USA TODAY bestselling author Julie Miller’s The Precinct: Task Force series heats up when a plain Jane and an experienced cop pose as an engaged couple.

Something about Hope Lockhart fascinated Officer Pike Taylor. The cop and his canine companion had been patrolling the neighborhood around Hope’s bridal shop for months, trying to capture the criminal who targeted her. Was it the way she hid her voluptuous beauty beneath a plain Jane exterior?

Hope bore the scars of a troubling past. And despite a profession steeped in romance, she’d never known the love of a man. But when Pike is assigned to protect her by posing as her live-in fiance, his tenderness may give Hope the courage to open her heart for the very first time.

“Do you feel it?”

“Feel what?”

“Someone watching.” She tipped her head back to see his sharp gaze swinging back and forth. He was looking, too. “Do you think I’m paranoid?”

That clear blue gaze settled on her. “No. I’ve felt it, too.” His hands tightened at her waist and he pulled her into his chest, winding his arms behind her back and resting his chin at the crown of her hair.

Her arms caught between them and she whispered against the KCPD logo embroidered on his chest. “Did you see someone? What do you need me to do?”

“Easy, partner. I need you to let me hold you for a minute. Okay?”

Hope nodded. She willed herself to relax against him. “I’m okay with that.”

“You’re not alone, Hope. It’s you and me, remember? This guy’s going to try to come after you, but he won’t get to you, understand? I won’t let him.”

Whatever the reason behind this show of support, Hope curled her fingers into the back of his shirt and held on. She needed to feel safe for a few moments. She needed to know she’d made the right decision to agree to helping the police.

She needed to hear him say it again, in that deep, husky voice that danced across her eardrums and soothed the fear from her heart. “You’re not alone.”

Task Force Bride

USA TODAY Bestselling Author

Julie Miller

www.millsandboon.co.uk

USA TODAY bestselling author JULIE MILLER attributes her passion for writing romance to all those books she read growing up. When shyness and asthma kept her from becoming the action-adventure heroine she longed to be, Julie created stories in her head to keep herself entertained. Encouragement from her family to write down the feelings and ideas she couldn’t express became a love for the written word. She gets continued support from her fellow members of the Prairieland Romance Writers, where this teacher serves as the resident “grammar goddess.” Inspired by the likes of Agatha Christie and Encyclopedia Brown, Julie believes the only thing better than a good mystery is a good romance.

Born and raised in Missouri, this award-winning author now lives in Nebraska with her husband, son and an assortment of spoiled pets. To contact Julie or to learn more about her books, write to PO Box 5162, Grand Island, NE 68802-5162, USA or check out her website and monthly newsletter at www.juliemiller.org..

CAST OF CHARACTERS

Hope Lockhart—Wedding planner and owner of Fairy Tale Bridal Shop. A shy, secretive woman who makes happily-ever-after’s happen for everyone else. After escaping a close encounter with the Rose Red Rapist, the neighborhood spinster becomes the task force’s best chance at capturing him. But agreeing to be the bait in KCPD’s trap means facing off against her own private fears…and a man who wants her dead.

Edison “Pike” Taylor—K-9 cop with KCPD. Nobody protects and serves Kansas City the way a Taylor can. This neighborhood cop has got his work cut out for him when he’s assigned to go undercover as Hope’s fiancé. Teaching the inexperienced Hope how to act like a woman in love is challenging enough. Keeping her alive might be the toughest—and most important—mission this cop could have.

Hans—Pike’s canine partner. A well-trained officer who likes playing tug-of-war and chasing down bad guys.

Hank Lockhart, Sr.—Hope’s father wants his daughter’s forgiveness.

Nelda Sapphire—Hank’s girlfriend.

Brian Elliott—Hope’s mentor and friend. His vision for revitalizing downtown KC doesn’t include a serial rapist.

Adam Matuszak—Hope’s attorney. Where do his loyalties really lie?

Leon Hundley—The neighborhood handyman has fixed a lot of things in Hope’s shop.

Gabriel Knight—Reporter at the Kansas City Journal. What’s his deal with KCPD, anyway?

Vanessa Owen—Television news reporter. She’s got the lead on a story that could make her a star.

The Rose Red Rapist—Will he finally be brought to justice?

For the wonderful pets who have blessed my life: Purr, Bobbi, Boots, Frosty, Cocky, Peanut Butter, George, Anxious, Butterscotch, Reitzie, Duke, Patches, Sherlock, Shasta, Padre, Maxie and Maggie.

Please consider supporting your local animal shelter, and open your heart to a new furry friend.

Contents

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Excerpt

Prologue

Today was a bad day to be a bride.

“Hello?” Hope Lockhart pressed her phone to her ear and inched her way toward the door, quietly seeking an escape as her perfectly executed plan for her client’s wedding blew up in an explosion of harsh words and wailing tears. “Hello?”

Click.

Hope cringed as the mysterious caller hung up without saying a word. She didn’t need this today. She tucked her phone into the hip pocket of the gray suit she wore and hurried her steps.

“Cold feet is not an option, young lady,” Dale Barrister lectured his daughter over the chamber music drifting down from the sanctuary upstairs while the mother of the bride wept right alongside her daughter. He pointed his white-gloved finger to the ceiling. “Everyone who’s anyone in Kansas City is in that church right now, waiting for us.”

“Daddy!” Deanna Barrister wailed, pushing her veil away from the mascara running down her cheeks. “I don’t think I can do this. Not today.”

“Well, we’re not doing it tomorrow or any other day.” The skin above his starched white collar turned red with anger. “I spent more money on this shindig than you’re worth, and this is how you repay me?”

Hope curled her fingers around the doorknob behind her and paused at the cruel words. Raised voices always twisted her stomach into knots. Tension like this usually suffocated the breath from her chest and scattered coherent thoughts right out of her head. The anger, pain and frustration filling the room reminded her of things she’d worked long and hard to forget.

“You stupid cow! When I tell you to do a thing, I expect—”

Uh-uh. Hope slammed the door on that particular memory and forced herself to take a deep breath and intervene. “Mr. Barrister, perhaps if we give Deanna a few minutes—”

“Miss Lockhart!”

It wasn’t a great day to be a wedding planner, either.

Hope flattened her back against the door as the father of the bride whirled around and stalked across the dressing room toward her. “I’m paying you a boatload of money.”

She turned her head from the finger jabbing near her face.

“You make today happen.”

As much as every frayed nerve inside her longed to bolt to a place of silence and solitude, she’d also worked long and hard to learn how to cope with volatile emotions and uncomfortable situations like this. She was stronger than her past. She could do this. Her client needed her. And if someone needed her, she had to help. That had always been her Achilles’ heel. Hope released the door, keeping her voice calm and her smile serene.

“Of course.” She gestured to the woman wiping at the tears that dripped on her taupe lace gown. “Perhaps you could take your wife to the restroom to freshen her face,” she suggested, needing to clear some of the emotions from the room if she was to have any chance of saving the big day. Ignoring both the father’s impatient curse and the doubt in the reluctant bride’s red-rimmed eyes, Hope pulled out her phone and texted her assistant upstairs. Tell organist to play another 15 min.

Send groom down. Keep smiling. Pray.

Hope hit Send and looked up to see the fractured family all staring expectantly at her. A mixture of compassion and trepidation filled her. She’d worked miracles in the past to make a bride’s wedding dreams come true. She hoped she had another miracle up her sleeve today. “Mr. Barrister? Please.”

With a grunt and a nod, he swung open the door and pulled his wife into the hallway with him. Hope closed the door softly, studying the grain in the fine old walnut, racking her brain for the next step in this impromptu wedding rescue.

A soft sniffle from the young woman behind her provided an inspiration. Adjusting her narrow-framed glasses on the bridge of her nose, Hope spotted a box of tissues on a shelf and retrieved them before sitting in the Sunday school chair beside her client. “Here.”

Deanna pulled a handful of tissues from the box to wipe her face and blow her nose. “It’s too much. I can’t take this kind of pressure. What if I’m wrong?”

“About Jeff?”

“About getting married. I’m only twenty-two.”

A decade younger than Hope. Her client had so much life ahead of her. She had two parents who loved her, even if they were having a hard time expressing it on this particularly stressful day. She was slender, beautiful—stunning in the mermaid-style gown Hope had helped her select. Deanna had a handsome young doctor who wanted her to be his wife.

Not for the first time in her life, a pang of envy nipped at Hope’s thoughts. And not for the first time, she pushed aside that longing and focused on what needed to be done at that moment.

She found a discarded florist’s box for Deanna to toss her soiled tissues into, and offered her another handful as the tears quieted into silent sobs. “You know, Deanna,” Hope began, “today isn’t about those people upstairs. Or the gifts or the doves or the champagne we’ll serve at the reception. It isn’t about how worried your father is that this won’t turn out to be the happiest day of your life.”

“He just wants it to be over.”

