The detective reunites with his runaway bride

A brand-new suspense story from USA TODAY bestselling author Marilyn Pappano

When a stalker targets Natasha Spencer—and her exes—Tash must warn the man she abandoned at the altar. She reconnects with Detective Daniel Harper, but a history of heartbreak still lingers between them. Daniel is determined to protect, but not trust, Tash. Every clue they pursue and chance they take reignites desire...and leads straight into an inescapable trap.

Oklahoma, dogs, beaches, books, family and friends: these are a few of MARILYN PAPPANO’s favorite things. She lives in imaginary worlds where she reigns supreme (at least, she does when the characters cooperate) and no matter how wrong things go, she can always set them right. It’s her husband’s job to keep her grounded in the real world, which makes him her very favorite thing.

Also By Marilyn Pappano

Killer Smile

Killer Secrets

Detective Defender

Nights with a Thief

Bayou Hero

Undercover in Copper Lake

Copper Lake Encounter

Copper Lake Confidential

Christmas Confidential

“Holiday Protector”

In the Enemy’s Arms

Copper Lake Secrets

Discover more at millsandboon.co.uk

Killer Smile

Marilyn Pappano

www.millsandboon.co.uk

ISBN: 978-1-474-07952-5

KILLER SMILE

© 2018 Marilyn Pappano

Published in Great Britain 2018

by Mills & Boon, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF

All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, locations and incidents are purely fictional and bear no relationship to any real life individuals, living or dead, or to any actual places, business establishments, locations, events or incidents. Any resemblance is entirely coincidental.

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Version: 2020-03-02

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“There was a prowler at my house last night, Tash,” Daniel said quietly.

“Also, we have a witness who says he’s seen a guy watching you.”

Natasha’s muscles froze, leaving her unable to breathe or process his words. She didn’t feel the trembling in her hands until she saw rings spreading across the surface of her coffee. Daniel’s right hand took her left, and she reflexively grasped it, squeezing tightly, focusing all her energy on maintaining contact with the one person who’d always, always made her feel safe.

“You went out there by yourself? Knowing that RememberMe wants to—” She finished with a gesture of her left hand, unable to put it into words. The mere thought of the danger she’d brought into Daniel’s life could break her heart and her spirit.

“I wasn’t alone. I had my weapon.” He laid his free hand on the pistol snugged on his belt. “You know I never leave home without it.”

The small smile that touched his mouth was reassuring, but Natasha couldn’t stop the ominous words in her head. Her stalker was here in Cedar Creek, and he knew where Daniel lived, and he wanted him dead...

Dear Reader,

I read somewhere that the song “Every Breath You Take” by The Police is widely considered by women to be one of the great love songs. In fact, quite a few of my female friends agree. While I like the song, I also think it’s very, very creepy. The composer himself, Sting, called it “sinister” and says it’s about “surveillance and control” in an interview with The Independent in 1993.

Just goes to show how different perceptions can be.

A woman meets a man in a social situation. She smiles and says, “Nice to meet you.” He hears, “I’ve waited all my life for you.”

She shakes his hand. He feels the promise of forever.

She pleads, “Leave me alone.” He understands, “Please don’t ever leave me alone.”

Perceptions.

It had been a while since I’d done a stalker story, and I’ve always wanted to write my own runaway bride, too. I already knew Detective Daniel Harper, from Killer Secrets, was going to be the hero, so I added one commitmentphobic heroine (Daniel was third on Natasha’s list of jilted fiancés) and one freaky psychopath and set them on a course that would alter, threaten or even end their lives. And I had a lovely time doing it.

I hope you have a lovely time reading it.

Marilyn Pappano

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

About the Author

Booklist

Title Page

Copyright

Introduction

Dear Reader

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Extract

About the Publisher

Chapter 1

When Daniel Harper was a kid, he had decided on two career options for the future: he would become the President of the United States, and in his first term, with his great wisdom, foresight and people-pleasing skills, he would solve the country’s problems once and forevermore.

Or he would become a doctor—not the medical kind; he had an aversion to sick people and preferred to avoid their spores when at all possible—and by the time he was thirty, he would discover a little known gene that, with slight manipulation, would cure all of humanity’s ills.

Instead, he became a cop.

In Cedar Creek, Oklahoma, with a population of twenty-five thousand—comprised of farmers, ranchers, cattle people and horse people; country folk and city folk; sports fans, foodies and good ol’ boys; stubborn men, stubborner women and pretty young things; cowboys, Indians, oil people and church people; winemakers, meth makers and troublemakers.

And beset by the most diverse weather he’d ever experienced, everything from drought to flood to blistering heat and subzero freezes, windstorms, hailstorms, ice storms, tornados and, lately, earthquakes that made his home state of California look like a slacker.

Life in Los Angeles hadn’t prepared him for this.

A snort ahead of him drew his attention to his fellow detective, Ben Little Bear, standing on the first of the six broad steps that led into the Cedar Creek Police Department. “You gonna stand there and soak up a little more water? Isn’t stepping in the puddle enough for one day?”

Daniel scowled at Ben, then at the water that had collected in the low spot in front of the steps from the downpour that didn’t appear to plan on stopping anytime soon. He knew the low spot was there. Knew it filled with water with the lightest sprinkle. Knew because he’d worked there five years, and because he’d stepped in it on the way out two hours ago. The water had finally drained from his shoes and his feet had stopped squelching with every step, and now...

Still scowling, he climbed the first step, shook the excess water from his shoes and his trouser legs, pulled his raincoat closer and swore mildly. His father cussed like the proverbial sailor and had made him cringe more than a few times as an impressionable kid. Now, at thirty-one, he rarely said anything harsher than damn himself.

This rain deserved more than a damn.

Finished shaking, he trotted up the remaining steps and followed Ben inside the station. It had been a post office back in the day and was as stately a building as any he’d ever been inside. The floor was marble, and so were the panels that went four feet up the walls. Here in the lobby, the ceiling was fourteen feet high, with the original chandelier still in operation. Sound echoed out here, but as soon as he walked behind the tall counter and into the station proper, with its lower ceilings and ugly industrial rugs, the echoes faded.

A row of brass hooks mounted on a gleaming oak plank hung on the wall just inside the doorway. He hung his soppy coat there and picked up the towel he’d left earlier, making half an attempt to dry his face and hair.

“Dan’l, you had a visitor,” Cheryl called from her desk. She was the chief’s secretary, but she pretty much handled the entire office. Though taking messages and making notes on comings and goings wasn’t technically her job, what was the use of working for the police chief, she declared, if she didn’t get to poke her nose into everyone’s business?

“Daniel,” he muttered under his breath.

She looked over her glasses at him. “I thought you’d given up trying to correct me years ago.”

He had. The best way to deal with annoying people, his dad had taught him, was to ignore them. Once they saw that their actions were no longer annoying, they stopped.

The best way to deal with annoying people, his father had disagreed, was to knock the crap out of them every time they annoyed you. Eventually they learned to leave you alone.

Both of his fathers were right. Ignoring people worked fine sometimes. Body-slamming them to the ground was sometimes the better option. But Cheryl was on their side, more or less, and Chief Douglas wouldn’t take kindly to Daniel body-slamming her.

“Who was it?” he asked, hanging the towel back on its hook so it could dry.

“She didn’t say.”

