loosened his tie before pulling a folder from the hand-sewn briefcase at his feet. Inside were copies of Sergeant Randolph’s notes.

The man had lousy handwriting, but he knew his stuff. It was a textbook report, concisely detailed, every question Rafe might have had answered. Just in case, he read it twice. By the time he’d finished the second read, his gut was twisted into an icy knot.

It was Folsom, all right. Rafe would bet his farm on it, the one he’d bought in the Maryland countryside about ten years back when he’d felt the need to have space and fresh air around him. He felt the same way now.

“Taxi just turned the corner.”

Without moving, Rafe opened his eyes and glanced toward the end of the street. Mill Works Ridge was only two blocks long. On one side, far below the street was the mighty Columbia River. On the other was an alley leading back to Waverly Avenue, the main access road.

His gut tightened as the cab pulled to the curve in front of the house listed on the crime report as Danni’s address.

“What the hell?” Gresham muttered under his breath as he shot to a sitting position.

“Could be a visitor.”

“Definitely female,” Gresham said as the passenger struggled to get out of the cab’s back seat. Swathed in a bright red slicker, she made a vivid splash against the gray landscape.

As she emerged and straightened, Rafe felt his world tilt. It was Danni. And she was pregnant.

A driving rain stung Danni’s face and obscured her vision as she struggled to balance two bulging grocery sacks, and the large shoulder bag that served as both a briefcase and purse. Ducking her head deeper into the slicker’s hood, she edged crab-like toward the curb, only to have a sudden gust of wind bang the cab’s door against her hip.

“Thanks for all the help,” she muttered in the direction of the grossly overweight cabby with really bad body odor who had refused to leave the protection of his equally smelly cab to help carry the groceries to her front door.

“Fact of life, lady,” he said with a shrug. “I get paid to drive. Anything else costs extra.”

Extra she didn’t have. “I’d hate to have your karma,” she muttered before ducking her head against the stinging drops.

Struggling against the wind, she finally made it to the safety of the curb, then turned awkwardly to slam the cab door. As she did, one of the sodden bags tore, spilling the contents into the muddy water surging along the gutter. Cold spray hit her shins as cans thudded onto the pavement. A large can of tomato juice smashed her toes, sending pain shooting through her foot.

She jerked back, only to lose her balance. With a cry, she dropped the other bag, and reached out desperately to keep herself from falling. He came from nowhere, a large man in a dark suit moving fast. An instant later, she was wedged against a chest as hard as granite, her head tucked against a bronzed throat. Steely arms held her steady while his wide back sheltered her from the rain and wind.

“Easy, I’ve got you.” The voice came from far above her head, a deep baritone with a faintly hoarse quality. She smelled soap on damp skin and felt the edge of a starched collar against her cheek. Heart thudding, she clutched at the strong arms supporting her.

“Don’t be frightened, Daniela, we’re Federal agents.”

Federal agents? Men in Black, or in this case a lovely charcoal gray? In safe and solid Mill Works Ridge, the same community known affectionately as Maternity Row? Hysterical laughter bubbled in her throat. She fought it down. Later, she would fall apart.

“If you’re IRS, you’re wasting your time. The old blood and turnip thing. I’m the turnip.”

She thought he chuckled before she remembered that government types had no humor. “Good thing we’re Treasury, not IRS, then.”

He loosened his hold but kept his arms around her. After straightening carefully, she pushed back her hood so that she could see his face. At the same time he lowered his head so that his gaze met hers, and for a moment she felt as though she were poised at the top of a ski run, with a pristine slope of freshly-groomed powder falling away in a dizzying drop below.

She knew that face. Oh, how she knew it! Once she’d held it in her mind so that she would fall asleep thinking of him. After he’d left her, his image had tormented her in dreams for months.

The proud angles and strong planes were more sharply chiseled now, but still breathtaking. Beneath slashing brows the color of sun-washed sand, his eyes were an unusual sage green with sun crinkles at the corners and dense lashes. His chin was solid, with a hint of a cleft, his features boldly drawn, as though with swift, angry strokes on an imperfect canvas—all but his lips which had the smallest of curves at one corner. Like the beginning of the sweetest of smiles.

It wasn’t really a smile, but a scar, one she’d put there herself when she’d been six and he’d been eight. He’d caught her crying because her brothers had gone fishing and left her behind, so he’d taken her to his own favorite spot along the Little Applegate.