“He wants it to be perfect. He’s about to lose his little girl to another man, and today is his way of showing the world how much he loves you and how much he’s going to miss you. He’s worried that you won’t be happy.”

“Dad’s angry with me, not worried. Today is a business opportunity for him, publicity for his company. He doesn’t care what I’m feeling.”

Hope’s phone vibrated with an incoming call, setting off a chain reaction of startled gasps. She apologized before reading the incoming number, and then felt the warmth drain from her blood. How? Why? She had a pretty good idea who the unknown caller harassing her today might be. The Fates must be mocking her for sitting here and defending fathers.

“Do you need to take that?”

“No.” Hope purposefully ended the call as temper brought heat back to her body. She’d have to change her cell number. Again. She buried the phone in her jacket pocket, politely masking the urge to hurl it across the room. Hope inhaled a deep breath and remained calm for the woman beside her. “Some men—some people—don’t know how to express what they’re feeling in a way we all understand. For fathers, I think the wedding day is that one last hurrah that he can do for you. He’s trying to show his love by giving you everything he thinks you want. But I’m guessing—behind the frustration and anger—that he’s afraid.”

Deanna sniffed. “Of what?”

“That he’s failed you. That if he’d done something more or less or different, then you wouldn’t be having second thoughts about getting married.”

Deanna blinked a few last tears from her dark brown eyes and looked at Hope. “Dad never failed me.” Lucky woman. “It’s just that today has gotten so out of hand. There’s so much that has to happen.”

“There’s only one thing that has to happen.” Hope reached over and patted Deanna’s hand. “Don’t think about the pressures of the day—that’s what I’m here for. Think about yourself, and the future you’ll have with your husband.”

A soft knock at the door ended the conversation. “Dee?” The groom covered his eyes as Hope let him in. “Your dad said you were freaking out. Is everything okay?” he asked, peeking between the fingers of his crisp white gloves.

Hope pointed to the woman rising to her feet. “I thought maybe you two could use a quiet minute alone.”

He dropped his hand and turned to his bride-to-be. “Wow.”

Deanna blushed at his unabashed appreciation for the image she created in the subtly blinged gown she wore. “Jeff. You shouldn’t see me before the wedding.”

“There is going to be a wedding, right?”

Hope politely faded into the woodwork when the bride’s and groom’s eyes locked onto each other’s. There was so much love, acceptance and desire in Jeff Stelling’s eyes that she didn’t see how any woman could hesitate to commit to a man who looked at her that way.

“That’s all that has to happen today.” Deanna repeated Hope’s words and met her fiancé in the middle of the room. “You and me. I want to spend my life with you.”

“I love you, Dee. Come upstairs and start that life together with me. Please?”

“I love you.” He leaned in for a kiss before Deanna shooed him out. “Okay. Go up to the church. Tell Dad I’ll meet him upstairs. Hope? Can you make me gorgeous again in five minutes?”

Crisis averted. Tally up one more happily-ever-after. For someone else. The phone was vibrating against her hip again. Her past was calling. Ignoring it, Hope smiled. “You bet.”

Chapter One

“Really?” Hope squinted and averted her eyes from the bright headlights that filled up her rearview mirror. “You’re following a little close, buddy.”

She gripped the steering wheel more tightly and pressed on the gas to put some distance between them. She wasn’t a nervous driver at all. But normally she wasn’t out this late, and she didn’t take the shortcut off the interstate through the heart of the city. But cleanup after the Barrister-Stelling wedding had run long past the end of the dinner and dancing. And though she wasn’t the one actually bussing the tables, there were family pictures and table decorations she’d promised to hold on to until after the honeymoon. Then the gifts had to be delivered to their parents’ hotel rooms. Other than the hotel staff, she’d been the last person to leave the reception.

So what if her panty hose had long since cut off the circulation to her toes? Or if she’d have to unload every last box in the trunk and backseat of her car herself because she’d sent her assistant home. Hope had earned a tidy fortune with this event. Earned every last penny playing fashion consultant, wedding planner and family counselor. The sooner she got home, the sooner she could celebrate with a glass of wine and a long, hot bubble bath. Or maybe she’d skip them both and just fall straight into bed and sleep until Monday.

“What the heck?”

The same lights rushed up behind her a second time, nearly blinding her. “Jackass.”

Hope blamed the unlady-like condemnation on the length of the day and the unwanted calls piling up on her cell phone that bothered her more than she cared to admit. She must have a stamp on her forehead that said “Pick on me” today. Just because she tended to be shy and soft-spoken didn’t mean she lacked backbone or a brain or a temper. When the driver flashed his lights through her rear window, she muttered another word in the Ozark accent that crept into her voice whenever she got a little too angry or afraid. She double-checked her speed. She wasn’t poking along, by any means. Still, if the guy was in that much of a hurry...

Pulling closer to the parking lane so he could pass, Hope adjusted her charcoal-framed glasses to try to catch a look at the driver and license plate on the beat-up white van. But it veered so close as it sped past that it nearly clipped the side mirror on her car. “Hey!”

The van shot back into the lane in front of her, forcing Hope to stomp on the brake and skid to a stop. Glass rattled and boxes shifted behind her as several brief images printed like snapshots in her brain. A shadowy figure dressed in dark clothes sat behind the steering wheel. He wore a black knit cap pulled low over his forehead and a white scarf across his nose and mouth, hiding all but his eyes. In those brief milliseconds when he’d looked down into her car, she was certain their gazes had met, although he flew on by before the details completely registered. A shiny silver bumper that seemed at odds with the rusting wheel wells and dinged-up back doors was the last image she saw before it disappeared into the night.

“Where’s a cop when you need one?” She sighed, fighting a niggling sense of unease that her sleep-deprived brain was keeping her from recognizing something important.

“Need some help, sugar?” A trio of young men, dressed in hoods and jeans and more jewelry than she owned, knocked on her passenger-side window.

Startled by their approach and frightened by their leering smiles, Hope stepped on the accelerator and did a little speeding herself—leaving a trail of rubber, laughter and catcalls in her wake.

She drove three more blocks before she eased up on the gas. Hope inhaled a deep breath and ordered herself to get a grip. It was probably just the neighborhood she was driving through that had made her suspicious of the van and driver. Besides the three young men, she’d passed a homeless man pushing his cart along the sidewalk, and at least one scantily clad woman who’d been leaning into a parked car—either picking up a client, making a drug buy or both.

If Hope wasn’t so darned nearsighted, maybe she could have read the van’s license plate, even on the dimly lit street. If she wasn’t so distracted by those unwanted phone calls, she could have gotten a useful description of the driver. If she wasn’t so worn-out, maybe she would have taken the long way home and bypassed this run-down neighborhood where she had no business driving alone, anyway.

Hope breathed a sigh of relief as she finally left the less savory section of the city behind her and drove past the familiar landmarks of renovated art deco buildings, solid midcentury brownstones and converted warehouses that now housed trendy new businesses and condo apartments like her own. Her company improved, too. Instead of the prostitute and gangbangers, and rude drivers crowding her on the street, she drove past a busy bar with a neon green shamrock sign and a group of friends standing outside the front door, sharing a laugh and a smoke.

She stopped at the next light and waited for a young twentysomething couple to cross in front of her. They were holding hands, out on a Saturday night date to a restaurant or coffeehouse in the next block. Or perhaps they were meeting a group of friends to go dancing at one of the newly opened clubs in the trendy Kansas City neighborhood where Hope lived over her own shop.

A little pang of longing squeezed at Hope’s restless heart. Even if she had a date, or a whirlwind social life that included dancing and barhopping, she was too tired to do more than drive herself home tonight. She couldn’t wait to kick off her heels, slide into that bath and curl up with a good book.

Still, it would be nice if just once she had something more to look forward to than a hard day of work and a quiet night at home. She wanted something more—something a little more exciting, something a little less lonely.

Almost as soon as she thought the wish, she regretted it.

She knew she was lucky to have built a successful business. Lucky to have a solid roof over her head and plenty to eat every day. She was lucky to have a few friends and a younger brother she was so proud of serving in the Marines. Hope’s gaze dropped to her right hand where it rested on the steering wheel. A familiar web of pale scar tissue peeked above the cuff of her tan trench coat. She touched her fingers to the collar of her silk blouse, knowing there was more scarring underneath. All along her arm, her foot, her thigh—there were scars there, too.

She was lucky to be alive.

Hope was grateful to be where she was now, considering where she’d started. She was pushing her luck to dream of something more—like holding hands or being the recipient of a look like the one Jeff Stelling had given his bride, Deanna, today.

“Damn lucky,” she whispered out loud as the light changed. And she meant it. As long as other people kept falling in love, she’d have a job—and the security she’d been denied growing up. What would she do with a man, anyway? Embarrass herself? Shy, plump and partially disfigured—what man wouldn’t want to get all over that?