Hmm. He knew an awful lot of shes, though most of them wouldn’t just drop in on him at work. “What did she want?”

“She didn’t say.” Cheryl slurped the last of her coffee from a giant mug that proclaimed her Queen of the World, and then wheeled her chair off the mat behind her desk and across the floor to what she called the beverage center. It was only fifteen feet. She could have walked with less effort.

“Was it about a case?”

“She didn’t say.”

He ground his teeth as he watched her fix her coffee. Wishing that someone else, even one of the inmates in the jail in the back, had talked to this visitor, he gritted out, “What did she look like?”

“She didn’t—Oh. She was pretty if you like size twos who look like they just strolled in off the beach, and what man doesn’t? I’m pretty sure she was wearing tinted contacts because I don’t believe anyone has eyes that shade naturally. Oh, and she was wearing the cutest dress, sleeveless, scooped neck, with a fitted bodice and a drop waist with a little pleating that gave it really nice movement when she walked. And her shoes! OMG.”

Bewilderment joined Daniel’s annoyance. All this talking, and had she actually said anything? He didn’t know what size two meant in women’s clothing. Small, he presumed. He would also presume the unnatural eye color was blue, green or some shade of purple. But scooped neck? Fitted bodice? Drop waist?

“So, she was a small woman in a cute dress?”

Cheryl scowled at him. “Isn’t that what I just said?”

From his desk in the back, Ben snorted again. Daniel was glad he provided entertainment for the guy. That could be his new purpose in life. Or he could just go ahead and strangle Cheryl like he’d wanted to since fifteen minutes after meeting her. He would even write up the inventory of his own personal possessions, take his own fingerprints and lock himself in the holding cell. No jury who’d ever met Cheryl would find him guilty.

“Next time someone comes in, get a name, would you?” he groused, heading past her desk to his own in the back.

“I asked, but—”

Everyone else in the room—three detectives, five uniformed officers preparing for shift change and two dispatchers in their alcove to the left—all chimed in together, “She didn’t say.”

Sometimes he hated this place.

No one in the department had a private office besides the chief and the assistant chief, who was out of town for training. The detectives had desks clustered in the rear of the large room and conducted interviews in the conference room off to the right. Normally, he was okay with that, but there were days when a person needed a little privacy and right now, as he kicked off his wet shoes and peeled away his dripping socks, was one of those times.

“She makes LA look better every day,” Ben said from his desk a few feet away.

“I thought you’d never been to LA.”

“I haven’t, but I don’t need to see it to know it beats working with Cheryl.”

Wringing first one sock, then the other, over the trash can, Daniel scowled at him. “She likes you.”

“No, she just has more fun with you.”

Ben turned back to his computer, where he was making one of his infamous lists. He had one for everything, probably even sex, and reviewed them regularly. It was the way he worked. Daniel preferred keeping information in his head and staring into space while letting his subconscious brain piece it together. It was the way he worked.

Though in his lifetime there had been no shortage of people pointing out that his way looked an awful lot like daydreaming. He didn’t care. He produced results. That was what mattered.

Footsteps echoed in the lobby, but he didn’t turn to look at the newcomer. They had a desk sergeant for that—and, of course, Cheryl. Plus Morwenna, one of the dispatchers, was nearly as nosy as the secretary, just in a much more pleasant manner.

Ben’s chair creaked as he swiveled to face Daniel. “Do you want to interview the suspect or the victim in the morning?”

“Victim.” It was an easy choice. Ben was more comfortable with suspects, and he’d handled far more domestic assault cases. Daniel had too much experience with bullies and related far better to the victims. It was odd that empathy was one of his better traits as a detective when most people thought he came down on the lacking side of the emotional scale.

“Deal. So...you don’t know any pretty size-two blondes with a fondness for black dresses with fitted bodices?”

“What do you know about fitted bodices?” Then Daniel stopped typing mid-word, and he looked up at Ben. “Cheryl didn’t say the dress was black.”

“That’s some good detecting there, son.” Ben nodded toward the front counter.

As Daniel slowly swiveled his chair, he realized the room had gone quiet and everyone was waiting expectantly, their gazes shifting from him to the counter and back again. When his own gaze got there, he saw why. There was the blonde, tall, pretty, not small—just a couple inches shorter than him—but slim and curvy and definitely looking like a California beach girl. Her hair was super short—last time he’d seen her, it was long enough to wrap his hands in—and to anyone who didn’t know her, she looked like a ray of sunshine on a dreary day.

But he knew her.

He’d been engaged to marry her.

Until she’d dumped him in front of every single friend and relative they’d had.

What in hell was she doing here?

Natasha Spencer would bet there wasn’t a person in the room who had any idea how much it was killing her to stand there and let them—let Daniel—stare at her. She used to have a lot of nerve—more then than now. Back then, she would have dared them to look their longest and hardest. She even would have done a few model-on-the-runway turns so they could form their impressions, back and front. Now she just stood, half a smile frozen on her face, and wished for a sudden case of amnesia. People always stared, but if she didn’t know why, she couldn’t care.

She’d hoped Daniel would come to the counter, maybe walk off to a distant corner or even outside with her. There was an overhang out there that provided protection from the rain. But he showed no inclination to even rise from his chair. He was leaving it to her.

She took a few more steps, until the counter blocked her way, and tried for a better smile. “Hello, Daniel. I was wondering if we could talk.”

Her words echoed off the high ceiling, followed immediately by the swivel of eight or ten heads to look at him. His silence was going to be even more booming and echoey, the kind they could get lost in and never find their way out of, and the hell of it was, he was entitled.

“We could always talk. Our problem was communicating.”

Funny. The words were in what she considered his usual tone of voice: even, cool, rational, calm. Growing up the way she did, she’d always loved even, cool, rational and calm. It had soothed her every time he’d said something as benign as, Do you want seafood or Thai for dinner?

But there was an edge to his voice that she’d heard so seldom she rarely remembered it, a sharp edge that passed for angry in his cool, calm world. It made her gut tighten. She lived with guilt all the time, and she hated it. Almost as much as she hated coming here.

She couldn’t think of anything to say to that, especially nothing she wanted to say in front of his coworkers. She didn’t turn and slink out, though. Unless he’d changed tremendously in the past few years, he wouldn’t shut her out. He was too courteous to leave any conversation hanging like that and too curious to leave this one hanging. No matter what he felt, there was one question he would have to ask: Why the hell are you here?

Yeah, this was a curse-inducing moment if he’d ever had one.

Water was pooling around her shoes, and the air-conditioning gave her chills where her dress was damp from blowing rain. She’d left an umbrella next to the door, but it hadn’t proven much help when the wind brought the rain in sideways. She thought longingly of returning to the room she’d rented, taking a warm bath, having a bottle or two of wine and coming up with a new plan, because apparently this one wasn’t working.

Then, with a heavy sigh, Daniel stood and walked toward the counter. His feet were bare, she realized, cute with his dark gray suit, white dress shirt and black tie. He looked more approachable barefooted...though that was just fantasy. Sometimes he was an easy man for mushiness and sentimentality. Other times, he was logic and pragmatism personified.

He stopped with ten feet still between them. “What?”

She caught a whiff of the cologne he’d worn since he was sixteen, when he’d filched a bottle from his dad’s bathroom. She never remembered the name, but she knew the bottle. She’d bought it often enough for him in their time together.

