Cold Case, Hot Accomplice Read online

  “Me, too,” Roxy said as her heart squeezed tight in her chest.

  “I just came up to tell you we’re all finished. I’m sure in the next couple of days we’ll need you to come in to finish up some reports, but somebody will call you and arrange a time that’s convenient for you.”

  “Whenever is fine with me. I just want to get this all behind me now.”

  “At least we can close one of the cases we’ve been working on.” He glanced over at Roxy’s sisters. “And you all know we’re doing what we can to find your aunt.”

  “We know,” Sheri said.

  “Do you want us to lock up as we leave?” he asked Roxy.

  “I’ll take care of it. In fact, I’m packing a small bag and heading to Sheri’s for the night,” Roxy said. “And the restaurant will be closed at least for tomorrow.”

  “I understand. The good news is you’re safe now, Roxy. Your attacker is dead, and now you can breathe easier.”

  She forced a smile at him and nodded. “Thanks again, Frank.”

  After he left it didn’t take Roxy long to pack for the night, and then the three sisters headed downstairs. They stepped outside, where the rain clouds had finally moved on, leaving behind a slice of moon and a million stars.

  Marlene looked up and then back at Roxy. “Seems like the worst has passed. Now we just have to wait for Aunt Liz to come home.”

  “And even if that doesn’t happen soon, in the meantime we’ve got each other,” Sheri said, her words ending in a group hug.

  It was only when she was in Sheri’s car on the way to her sister’s mountain cabin that Roxy replayed Frank’s words in her head. He’d told her that now she could breathe easier.

  But how was that possible when her love for Steve still filled her soul, and when she knew that once again his heart was full of grief, leaving no room for her or her love?

  * * *

  For the next three days Steve remained at home, lost in a fog of despair like he’d never known before. He knew he should get back to work. He knew he needed to talk to Frank, to speak to Roxy, but he couldn’t get past the black abyss he’d fallen into with Stacy’s death.

  His mother came by each day, forcing him to eat something, simply sitting in a chair near wherever he was to offer silent support. She knew him well enough to know that there were no words that could pull him from the darkness. He’d have to fight his way out on his own.

  It was finally on the morning of the fourth day that he woke up on the sofa, unshaven and in the same clothes he’d been wearing for the past two days, that the fog of grief that had encased him lifted enough for rational thought to occur.

  Just because Stacy was dead didn’t mean that Tommy was. Nothing had really changed except that Stacy would never be able to tell him where Tommy was, but Tommy was still out there someplace and Steve needed to pull himself together and move forward. There was still that fragile thread of hope inside him, the hope that somehow, someway, he’d find his son.

  With a renewed burst of life flooding through his veins, the first thing he did was check the messages on his phone that had piled up while he’d been in his dark cave. There were two from Frank, just checking in, and one from Jimmy letting him know they’d found nothing on Stacy to indicate where she’d been staying. There were also a couple of hang-up calls from a number he didn’t recognize, and one from Chief Krause telling him to take as much time as he needed to get back to work.

  He headed for the bathroom, where he leaned against the shower wall and let a hot spray of water hit his back. He was ready to go back to work, ready to get back to life. He still had to find Liz Marcoli, and he still needed to find Tommy. Stacy might be gone, but she’d obviously been staying in the area.

  As he stood, his thoughts went to Roxy. Thank God Frank had taken that shot. Although Steve would have liked things to have had a different ending, the one ending he couldn’t have lived with was Roxy’s death.

  Steve had been so stunned to see Stacy that he’d done the unthinkable and froze. If Frank hadn’t been with him, Roxy would be dead and Stacy would have probably either been arrested or dead, as well.

  He owed Frank a debt of gratitude for saving Roxy’s life. He had no ill will toward the partner who had done what he had to do. Frank needed to know that.

  Once showered, he dressed in a pair of black slacks and a white shirt, deciding he wanted to look like a real detective on his return. As he strapped on his gun, his thoughts once again went to Tommy. He’d call Tanner and let the private investigator know that Stacy had been in the area. Maybe he could figure out where she’d been staying and if Tommy was someplace close.

