“Not necessarily,” he remarked.
She studied him for a moment, trying to understand what he was suggesting. The apparent befuddled look on her face caused him to continue.
“Rachel, I’m a homicide investigator. I work cold case files that are decades old. I’ve solved murders with less to go on than what’s written in that diary. It wouldn’t take much to find out who this BF is.”
“A homicide detective?” Wallowing in her own turmoil, she’d never thought to ask what he did for a living. Then something else occurred to her. “Last I heard, you’d taken over your father’s computer company after he died.”
She cringed as she awaited his reply. Hoping he wouldn’t pick up on the fact that she’d indeed kept some kind of tabs on him over the years.
“I still own Quintac, yes, but it’s run by very competent managers.”
“Isn’t it a multi-million-dollar corporation? I’d think you’d be more focused on keeping it that way instead of working as a detective.”
He shrugged. “The money the company brings in helped me form the cold case unit in the Chicago PD. That’s what I’d rather focus on.”
She felt compelled to ask him why cold cases seemed so important to him, but she bit back the question. Knowing Travis, he wouldn’t tell her anyway, and besides, just hearing about his specialty had lightened her chest with hope.
In all honesty, she really did want answers. She knew she would never rest until she knew what happened to her sister. And she doubted she’d be able to unravel the mystery without the help of someone like Travis. But, before she allowed herself to smile, suspicion set in. Though Travis seemed sincere, she’d had plenty of experience with men, thanks to her mother. Men never did anything without wanting something in return, and she knew exactly what that something was.
“Why would you want to help me?”
As if he could see the trepidation in her eyes, he straightened on the couch, turning his posture from relaxed to strictly professional.
“I’d be curious for some answers myself, but it’s not just that.” He rose from the couch and approached the door, being careful not to step inside her space. “I’ve always regretted not being there for you after Carrie died.”
He took her hand, and she felt the sharp contrast in the warmth of his touch against the ice of her fingers. Apparently feeling it himself, he cupped her hand between his and began rubbing in some warmth.
“Let me do this for you and Carrie.”
Rachel wanted to say no. She wanted to believe Travis was no different then all the men who’d walked through the revolving door of her childhood home. She wanted to believe he was just after her body, that he would just steal her heart and crush it like all the others. But she couldn’t shake the genuine sincerity of his gaze.
He had been a friend, after all. It was long ago, buried under years of hurt and betrayal. But he had been a friend, nonetheless. A friend she had been quick to accuse, and in a fit of regret for all the years she’d hated him, she heard herself say, “Okay.”
Chapter Three
“Any developments on the Harris case?” Travis asked, poking his head into Matt Grafton’s office.
His partner’s blond head was bent over a file folder, and when Matt looked up with a satisfied grin on his face, Travis knew they’d gotten the news they’d hoped for.
“DNA results just came in,” Matt replied, holding out the file for Travis. “We got our man.”
Travis stepped toward Matt’s desk and took the folder, opening it and skimming the lab report. Nicky Thomas’s DNA and the genetic blueprint from the hair strands found at the scene were one and the same. The odds that Thomas wasn’t their guy were one in forty-eight trillion, and Travis liked those odds.
“I’ll write up the final report,” Matt said. “You can call Maggie Harris to tell her we found her daughter’s killer. Even if it is five years too late.”
“It’s never too late,” Travis said harshly.
He left Matt’s office and stepped down the narrow, stark-white corridor toward his own office. At the moment, not even the harsh fluorescent lights of Chicago’s Thirty-second Division fazed him. A wave of satisfaction flooded his body, as it always did when he and Matt put another scumbag behind bars.
In his office, he headed for his desk and sat on the brown leather chair. He reached for the little gold key hidden in a tin of paper clips and unlocked the bottom drawer.
A quick glance at the open doorway, then he was rummaging through the papers in the drawer until he found the photograph.
A lump of sorrow lodged at the back of his throat as he looked at the image in front of him. Big blue eyes. Long blonde hair. A lopsided smile.
We did it, Jess. We got another one off the streets.
The achingly beautiful woman in the photo didn’t answer, but Travis knew she was happy, wherever she was.
With one last look at the picture, he returned it to the drawer and locked it up.
Leaning back in his chair, Travis closed his eyes and let the memories surface. This had become a bittersweet routine. Solving a case, coming in here, reliving Jessica’s death.
He was in his car, driving home after a grueling eighteen-hour shift. The radio was on. What was the song again? Right, “Brown-Eyed Girl”. It was the tune he and Jessica had danced to at the Christmas party where they’d met. He remembered changing the words of the song to Blue-Eyed Girl, and seeing the pleasure in her eyes.
Travis sucked in his breath. He could feel the chilled air cooling his skin, despite the fact that the temperature in his office was spiked.
Still in his car, the radio being interrupted by the police scanner on his dashboard. A robbery turned murder. The address. His address.
The air grew icier as Travis recalled the fear and panic that slammed into his body like a city bus. The memories swirled in his brain, an out-of-control whirlpool determined to suck him into a bottomless abyss.
Don’t go in there. Matt’s voice. Matt standing at the front door of the apartment Travis shared with Jessica. The yellow crime tape taunted him, yelled for him to enter, and so he had.