“Archer and Jeffrey send their love.”

His only response was a twitch in his jaw. He must have already figured out she’d located him with his fathers’ help. It wasn’t as if he and she still had any friends in common. With another man, she might have pleaded for him to not be angry with Archer and Jeffrey, but Daniel’s relationship with them was such that he would never blame them for giving him up to her.

No, he would save his blame for her.

“There’s a diner across the street from the courthouse. Could we go there for a cup of coffee?”

He glanced over his shoulder, but she couldn’t tell what he was looking at: his desk, the clock on the wall back there or the big dark-haired detective whose desk was nearest his. Asking for permission to go or an excuse not to?

After a moment, he said an ungracious, “All right,” and started to come around the counter. Halfway he turned back, went to his desk, pulled a pair of running shoes with socks stuffed inside from a drawer and tugged them both on. Running shoes with a suit. She would definitely have to tell Jeffrey about that.

Finally he met her in the lobby, shrugging into his raincoat, while she picked up her umbrella. She waited until she was outside, beneath that little overhang, to shake the water away and then open it. Without speaking, she offered to share it with him. Without speaking, he moved far enough away to make his answer clear.

She supposed the space between the police station and the courthouse qualified as a town square. A gazebo stood in pride of place, a grassy area around it, and a parking lot on the east side. She’d never heard of Cedar Creek until Archer had told her the name, and she hadn’t seen nearly enough, but it seemed a sweet town, with an old, well-preserved downtown, lots of stone and brick, a lovely mix of commercial and residential spreading about a mile along First Street.

Natasha couldn’t think of anything she wanted to say that he might want to hear, so she grabbed the anxious, antsy Tasha in her brain around the throat and kept her quiet. Soon enough, she would have to talk, and she wouldn’t get a sympathetic reception, and it was going to be hard enough without Tasha running her mouth.

Her legs were wet when they reached Judge Judie’s Diner. The woman who owned the hotel down the street had referred her there for lunch, and the coffee had been unusually good.

She and Daniel reached for the door at the same time. He backed off before their hands touched. She’d forgotten he liked doing little courtesies like that. She pulled the door open, closed her umbrella and set it in a galvanized bucket for that purpose just inside.

“Sit wherever you like, hon.” The waitress gave Daniel a warmer smile. “Good afternoon, Detective Harper.”

She chose the last booth along the wall and started to slide onto the back bench. Daniel shucked his coat, draped it over a chair at the next table and shooed her to the opposite side, so he faced the waitress, though she doubted that was his sole intent. These days she was more comfortable sitting where she could see the door and who came through it. According to popular legend, so were most police officers.

The flirty waitress came. Natasha ordered coffee. Daniel asked for pop and a piece of pecan pie. When the woman was back behind the counter, he folded his hands together in his lap and said, “Well?”

Something sad settled in her stomach. She’d thought he might give her a break. Five years had passed. He’d moved on, moved up. He’d had other relationships. He’d probably even fallen in love again. She’d thought, for old times’ sake, he might bury the hatchet, and not in her.

“How are you?” she asked hopefully.

Irritation flared in his dark eyes. “You want chitchat? I’m fine. I like Cedar Creek. I like my job. I like it so much that I suggested my fathers consider moving here when they retire. How are you? Why are you here? Just making rounds of the people-I’ve-screwed-over club? Are you going in order? Kyle, Eric, then me? Did I miss anyone?”

Heat warmed her face. The fact that it was well deserved didn’t make it any less embarrassing. And he did miss one. It was Kyle, Eric, Daniel and Zach. Opera had its Four Tenors, her mother teased, while Natasha had her Four Fiancés. Her older sister referred to Daniel as Runaway Bride, Third Edition.

The waitress returned, giving them curious looks as she set down drinks and a dish of pie that looked incredible. “Can I get you anything else, Daniel?”

He turned his attention to the waitress, and a sort of smile twitched into place. “No, thank you, Taryn.” The smile disappeared as soon as she walked away. He took a bite of pie and washed it down before scowling at Natasha. “Look, I have a body found in a burned-out car, an attempted murder where the victim’s still touch-and-go and a woman to interview in the morning whose husband just broke her jaw for the second time in two years, plus her arm and her shoulder and her eye socket and might have done enough damage to leave her blind, to say nothing about the rest of the cases piled on my desk, and it’s the second Thursday of the month. First responders’ league at the bowling alley, and the chief gets annoyed when his detectives don’t show up. Just say what you want to say, Natasha, then do your disappearing act again. Preferably for good this time.”

This had been a stupid idea. There were a dozen different better ways to do what she needed, ways that didn’t involve laying eyes on Daniel or having to feel his bitterness and know she was wholly responsible for it. She dug ten dollars from her purse, laid it on the table and slid to her feet. “I’m sorry. I’ll find another way.”

He didn’t try to stop her. He didn’t even watch her walk all the way to the door; she felt the instant his attention shifted elsewhere. When she stepped outside and turned to the right, toward her hotel down the block, she glanced back at the last possible second and saw Taryn sliding into the seat she’d vacated.

Though she had no right to care, somewhere deep inside, it hurt.

By the time Daniel returned to the station, the shift change was over and Cheryl had gone home. Thank God for small miracles. He was surprised she hadn’t hung around to ask questions about Natasha—important ones like, Where did she get that cute dress? and OMG, don’t you love those shoes? A person would think, working in a police station, Cheryl understood the concept of You have the right to remain silent, but it didn’t register with her.

He’d slid into his chair and started shutting down his laptop when Morwenna popped out of the dispatcher’s shack and zeroed in on him. She was a few years younger than him, had come to Oklahoma from a small village in Cornwall long enough ago that her British accent was hit or miss, and she had a rather unique fashion sense. She was the least annoying person in the office besides Ben and the chief, and she and Daniel had actually considered going out on a few occasions before deciding neither appealed to the other in the right way.

She nudged one of his shoes before perching on the edge of his desk. “That’s some fashion statement you’re making, Detective.”

“Don’t tell my dad. He’d be mortified.” When Natasha had seen his running shoes, she’d looked like telling Jeffrey was exactly what she had in mind. Of course, Jeffrey’s mortification would be feigned. It was the reaction people expected from a man in his business.

“Eh, my mum’s mortified all the time by my clothes. She says I’m trying to embarrass her into an early grave.”

“Yeah, didn’t I see your mum out on her twelve-mile run this morning in the rain? She didn’t look like she might drop dead anytime soon.”

“Not unless it’s from exhaustion. She says she can’t skip her training just because of the weather. She’s got an ultramarathon coming up next month.”

“I don’t even know what that is.”

“Something extreme and excessive.” Morwenna stretched out one leg, flexing her muscles inside the pink tights, and sighed. “Do you know what’s it like when your mum has a better body than you do?”

Daniel frowned at her. “Remember Jeffrey? Been a model since before I was born?” A few of the people he worked with knew his fathers were gay, but only Morwenna knew much about them. She liked things that made people different. People who weren’t different, she sighed, were so much the same.

“Ooh, yes, I forgot. I saw that last ad he did for Migliora cologne. Whew. If I didn’t know... Yeah, I can see how you’d feel second-best compared to him.”

“I didn’t say I felt second-best,” Daniel protested. “He’s...”

“Something to aspire to.” She slid to her feet and started back across the room.