With a healthy dose of mental sarcasm to sharpen her dreamy focus, Hope turned onto her street. The familiar brick facade and storefront windows she’d decorated herself welcomed her as she slowed to pull into the parking lot beside Fairy Tale Bridal.

Hope parked her car in the reserved space next to the side entrance and climbed out, keys and pepper spray in hand. As stylish and reborn as this neighborhood might be, it, unfortunately, had become the hunting ground of a serial rapist that the press had dubbed the Rose Red Rapist. She had the unwanted distinction of being responsible for the horrid nickname because one of his first victims had been abducted right outside her shop. So much for fairy tales. Several more women, including a friend who’d worked just across the street at the Robin’s Nest Floral shop, had been blitz attacked, driven to another location, sexually assaulted and then dumped back here on this very block as if they were so much trash.

A client of hers, Bailey Austin, had been that first victim. Hope still felt guilty about the night more than a year ago when Bailey—then an engaged woman having a tiff with her fiancé at the shop—had stormed out of Fairy Tale Bridal and been assaulted. Although the younger woman had assured Hope that she in no way held her responsible for the attack, Hope was still looking for a way to make restitution.

Hope unlocked the vestibule and picked up the mail off the floor that had come through the slot. Then she unlocked the inner door to her shop and set the bills and letters along with her purse inside before returning to her car to unload the boxes from the wedding reception. She tilted her gaze to make sure the security lights and camera monitoring the entrance were working before opening her trunk and grabbing the first box of family mementos from her car.

With each trip to and from the shop, she made a point of scanning her surroundings and locking her car. KCPD had formed a task force to track down and arrest the elusive rapist, and they had stepped up patrols in this particular neighborhood. The Rose Red Rapist had received plenty of press on television and in the local papers, although facts about the attacks often got less coverage than the reporters’ negative opinions on the police department’s handling of the case. But every woman in town knew the dangers lurking in the darkness. Every woman who lived here knew the details of the crimes—what to look for and what to avoid.

She was one woman, alone in the city. And even though she was no slim, head-turning beauty, she wasn’t so naive to think she couldn’t become a victim, too. She fit the profile of the professional women the rapist targeted. She was successful and confident—when it came to her business, at any rate. Hope was smart enough to be on guard, especially at this time of night. But she couldn’t very well surrender to the terror she faced as a single woman in this neighborhood. Her entire life’s savings was tied up in this shop. Anything she could call her own was in that apartment upstairs.

Besides, she was experienced enough in life to know that danger could find a person anywhere—in the heart of the city, or on a dusty back road in the middle of nowhere. This building was her home and her livelihood, and no man—no threat—was going to frighten her into giving up everything she’d worked so hard for. She just had to be aware. She had to pay attention to the alerts and details the police had shared with the public.

Details.

Driven to another location...

Hope shifted the box of photos to one arm and closed the trunk as a shiver of awareness raised goose bumps across her skin. That was what she should have remembered about the white van that had cruised past her. She’d read a witness account in the paper with vague details about coming to inside a white van before being dumped in the alley across the street after her assault.

White van? A driver hiding his face on a cool autumn night?

There had to be hundreds of white vans in the city. Just because one had crept up on her bumper...twice...

And the man in black and white behind the wheel? Surely he wasn’t... Hope’s stomach knotted with fear. Surely she hadn’t gotten a glimpse of the Rose Red Rapist himself.

En route to another abduction.

Returning from the scene of an assault.

“No. Surely not.” No one had seen the serial rapist. One reason he’d never been arrested was that no victim had been able to identify him—no surviving victim. She hugged the box to her chest and tried to talk herself off the ledge of fearful possibility she was climbing on to. “He was just some jackass who was in a hurry.”

A blur of white in Hope’s peripheral vision drew her attention out to the street.

A white van moved with the late-night traffic past the entrance to the parking lot. The white van? Was the Rose Red Rapist on the prowl for his next victim?

Hope’s breathing locked up the way it had at the church. She was squarely and completely trapped on that ledge. “That can’t be him.”

Cruising through her neighborhood? Had the driver followed her home? Was he hunting her?

Hope barely managed to save the box and its fragile contents from crashing to the asphalt. “You don’t even know if it’s him,” she warned herself on a whisper. “It’s just a white van. It’s just some guy in a van. It’s probably not even the same one.”

Refusing to let her imagination turn her observation into a panic, she carefully set the box down on the trunk and took a couple of steps toward the street. Rusting wheel wells. Shiny silver bumper.

She glanced up into the cab. Dark stocking cap and...not a scarf.

A surgical mask.

Shadowed eyes met hers.

“Oh, my God.”

Hope slipped her hand into her coat pocket to pull out her phone as the van suddenly picked up speed and headed toward the next intersection. She hurried out to the sidewalk to see which direction the vehicle would turn and punched in 911. The driver might not be the Rose Red Rapist, but it was definitely the same van that had nearly crowded her off the road tonight.

“Nine-eleven Dispatch,” a succinct female voice answered. “What is the nature of your emergency?”

“I don’t know if this is exactly an emergency, but I’m not sure who to report this to.” Hope turned up the collar of her trench coat and huddled against the suddenly brisk chill in the autumn air. “I just saw a white van that matches the description the police gave in the paper about the vehicle the Rose Red Rapist drives. The man inside had his face covered.”

“Are you in danger, ma’am?”

“I...” There were a few people hanging out down at the corner where the van was waiting for the light to change. A group of young women wandered out of the dance club. Was the driver watching them? Choosing one for his next victim? “I’m not. But someone else may be.” Hope glanced around at the cars parked on the street, at the closed shops, at the deserted sidewalks here in the middle of the block. She was safe, wasn’t she? The van turned right, slowly circling past the group of women waiting at the crosswalk. “I think you should send the police.”

“Yes, ma’am. Where are you now?”

Hope relayed her location, refusing to take her eyes off the van until it disappeared from sight. A man wearing a surgical mask wasn’t necessarily a threat. Maybe it was part of his work—such as an exterminator, or someone who worked with food might wear. Or maybe he was one of those people who was phobic about catching germs. Still...it just didn’t feel right.

“We already have an officer in the area, ma’am,” the dispatcher assured her. “I’ll send him to your shop right now.”

Good idea. Go back inside her shop. Lock the doors. “Thank you.”

Hope disconnected the call, waiting a few seconds longer until the young women changed their minds and went back into the club for more dancing. The breeze whipped loose a long tendril of hair that had been pinned up in a French roll all day. The long curl hooked inside the temple of her glasses and caught in her lashes, forcing her to squint until she pulled it free and tucked it back behind her ear. Good. The women were all safely inside. She’d be smart to do the same until the police arrived to take her statement.

“Staring into space like you always did.”

Hope jumped inside her pumps and whirled around to see the gray-haired man standing behind her.

“I’ve been waitin’ for you, girl.”

* * *

“DAMN IT, HANK.”

“Don’t you get fresh with me, girl. I’m your father.” Not anymore, he wasn’t. And though he wasn’t much taller than Hope, he could still point his finger and somehow manage to look down at her. “You watch your tongue. Here.”

He held out a small box wrapped in brown paper and packing tape. Hope pulled her hands back to her stomach, instinctively retreating from his touch. “Go away.”

“Hey, if you don’t answer my phone calls, then I’ve got to come find you in person.” His twangy, low-pitched drawl grated against her eardrums. His face was clean-shaven; his clothes were clean. But Hope could smell the booze on him. Or maybe those were the bad memories. What some people might describe as folksy charm, she knew to be a lie, a facade that hid the monster underneath.

“So it was you,” she accused, referring to the countless unanswered calls and hang-ups she’d gotten on her phone today. “We have nothing to say.”

She turned to the parking lot, but stopped after a few steps when she realized he was following. Apparently, changing phone numbers and ignoring his calls hadn’t sent the message she wanted any more than moving away from the Ozarks when she was eighteen had. Getting rid of her father tonight would require one of those confrontations she hated.

Hope tugged the sleeves of her blouse and suit jacket over her wrists, and turned up the collar of her trench coat. “What are you doing in Kansas City?” As if she couldn’t guess.

“Truck broke down. I need some cash to get parts to fix it.”

“How did you get to K.C. if your truck’s broken?” She followed his glance over his shoulder to see the a middle-aged woman with brassy hair tapping her dark red nails against the steering wheel of the compact car she sat in. “Friend of yours?”

The woman waved when he winked a smoky gray eye, one of the few traits Hope had inherited from him. “Don’t you be rude, girl. I’ve been seeing Nelda for a couple of weeks now. She was nice enough to drive me up to the city from Wentworth. We’re staying with a cousin of hers here in town. Oh, I’ll be owin’ her for gas, too.”

“Then get a job.”

He folded his stout arms over his belly, reminding her of the wrapped package he’d brought her. He nodded toward the front of her shop. “Why don’t you give me one? You seem to be doin’ well enough.”

“I’m not hiring you.”