Instead of a steelhead, she’d hooked him, then in her dismay jerked hard on the line, slicing his mouth as the hook pulled free. Blood had spurted like a fountain, and she’d gotten hysterical. He had ended up comforting her.

“My God, Rafe?”

His mouth slanted. That same cleanly defined mouth that had brushed hers in her first real kiss. “So you do remember. I’m flattered.”

Remember? How could she forget? Suddenly cold to the marrow, she shivered violently.

His face changed, growing hard. “Give me your hand. You need to get inside.”

Somehow she drew herself taller, pitting her five foot four inch admittedly out of shape form against six feet three inches of hard-bitten, decidedly intimidating muscle. “I’m not moving an inch until you tell me why you’re suddenly on my doorstep after twenty years.”

“We’ll talk inside.”

“Oh no we—”

His gaze narrowed, acting remarkably like a whiplash. She refused to be afraid. “Inside, Daniela. Maybe you’re immune to pneumonia, but I’m not.”

Without waiting for permission, he slipped the strap of her briefcase from her shoulder and slung it over his own, before tucking a big hand beneath her elbow. She started to turn, only to have his hand tighten.

“Gresham!”

Startled by the sudden bark of command, she glanced up to find him looking over his shoulder. As though conjured by Rafe’s will alone, a tall, dark-haired man appeared, his suit blue instead of gray, his tie knotted in the same full Windsor Mark had preferred.

Ice blue eyes in a tanned, aristocratic face met hers with frank curiosity as he inclined his head a polite two inches then waited while Rafe performed a perfunctory introduction.

“Dr. Daniela Fabrizio, meet Special Agent Seth Gresham, of the Greenwich Greshams.”

The young agent’s mouth curved into a boyish grin. “A pleasure, ma’am.”

“Agent.” Her voice came out too thin, and she took a fast breath. Heart thudding, she willed herself to calm down. Adrenaline wasn’t good for the baby. It wasn’t all that good for the baby’s mom, either, she realized, as the dull headache that had gotten worse while she stood in the checkout lane took on a sharper edge.

“I need to get Dr. Fabrizio inside,” Rafe informed his partner curtly. “Make sure that rubbernecking cabby’s not thinking about calling out 911 on us, then get the damn groceries.”

“Yes sir.” Gresham shifted his gaze to her, then asked politely, “Ma’am, are you square with the driver?” His voice was Eastern, the diction perfect.

“Unfortunately, yes, the jerk.” She drew back to glare at the cab driver who was leaning forward, staring white-faced through the passenger’s window. “Took my tip, then refused to move his fat…self to help me.”

Rafe’s gaze flicked toward the cab. “Might be a good idea to rattle his chain a little, make him rethink the way he treats his paying passengers.”

“Be a pleasure,” Gresham said, his grin flashing white again before he turned away. The wind blew his coat back, revealing a gun in a holster hugging his side.

“Are you sure he’s old enough to carry a gun?” she muttered, feeling more ancient by the moment.

“He’s old enough.” Rafe tightened his grip and helped her up the two short steps to the brick walk.

Grateful for his support, she concentrated on sidestepping the puddles formed by the walk’s uneven surface. Water from the gutter squished in her sodden shoes, and her last pair of panty hose were now spattered with mud. To add insult to injury her mashed toes hurt like the very dickens, making her limp.

“What’s wrong?” he demanded after only a few steps.

“I was attacked by a can of tomato juice,” she shot back impatiently.

“Why the hell didn’t you say so?”

“Because it’s silly and—” Her voice ended in a gasp as she was suddenly swept off her feet and into his arms.

“Anyone ever tell you you’re supposed to take care of yourself when you’re pregnant?” he grated close to her ear.

Only everyone from her father and her doctor, Luke Jarrod, all the way down to Bruno of automotive repair fame, she thought peevishly. “I am doing my very best, I assure you,” she said with as much dignity as she could muster under the circumstances.

Behind her, she heard the cab roar away, leaving more foul air behind. Though it wasn’t quite six-thirty, the gloom had caused the streetlights to wink on. The rain was coming down harder, now, driven sideways by the wind.

“Is your daughter home?” he asked as they neared the small porch with its rose-covered trellis.

“No, Lys is…” She stopped abruptly and narrowed her gaze suspiciously. “How did you know I have a daughter?”

“It was in the file,” he said as he climbed the three steps to the porch.