“Hey. I thought you were going to ask about...”

“Natasha? I’ll get to it, all in good time.”

“How do you know—I never told you her name.”

She smiled smugly. “That’s some good detecting there, Daniel. Bet a clue never gets past you, does it?”

Daniel scowled at her until she was out of sight, then began packing up his desk. If somebody offered him a nickel, he’d go home and to bed. But like he’d told Natasha, the chief didn’t like it when they skipped bowling night. With all his refined tastes, why couldn’t Jeffrey have insisted on teaching him to play polo or ride dressage or something like that?

He made it out of the station without talking to anyone else, slogged his way through puddles and streams and reached the car with his feet soaked again.

It was only a few blocks to the duplex he rented in one of Cedar Creek’s older neighborhoods. It was a nice house, built of deep-red brick and topped with green-clay roof tiles. The place had been built with a main entrance on the street it faced and a servants’ entrance on the street that sided its corner lot. Fifty-some years ago, the owner, with two spinster daughters, had made the servants’ entrance identical to the main one and divvied up the interior into two halves of a whole.

Sad to think all that exacting work was easier than finding husbands for the daughters.

He didn’t have to be at Thunder Lanes Bowling Alley until 6:30 p.m., so he showered, then sprawled on the couch to watch the news before heading out. When his cell phone signaled a text, he frowned. His parents had told Natasha where to find him. Had they also given her his cell phone number?

It wasn’t her. That was relief he was feeling. He was pretty sure, even if it felt kind of strange. It was Jeffrey.

Are you still speaking to us?

Of course.

Did you speak to her?

No more than I had to.

I hope you weren’t rude. Even if she deserved it.

Daniel scrubbed his face. Sometimes he had trouble telling the difference between plain speaking and rudeness. He’d often been accused of the latter when he simply wasn’t mincing words. Had he been rude to Natasha? Yeah, the people-you’ve-screwed-over bit had probably crossed the line. He certainly could have phrased it better.

Though he also could have phrased it the way Archer would have, with a few alphabets’ worth of f-words.

I might have been. A little.

Your father said we should ask you first, but it seemed really important to her.

Daniel responded with one of the lessons Archer had taught him that Jeffrey had always tried to unteach: it’s easier to apologize later than to ask permission first.

His dad prefaced his answer with a frowny face.

Are you okay?

He considered it. Yeah, he was feeling a little cranky, but he was always cranky. He leaned toward the serious-dour-cynical side on the best of days, and this day had already gone down the toilet before Natasha showed up.

I’m good. I get to go bowl tonight.

Hope you get nothing but strikes. Love you.

Daniel typed the same, then tossed the phone aside. What excuse had Natasha given Jeffrey and Archer to get his whereabouts from them? What could possibly be important about talking to him now, five years after she returned his engagement ring via her sister? The time for saying, Gee, Daniel, I’m having some doubts, was long past.

Or, Sorry I broke your heart.

Even, Sorry I didn’t have the nerve to humiliate you in person.

Funny that she’d come all this way to talk and, after they left the police station, she’d said a total of nine words to him. How are you? I’m sorry. I’ll find another way.

To do what? Clear her conscience? If she felt guilty about the way she’d ended their relationship, that was fine, but he had no absolution to offer. It was over and done with. He’d even learned something in the process: to not believe for a second that he could be the one to change her. She’d told him on their second date that she’d run out on two previous fiancés, but he’d been stupid enough to think this time would be different. He would be different. He would be the one who made her want to stay.

Over and done with.

He’d believed that for a long time, since he’d reached the point where he went entire weeks without thinking about her. Missing her. Wondering what he hadn’t given that made it so easy for her to leave. He’d believed it when he finally started dating again, when he’d thought he was falling in love again. It hadn’t happened—the falling in love—but he liked to think it would have if they had been at different stages in their lives.

But if it was over and done with, why was he so darn irate?

The Prairie Sun Hotel, located a few doors from Judge Judie’s, was a three-story building with a sandstone facade and leaded-glass double doors leading into the lobby. It had begun life as a mercantile, later became a JCPenney, then an indoor antiques mall and now was a boutique hotel. It had been an easy choice for Natasha after seeing the cookie-cutter motels on the highways leading to Tulsa. Parking in the tiny lot out back was the only downside, but she could live with that.

She could live with it easier if she wasn’t convinced both she and her car were going to sprout mushrooms if the rain didn’t stop soon.

Her room was on the second floor at the front and had wood floors and tall ceilings and a claw-foot tub in the bath. Instead of a closet, there was a scarred oak armoire, standing across from the vintage tubular steel bed. It was all so lovely that the only thing she would even think of changing was the line of small iron birds that danced along the top bar of both the headboard and the footboard. Not only were they just too much, as Jeffrey said about excessive decorations, their sharp beaks and wing tips looked a little dangerous for someone wandering to or from the bathroom in the middle of the night.

She sat at the small oak table that served as a desk, her tablet and keyboard in front of her. She intended to spend the rest of the evening the way she usually did—a few games of Candy Crush, then a few chapters of whichever book caught her fancy. Fantasy tonight, she thought, with dragons and knights and self-rescuing princesses. Something that would take her out of Cedar Creek and far, far away from Daniel’s dislike.

“You dumped him,” she muttered aloud. “Did you really expect him to be happy to see you?”

No. She’d never thought he would be happy. He took things so seriously. Sometimes she’d wondered how someone raised by two majorly passionate people could be so cool and unemotional. Maybe he was just a version of her: coming from such a chaotic family, she’d craved quiet and calm. Maybe he’d craved rationale and reason.

But he felt things. Felt them deeply. He’d trusted until he’d learned better. He’d been fiercely loyal until she’d showed him disloyalty. He would have done anything for her until she’d done everything to him. He was done with her. She understood that. Respected it. Accepted it.

But it still stung.

With the email icon on the tablet screen showing new mail, she raised one hand to swipe across it, then hesitated. The tiny hairs bristling on the back of her neck told her there would be an email from him. The reason she had made this trip. The reason she’d had to face Daniel. She wanted to indulge in childlike games: if she didn’t open the program, she wouldn’t see the email, and if she didn’t see the email, it didn’t exist. He didn’t exist.

But he did, and all the pretending in the world couldn’t change that.

She had the usual spam in her inbox, a funny message from her sister, Stacia, and a sweet how-did-it-go note from Archer. He was the gruffer, blunter of the two Harper men, but he had a soft spot for her, and she for him.

And yes, there was also an email from him.

RememberMe.

The sight of his screen name made her skin crawl and her hand tremble when she tapped on it. Her cell phone had been blissfully silent today, but Monday he’d texted her multiple times.

You’re late for work, Nat. Why?

Your office said you didn’t call in. Are you sick? I should call Stacia to find out.

Where are you, Nat?

On Tuesday, he’d opened with...

There’s no family emergency or Stacia would be gone, too. Where are you? What are you doing? Why are you making me worry?

Are you too sick to answer your phone? Should I ask the dispatcher for a welfare check?

Is this about Kyle’s accident?

Answer me, damn it.

His final text that night had made her shiver and hunker deeper into the covers of a cheap motel somewhere in Texas, along Interstate 40.

I went by your apartment tonight, and your car was gone. What are you up to, Nat? Why are you doing this to me?