“I could do odd jobs around the place for you. Sweep up at night. Fix the plumbing and electrical. Help haul all that stuff inside.” He’d been watching her unload her car? Hope started to shake, although she wasn’t sure if it was anger at his lazy rudeness, just sitting there and watching her work, or fear that he’d been spying on her, lying in wait, and she hadn’t noticed—hadn’t even suspected—that heated her blood. “You need a man around the place.”

She didn’t need him. Hope swallowed her emotions and kept her voice calm. “I have someone who takes care of those jobs. I have nothing for you.” And that’s when she saw the canceled stamps above her name on the package. It wasn’t a gift he’d brought to try and buy his way back into her life. “You picked up my mail?”

“Just this.” This time, she took the parcel when he held it out to her. “It wouldn’t fit through the mail slot and was sitting outside your door. Didn’t want someone to take it.” Unfortunately, someone had taken it.

She studied the box for a moment, idly noting the lack of a return address, wondering at the plain brown wrapping when everything she ordered for her store came through a professional delivery service. Whatever was inside didn’t weigh much, but the contents seemed to shift each time she turned the box. She hoped it hadn’t come from her brother, who was currently stationed in the Middle East, because she suspected that whatever was inside had broken. “You do know it’s a federal offense to take someone’s mail? I have every right to call the police.”

That made his silver brows bristle. “I’m your father. I was doing you a favor.”

Hope shook her head. “It’s not worth what you’re asking me for. There’s a reason I don’t answer the phone when you call. And it’s not because I want to see you in person, instead. You’re not a part of my life anymore. Not legally, and certainly not emotionally.”

“That’s a lie, girl. I know how that heart of yours works. I know you want to be a part of something.” He stepped closer and Hope flinched. His eyes sparkled with satisfaction. He probably knew he’d finally pushed the right button to get around her resolve. His gaze darted to the bare fingers on her left hand. “I know you ain’t got a man in your life.”

“And you think being a family with you and—” she gestured to the car at the curb “—Nelda is some kind of consolation prize? No, thanks.”

Ending the late-night conversation, Hope turned away. But five strong fingers clamped down like a vise on her arm. She instantly tugged at his grip, but he jerked her shoulder back into his chest and whispered beside her ear, “We’re family. I paid my debt for what I did. How many ways can I say I’m sorry?”

Her pulse throbbed beneath the scars at her wrist and neck and suddenly she was ten again. Suddenly she felt weak. Trapped. Afraid. “Hank, I—”

“Hank!” A car horn honked at the same time a siren whooped through one warning cycle. Flashing lights reflected in Hope’s glasses and bounced off the windows of her shop as a black-and-white pickup truck screeched to a stop in the parking lot entrance behind them.

Hank Lockhart released his daughter’s arm and shushed the brassy-haired woman who’d sounded the alarm. Hope clutched the package in her hand and rubbed at the bruised skin above her elbow.

She, too, backed off a step when she heard the fierce barking coming from the cage in the backseat of the truck. She held her breath as a wheaten-haired cop in a black uniform and KCPD ball cap jumped out of the hastily parked truck and circled around the front. She recognized the blue eyes and rugged features and felt an embarrassed awareness choke her throat. This was the cop KCPD had sent? Could her night get any worse?

Pike Taylor rested his hand on the gun at his waist as his broad shoulders came up behind her father and dwarfed him. “Is everything all right, Miss Lockhart?”

Chapter Two

Why did that woman jump every time he spoke to her?

Edison “Pike” Taylor bit down on the urge to curse and concentrated on the wiry older man who’d put his hands on Hope Lockhart. With his canine partner, Hans, loudly making it known that Pike had backup—in case six feet four inches of armed cop wasn’t intimidating enough—he subtly maneuvered around the gray-haired coot who smelled as if he’d just walked out of a bar. Despite a nonchalant adjustment to the bill of his KCPD ball cap, Pike turned his shoulder into the space between Hope and her assailant, blocking any chance of the man reaching for her again.

Damn it. She drifted back another step, as if she was just as afraid of him as she was this guy. He and Hans had been patrolling this neighborhood for months now. And, as members of KCPD’s Rose Red Rapist task force, they had answered every call to the scene of a female assault victim in the area, including one this past summer to the flower shop across the street that Hope’s friend Robin Carter—well, Robin Lonergan now that she’d recently married—owned.

Up until that night, Hope Lockhart had been this prim, uptight shop owner—a stereotyped old maid who wore glasses, buttoned-up suits and her hair in a bun. She’d said barely more than “Hello, Officer” to him whenever they ran into each other on the street. She was either too busy, too snooty or too disinterested to make friendly conversation with him, despite his best efforts. It had become a challenge of sorts every day or night he worked for Pike to walk Hans by her storefront and wave or tip his hat to her through the display windows to see her sputter or blush or quickly turn away.

But on the night of the flower shop attack, when Hope had come over to check on the well-being of her friend Robin, and Robin’s infant daughter, he’d suddenly seen her in a whole new light.

Hope Lockhart wasn’t a snob at all. She was shy—a woman on the quiet side—maybe about as awkward making conversation with him as he’d been trying to tease and get a rise out of her. Hope Lockhart was guarded, a little mysterious, even. She was pretty, too. Not in a knock-your-socks-off kind of way. But if a man looked—and he’d been doing more looking than he should have that night—he’d notice there was more to Hope than a tight bun and those boring suits she wore like some kind of uniform.

That night she’d worn the same trench coat she had on now, hastily tied over a nightgown, showing a V of creamy skin that dropped down between some seriously generous breasts. Without the pins and barrettes, long, curly hair tumbled over her shoulders in sexy, toffee-colored waves. He’d noticed her eyes behind those skinny glasses that night, too. They were big and gray and deep like a placid fishing lake early in the morning before any boats or lines had disturbed the surface. But she’d about bolted from the room and gone all shades of pale when he’d tried to talk to her. Kind of hard on a man’s ego.

Shyness didn’t explain why she didn’t like him much. But with her unwillingness to get better acquainted, he had no idea why. An aversion to cops? Was she intimidated by big men? Had he said something to offend her? Hope’s reaction to him that night—and every other time he and Hans had crossed her path since—read fear to him. And that kind of fear—when he was damn sure he was one of the good guys—rubbed him the wrong way.

Pike glanced down over the jut of his shoulder to see Hope massaging the arm this man had grabbed. “Are you hurt, ma’am?”

That gray gaze darted up to meet his for a split second before dropping down to the pavement. “I’m okay.”

Anything creamy or sexy or pretty was locked up tight beneath the buttoned-up coat and tightly pinned hair she wore tonight. Pike discovered that that bothered him, too. Why would a woman go to so much effort to hide what were potentially the prettiest things about her?

Hiding? Afraid?

Ah, hell. Why hadn’t he fit the puzzle pieces together sooner? If Hope’s covered-up appearance and skittish behavior didn’t speak to some history of abuse, Pike didn’t know what did.

Pike focused squarely on the man in front of him, even though he spoke to Hope. “Do you want him to stay?”

“We were just having a conversation, Officer, um...” The older man squinted the name on Pike’s shirt into focus. “Taylor. I’m Hank Lockhart—Henry Lockhart the first.” He extended a hand that Pike ignored. “I’m Hope’s daddy. I happened to be in town and thought I’d drop by and have a visit.”

Her daddy? Paying a surprise visit after midnight?

“Hank?” A blonde woman, wearing a top that was too tight and skimpy for her age and the autumn weather, climbed out from behind the wheel of a parked Toyota. “Is everything all right? You said this would only take a minute. You’ve kept me waiting for more than an hour.”

“Not now, Nelda.” Hank waved off the woman, who’d tried to signal Pike’s arrival when he pulled up.

“You didn’t say she was friends with the cops. You said this was going to be easy—”

Hank swung around, pointing a bony finger at the woman. “Get back in the car.”

With an annoyed huff, the woman tossed back her overbleached hair and slid behind the wheel.

Friends with the cops.

Pike slipped another peek at the woman cradling a small package in her hand and warily keeping an eye on everyone involved in this late-night tête-à-tête, including him. Hope didn’t seem any more open to the idea of becoming friends now than she’d been during the other brief encounters they’d shared. And though he wished he knew what he’d done to earn such a cool reception from the bridal shop owner, Pike knew he didn’t have to be liked by all the residents he’d sworn to protect and serve—he just had to protect and serve them.

“Did you want to press charges against him, ma’am?” Pike asked.

“Charges?” both Lockharts answered in unison.

But while Hope didn’t seem to know how to answer the question, Hank had no trouble arguing his innocence in the matter. “Charge me with what? We were having a family discussion. A private one, I might add. I don’t know where you came from or why you’re here. But I haven’t done anything wrong.”

“Hope?” Pike prodded, willing her to snap out of her meek silence. He’d come here, looking for a suspicious white van, and he’d shown up right in the middle of some kind of domestic dispute. He could arrest this guy and make him go away for the night, but not for any longer if she refused to speak up. Pike hooked his thumbs into the top of his utility belt and waited for an answer. “What do you want me to do?”

