Yesterday's Gone (Two Daughters Book 1) (23 page)

“I want to look him in the eye and send him to prison,” she said with such ferocity, Seth relaxed.

There was his gutsy girl, determined never to let herself be a victim again.

Too bad it was still an open question whether she’d ever be able to trust anyone again, either. He was beginning to think she wanted to, but still wasn’t sure herself that she could.

Yeah, but she was calling him more often, talking more openly.

“I’ll let you know when we need you,” Seth told her. “It’ll be a while. Weeks if not months.” He mulled that over. “Unless they decide to have you go to Arizona. That’s a possibility. If it comes to that, you won’t do it alone. I’ll be there with you.”

“Okay.” She sounded almost meek now. Stunned, probably. “Thank you, Seth.”

Two hours later, she called him back. “I don’t know why I never thought of this, but... I still have a couple of things that he left with me in that motel. I don’t know why I kept them, but—I had so little. What if they have his fingerprints on them?”

This time, he’d been walking into headquarters. He stopped dead in the middle of the parking lot. “Why didn’t I think to ask you?”

She giggled, a happy sound that told him she was reveling at her power over the monster who’d continued to live in her closet. “Because there was no reason to think I’d
want
to keep anything associated with him?”

“What do you have?”

“A doll. A motel owner gave it to me. I think she almost called child protective services, but he convinced her we didn’t have much with us because his mother had had a heart attack and we’d left home suddenly to get to her. I had to plead with him to let me keep Rainbow Brite. It’s funny, because even though I didn’t remember, I had the same doll before. It’s still there, in my bedroom at the Lawsons’. The body is cloth, but her head is plastic.” She paused. “And there was this one book I really loved,
The Borrowers
, about these little people who live like mice in secret parts of a country manor. They’ve both been in a box I hauled along with me through all the foster homes. I’m sure he touched both. I remember rescuing the book this one time after he’d dropped it in the trash.”

A mix of pride and triumph had Seth grinning. “Don’t get them out, if you haven’t already.”

“No, I’m at school. I just got to remembering.”

“Good. I’ll arrange for someone from LAPD or the LA branch of the FBI to come and pick them up.”

“Chain of custody,” she said wisely, then giggled again. “I like murder mysteries.”

When Seth called, Stuart was as pleased as Seth had been, and promised to have someone do the errand. “If his fingerprints are really on either the doll or the book, it won’t matter if she can’t pick him out of a lineup. Jurors will understand why she might not recognize this guy eighteen years later, especially given that she was only eleven the last time she saw him.”

Seth would prefer that he didn’t see Bailey the next time only because she was flying up here to identify Hamby, or he was joining her for a trip to Arizona. For one thing, either way, it probably wouldn’t be soon. For another—damn. The longer she was away from him, the greater grew his fear that she’d go back to thinking
alone
was right for her.

He swore out loud. The worst thing he could do was put pressure on her—but his patience had about reached it’s limit.

* * *

H
ER
PARENTS
OFFERED
to fly to California for Thanksgiving, if she couldn’t come to Stimson. “Eve says she’ll come, too,” Karen said. “We’d really like you to be part of our holidays from now on, Hope.”

“I’ll come home,” she heard herself promise. She hadn’t known she’d 100 percent made up her mind, but evidently she had.

After that, she pondered whether it would be horribly awkward if she asked that Seth be invited for Thanksgiving dinner. Only—he probably went to his mother’s, or her and his sister’s family to his house.

And then there was Eve.

After she’d said goodbye to her mother, Bailey sat cross-legged on her twin bed and ran a hand over the quilt, the most amazing gift anyone had ever given her. Her first heirloom. So far, she kept it folded at the foot of her bed where she could admire it and touch it. At night, she laid it carefully over a rocking chair. She really should buy a new bed so she could use it and get the whole effect, too; the space would be tight, but she could fit in a full-size bed. On her way to the campus, she went right past the mattress store where she’d bought this one, but she always kept going because—well, just because.

Maybe for the same reason she hadn’t registered for ballroom dance. Without a partner, she didn’t really
need
a larger bed.