What he was doing to her apparently counted for nothing, and what he’d done to Kyle...

Goose bumps everywhere, she finally focused on the tablet screen.

You shouldn’t have done this, Nat. But it’s okay. I’m not mad. I was, but I’m not anymore because I know I’ll find you. The connection between us is so deep and strong that I’ll always find you, and when I do—after all, Cedar Creek’s not that big—you’ll never want to leave me again.

Damn it, he knew where she was. Deep inside, though, she wasn’t surprised. Coming here had been on the spur of the moment; on Sunday night she’d called Archer and gotten Daniel’s information, told Stacia she was leaving, packed her bags and slipped out of the apartment before dawn Monday morning. But she’d known RememberMe would figure it out. He knew everything she did.

Swallowing hard, she pressed her hands together to stop their trembling. He made her feel so damn vulnerable. There had been times when his messages were almost sporadic, a few weeks when she hadn’t heard from him at all. She’d readjusted to life quickly, neglecting to be wary when she was out, to look over her shoulder or to search for familiar faces in unfamiliar places. Then, when she’d thought he’d moved on, that some other woman had caught his fancy, another email had found its way into her inbox, or a text to her cell phone, or a card to her mailbox.

RememberMe. When the first emails had come, she’d thought the name was cute, a friendly question without the question remark. Hey, remember me? After what had happened to Kyle, she knew there was nothing cute or friendly about him.

And she didn’t have a clue in hell who he was or what he wanted besides frightening her. She didn’t know why he was fixated on her, how he’d gotten her email address or her cell number or her home address. She didn’t know how he tracked her down every time she changed jobs, where he watched her from, what he wanted from her.

What was the point of his sick game?

Right now it didn’t matter. All she had to do was warn Daniel. Have that conversation he so clearly didn’t want to have. Give him one more reason to hate her. She would do the same with her other two exes—she was still searching for them—and then she would find herself a hiding place so far away that RememberMe would never find her.

She closed her email and stared at the screen a long time before opening the browser. Cedar Creek was a pretty little town, but she needed to put it in the rearview mirror as soon as possible. Vulnerable wasn’t a pleasant way to feel, and she wanted it done.

It wasn’t likely that a town the size of this one had more than one bowling alley, and a search showed that was true. She’d discarded her wet shoes when she came in from the diner and hadn’t brought another pair that went so well with the dress, so she changed into jeans and a button-down, put on chunky-soled boots that should keep out the worst of the water, grabbed a raspberry-colored slicker and her bag, and left the room.

Claire Baylor, proprietor, manager and housekeeper of the Prairie Sun, was sitting behind the grand oak counter, a book propped open on the desk. When she closed it, Natasha caught a view of the cover. The Unlucky Ones.

“I’ve heard that book will give you nightmares,” she commented.

Claire came to stand in front of her. “It makes me unbearably sad.”

“I haven’t read it. These days, if it doesn’t make me laugh or give me the thrill of adventure, I don’t read it.”

“It’s disturbing but hopeful. She survived horrible things and went on to live a good life.” Claire glanced past her to the wet street outside. “Are you heading out?”

“Yeah. I was wondering where to find Highway 97.”

“Main Street, a couple blocks west, becomes 97 when it leaves town. Anyplace in particular?”

“The bowling alley.”

The woman winced. “I had to take a physical education class in college, and I chose bowling because...well, let’s face it. I’m not a physical sort.” She patted her rounded hips. “Luckily, the instructor graded on effort, because I don’t think I threw a single ball all semester that didn’t go into someone else’s lane.”

“I’ve never tried the game. I just can’t see the point of heaving a twelve-pound ball at a bunch of pins that far away. Of course, I never got the point of golf or tennis, either. Hockey—that makes sense to me. Pounding people who get in your way.”

Claire’s laugh was hearty and easy, as if it was second nature. “I’m with you, sister. Anyway, just go up to Main, turn right and it’s a couple miles north on the right side of the road. Have fun.”

Claire left the desk and walked with Natasha to the rear door, where the hour and the weather kept the lot dimly lit. “Feel free to park on the street out front when you come back. Your key unlocks both front and back doors, and after talking about that book, the front’s just less creepy.”

“Thanks.” Natasha jogged to her car and locked the doors as soon as she was inside. There’d been a time when that had instantly made her feel safer. Not any longer. Even a thorough look around the vehicle didn’t inspire confidence. She didn’t know what skills RememberMe possessed. He’d found her new email address every time she’d changed it; within twenty-four hours of her changing her cell number, he was calling again. She’d moved from an apartment in her own name to one in her cousin’s name, and flowers had arrived at her doorstep the next morning. Was tampering with her car beyond him? Was anything beyond him?

The tears that had put a quaver into Kyle’s mother’s voice last weekend answered that question effectively.

But the car started fine, and when she turned on the heat to dispel the chill, nothing noxious poured from vents. This was one of the problems of a stalker: he frequently made her lose sight between reason and paranoia. At the moment, she wasn’t convinced there was a difference.

The gutters along First Street were overflowing, spreading into the street and sometimes bubbling onto the sidewalks. With no oncoming traffic, she drove, straddling the dividing line to stay out of the deepest water. It wasn’t seven thirty yet, but it seemed hours past her bedtime. The clouds, the constant flow and splash, the damp and the chill all combined to convince her winter was on its way in a place where it mattered. Not the mild few months they got at home but real cold, real snow, real ice.

Thunder Lanes couldn’t be missed. It sat in a mix of industrial and residential structures, the only business open now, its blacktop parking lot full. Natasha was lucky to find a space near the front as another car backed out. She swooped in, sat there gripping the steering wheel for a while and then forced herself to let go. Open the door. Take off her seat belt. Get out. Close the door. Walk to the main entrance and...and...

She actually decided to leave but got caught in the shuffle when two customers left and four more came in at the same time. Before she got untangled, she was on the other side of the doors, with escape behind her and loud music and loud voices ahead.

She wasn’t intending to talk to Daniel tonight. She would just walk inside, keep her distance from his group. How hard could it be to avoid a bunch of cops, deputies and firefighters? She would get a snack and find an out-of-the-way place to watch him for a bit. See how he interacted with the others. See if he was still angry.

See if he’d brought that girl, Taryn.

The lanes were busy. The food counters weren’t. She got a beer and a corn dog, a glob of mustard and napkins and scoped out the best place to go unnoticed. The arcade was mostly empty, and only a couple of kids played in the enclosed toddler playground next to it. A narrow counter and chairs lined one side of it so parents could keep watch.

Only one woman sat there, dark-haired, pretty, the messy remains of hot dogs and pop to one side, along with a mountain-sized pile of dirty napkins. She caught Natasha’s look and smiled drily. “Silly me. I thought it would be hard to create disaster with a bun, a wiener and a spurt of ketchup. Who knew?”

Natasha left two seats between them and sat to the woman’s left, where she would have an excuse for looking toward the first responders at their side-by-side lanes at the far end. “Your kids?”

“Oh, no. Samwell is my husband’s cousin’s child. He’s spoiled rotten, throws temper tantrums at least once an hour and thinks he will absolutely ‘diiiieeee’ if he doesn’t get his way every single time. The girl who ignores him and plays so politely is the daughter of one of the firefighters over there.”

“You don’t bowl?”

“I only come for the popcorn. Who are you with?”