  He left the house with a new sense of purpose. He needed to find out where Stacy had been and where Tommy might possibly be. He wanted to continue the investigation into the missing Liz Marcoli, and he wanted—needed—to see Roxy.

  Walking into the police station felt right, and the first person he saw was Frank, who looked like hell. Steve walked up to his partner and placed a hand on his shoulder.

  “Hey, Steve,” Frank said, and Steve couldn’t help but see the shadows in Frank’s eyes, shadows he hadn’t seen in Frank’s eyes since Frank’s wife had committed suicide.

  “It’s good to see you back.”

  “I realized over the last couple of days I need my partners in my life,” Steve said. “I especially need the kind of partner I can depend on to do the right thing when I’m mentally shut down.”

  He saw the flicker of relief dash into Frank’s eyes. “I’m so sorry how it all went down, Steve.”

  Steve dropped his hand from Frank’s shoulder. “There’s nothing to be sorry about. You did the right thing, and that’s that. I couldn’t have lived with myself if Stacy had managed to kill Roxy, so I thank you for taking that shot. Now tell me what’s been going on since I left.”

  “Nothing much. Jimmy has been checking out the similarities between Agnes Wilson’s and Liz’s cases, and I’ve been tying up the ends of what happened at the Dollhouse.”

  “Have you seen Roxy?” Despite the pain in his heart, a tiny ray of joy shone through as he thought of her. “I should have called her over the last couple of days, but I’ve been in a pretty dark place and didn’t want to talk to anyone until I got my head back on straight.”

  “She’s doing fine. She closed the Dollhouse for a day, but she’s back up and running now. In fact, she’s due in here anytime now to sign off on some final reports,” Frank said.

  The last time Steve had seen Roxy, he’d let her down by not shooting the woman who was about to stab her to death. And before that, he’d told her he loved her and she’d turned her back on him, but that didn’t halt his heart from reacting to the anticipation of seeing her again, of finding out how she was doing.

  Even though she’d basically told him she didn’t want a relationship with him, that didn’t mean he’d stopped caring about her, didn’t mean his love for her had magically disappeared.

  He made the rounds, chatting with everyone who was working, and then finally made it to his own desk, where he sat and tried to figure out what was the first thing on his agenda.

  He’d just settled in when Roxy came through the door. Clad in her usual pair of tight jeans and wearing a hot pink T-shirt with the Dollhouse in black lettering across her midsection, she looked every inch the Foxy Roxy he’d come to know and love.

  Her eyes widened and softened as he stood and approached her, and he didn’t realize who reached for who first, but suddenly she was in his arms, the warmth of her, the scent of her, snaking into the places in his heart where only love could fit.

  “I’m so glad you’re okay,” he said as she broke the embrace.

  “Are you okay?” A dainty wrinkle creased her brow as she gazed at him with her beautiful brown eyes. “I’ve been so worried about you.”
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  He wanted to pull her close again, to lose his grief in the warmth of her body, in the sweet scent of her that smelled like home, but instead he nodded. “As okay as I can be,” he replied.

  Although it had only been four days since he’d seen her, it felt like a lifetime. “How’s business at the restaurant?”

  “Good.” There was an awkward moment of silence. “Speaking of which, I’d better get this paperwork done and get back to work.”

  With murmured goodbyes, she headed for Frank’s desk and Steve went back to his own. He’d only been there a moment when the uniform on duty in the civilian area poked his head in the door. “Steve, you got a minute? There’s a guy here who wants to speak to somebody.”

  “Send him in,” Steve said, wondering what crime was about to be reported now.

  The man who entered appeared to be in his early thirties and looked like a stoner. Clad in dirty jeans and a grungy white T-shirt, he was painfully thin and had a bad complexion.

  “Can I help you, Mr....?”