Tonight, as she stroked her quilt, pain gripped her and squeezed hard. No, not pain—hope.
My least favorite word.
And yet...

Seth had a bigger bed. And he was the partner she wanted.

Bailey drew a shuddering breath. Thanksgiving was too far away. She needed to see him. The phone calls weren’t anywhere near enough.

* * *

T
HE
MINUTE
S
ETH
heard how softly the pawnshop owner was speaking he’d known the information was going to be good.

“If you could get here quicker, I’d try to stall the little punk,” he said. “But he got antsy when I made an excuse to go to the back room. What should I do?”

Seth had been waiting for a break on this investigation. The stolen jewelry he’d been keeping his eye out for hadn’t appeared locally. He’d begun to think the thief was smart enough to go as far as Seattle to pawn it. Instead, it sounded as if all he’d done was wait long enough to convince himself nobody would be looking for the stolen items anymore.

Seth had had dealings with this particular pawnbroker before. He genuinely kept an eye out for stolen merchandise, and contacted law enforcement if and when it appeared. His description of the particular pieces he’d seen sounded like what Seth had been looking for.

“Drag it out as long as you can,” he instructed, “but don’t try to hold him. Ask to see ID, and, if you can, get a license plate number if he leaves. I’m on my way.”

He arrived to find the kid gone, but was able to positively identify the couple of pieces the pawnbroker had accepted. When asked for ID, the boy began to twitch and claimed to have left his wallet home, but it didn’t take Seth two minutes to match a name to the license plate number.

The vehicle belonged to the home owner whose jewelry had been stolen, and the kid, as described by the pawnbroker, matched Seth’s memory of the sulky teenager lurking in the background when he’d been at the house taking a report.

Shaking his head, he took the two pieces of jewelry. The son’s fingerprint on either piece wouldn’t do them much good, as he might have had reason to pick up his mother’s jewelry at some point or other. Too bad for him the pawnbroker had been held up enough times, he now had a hidden camera. Seth looked forward to confronting the little prick, but was sorry for the parents.

He detoured to buy a deli sandwich and took it back to headquarters. The parents would be at work, the kid in school. He’d do some research on other cases in the meantime.

He was stuck on a never-ending hold with an insurance company when he was buzzed for an internal call. With some relief, he ditched the hold and answered.

“Someone here to see you,” the desk sergeant said laconically. “Says she has information for you.”

“On my way down.”

He couldn’t see anyone beyond the counter until he’d reached the divider. There he froze.

A woman stood with her back to him. Moonlight pale hair, five foot five or six, great ass, long legs.

Déjà vu.

His heart leaped into overdrive. “Bailey?” he said hoarsely.

She turned, her expression momentarily so vulnerable the sight pierced his chest like a scalpel. She had her bottom lip caught between her teeth and anxiety darkened her eyes.

Then she smiled, but it was the one she saved for show, to hide what she really felt. “Hey. I know this might be a bad time for you, but—”

Released from his paralysis, he wasn’t even aware of moving until he’d already pushed through the waist-high door and his hands closed over Bailey’s upper arms. He searched her face with a hunger she wouldn’t be able to mistake. “You’re here,” he said, not so intelligently.

Her smile faded to something a lot shyer. “I don’t know why, but I wanted to surprise you.”

“This surprise, I like,” he said huskily. God, he wanted to kiss her, but two deputies were walking in, the desk sergeant watched them and half a dozen people sat waiting only a few feet away. “Are your parents expecting you?”

Eyes never leaving his face, she gave her head a quick shake. “No, I didn’t tell them I was coming, either.”

Suddenly, he laughed out loud, swooped her up and swung her in a circle. “Damn. You’re here.”

She was laughing, too, her cheeks pink. When he set her down, Seth was vaguely aware everyone else around them was smiling.

“I know you have to work,” she began.

“No, I don’t have anything going that can’t wait. Don’t move,” he ordered her. “I’ll be right back.” He bounded upstairs, shut down his computer, grabbed his cell phone and was back in the waiting room in two minutes or less.

The smile that dawned on Bailey’s face at the sight of him had Seth feeling buoyant, hopeful. She was here. Not just in Stimson, but here in front of him. She’d come to see him before her parents.