“What file?”

“Later.” As he swung her around, her sleeve brushed one of the lavender roses climbing the terraces, and she caught a whiff of its perfume. Roses in the rain, her favorite scent.

“Where’s your house key?”

“In my briefcase. If you’ll just put me down, I’ll—”

“Gresham, get your butt over here and unlock the damned door!”

She winced. What did he have to be so angry about? She was the one whose life was imploding. Reminding herself that she was a responsible, mature adult and not an hysterical six-year-old, she drew back her head and treated him to her coolest shrink look. “Wouldn’t it be more sensible if you just put me down and let me unlock the damned door?”

“Probably.” He flicked her an impatient glance. “In case you haven’t noticed, you’re still shivering.”

She hadn’t actually, but she noticed now. Noticed, too, that her head was splitting. Even more annoying for a woman who prided herself on her coping skills, it was becoming a struggle to keep her mind from wandering off on odd little side trips. Like remembering the last time she was smashed up against that muscular chest.

They’d both been naked and…

Oh God, don’t think about that now, she thought, squeezing her eyes shut. It had taken years—years—before she stopped remembering every touch, every kiss, every fevered word they’d spoken to each other in the heat of passion.

“Sorry, had to get the rest of the oranges,” Gresham said as he vaulted up the steps. “Sneaky little suckers rolled halfway down the block.”

Remembering the sodden bags, she started to ask him how he’d managed when she saw the dark blue tote bag slung over a shoulder that wasn’t nearly as broad as Rafe’s. A stalk of celery protruded through the open zipper. Grateful for the distraction, Danni burst out laughing, then winced as pain crashed through her skull.

Rafe jerked his attention to her face. He’d spent time recently in the sun and the same rays that had burned his tan to a golden bronze had bleached his brows to a tawny hue. “What’s wrong now?” he demanded impatiently.

“Trust me, you don’t want to know.” She sighed. “Even I don’t want to know all the things that are wrong in my life at the moment.”

His mouth softened, and time seemed to spin backward to the innocent days when she had run to him with all her problems, confident he would make everything better. “Put your head on my shoulder, Daniela,” he commanded in that oddly hoarse voice.

“No, I’m fine.” But suddenly her eyes were stinging.

“You always were part mule,” he grated.

“Like you weren’t,” she muttered, but suddenly her cheek was resting against his shoulder and her eyes were drifting closed. Just for a minute, she told herself firmly. Until her head stopped clanging.

Vaguely, she was aware of Gresham unlocking the door. She heard the faint creak of the hinges as he entered. She frowned when Rafe didn’t immediately follow. “If you’re waiting for a polite invitation, consider it extended,” she murmured in a voice that seemed oddly slurred.

“Shut up,” he ordered brusquely.

Before she could answer, his companion returned. “It’s clear.”

She blinked. “What’s clear?”

“Just checking your house for intruders, ma’am,” Gresham said, smiling at her. “All part of the service.”

Narrowing his gaze, Rafe shot his partner an impatient look. “You want to make sure you got all those canned goods?”

Gresham’s boyish smile faded. “Yes sir.”

As Rafe carried her inside with the same loose-jointed stride that could cover twice as much ground as her short legs, Danni roused herself to lift her head. “Okay, we’re inside now. What’s going on? Why are you here?”

He looked down at her. “To ask you a few questions.”

“Questions about what?” She stared at that hard shuttered face and felt an inexpressible feeling of loss. Why hadn’t he loved her? she wondered before ruthlessly pulling her mind back to things she could control.

“Not what. Who. Jonathan Sommerset.”

She drew in a sharp breath. “Do you know Jonathan?”

“I know him.”

Hope flared, and her heart gave a leap. “Do you know where he is?” she asked with a pathetic eagerness she hated, yet couldn’t seem to disguise.

“No, that’s why we’re here.”

“I don’t understand.”

“You will. First you need to get out of those wet things, and I need to make a phone call.” He set her down gently, keeping one hand on the small of her back until she settled firmly on both feet in the center of the square foyer.

“But—”

He cast a lazy glance at her sodden suede pumps. “You’re dripping on the rug. Pretty nice rug, too. Looks expensive. Be a shame to ruin it.”

He was right, damn him. “Then get your big feet off of it!” she shot back before turning around to climb the stairs.

“Mind if I make some coffee?” he called after her.

“You lay one hand on anything in this house, and I’ll sue!”