Natasha’s face flushed. “I only came for the corn dog and the beer. I’ll have to try the popcorn next.”

Briefly taking her gaze from Samwell, the woman smiled. “I’m Mila.”

“Natasha.” She dipped the entire end of her corn dog in mustard and was taking a big bite when Mila made an interested sound.

“Are you the Natasha?”

Mustard went down her throat the wrong way, and bits of breading tried to work their way up and out her nose. She covered her face with a handful of napkins, spitting and wheezing at the vinegary burn, so lost in her little fit that she barely heard Mila say, “I’ll take that as a yes.”

Followed by, “Ooh, I’ll take that as an even bigger yes.”

Natasha swiped the tears from her eyes and wiped her face clean before looking toward the lanes where all the good-looking guys were. Had been. One was weaving his way around benches and bowlers toward them.

And he didn’t look happy.

Chapter 2

“What the hell are you doing here?” Daniel saw Mila arch one eyebrow, then heard his choice of word too late. Too bad. Heck just didn’t get the emotion over.

Natasha coughed to clear her throat. “I heard the popcorn here is the best around.”

His gaze flickered at the corn dog on its paper sleeve. The popcorn was good. The corn dogs were like every other corn dog found in the freezer case at the market. “Why are you following me?”

“Judging by all the writing on your screen over there, you’ve been here a while. I just came...” A tiny hesitation, an offer of a smile. A sure indication she was about to lie. “For the food.”

“You need to leave.” His voice wobbled before he got it under control. “You need to leave the bowling alley, the hotel, the town and the entire damn state, and you need to go now.”

Mila was keeping an eye on the kids while discreetly following the conversation, and Daniel knew without turning that they had an audience back on the lanes. He didn’t often give them anything to talk about, other than how often he got hit on by the females he came across on the job. He didn’t want them talking about this, either, not even if he had to bodily eject Natasha from the bowling alley.

Which he had zero grounds for doing, especially with more than half of the county’s law enforcement officers looking on.

Natasha’s discomfort was palpable as she pushed back her chair. “Talk to me—listen to me—and then I’ll go.”

He clenched his jaw, though he managed to keep his hands flat and loose at his sides. He hated being outmanipulated, outwitted or outgunned. It wasn’t anything his fathers had drummed into him, though they both had competitive streaks a mile wide. It was just something he expected of himself. And he especially hated being undone by Natasha. Mila, Morwenna, Taryn—they were okay. Cheryl and Lois, the first-ever and still-serving female officer in Cedar Creek—it was a given they could undo him without even trying.

But Natasha? The idea made his stomach turn sour.

He glanced at Mila, whose attention was still on the kids, but a faint smile touched her face. She was his boss Sam’s wife, survivor of several assaults and murder attempts a year ago. In the beginning, he hadn’t cared a thing about her other than her ties to the case, but since then, they’d become...distant friends, maybe, or close acquaintances. He liked her, respected her, and when she gave him a tiny nod, he struggled not to grouse.

If listening to Natasha was the only way to get rid of her, he would listen.

“Fine.” He directed the response to Mila—he didn’t want to see the triumph on Natasha’s face—then pivoted and returned to the lane to change into his boots and get his slicker.

“Jeez, he even gets hit on twelve lanes away by the prettiest woman in the place,” Cullen Simpson muttered, then shot a look at Sam. “No offense, Chief.”

“None taken,” Sam said before pointing his beer at Simpson. “If I thought you were spending your time thinking about how pretty my wife is, I’d have to pound you into the ground.” Before Simpson could stumble over a denial that could only get him in hot water, Sam turned to Daniel. “I’m guessing you won’t be back.”

“Probably not.”

“You’re awful damn close to a perfect game.”

“I’ve had plenty of perfect games.”

Ben clapped him on the shoulder, practically knocking him off balance. “You gotta love the boy’s modesty, don’t you?”

“Just stating a fact. I’ll see you in the morning.” As he stalked back toward the play area, Daniel pulled on his slicker, making sure to cover his pistol and badge, then waited in the broad corridor for Natasha to dump her corn dog and beer in the trash.

She walked toward him with the long, fluid strides that had always seemed more than just a form of locomotion to him. Her jeans clung snugly to her thighs, and her shirt did the same with her upper body. She had gained a few pounds since he’d last seen her. They gave her body a softer, more womanly look.

Not that he cared. He was just appreciating a fine form. Jeffrey had always encouraged him to appreciate beauty.

Archer had taught him that sometimes it could be deadly.

When they reached the vestibule, they both stopped. He supposed it was best to decide their destination before stepping out into the deluge. There were plenty of places open, just none that he wanted to go to with Natasha. Her hotel was out of the question, and so was his house. There was no way he could let her in there.

“There’s a McDonald’s on South Main,” he said shortly. The micro-change in her expression showed that she remembered he wasn’t a McDonald’s fan—all those kids and all their oblivious parents with their cell phones. Better to go someplace other than usual, right?

“I’ll follow you.”

His car was parked in the row nearest the highway. Hers was twenty feet from the door. He jogged to his vehicle, the hood of his slicker down, cold rain running down his neck. By the time he got inside and started the engine, Natasha was waiting near the exit.

There wasn’t any traffic to speak of, nothing to delay the moment they would reach the restaurant. As he crossed the street that would lead to his house, he sent a mournful look that way but continued south.

Daniel waited for her in the parking lot—it was the polite thing to do—and held the door for her. They both ordered black coffees, each paying for their own, and carried them silently to the table farthest from other customers. It was a bench, actually, with stools for chairs. He felt like he was hunkered at the kids’ table, like his knees might bump his chin.

Natasha looked as if she perched on the most elegant chair ever imagined.

She sweetened her coffee, stirred it, then gazed out of the streaky window at a scene so saturated with water that everything overflowed: the street, the gutters, the sky itself. “Is the weather often like this?”

Irritation flared at the pointlessness of her comment. “No. Sometimes it rains really hard.”

Her gaze jerked back to him, her lips turning up in a startled smile before it faded beneath his scowl. “Sometimes I forget you have a sense of humor.”

Her comment gave him the same fleeting startle. Sometimes he forgot, too. He hadn’t laughed at anything lately. There was nothing lighthearted about his job. Usually the grimness of cases rolled off him—he’d learned coping mechanisms when he was a little Harper—but the past few days, they’d seemed a little harder to shake.

Maybe a portent of the shake-up to come.

Man, was he shaken.

“What do you want?” he asked before that admission had time to unsettle him even more.

She opened her mouth, closed it and wrapped her fingers tightly around her coffee. Her nails were polished pale pink with tiny flecks of hot-pink glitter. She’d always been such a girly-girl, no matter what she wore. Even in one of his dress shirts and nothing else, she’d looked like a princess ready for the ball. Now, when he felt like a drained rat, she was beautiful.

After a minute, she eased her grip on the cup and raised her gaze to him. “I’m sorry about the way things went.”

For a moment, he thought that was just a start, that she would go on with some crappy explanation, but when she didn’t, he stared at her. “That’s it? That’s what you came all this way to say?”

“No. I came to tell you...”

He knew how to conduct interviews, how to get a reluctant person to talk, how to sort through everything a talkative person said to get to the important details, how to get his instincts at work on determining truth versus lies versus obfuscation. He knew the best action was to be silent and still; soon enough, she would talk just to fill the void.

