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Nick liked to think of it as weeding out the bullies. Pushers or terrorists, they were all the same. Narrow-minded. Violent. Caring nothing for anyone else. Just like any other loud, abusive, small-town bully trying to impose his will on everyone around him.
The one he’d grown up with, for instance.
So yeah, being a cop was a perfect fit. He’d never regretted his choice of careers. Except maybe a tiny bit on days like today. “Come on, Rupert, you punk, come visit Mr. Miller here so I can go home, shave and take a shower,” he said under his breath. Rupert was a low-level dealer. Miller was the big fish who brought in the shit that poisoned kids, ruined lives and sparked crime by addicts desperate to get one more high.
Nailing Miller would help a lot of people…which meant a lot to Nick. Because he’d discovered something else when he’d been fighting half a world away in a war-torn area foreign to anything he’d ever known: he was good at helping people who couldn’t help themselves. That was his talent, his calling.
He’d picked up that burden in Kosovo. And he’d never been able to put it back down.
“Hey, partner, you still awake?”
He slid down, trying not to let his head come in contact with the headrest. His personal ick-limit wouldn’t stand for it.
“I’m here,” he said softly into the small, handheld radio, keeping it concealed by his fingers. “Nancy Drew’s back on the beat, keeping the area safe from miscreants and jaywalkers.”
Dex laughed. He could. He was covering the back of the building. In the shade. In a newer car. With air-conditioning.
Nick was the rookie detective. So he got the P.O.S.
“You ever find out from Rosemary why this friend simply had to move in now?” he asked, his voice still low, his eyes constantly scanning the street.
“She’s an old friend of Rosie’s who’s starting a new photography business,” Dex said.
Hence the camera.
“Apparently she just came out of a really ugly divorce.”
“Wait…there’s a truck pulling up.” Nick lowered the radio, watching in his side mirror as a sizable U-Haul truck maneuvered up the street. It almost clipped a BMW and came damn close to taking out a street sign. As the truck passed, he casually glanced over and saw a small woman with curly light brown hair clutching the wheel as if she was a lion tamer holding a chair.
“No,” he bit out when the truck stopped. “Keep going.”
The radio crackled. “What is it?”
“Trouble. A big truck just pulled up in front of Rosemary’s father’s building and double-parked. It’s completely blocking my visual on the perp’s apartment. Not to mention traffic.”
“Want me to get a uniform out there to tell them to move?”
“Absolutely,” he said when he realized the driver was getting out of the truck. The woman called to someone. Somehow, Nick couldn’t muster up much surprise when he saw she was waving at the nosy photographer, who came jogging over.
That female was destined to be the bane of his existence this week.
He waited, tapping his fingers on the dash, watching the two women from behind his dark sunglasses. They stood beside the truck and talked for a while, looking upset. Finally the short, curly-haired driver pulled a cell phone out of her purse. Crossing the street to the shady square, she sat on a bench and started an animated phone conversation.
“No, you are not doing this,” he muttered, shaking his head as he observed the other one—the tall photographer—open the back of the truck and climb inside.
But she was doing it. As he watched in disbelief, she came staggering down the truck ramp carrying a double mattress. All he could see of her behind the mattress was two sandal-clad feet at the bottom, and two hands clutched on either side. Her oblivious friend was turned the other way, not even watching.
“Dammit.”
He looked at his watch. Tried again to peer around the truck. Wondered just how long it was going to take a beat cop to get his ass here and get the truck off the street. But most of all, he wondered what the heck the woman thought she was doing schlepping furniture all by herself on a hot summer day.
“Watch it, lady, you’re gonna fall,” he whispered when she reached the curb, which he thought she might not see.
Nope. She didn’t see it. Realizing what was going to happen, he called, “No!” and leaped out of his car. But it was too late. She tripped and fell forward. It was her extreme good fortune, however, that she landed right on her own mattress.
Before he could think better of it, Nick jogged the few yards over to her. “You okay?”
The woman was still lying there, facedown on the mattress in the middle of the sidewalk. She mumbled something but since her face was buried, he couldn’t make out what.