Nelda honked the horn again and Hank swore beneath his breath.

To Pike’s surprise, he heard a soft voice behind him. “My father was just leaving.”

So the old man hadn’t completely knocked the spirit out of her.

“We’re not finished, girl,” Hank dared to argue. When he turned that bony finger on Hope and took a step toward her, Pike quickly shifted to block his path. “About that job we were discussing—”

“I said he was leaving.”

The rising confidence in Hope’s tone made it that much easier to back her up—and made it clear that in this situation, at least, she’d appreciate a little help from him. Pike nodded toward the irritated blonde. “I wouldn’t want to keep you, Mr. Lockhart.”

The grizzled older man sized up Pike with one contemptuous glance, then angled his head to make a final plea to his daughter. “Don’t you do this to me. You can’t punish me forever. You know I need—”

“I suppose it’s about time to walk my dog.” Pike pulled out his black, reinforced leather gloves and nodded to the muscular German shepherd fogging up the rear window of his departmental vehicle, intently watching Pike’s every move. Right on cue, the dog started barking again. “Hans has been cooped up inside my truck for a long time tonight.”

He watched the color bleed from Hank Lockhart’s cheeks, making the broken capillaries in his alcoholic’s nose stand out in redder, sharper detail. That’s what he figured. Pike’s canine partner had a knack for convincing people to do exactly what Pike asked.

“I get your message loud and clear.” Offering a placating hand that sported half a dozen homemade tattoos that indicated the man had done some jail time, Hank Lockhart finally retreated. “I’ll talk to you later.”

A soft trace of vanilla joined the damp scent of dying leaves on the late-night breeze as Hope stepped onto the sidewalk beside Pike to watch Hank and his lady friend drive off down the street. The sounds of a heated argument leaked through the open car windows and faded as the car turned the corner and vanished into the night.

Pike stuffed his gloves back into his pocket. “He’s hurt you before, hasn’t he?”

Hope’s breathy sigh was confirmation enough. So maybe he’d been a little blunt with his speculation. Knowing she’d grown up with an abusive man went a long way toward explaining her ready distrust of him. And made him more determined than ever to prove that he wasn’t the bad guy here.

A long twist of honey-brown hair had freed itself from the severe confinement of the clip at the back of her head and lifted like a feathery banner in the breeze. As she captured the wayward curl and tucked it behind her ear, Pike realized that that was where the sweet scent from a moment ago had come from. Once again, he wondered why Hope Lockhart would hide something so feminine and pretty as that glorious hair from the world.

Either unaware of or uninterested in the stirrings of awareness she sparked inside him, Hope turned away to the parking lot, dismissing him. “Good night, Officer Taylor.”

Pike got the brush-off message but followed her, anyway. “Do you have a restraining order against him?”

She set aside a small package on the rear fender of her car and reached for a bigger, heavier box. “I haven’t seen him for a couple of years. He doesn’t even live in Kansas City.”

“He’s here now. I’d consider filing for one.” Pike nudged her aside and picked up the box for her. “Where to?”

Her mouth opened to voice a protest, but once she understood he wasn’t leaving her here alone at this time of night, she pointed to the side entrance of her shop. “Thank you.”

“Miss Lockhart—Hope—is it okay if I call you that?” After a momentary hesitation, she nodded and opened the door for him. “You want to tell me about that 911 call?”

She held open the interior door, as well. “It had nothing to do with my father, Officer Taylor.”

“Pike.”

“Pike,” she repeated, then paused, knotting the smooth skin above the nosepiece of her glasses. “What kind of name is Pike?”

He grinned, seeing the first opportunity for a normal, friendly conversation between them. “There’s a story behind it. Taylor is my adoptive parents’ name. But I was born Edison Pike.”

No comment. But the curiosity was still there.

So he forged ahead. “Like Thomas Edison. I think my grandmother who raised me was hoping for an inventor—someone brainier than I turned out to be. And for a while, I did think about going into veterinary medicine. But what can I say? I come from a family of cops and firefighters. I always liked the action more than the books. But I kept the nickname as a way of honoring the woman who took care of me for the first few years of my life.”

She tilted her eyes up to his, flashing him a look that said his words didn’t make sense, before she led him through her shop to the back room. “Your grandmother raised you—but you’re adopted?”

Well, at least he knew she’d been listening. Pike ignored the gowns, mannequins and fancy accessories surrounding him and focused in on the curly lock bouncing against Hope’s neck as she walked. “Gran died when I was ten. I went into foster care, where I met my mom and dad and my three brothers. They’re adopted, too. Alex is the oldest. Then there’s me, Matthew and Mark.”

Hope turned on the light and hugged the door frame to stay out of his way as he carried the box into the storage room. He set the box of picture frames and photo albums down on the shelf she indicated. “There was no other family to take me when Gran got sick. I lucked out, though. My mom, Meghan, had been a foster child in the same house when she was younger, and she liked to come back and help out whenever she could. She brought me my first dog—a smaller, mutt version of Hans—that she’d rescued from a fire. I named her Crispy. I think Mom kind of adopted us even before she married Gideon Taylor.”

Pike paused when he realized he was rambling to fill up the silence. He reached over Hope’s shoulder to turn off the light switch and watched her scuttle out of the room, leaving a trail of vanilla deliciousness in her wake. Hmm. Maybe the KCPD brass had made a mistake in selecting him and Hans to do frontline PR and security work between the task force and the community. Apparently, his presence was more unsettling than reassuring—at least with this particular community member.

Protect and serve. Forget the sweet fragrance and tempting lock of hair. He just had to earn Hope’s trust and keep her safe. She didn’t have to like him.

Inhaling a deep, resigning breath, Pike followed Hope out to the counter at the center of the shop. “I’m doing all the talking. If you don’t say something soon, I’ll never shut up.”

Was that...? No. A smile?

“I don’t mind. I like to listen.”

Some unknown weight lifted off his chest and Pike grinned right back. He’d almost made her laugh.

But just as soon as it had softened her mouth, Hope’s smile disappeared. She pulled her purse from beneath the counter and looped the strap over her shoulder. “I was a foster kid, too. My mother passed when my brother was born. And Hank wasn’t... He couldn’t handle her death and we... Harry—my brother—is just a year younger. When I aged out of the system, I filed for guardianship and we moved to Kansas City. I went to school and Harry enlisted in the Marines.”

“Sounds a lot like my mom’s story.”

Ah, hell. Wrong thing to say. Telling a young woman she reminded him of his mother—no matter how much he loved that mother—wasn’t the smoothest line a man could use.

Just as he thought he was getting somewhere with Hope, her body language became all stern business again, and she spun toward the parking lot exit. “I called because there was a van following me home from the wedding I worked today. At least, I thought it might be. When I saw it drive past my shop several minutes later, I realized it matches the description of the van your task force may be looking for.”

Pike shook his head at the abrupt change in topic. But then the import of what she was saying hit and he hurried after her to catch her before she reached the door. He turned in front of her, blocking her path. “This van was following you?”

She tipped her head back, adjusting her glasses at her temple to look him in the eye even though she was sliding back a step. “I don’t know that he was intentionally following me. But he was driving behind me, maybe a little closer than I’d like, on the street. When I saw him drive by again and circle the block, that’s when I called KCPD.”

This was exactly the type of lead the task force had been looking for. And he’d been worried about making nice with her? “Did you get a license plate? A description of the driver?”

She shook her head. “I can’t tell you much. He was dressed in black. Wore a stocking cap pulled down over his forehead and...”

“And what?”

Her shoulders lifted as though she doubted what she’d seen. “At first I thought he was wearing a white scarf around his neck. But I got a closer look the second time he drove by. He had on a surgeon’s mask.” She raised her hand to her face to indicate how little she’d been able to see. “It covered his nose, mouth and chin.”

Wait a minute. Pike propped his hands on his belt, tuning in to the details beyond her description of the driver. “The second time?”

She nodded. “He circled the block and came back by the shop.”

“Did he see you? Do you think he was looking for you?”

“I don’t know. I know we made eye contact, but then he sped off and my father showed up and...” She shrugged again. “Sorry I can’t tell you more. But I can give a pretty accurate description of the van if that helps.”

“We’ll take whatever help we can get if it leads us to our rapist.” Pike hesitated a moment before stepping aside and following her into the vestibule and waiting for her to lock the shop door. He guessed the other interior door, built of antique walnut and bolted tight, led upstairs to the apartment above the shop. Had she carried in all those other boxes, packed with the similar white netting and tissue paper tonight? By herself? After midnight?

With a serial rapist at large in the city?

How many other nights had she worked this late and come home alone? Even if the guy in the van wasn’t the Rose Red Rapist, and her father hadn’t been on-site to bully her, she’d been at risk.