He knew all that and ignored it. Instead he stood up, reached into his pocket and slapped a business card down on the table. “There’s my office number and my email address. If you ever decide to actually say what you came to say, you can leave a message. Once that’s taken care of, I assume you’ll be getting the hell out because that’s what you do, isn’t it?”

He hadn’t managed a single step when she spoke. “I think you might be in danger, Daniel.”

Saying the words out loud was hard. Hadn’t she already provided enough upheaval in his life? But she couldn’t have not said them, not if she wanted to live with herself. She felt so bad about what had happened to Kyle, and she’d had no advance warning. Finding out that one of the others had been injured or even killed when she’d made no effort to stop it would have been too much to bear.

The incredulous look he was giving her wasn’t easy to bear, either. It made her face hot, made her want to squirm on the ridiculous stool where she loomed like a giant over a doll’s table. Slowly, he sank back onto his own stool, his hands gripping the table in front of him, his fingers pressing tightly like he was imagining them around her throat. He squeezed his eyes shut for a moment, then pinched the bridge of his nose. Those were his first outward symptoms of frustration, a habit she’d rarely seen directed her way but was still familiar with. Did he know he’d picked it up from Jeffrey? Except Jeffrey didn’t pinch. He just pressed two knuckles to that spot between his eyes.

When Daniel spoke, his voice would seem calm to most people, but she heard the stress, the tight control. “Would you say that again?”

She thought about repeating it verbatim, just to tweak his frustration a little tighter, because she knew he didn’t want a repeat. He wanted an explanation.

Deserved an explanation.

After drawing a deep breath, she exhaled, hoping to blow out some of her own stress, but it didn’t work. “I have a stalker,” she said flatly. “I got him about a year ago, right around Halloween.” That was Stacia’s birthday. Her sister had even joked about how bad her luck was: her birthday, and Natasha got a secret admirer. “Last weekend, he sent me a message that he had enjoyed his visit with Kyle on Saturday. You remember—”

Daniel growled. Of course he remembered her first fiancé.

“I still run into Kyle occasionally, so I called to see what he could tell me about this guy, and... I talked to his mother. He had a bad accident that day. He fell down the stairs at his house. He’s in a coma, and they don’t know whether he’ll survive.” She closed her eyes briefly, and an image of her first fiancé came to mind: boyish, auburn-haired, bearing a strong resemblance to Britain’s Prince Harry. The idea that he might die broke her heart.

“RememberMe said—”

“What?” Daniel interrupted, still looking flummoxed.

“RememberMe. It’s his email address. It’s the only name I have for him.”

“You don’t know who he is?”

“If I knew, I would call him by name.” She mimicked his dry, stating-the-obvious tone almost perfectly. “I have no idea. Stacia and I considered every guy I ever met and came up with nothing.” It was hard, looking critically at people she’d been friends with, had dated, kissed or more, and wondering if they could be dangerous. Could one of them be the one so determined to terrorize her? Was anyone she knew actually capable of that?

Dear God, she hoped not.

“What do you know?”

The memory of her first contact with the man was clearer now than the day it happened. At the time, it had been no big deal, just one more email from a stranger in an inbox that got plenty of those every day. His was friendly, lighthearted. It had made her smile, and she’d needed the smile, and she truly hadn’t found anything intrusive about it. She’d always had the option of deleting the email and, in that case, would likely never hear from him again.

Instead, she’d chosen to answer. What would have happened if she hadn’t?

“He sent me an email, just a short note. It had been a gray and dreary day, and he said it reminded him of the day we’d met. He said, of course, I probably didn’t remember because I had been surrounded by admirers. He said—” She broke off, pulled out her cell and scrolled through her email. She hadn’t known in the beginning why she kept his messages. It certainly wasn’t foreboding, and she hadn’t had any idea that they might be important someday. Maybe she’d just liked the picture attached to the first one, or the cartoon embedded in the second, or the link to a funny video in the third one. But she had kept them. Every one.

She offered the phone to Daniel, and he took it. It was big enough that there was no chance of an accidental touch. His touch had always been simple. No-nonsense. Comforting. It had made her feel safe and protected and loved and aroused and so very lucky. And afraid. She’d wanted to love him and adore him and never, ever hurt him, and she’d done it all—the loving, the adoring and the hurting.

He wouldn’t let her hurt him again. She knew that. He wouldn’t let anything the least bit sweet enter into his thoughts or his actions, because he had to protect himself from her, and that hurt her.

Daniel read the note, then gave the photo a cursory glance, unimpressed by it. It had taken her breath away the first time: sunset that very day over the ocean, the sun’s rays bursting out of dark clouds to form a halo of gold and deep pink and dark blue and luscious purples. She’d thought about having it enlarged, printed and framed to hang on her wall, and Daniel gave it just a look. Huh. A sunset.

He went on to read the second mail, the third, on down the list. After four minutes, according to the bank sign across the street, he looked up. “These aren’t exactly what comes to mind when I think ‘stalker.’”

“I didn’t think of him that way, either. I honestly thought it was someone I knew who was being coy. Seeing how long it would take me to figure out who it was. That was before.”

“Before what?”

“Before the number of emails passed five hundred in the first four months. Now it’s around two thousand. Plus he’s sent me nine hundred plus texts, twenty-eight cards, a half dozen flower deliveries and four personal deliveries. The ones you’ve read, he was still being charming and fun and not creepy.”

He stared at her a long time, his dark gaze steady. He could make a person squirm with that gaze, in both good ways and bad. She could easily imagine him in an interrogation room with a suspect across the table, getting a confession without saying a word. That look just compelled a person to talk.

“Did you contact the police?”

“Yes. Apparently, stalkers aren’t a big deal these days. Just about everyone in Los Angeles has one.” Then she sighed. “I talked to a detective, asked for advice. She looked into it and agreed it was probably just someone I knew playing games. He hadn’t actually done anything. She suggested I change my email address and my cell number. I’d already done both a half dozen times. She said moving couldn’t hurt. I’d already done that. She said let her know if he escalated.

“I called again after Kyle’s accident. She looked into it again. He was home alone. He was carrying some boxes down the stairs and apparently misjudged a step. His parents believed it was an accident. His girlfriend believed it. No one had a reason to hurt him.”

Her conversations with the detective had all sounded so logical over the phone in her tightly secured apartment or sitting at the woman’s desk in a building filled with armed people. She was overreacting. Hypersensitive. Reading more into the emails than was there.

But there’d been one small issue that prevented Natasha from taking the detective at her word.

“Who did you talk to?” Daniel asked.

“Felicia Martin.”

His face tightened. He’d gone through the academy with Felicia. They’d called her Flea because she was nearly a foot shorter than most of them, wiry and compact, constantly in motion and tough as hell to get rid of. He and Flea had liked and respected each other. It had seemed only natural to Natasha that, after the way she’d ended their engagement, Flea neither liked nor respected her.

“She’s a good cop.”

Natasha didn’t respond. Cops were also people, and people were influenced by a lot of things. Was Felicia a good cop? Probably. Would she have taken more interest in Natasha’s complaint if they were strangers? Maybe. But that wouldn’t have changed the bottom line: that Natasha was being haunted by a phantom who didn’t leave the slightest trace and Felicia didn’t have the resources to discover who he was.