While waiting for her to move, he noted the richness of her thick hair, which, on closer inspection, was more auburn than true red. It was a warm shade, the color of vibrant earth after a rain. And he definitely noted her tall, curvy form, clad in tight jeans and a sleeveless white tank top.
If he’d thought she was really hurt, he might not have taken a second to appreciate the way she filled out those jeans. But she’d landed on something soft, and the view was definitely worth appreciating. Definitely. Hell, a saint would have looked, and no Walker had ever been accused of being a saint. A devil straight from hell was a more frequent expression.
Breathing deeply, he swallowed his libido back into his gut. “Ma’am? Do you need help getting up?” He cast a quick look to the side, noting that Miller’s blinds were closed tight. Hopefully he wasn’t sitting there in the darkness of his apartment, watching the world through his warped little drug-pushing eyes.
“I’m fine,” he heard as the woman pushed herself up to her knees, until she was on all fours right below him.
Lord have mercy.
Nick closed his eyes briefly, thrusting every low-down wicked Walker thought out of his head by sheer force of will. Trying to find the good manners his mama had tried so hard to teach him, he got hold of himself. When he opened his eyes again, the woman had risen to her feet. Thank God.
It took him less than a second to realize she was afraid of him. Though she jutted her chin out and kept her head up, she did step back. She obviously recognized him as the suspected pervert from the rust bucket parked at the curb around the corner.
He put his hands up, palms out. “I just wanted to make sure you were okay.”
The tension in her body eased a bit, which gave Nick a chance to study her from behind his tinted sunglasses.
She was tall, and as nicely curved in the front as she was in the back. Though dark circles hinted of stress and her cheeks were a little pale—maybe even gaunt—her face didn’t suffer for it. In fact, she had a great face—wide mouth that would probably be beautiful when she smiled. Big old eyes that he figured were blue, but couldn’t tell for sure because of his glasses. Long lashes, creamy complexion, high cheekbones. Yes, indeed, his Nancy Drew was a pretty woman. Even if she was a busybody.
“If you’ll excuse me, I have to get this done,” she said, her voice sounding shaky. As if she hadn’t completely accepted that he was merely a nice bystander wanting to help out. Considering how he looked, he couldn’t blame her.
Then she turned her back on him and bent over again—heaven help him for being a bad man—and tried picking up the mattress.
“You’re gonna hurt yourself,” he said, his throat tight.
“I’m stronger than I look.” Still bent over, she stared doubtfully at the building and added under her breath, “Though the stairs up to the third floor may be…difficult.”
“Third floor?” he snapped in disbelief.
“It’ll be fine,” she insisted, straightening up—without the mattress. “I’m just bringing a few things up there. Not much.”
He followed the airy hand she waved and looked into the truck. No, not much. Just a frigging box spring, dresser, small table, two chairs and a love seat. “You’re nuts. For God’s sake, wait for the movers.” Then, remembering he had a job to get back to, he added, “And you have to move this truck.”
She stiffened. “I don’t have any movers. Paige’s—my friend’s husband was supposed to be here, but he’s not.” Her voice rose a little and she stepped closer, as if she didn’t even realize it. “I have to empty that truck and return it before four o’clock or I’m going to owe Paige for another day’s rental.” Another step. Another flash of spirit. Another decibel and she was almost shouting. “And dammit, that truck is not going anywhere until I get this furniture into that building.”
Feisty. He liked that. He almost smiled, but figured she wouldn’t appreciate it.
Despite a little quiver in her bottom lip, and her initial fear of him, the woman was standing her ground. But that quiver, and a hint of moisture in her big eyes, made him suspect she was hanging on to her bravado by a thin thread. Remembering what Dex had started to say a few minutes ago, he realized this woman was probably moving out on her own for the first time after her…how had his partner described it? Ugly divorce. With nothing but a bed, a table and a few chairs.
His heart twisted, even while a voice in his head whispered, No, this is not your problem.
Damn. The last thing he needed was to worry about her, but he couldn’t help it. Despite being a better-than-average-height female, she had such a look of vulnerability. Particularly in that unsmiling mouth and those darkly circled eyes. Empty eyes. Frightened eyes, he’d say, if he didn’t already know she had guts, because of the way she’d been standing up to him.
