“Don’t trust them then? Afraid of them?”
“Look, Nick, I didn’t come here to argue our personal faults.”
He stepped across the floor toward her, and Jackie found herself eye to eye with the sheriff’s badge. It did indeed look like the genuine article.
He arched an eyebrow, pulling Jackie’s glare up to his glowing eyes. “Well, you sure started out that way, and now you’re chickening out.”
Jackie reached up to slap him, and Nick caught her wrist in his hand. “I’m not a coward, Jackie. I’m tired. I’ve come to the end, and I’ve failed. It’s disappointing that I let down those I promised to get justice for. If you have a problem with the fact I choose to go out the same way I came into this nightmare, then so be it, but do not call me a coward.”
“Then let’s get him,” she said defiantly, wishing he would let go and stop looking down at her. His eyes had gone from a glint to a soft glow. “I can’t let him get away with killing you, or anyone else, so quit trying to get everyone out of the way who wants to help. That’s just stupid pigheadedness.”
“And why do you care so much, Jackie? Tell me that.” He still held her wrist, as though keeping her in his grip might force her to answer. “People like you don’t do this because they want to. It’s because they need to.”
“People like me?” She yanked her hand away from him, and he let her go. “What the fuck is that supposed to mean? I catch guys who are the lowest of the low, the sickest, most twisted minds around who deserve to be taken out or put away. I like justice just as much as you do, Sheriff.”
Nick looked at her for a long moment and then nodded once, stepping around the counter to sit himself down on a bar stool. “Noble of you.” He smiled, but it was wistful and sympathetic.
Jackie hated that smile.
“So who was the guy who got away?”
“What?” She knew what he was asking, but it shocked her that he would ask.
“Who ruined your life that drives you to such extremes and keeps you from ever being happy?” He tipped his hat up, a curious brow cocked over one eye. “Who’s your Drake, Jackie?”
For a moment, all she could do was stare at him in silence. Indecision froze her. How had the conversation turned to this? It was the last thing she needed to be doing. She had little doubt, however, that Nick thought Shelby and the girl were dead. There was no reason to stay any longer.
Yet Jackie made no move to go. She sucked in a deep breath, holding it, looking at Nick. This is dumb. Stupid, dumb, idiotic conversation, and I should get my ass back to the car. “My stepfather.”
Nick watched her in silence, making no move to agree or respond.
“He was a cop, and he abused my mother until she killed herself.”
Still, Nick sat in silence, waiting and wondering.
“He told me I would end up just like her.”
Nick sat up straight again, reached over, and handed Jackie her coffee. “Ah, well, I am sorry you had to endure someone like that, and that your mother came to such a sad end, but you won’t.”
She frowned at his presumptuousness. “Are you a psychoanalyst as well?”
“No,” he said with a slow shake of his head. “I’ve been around a while though, and I know you had your moment there a couple days ago, and you survived. You won’t let yourself get to that point again, because it’s a scary place to be, and you want to get your life back.”
Jackie sipped her coffee to hide the disbelief. The damn bastard was far more perceptive than he looked. Who knew men could pay that close attention? “And what about you, Nick?” She waved her hand at his outfit. “What do you want?”
He gave her a wistful smile, his eyes crinkling at the edges. “I want justice. I want to move on from all this, for it to be done.” He set his mug down on the counter and stood up. “What I want at the moment is the answer to a question that’s been plaguing me for the past few hours.”
He stepped up in front of her, and Jackie gulped down her mouthful of coffee. A few hours ago? What happened a few… Oh, damn. He can’t be serious. She looked up at him, the bemused smile still turning up the corner on one side of his mouth, and felt his hand remove the coffee cup from her own. Oh, my God! He is! “What… um, what question is that?”
Nick inched closer to her, and Jackie inched back until she found the wall behind her. “I’m curious,” he said, holding her gaze while one hand reached up and tucked an errant wisp of hair behind her ear. “How much was Shelby, and how much was really you?”
Where are a dozen shots of tequila when you need them? He stood toe to toe with her now, looming above in the cowboy hat and the thick leather duster, two pistols the size of her arm at his hips. The brush of his fingertips along her scalp, trailing down behind her ear, sent a wave of prickly goose bumps down her spine. I can duck out of this, I still can, damnit! God, this is stupid. What the fuck are we doing? The thoughts tumbled through Jackie’s brain in a befuddled mess. She could not remember the last time she had been sober for this kind of thing.
“Mostly her,” she finally whispered, trying to lick a hint of moisture back to her lips.
His hand cupped the back of her head, the fingers laced into the short waves of hair, and Jackie held her breath for a brief moment, terrified of the awareness of thoughts and emotions that alcohol had always drowned in its lovely, numbing sea.
She had been prepared for fierce, hard desperation, or a warm snake of a tongue dancing down her throat. Jackie didn’t expect the first soft brush of lips, barely a kiss at all, a hesitant introduction of his lips to hers. She opened her eyes after a moment to find his face inches away, looking at her with eyes that saw far more of her than she deemed reasonable.
“You’re trembling,” he said. The other hand reached up and cupped her cheek, and Jackie found herself in a very defenseless position. “In a good or bad way?”
Some small part of Jackie’s brain was screaming, “Groin him and run!” But in another, the strong, vibrant voice of Laurel came to her, and Jackie remembered the offhand promise she had made. “Good, I think.”
She closed her eyes, and this time, perhaps for the first time, Jackie let herself be held by those hands, giving in to it instead of bracing herself against it. The lips were still soft, but there was no hesitation as he kissed her this time, and Jackie could feel the hunger. His teeth gave a gentle tug on her lower lip, and that slight relenting of her mouth to his broke down whatever will remained to resist, and Jackie brought her arms up around Nick’s neck and invited his tongue into her mouth for a fervent, burning waltz.
After a few seconds or an hour, Nick pulled away from the embrace. “I believe you answered my question, Agent Rutledge.” He had a pleased smile on his face, but the eyes stared with far more than amusement and didn’t look to be entirely focused on her eyes.
That was completely unfair. Jackie leaned against the wall and slowly let out her breath. This was not what she was here for. Not at all. She could not decide if she was terrified or just wanted to strip him down to the gun belt and play “ride ’em, cowboy.” The fact she even considered the notion was scary enough. And exciting.
“Good. Glad to help. Now answer my question, because it’s why I came over here.”
He picked up his coffee cup and took another swallow. “Hmmm?”
“Why would there be no bodies in that SUV?”
Nick nearly choked on his coffee. “What?”
His reaction looked real enough. “Drake’s Escalade. It burned to a crisp, but when we looked inside, it was empty. So I know how Drake got out, but what about Shelby and the little girl?”
Nick sat back down on the bar stool. “Damn. He must have dropped the girl off somehow and took Shelby with him, unless she figured out how to do it herself. Or maybe she crossed over with the girl?”
“The alley!” Jackie remembered now. “He pulled into an alley for, like, five seconds and then nearly ran us over coming out.”