  “My friends call me Chopper,” the man said as he sat in the chair in front of Steve’s desk. “Look, I let this crazy chick flop at my cabin for the last couple of weeks. She came and went as she pleased, but the last time she left my place she never came back, and I’m not about to take care of a kid that isn’t mine.”

  Steve’s heart stopped beating. “Slow down. What was the woman’s name who was crashing at your cabin?”

  “The boy is a good kid, but I ain’t no babysitter, and I knew that chick was trouble the minute I met her. But I felt bad for the kid, and they needed a place to crash,” Chopper continued.

  “Her name. What was her name?” The question seeped through the tiny space of Steve’s narrowing throat.

  “I don’t know her last name, but her first name is Stacy. You need to find her and tell her to come get her kid.”

  Steve continued to stare at the man as the implications of his words pierced through his brain, arrowed into his heart. “The boy...where is he now?” Steve felt light-headed, almost nauseous with the surge of hope that slammed into his heart.

  “He’s out in the waiting room. I’ll go get him.” As Chopper jumped up from his chair, Steve rose more slowly, afraid of the hope, afraid of the tumultuous emotions that pressed so tight in his chest he could scarcely draw a breath.

  The door opened, and the boy walked in. Everyone in the entire room stopped what they were doing. It was as if the whole world halted at the sight of the little boy with shaggy blond hair and eyes the color of the ocean. His jeans were dirty and torn at the knees, his T-shirt stained, but Steve knew that face. He’d loved that face since the moment it had come into being.

  He choked out a sob and fell into a crouched position. “Tommy?”

  Tommy’s gaze held his, and Steve saw his beautiful eyes widen and wonder steal across his already handsome little features. “Dad?” Tears filled Tommy’s eyes. “Daddy?”

  Steve opened his arms and Tommy ran to fill them, his skinny arms winding around Steve’s neck. Ah, heaven. His child was in his arms, and as Tommy clung tightly to him, Steve wept unabashedly.

  He finally got to his feet, Tommy’s legs wrapped around his waist as he pressed himself against Steve’s chest. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you,” he finally managed to say.

  “And I’ve been waiting for you to find me,” Tommy replied.

  Steve gave no thought to anything else but the child in his arms. The world had shrunk to a tiny picture of Tommy. “Let’s go home,” he said to his son, and without a backward glance, he carried his son out of the police station and into the beautiful spring day.

  There would be time enough later to tell Tommy that his mother was dead. There would be time to catch up on where Tommy and Stacy had been for the past two years. But for now, Tommy was back with him, and for Steve that was more than enough.

  Chapter 18

  It had been a week since Roxy had last seen Steve, a week that she had held the heartwarming vision of him walking out of the police station with his son in his arms.

  Roxy had thought about the two of them a lot in the past seven days. Frank and Jimmy had come in for breakfast one morning and had told her that Steve had taken some time off from work to be with Tommy, but they’d assured her they were still on the case of her missing aunt.

  The pain of the absence of Liz had not lessened with time, but Roxy had finally understood Steve’s advice. She couldn’t control when Liz would be found. She and her sisters had done everything they could in order to help the investigation, but ultimately they had to carry on with their lives.

  However, the return of Tommy to Steve after two long years had renewed Roxy’s hope that eventually Aunt Liz would be found safe and sound and returned to where she belonged.

  As far as Roxy’s love for Steve, it remained as hot and as strong as it had ever been, and most nights she fell asleep wondering what if? What if she’d told him she loved him that night on the deck when he’d professed his love for her? What if she hadn’t allowed her mother’s mistakes to make her too afraid to reach out to the man she knew would only add happiness to her life?

  She couldn’t stop loving him, but she also knew his heart was filled now, just like that bedroom at the end of his hallway that had been empty for so long.

  Tommy was home, and it was obvious Steve’s life was full once again. Whenever she thought of the two of them together, her own heart filled with joy.