Before he could decide what to do, a marked car pulled up behind the truck and a young beat cop Nick recognized from the station got out. Their eyes met for one second and the kid’s mouth quirked in a smile as he took in Nick’s getup.
“Someone’s going to have to move this truck,” he said as he approached them. “It’s blocking traffic.”
Nancy Drew’s friend finally realized what was going on and came running from across the street. “Wait, please, we’ll be so quick unloading it you won’t even know we were here.”
“I’m sorry, you have to get it out of here,” the cop said.
The pretty, sad-looking woman at the center of all of this blinked, looking back and forth between them. Then she wrapped her arms around herself, as if needing strength. Needing support.
Needing.
Nick mentally kicked himself. But even as his internal voice told him he was an idiot, he opened his mouth and surprised them all. “Officer,” he said, looking at the younger man, “between the two of us, we could empty this thing and have these ladies on their way within ten minutes. Don’t you think?”
The kid flinched, not expecting the response. With a slight shake of his head, Nick stopped any questions and got his point across. They were going to do this. If Miller looked out his window, he’d see a cop and a guy helping a lady move in. Not anything unusual in a Southern town known for its hospitality.
Dex might not agree, but Nick’s decision was made. He couldn’t explain it, couldn’t understand it himself, really. But something inside him wouldn’t let this haunted-looking woman load her mattress back on that truck and drive away.
She needed help. And he was going to give it to her.
VANDALIZING A BILLBOARD to announce to the world that your husband was a cheating scumbag might not be the best way to save a marriage, but it was one hell of a way to end one.
Melody Tanner-Todd—now just Tanner again, thankfully—had discovered that when she’d sought retaliation against her bastard of an ex, who’d slept his way across Atlanta during their marriage. It had been hugely public, hugely satisfying and it had hugely entertained the city’s commuting population. It had also cost her nearly everything she owned.
“You mean he gets practically all your money just because you painted some graffiti on a billboard?” said Paige Winston—now Suffolk—sounding shocked and dismayed.
Rosemary and Tanya wore similar looks of disbelief, which probably matched the one that had been on Mel’s own face for the past two months—since the day a judge had given her ex most of what she had earned during nineteen years as a model and actress.
“This is unbelievable! The house? The boat? That cheating sack of shit gets it all? Gawd, I’m never getting married. Vibrators are just as good and they don’t come with six-foot-tall walking dicks attached.” Six years might have turned Tanya into a softer-looking, mature woman, but they hadn’t done anything to smooth out that ballsy attitude.
Melody had a flash of déjà vu. It’d been almost exactly six years ago that the four of them had been sitting in this same restaurant, with the same watchful owner, at this same table, drinking margaritas out of possibly these same glasses, on the night before her wedding. Her blissful, lovely, elegant wedding that was supposed to be the start of her perfect life.
The perfection had lasted about ten months. Until Melody had started hearing rumors that her devoted husband was devoted to anything with two parted legs. It had taken another three years for her to grasp the scope of Bill’s betrayals. But eventually she’d realized that her dentist husband was willing to drill absolutely any woman who opened wide.
“The judge agreed with his lawyer that I’d damaged his professional reputation,” Melody murmured, knowing the others were waiting to hear the rest of the story.
They’d heard bits and pieces, of course. Though they lived several hours away, her friends had been a great source of support—even with only their telephone calls—during the ugly, rancorous split-up. They’d wanted to come to see her, but Melody had put them off, not wanting them to know how bad it was.
Only Tanya, who was a flight attendant and visited Atlanta a lot anyway—and who would never take no for an answer—had ignored her request. She’d shown up at Mel’s door one day last May with a bottle of tequila and a big cheesecake. So she knew something about Melody’s disgrace. Just like Rosemary knew the most about her unhappiness. And Paige knew the most about her dreams for the future. But none of them knew the whole story.
“I know you’ve all been wanting to hear everything, but I needed a couple of weeks to pull myself together,” Melody said. “I only want to tell the story once. This is the first time all four of us have been together since I got back, so I guess tonight it’s time to let it all come out.”
Paige reached across the table and took her hand. Rosemary listened quietly, and Tanya gave her a nod of encouragement.