No, he thought, what she’d done was replay their first meeting. Was there a message in that? Or had she just wanted to see his expression when he hadn’t expected her?

He hustled her out, realized with disfavor that she had a car, and said, “See you at the house?”

“I think I can still find it,” she teased.

The drive wasn’t long, which was fortunate, since he barely took his gaze from the rearview mirror. The silver compact sedan stuck right behind his bumper and pulled into his driveway beside his SUV.

“You’re staying with me, right?” he asked, over the roof of her rental.

A hint of nerves showed in her eyes. “If you want me to.”

“That’s safe to say. Pop your trunk.”

He grabbed her small suitcase, gave her a minute to grab the hefty bag he knew held her laptop along with the usual contents of a woman’s purse, and led the way to his front door. He was so damn aroused, he wasn’t sure he could make it. And it wasn’t as if he could fall on her like an animal the minute they got inside.

Except maybe he could, because he’d no sooner closed the front door behind them than she dropped her bag with an audible thunk and flung herself at him. Letting go of her suitcase, he caught her but staggered back a step. The suitcase fell, too, then toppled over, but as long as it didn’t trip them, he didn’t give a damn about it.

“Oh, Seth.”

“God. Bailey,” he said thickly, and sought her mouth. Not hard to find, since she had risen on tiptoe and met him with equal fervor.

This kiss was almost frantic—desperate, passionate, awkward. Their noses bumped, their teeth clanked, their tongues warred, but he couldn’t seem to summon an iota of control. Bailey was in his arms, plastered against him, and nothing else mattered.

Until he felt the dampness against his cheek, and on a pang of fear, pulled back. “You’re crying.”

“What?” Her eyes opened. “I’m not—” She took one hand from his shoulder to touch her cheek. “Oh, no. I am. I don’t even know why!”

He led a weeping Bailey to the sofa, sat down and pulled her onto his lap, enclosed in his arms. She grabbed his shirt and crumpled it in one fisted hand, as if she was afraid to let go. Then she laid her head in the crook between his shoulder and neck, and took deep, careful breaths.

“I don’t know why,” she whispered again in apparent bewilderment.

“You came to me. God. I’ve been so afraid—”

She lifted her head to stare at him. “
You’ve
been afraid?”

“That you wouldn’t miss me. You said—” He couldn’t finish.

Tears still dampened her cheeks, but awareness filled her eyes. “That I’d find out what I missed...”

“And what you didn’t.”

“I’m sorry I said that. I think I always knew I’d miss you most of all.” Her grip on him hadn’t loosened any. “Oh, Seth. I missed you by the time I got to the airport.”

He tried to smile but knew it was askew. “And you had to fly without me. I hope you didn’t grab your seatmate’s hand.”

This giggle was watery. “No, but I may have done some damage to the armrest.”

He touched his forehead to hers. “I missed you, Bailey. Every minute.”

“I’m here.” She laid her head against his shoulder again, going boneless as if letting herself melt into him. The only remaining tension was that small fist.

He had to ask. “For how long?”

“I leave Tuesday morning, really early. If I hurry, I can get to my three o’clock class.”

Seth’s eyes closed. He breathed her in. Four days. Four nights. Not nearly long enough.

“That’s a start,” he said huskily.

For a long time, all he did was hold her, happy as long as he didn’t let himself think ahead. He was still aroused, but making love wasn’t the assurance he needed most from her. He soaked in what he could, and waited for her to be ready to tell him why she’d come.

Finally she rubbed her cheek against him and straightened again to look gravely into his eyes. “I came to find out whether you want to...to try to make this work, like you said. I mean, I have to go back. So, we wouldn’t see that much of each other until I graduate—”

The ability to breathe restored, he squeezed her hard. “Did you think I’d say no? Bailey, whatever hit me the minute I saw you turned into the real thing damn near as fast. I’ve been hanging on by my fingernails since you left. You have no idea how much I wanted to fly to LA and knock on your door. If I hadn’t been sure that would backfire, I’d have been there. But I really thought you needed to come to me, not the other way around.”

“Like a bird whose broken wing you healed, after which you held out your hands and let her fly free.”