With a whoosh, Travis let out the breath he’d been holding and jarred himself from the memories. No more. He wouldn’t allow himself to remember any more. Jessica was gone and he hadn’t been able to save her. It was futile to go any further.
Standing up, Travis walked over to the window and stared at the city below. Looking but not really seeing the rush of traffic or the whizzing of tires or the clutter of pedestrians. What he saw was a young woman standing at a crosswalk. A middle-aged woman lugging a sack of groceries. Two teenage girls giggling in front of a convenience store.
He might not have been able to save Jessica, but he could sure as hell save these women in his city, keep them safe. And if it came down to it, avenge them.
“The suspect in the Davis shooting is willing to talk.”
Travis lifted his head and saw Matt enter the office. “Good,” he said absently.
Matt glanced around the cramped space and shook his head. “How you passed up on working in an air-conditioned building rivaling Trump Towers in size escapes me.”
“You’re just jealous that I can quit my day job and still have millions of dollars in the bank.”
“Jealous? Hell, yeah. If I knew how to design those nifty anti-virus programs, I’d be doing that right now, man.” Matt gestured to the array of files on Travis’s desk. “Not digging through paperwork that’s decades old.”
“To each his own.”
Matt just shrugged. “Our suspect is in interrogation room three. You want to come along?”
Travis shook his head. “You handle it. I need to take care of a few things.”
After Matt left, Travis returned to his desk and flicked on his computer. Time to get down to business.
As he waited for the screen to load, he thought of Rachel, and everything she’d revealed yesterday. His veins still filled with anger to think she’d
blamed him for Carrie’s death all these years. If she only knew the extent of the guilt he’d been burdened with. He’d never blamed himself for her sister’s suicide, but it tore him apart that he hadn’t been there for Rachel.
But he could be there for her now.
You’re doing it again, trying to save every female who comes your way.
Travis ignored the taunting voice in the back of his head. So what if he’d made it his mission in life to prevent what happened to Jessica from happening to another woman?
He wasn’t helping Rachel just to satisfy his savior instincts. He had a stake in this too. Carrie had been his girlfriend. They’d only dated a few months, hadn’t even slept together, but he still felt he owed it to himself to uncover the events leading to her suicide. He owed it to Rachel.
And it had nothing to do with the way she set his blood on fire. Nothing to do with her honey-blonde hair that smelled of strawberries. Nothing to do with the way her firm, round ass had looked in that flimsy thong…
The computer beeped, rerouting his train of thought. Travis’s fingers flew across the keyboard as he navigated through the police station’s database. After a few minutes, he found what he was looking for, and scrawled the name and address on a notepad.
“Jenny, could you get me the business address for Rachel Foster? Should be listed under Rachel Foster Designs,” he said into the intercom.
“Give me a second, Trav,” his assistant’s voice crackled back. He waited. “All right, here you go.”
Travis wrote down the address on the same pad and reached for the sports coat draped over the back of his chair.
He left the office and paused in front of Jenny’s desk. “I’ll be out of the office for a couple of hours. Hold my calls.”
“Sorry, did I prick you?” Rachel asked as the tall, willowy model in front of her squirmed.
Misty grinned. “Don’t worry. You can prick me as much as you like. It’s for the sake for fashion, after all.”
Rachel smiled. It was nice working with such an easy-going model. Mannequins were good for initial fittings, but it was difficult to see how well a bra worked on a pair of plastic breasts, so part of her job required her to alter designs on a real-life woman. Real-life women, however, could be quite difficult, and Rachel had worked with a few models who had made her want to scream. Thank God for Misty.
Misty was twenty-two and she’d been working for Rachel for six months. She never complained about having to stand for long periods of time, remained unfazed by a pinprick here and there, and boasted an outrageous sense of humor that had Rachel’s stomach in stitches.
“So, Suzanna told me you were modeling yourself yesterday,” Misty remarked, her blue eyes twinkling. “Walton’s, huh?”
Embarrassment flushed Rachel’s cheeks. She shot a dirty look at her assistant, who sat at a nearby desk studying fabric samples. “What part of never repeat this didn’t you understand, Suzanna?” she called.
Suzanna shrugged. “It was too funny not to share, boss. Misty and I almost wet our pants laughing about it.”
Rachel shook her head. “Good to know my life is so amusing to you two.”
Misty laughed and Rachel felt the urge to prick her again. On purpose, this time.
“I would have paid to see you standing in the men’s department in your underwear,” Misty remarked, still chuckling. “Maybe on my next audition I’ll mention the story to the casting director and suggest they turn it into a movie.”
Rachel pointed the needle at the model/struggling actress. “You do and I’ll tell your agent you’re too difficult to work with and that you should be a hand model.”
Misty shrugged. “Hand models make a lot of money, you know.”
Rachel rolled her eyes and tried to focus on the pink satin bra. Normally, she loved the good-humored banter the three women engaged in. Her studio was located in a downtown loft, which consisted of a reception area in the front, an office in the back and one spacious work room in between. Coming to work every day was a joy rather than a chore. She loved the bright, airy space, the mannequins scattered around, and the piles of lace, satin and other sensual fabrics she worked with. But most of all, she loved the company. Suzanna had been working for her for four years, and the two women got along splendidly. And now that Misty was around, laughter always filled the office.