“So to start, yes, he got almost everything.” She squeezed Paige’s fingers. “You know, letting me borrow that furniture to camp out while Rosemary’s father had renovations done on the building was a godsend. I finally got the stuff the judge said I could take from the house, but up until a week ago, I wasn’t sure Bill would let me have even that without another battle.”
“I asked you to stay with me,” Rosemary said.
Rosemary’s frown emphasized some unusual dark smudges beneath her eyes, and Melody realized just how tired and pale her friend looked. She had to wonder what was up with Rosemary, who was usually very precise about her appearance.
“Or me,” Tanya added.
Yes, they’d all offered. But starting a new life on her own had meant just that. On her own. “I know, and thank you. But it was fine. Paige’s stuff was all I needed. Thanks again.”
Paige grinned. “You’re welcome. It was worth it—that cop looked cute carrying stuff up the stairs in his tight pants.”
Frankly, Melody had been too shaken by the scruffy, bearded stranger in the dingy jeans to pay much attention to the boyish policeman who’d helped them move furniture a couple of weeks ago. She still wondered about the man, who, she had to admit, had come to her aid at a time when she’d nearly been at the end of her rope. Odd, since she’d started out being afraid of him—wondering if Bill had hired someone to stalk her when she saw his car parked around the corner two days in a row.
When she’d actually spoken to him—after she’d so stupidly fallen on the mattress—she’d been taken aback by his smooth, sexy voice. There’d also been something nice about his lean jaw, even though it had been almost hidden by his scraggly beard.
Then there’d been his eyes. During one moment when he was helping carry a table up the stairs, his glasses had slid down briefly, allowing her a glimpse of his brown eyes. Nice. Very nice. She liked brown-eyed men. Maybe because Bill’s were green.
Melody had wondered once or twice what had happened to the dangerous-looking stranger who’d been so helpful. He must have accomplished whatever he’d been doing on her street, because she hadn’t seen him since that day.
Mel shrugged off her curiosity. “Anyway, like I said, Bill got almost everything.”
Sipping her sweet tea, Rosemary murmured, “I can’t believe this, sugar. These things don’t happen here in Georgia. All of my friends have lived like queens off their divorce settlements.”
“Atlanta’s not Savannah,” Melody replied. “Here, it’d be perfectly understandable for a wife to take retribution against a cheating husband by having that voodoo queen, Lula Mae Dupré, curse him. Or by breading his Southern-fried steak with rat droppings. But Atlanta’s different. More…”
“Northern,” Rosemary said with audible disdain.
“They said that, because I painted a billboard advertising Bill’s business, I hurt him professionally and damaged his ability to practice dentistry. Meaning, I owe him a living for the rest of his rotten life. And oh, how he loves to rub that in. Can you believe he had the balls to come visit me here? Just to throw it in my face one more time that he won.”
That was the hardest part to swallow. The man could live off her money for a long time. Meanwhile, Melody could be out of funds in as little as two months if she didn’t start working fast. Or if she didn’t sell her famous peacock-feather lingerie on eBay, which she’d seriously considered.
It’d serve Bill right, the bastard, since he’d tried to get that in the divorce settlement, too.
It shouldn’t get that bad. Thankfully, she had her photography hobby—as Bill had called it—to fall back on. She’d tried to pursue it after the wedding, always having a talent for instinctively knowing how to photograph something—or someone—to make a statement. But Bill had been less than supportive, almost petulant, saying she was wasting her time. Eventually it just hadn’t seemed worth the fight and she’d let it go.
Now, though, she had the chance to try again, to prove she was every bit as good behind the camera as she’d been in front of it. She’d already set up her new studio, right downstairs from the small apartment Rosemary’s family had rented to her in one of their historic district townhomes. The Chiltons had been wonderfully supportive; Rosemary’s brother even arranging for some renovations so she’d have a darkroom. She was all set to begin her new life in Savannah as a photographer.
And a single woman.
That was the silver lining in this whole thing. She was free. Free of everyone for the first time in her life. Free to choose what she wanted—not what her mother or her husband wanted for her. Melody intended to enjoy the hell out of her new life. Not as a kid model with the world watching her every move and a controlling mother on her back. Not the immature, desperate-to-be-wanted-for-herself young woman she’d been before she’d married Bill. Not the wife of an up-and-coming society dentist.