Swallowing the acrid taste that suspicion left in his throat, Pike gave one last glance at the racks of fancy dresses and froufrouy displays that marked her bridal shop as foreign territory. He was too big, too male, too comfortable in his black uniform to ever fit in with all the lace and glitz and monkey suits there. Maybe that’s why she’d barely spoken a dozen words to him over the past few months. They had next to nothing in common. But ignoring the extra security he provided this neighborhood wasn’t an option. Not anymore. Hope Lockhart needed to accept somebody’s help in making her habits smarter and safer.

“How often do you come home late like this?” he asked, holding the outside door open for her.

“Once or twice a month,” she answered, walking to the trunk of her car. “Depending on how elaborate the wedding is and how late the ceremony or reception runs.”

Pike reached behind the badge on his belt to pull out a KCPD business card with his contact information on it. “Next time you’ve got a car full of stuff to unload by yourself late at night, you call me.”

“I’m perfectly capable of—”

“I’m not talking muscle.” The breeze lifted the distracting swirl of caramel hair again and Pike was reaching for it before he’d even thought the impulse through. He caught the silky twist and wound it around his fingertip, watching twin dots of color warm her cheeks as he tucked it behind her ear. Yeah, maybe his hand lingered a little longer than it should have, but those curls were just as soft as they looked. “I’m talking company. You shouldn’t be alone on the streets or in this parking lot after dark. It’d make my job a lot easier if I knew I didn’t have to worry about one of the locals getting herself into trouble with a serial rapist—or a long-lost father.”

“I’ll try not to be a bother.” She pressed her hand against her ear and the nape of her neck, as though checking to see if the wayward strand he’d touched was still there. Her eyes darkened and she turned away, acting as if his curious touch had somehow upset her.

“That’s not what I meant.”

She hurried to retrieve the small parcel still sitting there, never giving him a chance to apologize.

“I know what you...” The box toppled off the trunk of her car before her fingers ever touched it. It landed flat on the ground, came to a complete rest, then wobbled on the asphalt. The thing rocked back and forth, moving several inches, as though it had sprouted feet and was slinking away. “That’s weird.”

When she went to pick it up, Pike latched onto her arm and pulled her back. “Hold on. Is that box from the wedding?”

“No.” She quickly moved away, hugging an arm around her waist and clutching her collar together at the neck. “My father had it when I came home.”

Pike let her go and squatted down to get a closer look at the package. Loosely taped. Plain brown wrapping. Moving away like a drunken snail. Something was wrong here. “Gift from your dad?”

“He handed it to me. Said he picked it up outside my door. I’m not sure where it came from.”

Pike read Hope’s name and this address scribbled directly onto the brown paper. “You got any friends who are into practical jokes? Maybe it’s full of Mexican jumping beans.”

But Hope wasn’t laughing. “I thought it might be from my brother overseas. He’s in the Marines. But there’s no APO address, country of origin or customs label, either.”

“There’s no cancelation stamp, period. This didn’t come through the mail. If your dad didn’t bring it, then someone left it here.” Pulling his gloves from his hip pocket, Pike rose to his feet. “Let me get Hans out to check it before you open it.”

“That’s not necessary. I...”

But Pike was already heading to his truck. He pulled Hans’s leash from the front seat before opening the back door. “Hey, big guy. Want to go to work?”

The familiar whines of anticipation were as clear as a verbal yes. Pike rubbed his hands around the German shepherd’s jowls and neck, reinforcing their bond and cueing his intention before he clipped the work leash to the harness between Hans’s shoulders. Pike rotated the dog’s collar so his brass badge hung in front of his deep chest. Then he patted the tan fur twice and issued the command to exit the truck.

Jogging at a pace that gave Hans a chance to stretch his muscles, Pike took him in a circle around the perimeter of the parking lot before he tugged on the lead and slowed the dog to put his sensitive black nose to work. “Find it, boy. Such!”

Working in methodical steps along the building’s south brick wall and around Hope’s car, Pike let Hans sniff the ground and vehicle. This was a game for the dog. In addition to his security work, he’d been trained to search for certain particular scents, and once he found one and sat to indicate his discovery, he’d be rewarded with a game of tug-of-war with his favorite toy. If Pike led him straight to the box, Hans might not identify it as anything suspicious because he hadn’t had the chance to track the scent first.

“There he goes.” Hans’s rudderlike tail wagged with excitement as he zeroed in on the trunk of the car. His breathing quickened and his nose stayed down as he picked up the trail of the mysterious package. “Find, it, Hansie,” Pike encouraged, repeating the command in German. “Such!”

His black nose hovered over the package, touched the ground beside it. He whined at a high pitch, then jumped back as the package moved again. Hans was panting heavily now, more worked up with excitement than with the duration of the search.

“What is it, boy?” The dog lifted his dark brown eyes to Pike and sat. “He’s not hitting on it like he does when there are drugs or explosives inside.” The dog’s high-pitched squeal indicated a degree of discomfort or uncertainty. “This is something different. I don’t think it’s anything dangerous or he’d let us know, but I’m damn curious to open it.”

After tossing Hans his toy, and giving him a few seconds of play time to reward him for completing his job, Pike pulled his utility knife from his belt and flipped it open. “I’m going to go ahead and open it. Unless you want to?”

With a cautious hand, Pike slit open the packing tape and peeled off the outer wrapping. As he set the paper aside, he turned his ear to a clicking noise coming from the tottering box. He leaned closer. Not clicking. Chattering. Shuffling, maybe. Oh, man. Was there something alive in there? Forgetting caution and feeling pity for whatever poor creature had been trapped inside, he sliced through the cardboard and pulled open the flap.

“Whoa.” Pike landed on his backside as he jerked away from the bugs tumbling out through the opening in the box. Hans barked at Pike’s surprise as the insects poured out, scurrying across the asphalt, seeking their freedom. Dozens of them. Hundreds, maybe. Cockroaches. Crickets. Centipedes. Creepies and crawlies he couldn’t identify. “What sick son of a...?”

He scrambled to his feet and backed toward Hope, positioning himself between her and the swarm of shock and terror. “Don’t come over here. You don’t need to see this... Hope?” Pike spun around, desperate for a glimpse of prim-looking glasses and tied-up hair. “Hope!”

She was gone.

Chapter Three

“Hope? Hope!”

“Get back here, girl! You runnin’ from me?”

Hope bolted the door behind her and scrambled up the stairs, desperate to put some distance between her and that huge, horrible monster.

The bugs were gross, a sick joke—maybe even from her dad. Probably meant to scare her into thinking she needed a man here. Maybe he’d even hoped she’d open the box inside her shop or apartment and then she’d hire him to exterminate every last one of them. Never. A bug she could step on.

But the dog...

“Hope?” The pounding on the door pushed her across the landing, past the double door leading to a loft storage area and straight to the restored antique door to her apartment. She dropped her keys when a thundering bark joined the pounding. “Are you in there? Are you okay?”

Knowing she was acting on blind panic, but feeling just as helpless to stop it, she scooped up the fallen keys and unlocked the door.

“Hope? Answer me!” Wood splintered around the lock below as she pushed open the door and ran straight to her kitchen. “Go, boy! Voran! Hope?”

She yelped when she heard the galloping up the stairs, the long legs running her down. The rapid drumbeat filled up her ears and she could barely catch her breath. She swiped away the foolish tears that stung her eyes and reached for the biggest weapon she could find.

Pulling a carving knife from the butcher block on the counter, Hope swung around into the open dining and living area to meet the beast at her front door. A man in black filled up the opening, but he was just the imposing backdrop to the real threat.

Gripping the knife in both hands, Hope prepared to defend herself. Far better than she had done twenty years ago. This time, she was no little girl. This time, she wasn’t weak from starvation. This time, she was armed.

She heard the growl. Saw the rush of movement. Screamed.

“Hans! Platz!”

The charging dog halted as if he’d jerked to the end of an invisible chain and plopped back onto his haunches. He slowly walked his feet forward until he was lying down beside the black military-grade boots of the man in the doorway. Hope didn’t believe that relaxed posture for a moment. The dog was breathing just as hard as she was, and those big, midnight-brown eyes still had her in his sights.

“Miss Lockhart?” The man raised one hand in a placating motion, then stooped down to clip a leash to the harness the dog wore. He dropped his voice to a deep, husky pitch. “Hope?”

Something short-circuited in her brain, cutting off the instinctive fight-or-flight response long enough for her to see what was really happening here. Pushing the falling hair off her face, still breathing deeply and erratically, still holding the knife, Hope blinked Edison Pike Taylor into focus. Clear blue eyes in a rugged, masculine face. Broad shoulders. Black ball cap. KCPD embroidered on the shirt that stretched over a black turtleneck and protective vest. A badge and gun on his belt.

Not her father. Not the damned babysitters. “Get her!”

Hope cringed and looked away from the ugly nightmare that tried to surface.