  The restaurant kept her busy, and in the evenings she’d begun spending more time with Marlene and Sheri at the Roadside Stop. The bonding time between the sisters was good, although she still worried about Marlene and the dark shadows that never quite lifted from her pretty blue eyes.

  Business at the restaurant had been brisk, and at the end of each night Roxy fell into dreamless sleep, no longer afraid for herself as the danger that had come at her from Steve’s past was gone. She told herself life was good, but each night before she slept, her heart filled with thoughts of Steve and Tommy and what might have been.

  “Ah, hump day,” Josie said as Roxy came down the stairs early Wednesday morning. The room already smelled of the sweets that Marlene had dropped by before Roxy had come downstairs.

  Roxy perched on a stool as Josie continued to debone chicken and Gregory finished up the breakfast prep. “I’m thinking about hiring a pastry chef.”

  Josie looked at her in surprise. “Won’t that hurt Marlene’s feelings?”

  Roxy frowned thoughtfully. “I don’t think so. She only took over the job when Aunt Liz disappeared, and I think between the baking for me and her work at the shop, she’s burning the candle at both ends. I think maybe she’ll be relieved. So you know of any pastry chefs in town?”

  “I’ll put out the word,” Josie replied. “And now you’d better get out there and open the doors. It’s almost five minutes after seven.”

  Roxy jumped up from the stool and hurriedly left the kitchen. As she approached the front door, she smiled as she saw Jimmy and Frank, and then her heart expanded even more when she saw that they weren’t alone.

  Steve and Tommy were with them. At the sight of father and son together, her heart soared with their joy. She quickly turned the Closed sign to Open and then unlocked the door to allow them inside.

  “Well, what a fine-looking group this is,” she said as they entered and headed toward their usual table. She tried to quiet the beat of her heart at the sight of Steve smiling so widely, appearing so complete and whole.

  “Roxy, I’d like to introduce you to my son, Tommy.”

  “Hi, Tommy, I’ve heard a lot about you from your dad,” she said. There had been changes in the boy during the past week. His hair was neat and short, his jeans new and his shirt a pearl-buttoned Western plaid. “It’s so nice to finally meet you.”

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bsp; “It’s nice to meet you, too,” he said and gave her a shy smile.

  Orders were taken and then Roxy disappeared back into the kitchen, her heart experiencing a battle—happiness for Steve and the deep yearning to be a part of his life with his son.

  Josie took the order slip from her, and at that moment Steve stepped into the kitchen. “Roxy, could I speak to you for a minute alone?”

  She frowned. “Will Tommy be okay without you?”

  Steve smiled. “He’ll be fine. He knows he’s with big important detectives who would never let anything happen to him. When I left the table, he was explaining to them that he wasn’t sure whether he still wanted to be a cowboy or if maybe someday he’d like to be a private investigator or a detective.”

  He grabbed her by the arm and pulled her out of the kitchen and into the small mudroom that served as a combination storage and prep area.

  “I’m so happy for you, Steve,” Roxy said. “He’s adjusting well?”

  Steve’s smile faltered a bit. “It was rough telling him that his mother was dead, but he didn’t ask many questions about it and seems to be adjusting very well. I know he might have more questions when he’s older, but for now he seems happy just to be with me.”

  “Your happiness shows,” Roxy said, fighting the need to reach out and touch him, knowing that she had no right.

  The smile on his face disappeared, but his eyes held a sweet softness as he gazed at her. “For the last two years I believed that if only I got Tommy back, my life would be complete. I thought he was all that was missing to make me whole.”

  Roxy’s heart had begun a rapid tattoo, and she didn’t know if it was because he’d taken a step closer to her or because of the desire that shone so sharply from his beautiful eyes as he gazed at her.

  “I’m not sure what to say,” Roxy finally managed to utter. She had no right to believe something magical might be about to happen. He’d already professed his feelings for her, and she’d shut him down.

  He smiled, that slow, sexy upward slide of his lips that melted her heart. “Roxy Marcoli speechless? I never thought I’d live to see the day.”