But today, all the kidding and laughing was distracting. Yesterday’s conversation with Travis still ran through her mind like a broken record. He was going to help her find out what happened to Carrie, and although the truth called out to her, a part of her wished she could still blame Travis for it all. It had been so easy, so comforting, having someone to blame. That way, she could let go of the memories and try to move on. But now that she suspected Travis was right about not playing a part in Carrie’s suicide, Rachel felt like she’d been sucked right back into the past. And she didn’t want to be there.
What had the past ever done for her? Her childhood had been lonely and painful, her adolescence degrading. Her mother was a sad excuse for a human being; her sister had selfishly left her. All the past offered was heartache, shame, and anger. It had taken years of therapy to try to let it go, and now she was disregarding every shrink’s advice and delving back into a place she’d vowed never to return.
“Ouch!”
“Sorry, Misty,” Rachel said quickly, realizing she’d yet again stabbed her model. With a sigh, she placed the needle on the pincushion next to her. “Why don’t we take a break? I’m a little distracted, and I’m scared I’ll seriously injure you.”
Misty didn’t answer, and as Rachel stood up and followed the young woman’s gaze, she saw why. Travis was standing in the doorway.
“Who’s the hunk?” Misty said loudly.
Rachel’s cheeks flushed again. “You do realize he can hear you?”
“So?” Misty tossed her long, blonde hair over her delicate shoulders. “You’re a hunk,” she said to Travis, wiggling her eyebrows.
“I know. My mother tells me that all the time.” The corners of his honey-brown eyes crinkled as a grin curved his wide mouth.
Rachel felt a spark of attraction tug at her belly as she watched him cross the loft. God, he was such an incredible-looking man. He wore a navy-blue T-shirt that stretched across his broad chest and gave her a teasing glimpse of the ripples of his flat stomach. Faded blue jeans encased his legs, and a black sports coat was tucked under one arm. He looked good. Too good, she noted as her pulse quickened.
“Do you have a minute?” Travis asked as he approached.
Their eyes locked, and she almost trembled. She’d never believed all that junk about pheromones, but she could swear his scent was intoxicating. He smelled of spicy aftershave, Ivory soap and something that could only be described as masculine, and although they were standing feet apart, the delicious aroma tickled her nostrils and caused a lazy heat to dance across her breasts.
“Sure,” she answered. She glanced at Suzanna, then Misty, and saw both females eyeing Travis with blatant longing. “Let’s go outside.” Where we can be alone, she added silently. The loft provided no privacy, and she knew she wouldn’t be able to focus on what Travis had to say when two pairs of eyes were undressing him.
Once they were on the front steps of her building, Rachel breathed in the warm September air. They’d been blessed with an Indian summer this year, and she hoped the weather would stay this way just a little bit longer. The winter months always depressed her, reminded her of the cold, snowy days that had kept her inside her mother’s house to bear witness to the degradation around her.
“So, what’s up?” she said, glancing at Travis.
“Can you get away from the office for an hour or two?”
She saw the serious look on his face and instantly knew this was about their investigation. “Where are we going?” she asked.
“Woodland,” Travis answered, naming a small town about an hour’s drive from the city. “To see Layla Kincaid.”
&n
bsp; Rachel felt like she’d been gutted with a bowling ball. Layla Kincaid. She hadn’t heard that name in years. She hadn’t seen the owner of that name since Carrie’s funeral.
“You tracked down Layla?” she finally said, struggling for breath.
“I figured our best bet is to start with Layla. She was Carrie’s best friend, after all. If anyone might know the identity of BF, it would be Layla. I got her address through DMV records, and I thought we could drive over there today.”
Rachel took a breath. “Let me get my purse.”
In Travis’s gleaming silver SUV, Rachel wrung her hands together, feeling nervous at the thought of seeing Layla Kincaid again. Another face from the past. Another step back into unwanted memories.
She fixed her gaze at the scenery whizzing past the window, grateful for the silence in the vehicle. If someone had told her two days ago that she would be investigating her sister’s death with none other than Travis Gage, she would have scoffed. Yet here they were, doing just that.
“Your work seems interesting,” Travis remarked, breaking the quiet lull.
She shot him a sideways glance. “It is.”
“I remember in high school you liked to draw, but I didn’t know you were into design. Were you a design major in college?”
His eyes were focused on the road ahead, so he didn’t see the bitter twist of her mouth. How ignorant he was. “I didn’t go to college, Travis.”
How was college ever an option? she wanted to add. Travis had come from a respectable, wealthy family. He had parents who could afford to send him to college, parents who encouraged him to go. But where did she come from? Her mother blew every dime on alcohol, and because of the time Rachel had spent cleaning up Hattie’s vomit and fighting strange men from their doorstep, her grades hadn’t been good enough to merit a scholarship.
“I’m sorry, Rachel, I just assumed…” Travis’s voice drifted off, but she hadn’t missed the sharp tinge of pity in his tone.