Pike Taylor slowly straightened, filling up the doorway again. “Why did you run? I turned around and you were gone. I thought you’d been abducted or something—that maybe your dad had come back or...” He took a step toward her and she lifted the knife, gripping it between both hands. He stopped, put up his leather-gloved hand again and drilled her with those startling blue eyes. “Don’t be afraid of me.”

The sharp words, more command than request, pierced the fog of fear that lingered in her brain. “I...I’m not. I don’t think I am.”

“Could have fooled me.” His gaze dropped briefly to the knife she still wielded, and she suddenly realized that with a gun and a guard dog and the sheer size and strength he had over her, she hadn’t stood much chance of defending herself, anyway. But he still didn’t make another move toward her. “Did you see something out there? That van? Was it the bugs? Trust me, they’ve scattered.”

“They’re not especially pleasant, but—”

“Is it me?”

She was the target of Pike Taylor’s piercing blue eyes again. “Not exactly.”

She couldn’t handle the intensity there—the suspicion? The anger? Hope blinked. She blinked again, trying to understand exactly what was happening here. Damn, he was big—more man than had ever been in her apartment before. He’d come by her shop nearly every day for months now—had always tipped his hat and said hello or winked as if they were some kind of friends. And now he was in her apartment, shrinking the wide-open space down to the few feet that separated them.

Why had he touched her hair tonight? And why had she...? Her heart had never raced like that before—not with anything except fear. Why had his fingers tangling into her wayward hair felt like a caress? As if she had the experience to recognize a man’s gentle caress.

Hope shook her head, dispelling the unfamiliar imprint of a man’s warm hand brushing across her cheek and ear. Blue eyes and distracting touches didn’t matter. She couldn’t afford to take her gaze off the black and tan dog. She could smell him now—the heat of his panting breath, the outdoor scents that clung to his thick fur. Hope finally lowered the knife, but only to slide her fingers beneath the sleeves on her right arm and rub at her wrist. The ridges and dots had softened and faded over the years, but she could feel the pain and itch of every scar as if they were new.

“Is it Hans?” At this hushed volume, Pike’s deep voice danced along her fried nerves like a soothing balm.

As embarrassing as her phobia might be to admit, her behavior put her past the point of lying or making a joke about it. Hope nodded. “I’m sorry. I guess I had a panic attack.”

“You think?”

“I haven’t had one for a long time. I usually can control it. But with the running and...and he was tracking so hard, so relentlessly. He’s so strong—all muscle, isn’t he?” She pushed her glasses into place at her temple, then found her fingers sliding beneath the collar of her blouse and loose hair to touch the scar there. She’d lost her big hair clip somewhere, and had probably left a trail of bobby pins on the stairs. Her hair was most likely sticking out in all directions, looking as wild as the pulse beat at the side of her neck felt. “I’m sure it seems irrational to you. I know he’s specially trained, he’s a member of the police force, and that he helps—”

“He’s not going to hurt you.”

“You don’t know that.” She blinked away flashback images of tearing flesh and searing pain. Of a gunshot that jerked through her even now. The final tragedy of two desperate children’s struggle for survival.

“Stay with me, Hope.” Pike stepped forward and Hope retreated.

“I am.” She managed to keep the knife pointed to the floor, although she couldn’t seem to ignore the phantom throb beneath the scars on her wrist. She pulled up a coat sleeve, a jacket sleeve and unbuttoned the cuff of her blouse to massage the skin there. “I will.”

Tall, Blond and Rugged was moving closer again. Hope focused on the black button at the center of Pike’s shirt. She could still hear the dog panting, but she could no longer see him past the width of those shoulders and chest.

“I trust Hans with my life. I trust he’ll do whatever I say. He’s trained to be an extension of me on the job, not a rogue wild animal.” Pike pulled off his cap and rubbed at his short dark gold hair, leaving rumpled spikes in its wake. He dropped his gaze to the leash in his hand and followed it back to the dog lying in the doorway behind him. The dog’s black muzzle lifted up and he tilted his head in some sort of anticipation.

Hope’s fingers tightened around the knife handle.

But Pike raised his hand and the dog settled down again, resting his head on his front legs. When Pike faced Hope again, his narrowed, probing eyes looked straight into hers. “I never had a chance at getting you to trust me, did I. All these months I’ve been patrolling this neighborhood, I’ve been trying to get to know you. Trying to find out if you were stuck-up or just unaware of my efforts.”

Regret followed closely on the heels of her simmering panic, sapping the remainder of Hope’s strength. It was a shy person’s worst nightmare to have her quiet moods and awkward social skills mistaken for arrogance or indifference. It compounded her frustration to discover that the time she needed to process her thoughts, emotions and reactions could be interpreted as a lack of caring. It hurt to know that the fight it took to assert herself sometimes came off as disdain.

“I’ve even been a little ornery about it,” Pike went on. “Making up excuses to come by your shop, demanding that you give me your trust and respect. But you were never going to give me a real chance.”

“I’m not stuck-up,” she whispered, mindlessly massaging the scars again.

“No. You’re terrified. Doesn’t make me feel like much of a cop—or much of a man—to see you look at me like that. I’d like to fix your perception of Hans and me.” He reached out, and for a moment, she thought he intended to disarm her. Instead, he reached past the knife and slowly closed his fingers around her wrist, brushing the warm pad of his thumb across the pale web of scars there. “What happened to you?”

“I...” Gentle though his inquisitive touch might be, Hope jerked her arm away and quickly pulled down her sleeves. What did she tell him? Long version? Short version? Was there any version that didn’t make her sound sad or eccentric or worth anything more than his pity?

Hans raised his head and woofed a split second before Pike turned his head and Hope heard a whisper of sound from the foot of the stairs. The outside door opened.

No version.

She clutched the knife in both hands again. There were knocks at both the shop and stairwell doors.

“Taylor!” a man shouted from the vestibule downstairs. “Pike! You here?”

“We’re not done with this conversation.” Pike adjusted his ball cap on his head and turned to the door. “I’m here!” he shouted. “Hans. Fuss!” The dog jumped to his feet and fell into step beside him. “Detective Montgomery? Nick? What are you doing here?”

Hope followed them out the door to see man and dog jog around the landing and down to the entryway below.

She heard a second man’s voice now. “We saw your rig out front. Thought maybe you knew something we didn’t.”

“Knew something about what?” Pike asked.

Hope crept to the top of the stairs behind him. “He took someone else, didn’t he? That’s why he was here.”

“The Rose Red Rapist?” At the foot of the stairs, Pike stood taller than either of the two men, one in a gray wool suit and tie, the other wearing jeans and a black leather jacket. The badges they wore identified them as cops, too.

Hope sank onto the top step, still holding the knife. “That was his van I saw, wasn’t it? That was him.”

The shorter of the two detectives pulled back the front of his leather jacket and reached for his gun, his gaze zeroing in on Hope—or, more specifically, on the carving knife she still held in her fist. “Ma’am? I need you to put that down.”

Hope’s breath locked up in her chest and she instinctively recoiled.

Pike put up a hand and warned the dark-haired detective not to unholster his weapon. “It’s okay, Nick. She’s a witness, not a threat. I...” His head tipped down toward Hans. “We...scared her.”

The air gradually eased from her lungs at Pike’s politely vague explanation. She’d pulled a knife and freaked out on him, yet he was still kind enough to defend her. And although she appreciated having that blockade of Pike Taylor’s shoulders between her and the two plainclothes detectives, Hope wisely set the knife down on the floor beside her. She spotted two bobby pins on the next step down and remembered that she probably looked as if she’d been fighting something more than her own fears tonight.

The red-haired detective who seemed to be in charge slid his gaze up to her, too, assessing her unkempt appearance and dismissing her before giving a concise, emotionless report to Pike. “We’ve got a body dump around the corner in the alley. Red rose inside her coat.”

Body dump? That meant the victim was dead, didn’t it? Raped and murdered. Hope’s audible gasp echoed through the walnut banister and across the crisply painted white landing. The dog’s ear pricked to attention, but none of the men seemed to notice. Hope pressed her fingers to her lips and whispered, “Oh, God. She was inside there, wasn’t she? She was in that van.”

The red-haired detective heard her hushed voice and looked up the stairs. “A LaDonna Chambers. Do you know her?”

“LaDonna?” For a moment, the detective’s hard eyes swam out of focus. But she blinked away the emotions that made her light-headed and nodded, picturing the friendly acquaintance she’d seen just yesterday morning. “Not well. She’s interning at a law office on the next street over. I’ve waited in line with her at the coffee shop several times.”

The detective in the suit jotted something into his notebook before tucking it inside his jacket pocket and turning his attention back to Pike. “Some college kids who’d been at Harpo’s Dance Club found her. That’s not the call you’re answering?”

Pike shook his head. “Miss Lockhart called in that she’d seen a suspicious white van on her way home tonight. I came to take her statement.”

“She saw the van?” The redhead pulled back the front of his jacket and splayed his hands at either side of his waist. “His van?”

Pike answered. “Could be, sir. She gave me a detailed description, but no plate number.”