Just Melody. Free, independent and ready to live, back here in the only place she’d ever considered home, with the only people she’d ever considered family.
“So,” Paige said, “you never were clear on this. What exactly did you do, and how did Bill know you’d done it? People vandalize signs all the time. You should have denied it.” A few people looked over. Six years and a husband hadn’t done much to quiet Paige’s big voice. Or tame her big curls.
Nibbling her lip, Melody shook her head. A thick lock of reddish-brown hair fell across her eye, and she brushed it back, loving the way her new, shorter hairdo felt. She’d chopped half of it off to frame her face in chunky layers that barely touched her shoulders. Returning to her natural auburn color had been an extra perk—another up-yours to her ex. Bill had adored her long hair, which he’d talked her into dyeing blond again after the wedding.
So much for saying he wanted her for who she was, not the model the world knew. Within a month of their marriage, she’d looked just like the twit who’d gushed to Teen Magazine that what she most wanted was world peace.
World peace would be great. But right now, she’d settle for a five-figure balance in her money-market account.
“Mel?” Paige prompted. “Why did you admit you did it?”
“I couldn’t deny it when I was plastered all over the eleven-o’clock news standing up on the billboard platform with the paint can in my hand,” she said. “Not to mention that the fresh paint was the same Cherry Cordial I’d used to redo the guest room.”
“Cherry Cordial? Gosh, the room must have been so dark,” Paige said, immediately distracted.
“Hush up, I want to hear the rest,” Rosemary said as she tapped a long, pink-tinted nail on the table. “Now, honey, what was it you said that was so damaging to your lesser half?”
Rubbing her eyes wearily, Melody didn’t even look at her friends as she explained, “The billboard was directly over his building, by an exit ramp, so it was pretty high profile.”
High profile, indeed. God, she still couldn’t believe she’d been so damned furious at Bill that she’d climbed up a rickety scaffold ladder with a paint can in one hand and a thick paintbrush clasped tightly in her teeth.
Being honest with herself, she acknowledged that it hadn’t been just his cheating that had driven her to seek revenge. She’d gotten used to the infidelity. Her feelings for Bill had been dead for a long time—she’d just been biding her time, waiting for the opportune moment to hit him with divorce papers. Her lawyer had been looking into ways to separate their money first since she’d been too young and too stupid to demand a prenup.
In that instance, she should have listened to her mother.
She’d waited patiently, trusting her lawyer. But finding out who Bill had had that last fling with had sent her right out of her mind. Shaking her head, she murmured, “The billboard had this big giant picture of Bill, smiling his phony ‘you can count on me’ smile, with the caption ‘Trust Dr. Bill to Drill.’”
Tanya snickered at the cheesiness of it, as Melody had a few years ago when her husband had informed her of the slogan he planned to use in a new ad campaign.
“I wouldn’t trust him to clean my litter box,” Paige said. Then she smiled. “Did I tell you about my new cat? He’s so—”
“Shh!” Tanya hissed, silencing Paige. Never an easy feat.
“I had planned to wait him out—let him ruin himself,” Melody said. “But that day, I learned from one of our closest friends that Bill had seduced her eighteen-year-old daughter…a kid we’d bought Girl Scout cookies from a few years back. I sort of lost it. So I got what I needed and drove to his office.”
Around them, the cacophony of noise seemed to diminish, as if everyone were waiting for her to continue. A look confirmed a few eavesdroppers. But considering everyone in Atlanta had seen her swinging like a deranged monkey from a billboard, she’d pretty well used up her lifetime supply of embarrassment.
In a low, shaky voice, Paige asked, “What’d you do, Mel?”
Reaching for her glass, she admitted, “I added a few words to his slogan until it read, ‘You can Trust Dr. Bill to Drill…your wives, your daughters and certain barnyard animals.’”
A snort from the two women at the next table and the grin on the face of the owner—who’d been hovering over Melody since the minute she’d arrived—confirmed her wider audience. At her own table, her three friends made no effort to hide their laughter. “Oh, my goodness, I would have paid to see that,” Paige said, her face growing red as she giggled helplessly.