His gaze skated down the arch of her back and landed on the round swell of her ass, jutting out toward him. The thin material of the green scrubs left little of her curves to the imagination. His fingers twitched and his cock stirred with interest.
Which was wrong on about forty-seven levels.
“How is it that you arrived to my house right when the intruder was here?” she asked, looking over her shoulder.
Rixey didn’t blame her for the distrust he saw in her still-wide gaze. “I should’ve listened yesterday, and I’m sorry I didn’t. I decided to keep an eye out for a day or two. Make sure you were safe.” Which, of course, she wasn’t. Had something happened, that would’ve been on him.
A series of emotions flitted over her expression. “So, you’ve been . . . watching me?”
Aw shit, in for a pound . . . “Basic surveillance. But, generally, yeah.”
For a long moment, she didn’t say anything, just seemed to study his face. Would be perfectly within her rights to come at him with all kinds of accusations, and he’d have to take that shit lying down. “You were on my dad’s Special Forces team?”
Rixey schooled his expression. “For five years.”
After another moment, she nodded. “Well, thank you. I’m glad you’re here.”
Twin reactions coursed through him. Admiration that she’d taken the high road when no one would’ve begrudged her a bitch fit, including him. And irritation that she’d apparently just used her father as a way of measuring his trustworthiness. The fucking irony. “Look, I should clear the house. The way he bugged out, probably no one else here, but I should make sure.”
She stood, hands braced on the counter, and nodded. “Okay. What do you want me to do? I have a gun, but it’s up in my bedroom.”
Sweet, innocent-looking Becca had a gun?
Sirens echoed off the buildings in the distance. Becca’s eyes went wide, and she shot to the other counter and grabbed the phone receiver lying beside its base. “Hello? Hello?” She sagged and lowered it to its cradle. A shrill screech sounded right out front, and red lights flickered off the dim dining room walls. “I called nine-one-one. When I first realized someone else was here.”
“That’s good.” Rixey holstered his weapon and zipped his jacket.
She’d called for help. Armed and defended herself. And held it together when help arrived. Smart fucking girl. Becca clasped her hands on top of her head, heaving another deep breath that drew his gaze to the lift and fall of her breasts. Make that woman. Jesus.
“Come on,” he said, leading the way to the door just as the knocking commenced. He glared up the steps, his nerves rankling to have uncleared spaces at his back, as Becca jogged to the door and pulled it open.
“Thank you for coming,” she said to the pair of uniforms standing on the other side. “There was an intruder, but he ran out this door just a few minutes ago.” The cops urged them outside onto the stoop as a second squad car arrived. The new uniforms went through the house to secure the scene and ensure no one else remained inside. She answered the officers’ basic questions about her identity and the incident.
Rixey eyeballed the street in both directions. Realizing they weren’t needed, the EMTs were reloading their equipment onto the back of their rig. Here and there, neighbors gawked on stoops.
“And who are you?” one of the cops asked.
He turned his attention to the conversation. “Nick Rixey. Friend of the family,” he said, managing not to choke on the word friend. Once, it had been damn true. Frank Merritt had been more than a mentor; he’d become a friend and confidant. Right before the old man had violated every principle they’d ever held dear: loyalty, trust, integrity, honor.
“Nick’s a friend of my late father’s. They fought in Afghanistan together,” Becca said, the casual familiarity of her words aggravating him. She didn’t know shit about him or what had happened in Afghanistan. The Army had made damn sure of that.
“Oh, yeah? I was there in ’06 and ’07. Marines. Reserves, now. You?” Cop was late twenties. Stocky. Hair high and tight. Shoulda guessed he was a jarhead.
“Army Special Forces. Whoever broke in picked the lock on the back door,” Nick said, steering the conversation back where it belonged.
“Crime scene techs will be here soon. They’ll give the place a full once-over,” the Marine-cop said.
“Soon” turned out to be thirty minutes later. Two more uniforms carrying briefcases of gear disappeared inside. Nick’s gut said Becca shouldn’t be standing out there in the open, but there was little they could do but wait to be readmitted to her house, which surprisingly only took another fifteen minutes.
“Okay, Miss Merritt, why don’t we walk through and see if you can tell if anything was stolen,” one of the uniforms said.
Inside, Becca made for the upstairs first. Apparently nothing was off in the bathroom at the top of the steps or in the neighboring bedroom, but her gasp in the front bedroom-turned-office brought Rixey right to her side.
Several desk drawers stood open, and papers protruded from one file cabinet drawer as if the guy hadn’t wanted to take the time to right his handiwork. So, he’d been rifling through her drawers and files. What the hell for?
“It doesn’t look like anything’s been stolen,” she said, bewilderment plain in her voice. “At least nothing valuable.” She turned to the officers who had followed her upstairs. “This can’t be a coincidence, though, can it?”
“What’s that, ma’am?” the older cop asked.
“I filed another report this afternoon. I went to my brother’s house looking for him. I haven’t heard from him for a few days. And his apartment had been completely ransacked.”
Rixey heard the words as if she’d spoken them through a tunnel. What in the everliving fuck was going on? His instincts lit up all over the place and pointed to one undeniable fact: Becca Merritt was in some sort of worst-case-scenario trouble. And so was her brother, by the sound of the story she was telling the police.
Goddamnit.
Another fifteen minutes passed with Becca answering questions and getting some damn-near useless advice from the cops. Keep your doors locked. Call a locksmith in the morning and get the locks changed. Ever consider a home-security system? Or a dog?
Man’s best friend aside, that back door had been unlocked when Nick had tried it. Knob hadn’t been damaged. Glass hadn’t been broken. And she sure as shit hadn’t left it open, not with the paranoid behavior he’d observed the previous night. Someone had picked the sonofabitch. Bad guy wanted in again, a new lock wasn’t likely to keep him out. Not unless she seriously stepped up the quality of the hardware.
And someone clearly wanted something from the Merritts.
The cops left Becca with some vague pronouncements about what would happen next. If anything. The eighth most dangerous city in America, Baltimore had fourteen hundred violent crimes and nearly nine thousand property crimes, burglaries, and thefts a year—statistics that kept Nick busy serving papers five days a week. And statistics that also meant Becca’s seemingly victimless B&E wouldn’t get a lot of attention from the authorities.
The despairing expression on her face told him she knew it, too. As she thanked the police, Rixey took stock of his late commanding officer’s daughter. Weariness had settled onto her shoulders and dampened the light in those baby blues. Wisps of hair had fallen haphazardly from her ponytail, and exhaustion painted dark circles under her eyes. But Becca Merritt was still a looker—a real sweetheart of a face, curves in all the places women were supposed to have curves, toned but real. And he found her even more appealing for the fact that some seriously stressful shit had gone down here and she’d held it together better than most civilians would.