The dark-haired detective looked agitated. “When? Did she see our guy? Can she ID the driver? Is that what spooked her?”

Clearly, the two detectives suspected there was more to her story than a helpful citizen’s phone call. But Pike didn’t mention her father, the sick present she’d gotten or her off-the-charts paranoid reaction to his efforts to help her. Thankfully, neither detective had questioned her erratic behavior, either. Until now.

They had bigger problems than hers tonight.

“I’m Detective Spencer Montgomery, KCPD task force, ma’am. This is my partner, Detective Nick Fensom. We work with Officer Taylor here.” Detective Montgomery flashed his badge and looked over Pike’s shoulder, right at her. Somehow the intensity of that slate-colored gaze was even more unsettling than the threat of Detective Fensom’s pulling his gun had been. “We need to talk to you.”

* * *

“WELL, THAT WAS a lousy plan. Do you think she recognized you?”

“I don’t know.” He breezed past the woman in the negligee and robe and headed straight for the bathroom.

“You don’t know?” She followed him in. “You already made one mistake tonight. I don’t think we can afford another.”

He unhooked his belt and slung it at her feet. “We?”

She crossed her arms beneath her breasts, refusing to let the subject drop. “I did my part. LaDonna Chambers can never hurt you again. But you don’t even know if this woman—”

“Shut up. I need to think.” He opened the shower door and turned on the shower until the water ran blisteringly hot. He stepped underneath the spray, clothes and all. He braced his hands on the tile wall and bent his head. The water beat against his scalp, drowning out the sounds of her calling him all kinds of stupid for going to the bridal shop tonight. Finally, she got the hint and returned to his bedroom. He stood there for countless minutes, letting the hot water sluice through his hair and soak through his clothes while the trapped, steamy air opened the pores of his skin. He stood like that until most of the rage was purged from him.

Once the haze of emotion had cleared his brain and reason returned, he peeled off his sodden clothes and dumped them into the hamper beside the shower. Then he unwrapped a fresh bar of soap and started to wash, cleaning beneath every nail, massaging every hair follicle, rinsing his skin twice and then again.

When he was done, exhausted by the furious emotions and the long night, he pulled a clean towel from the linen closet and wrapped it around his waist. He pulled out a matching towel to wipe down the shower walls and glass door. Then, with a third towel, he dropped down to his hands and knees, sopping up the puddle of water beneath the hamper.

He hated that he’d have to do something about Hope. He knew most of the women he hunted by their face, their habits, their location. But he rarely knew their names until their pictures were splashed across the television screen or centered in a newspaper article. He knew Hope, liked her well enough, he supposed. She stirred nothing inside him—no desire, no rage—but now he could see he’d been wrong to think she was of no consequence.

Hope Lockhart ran a successful business. She was loved by clients and respected by leaders in Kansas City business and society. Who’d have thought she’d have the guts to look him in the eye and call the police?

He’d have to find out exactly what she knew about him, exactly what she’d seen. If he was lucky, she’d still be of no consequence. But if she was a threat to him...

The damp towels fisted in his hands and he felt the stirrings of that damned hunger stirring inside him again.

“I suppose you need me to take care of this problem, too?”

She was in the doorway again, sneaking up behind him, standing over him. With his nostrils flaring as he fought to maintain his composure, he slowly eased his grip on the towels and folded them neatly around the wet clothes he’d discarded. “I’ll handle it. You were messy tonight.”

“Me? You’re the one who was careless. I told you it was too soon, but you wouldn’t listen.”

“Really? A gun? Do you know how long it took me to clean up the blood?” He laid the squared package of damp clothes and towels in the bottom of the hamper before turning to face her. “I had everything under control. She was mine to use however I wanted—until you interfered.”

“Do you think she would have given you what you wanted?” He went to the sink to unwrap a fresh comb. Her reflection joined his in the mirror. “She woke up, called you by name when she recognized your voice. I had to silence her.”

“I wasn’t finished with her.”

“Oh, you were finished.” She laughed.

His comb clattered into the sink. “Shut up.”

“I’m the voice of reason in your sad, secretive life. I’m the only one who has always been here for you. Without me, you’d be rotting in prison. I know the lie you live and I’ve loved you any—”

He spun around, clamping his hand around her throat and shoving her against the wall. “I said, shut. Up.”

“You won’t hurt me. I made you. You need me.”

What he needed was to feel in control again. His fingers tightened for a few moments until he heard her choking gurgle. But, damn her, even as her face drained of color, she barely even blinked at the dangerous torture he inflicted.

He popped his fingers open and released her. She inhaled a calm, deep breath and smiled. “You see? You know you can’t hurt me, that I’m the only one who’ll always be here for you.” She left the room to pour herself a drink. “Now. What are you going to do about Hope Lockhart?”

Chapter Four

The whole elevator smelled of vanilla, reminding Pike of the decadent sugar cookies his grandma Martha baked for Christmas every year.

Crossing his arms over his chest, he looked down at the toffee-haired woman standing at his shoulder, resolutely watching each number light up as they rode from the garage level up to the third floor of Fourth Precinct headquarters. She’d tamed her hair back into a loose ponytail, but a handful of curls escaped to frame her weary eyes. “You don’t have to do this, you know.”

It was maybe the fifth or sixth effort he’d made at starting a conversation with Hope Lockhart since driving her to the station for an interview with Detectives Montgomery and Fensom. “Get her downtown. Let’s talk to her while the memories are fresh.”

If he hadn’t scared the memories right out of her.

In the truck he’d gotten nothing more than a couple of nods and some wild-eyed glances back at the dog caged securely in the seat behind them. Maybe now, with Hans secured in his kennel downstairs, he hoped the skittish woman might relax a bit and they could share some normal, friendly conversation like the kind they’d started at her shop.

Well, he got conversation. But there wasn’t much normal or friendly about a woman talking to a pair of steel doors instead of to him.

“I know. But I want to help. Too many people I know have been hurt by that man. I barely knew LaDonna, but it feels like I’ve lost another friend. She splurged on mochas every Friday, and she had this big smile. Tonight she looked like she was sleeping. Until the M.E. closed that zipper...” Pike watched the ripple of movement down her creamy throat as Hope swallowed. “She was in a bag. Like...like she was being discarded.”

“You shouldn’t have agreed to confirm her ID.” Sure, the quick confirmation helped speed the investigation along, but very few people got to look at dead bodies outside of a funeral home. So how did he reassure her? How did he stop feeling so guilty about everything she’d been through tonight? “It’s a good thing, actually—the bag, I mean. It protects the evidence as much as it honors the victim’s dignity and keeps others from seeing what can sometimes be a pretty disturbing sight.”

He almost startled when she suddenly tipped her head and looked up at him. Even her glasses couldn’t diminish the impact of her gaze locking onto his. Her eyes were as warm with concern as they were cool in color. “Have you seen a lot of that? Disturbing things?”

Pike dropped his arms and reached out, feeling the need to offer some kind of comfort. But he wisely curled his fingers into a fist and kept it at his side. The last thing he wanted to do was to scare her into silence again.

“More than I want to.” Yeah. There was a lot of pretty to discover about this woman if a man took the time to look. Maybe he was doing a little too much looking. Taking a cue from the champ, he turned and focused his gaze on the elevator panel. “But you learn to turn off your emotions and you just deal with the facts.”

“How do you do that? Turn off your emotions, I mean.” She was staring straight ahead again, too. “Maybe I live inside my head too much. But sometimes, I can’t stop thinking about things. I wish I could just do. And not overthink the consequences or second-guess myself.”

“What do you want to do?” He couldn’t help himself. The woman was too much of an enigma to ignore.

She shook her head, stirring the curls down her back. She wasn’t going to answer.

“Come on, now. You’ve just said as many words to me as you’ve said in the entire twelve months I’ve known you.” He nudged his shoulder against hers. “Are you going to stop talking to me now?”

Her eyes darted up to his at the teasing request. And was that a smile? Victory. “You’re awfully patient with me, Officer Taylor.”

“Pike.”

“More persistent than most men I know. Why do you keep trying?”

He liked a challenge? He was a sucker for a complex mystery like this woman? He just plain couldn’t stand the irritation of having someone not like him or his dog? “I am determined that you’re going to look at me and not think I’m the evil villain in the fairy tale of your life.”

“The fairy tale?” The smile disappeared and she fixated on the K-9 Corps patch sewn onto the sleeve of his uniform. “Oh. My shop. Believe me, my life isn’t a fairy tale, Offic...Pike.” And then her gaze crept back to his. “There’s no Prince Charming. There’s no fairy godmother. I just try to make the magic happen for others.”

“Why aren’t you making it happen for yourself, Hope?” And then he did the dumbest thing he’d done all night long. He tunneled his fingers beneath the silky knot of her ponytail, stroked his thumb along the line of her jaw to her chin and tilted his face down toward hers. “Why don’t you have the fairy tale?”

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