Daniel set her phone carefully on the table between them. “So, how did you make the leap from Kyle falling down the stairs to thinking that I’m in danger?”

“The same message where he mentioned Kyle. He said he was looking forward to meeting with you, Eric and—” Her mouth froze, and it took her a moment to get it working again. “And Zach. He said he hoped the visits would be as satisfying.”

“Zach.” Daniel’s voice was hollow, his mouth quirking in a sardonic twist, his gaze rolling skyward in a grimace of distaste. “There’s four of us now? Is that all, or did RememberMe miss one?”

“That’s all.” She barely managed a whisper. Four men. Four loves. Five broken hearts. And all the blame lay on her.

He was silent a moment longer, until a gust of wind rattled the window beside them. Rain hit it so hard that it sounded like pebbles hitting the glass. She knew the sound, because once when she’d teased that no boyfriend had ever tossed pebbles at her bedroom window when she was growing up, Daniel had done just that the next night with a handful of aquarium gravel.

“Have you talked to Eric and Zach?”

She shook her head. “I’m looking for them.”

His shoulders straightened, his expression going blank, as he gathered the empty sugar and creamer packets he’d used. “Okay, so now I know. There wasn’t any need to come here. You could have called. You could have just given the message to my parents and let them pass it on. But I appreciate the heads-up. Don’t feel like you need to stick around any longer.”

With that, he stood and walked away. Natasha turned to watch him throw his coffee and litter into the trash, then go out the door and into the rain. He didn’t look over his shoulder until he was inside his car and then only to check traffic before backing out of the parking space.

A lump rose in her throat as he drove away. It had gone better than she’d had any right to expect, she told herself as she threw her own coffee away, then exited the restaurant. He was probably right. She should have just told Jeffrey and Archer and let them handle it. But she’d needed to get out of LA, and she’d found it hard enough talking to him. She didn’t think she could have borne the anger that his fathers surely would have felt finding out that he was in danger because of her.

“And you wanted to see Daniel,” Tasha whispered, filling all the corners of her brain with malicious glee.

All right. Yes, somewhere deep, deep inside, she’d wanted to see Daniel.

Stumbling to a stop in the drive-through lane, Natasha tilted her face to the sky and let the rain wash over her. It ran down her cheeks, caught on her eyelashes and dripped from her chin. It didn’t make her feel better, didn’t wash away her hurts or regrets.

But if a tear or two happened to seep from her eyes, no one would suspect. It’s just rain, she could say.

She could even pretend she believed it.

The rain had stopped sometime during the night, giving the waterlogged city a chance to drain and catch its breath. Daniel needed to catch his breath, but it was going to take a lot more than a break in the clouds to do that. He didn’t even have a chance until he knew for sure that Natasha had left Cedar Creek and Oklahoma far behind. He figured he would be able to feel it in his bones when it happened.

The police station was quiet and dimly lit. He’d dressed down today—black tactical pants, a gray polo shirt embroidered with the department’s badge and boots—only very slightly in deference to the fact that it was Friday and everyone else always dressed down on Friday. Mostly it was because of the weather and his desire to keep his feet dry but also because of the trouble he’d had with his tie this morning. The agitation that hummed through his nerves all night long would have made self-strangulation far too tempting if he’d had to give the silk noose one more effort.

He checked the time and grimaced. It was a little after six, so shortly after 4:00 a.m. in Los Angeles. Flea would kill him if he called now. He wondered if Natasha had shared her danger theory and Flea had found it without merit. She obviously hadn’t felt the urge to pass on the information to Daniel. But if she wasn’t taking the stalking seriously, why would she take the stalker’s remark as a threat?

He was tired from a night of restless sleep, he had a headache and when he’d tried to drink a cup of coffee while getting dressed, it had gone down so poorly that he’d thought he might throw up. Thank God the weekend was here. Maybe he would retreat into his bedroom until Monday morning, or maybe Morwenna still wanted a weekend trip to Eureka Springs. Surely her company, the Arkansas town, the tourists and the hundred and fifty miles’ distance would allow him to get his mental balance back.

“Why are you in so early?”

Blearily Daniel glanced up as Ben dumped a half dozen spiral notebooks on his desk. They were wrapped in a plastic trash bag to keep them from getting wet even though two empty attaches resided in the other detective’s bottom desk drawer. “Couldn’t sleep.”

“Because of Size-Two Fitted Bodice?” Ben shrugged out of his slicker and tossed it on an unused desk. “What’s the story?”

Daniel scratched his jaw and felt the stubble of hair where he’d missed a swipe with the razor. He grimaced. Now he would be aware all day long that that thin line of whiskers was there and it would drive him crazy. “No story.”

Ben snorted. He unpacked the notebooks from the trash bag—probably containing lists of his interminable lists—then threw the bag next to the slicker. “Everybody in the department knows there’s a story. And the sheriff’s office. And the fire department. A man doesn’t leave first responders’ night two-thirds through a perfect game without a story.”

Daniel looked over his shoulder. There was a nighttime desk officer on, but they had so few walk-ins that he spent most of his night in the dispatcher shack chatting. All he’d done this morning was stick his head out the door when he heard Daniel come in, wave and settle back in.

“We’re both early,” Ben said. “Let’s get breakfast at Mom’s.” He left the rest unsaid—we can talk there—but it was implied.

“Yeah, sure.” Not that Daniel particularly wanted to eat breakfast or talk, but since the time difference kept him from doing what he did want, he might as well do something besides brood.

Mom’s, known as Creek Café outside the Little Bear family, was eight blocks east of the police station. They could have run it easily, could have walked it even more easily, but they took Ben’s car. Even though neither of them was on duty yet, if they did get a call, the chief would be annoyed if they got caught without transportation.

The café was located just west of the bridge that spanned the creek, the building high enough above the stream that it couldn’t really take advantage of the view. Instead, when a customer looked out, he saw the rocks that lined the creek bed twenty feet above the water’s surface. When Ben told him it was because of occasional floods, Daniel hadn’t quite gotten it. Sitting now at a table against the side windows, he glanced over the water, swirling and splashing fifteen feet higher than usual, and he got it.

Mrs. Little Bear came from the kitchen when she heard Ben was there. She hugged him, combed her fingers through his hair then turned her attention to Daniel. “You look pale,” she said, catching his chin in her fingers and studying his face. “You didn’t get enough sleep last night. You young people think you can get by on coffee and your good looks, but take my word for it—you need a good night’s sleep every single night.”

“It wasn’t for lack of trying, Mrs. Little Bear,” he said drily.

She gave him another appraising look. “I’ll fix you something special. You’ll feel better in no time.”

She left without taking their orders. The first couple of times that had happened, Daniel had been openmouthed, trying to say, Wait, you don’t know what I want. He’d learned that it didn’t matter much what he wanted, because everything Mrs. Little Bear and her kitchen staff made was excellent, and she always chose well for him.

“Am I getting chicken soup for breakfast?” he asked as a waitress filled Ben’s coffee cup. She didn’t offer him any. Her boss had probably told her not to.

“Could be. Or maybe her special grits. They have healing powers. So do her breakfast casseroles. And her sticky buns. With Mom, you never can tell.” Ben sipped his coffee, no cream, no sugar, then fixed his attention on Daniel. It was rather an unsettling experience. “The fire department won last night. It would have been different if you hadn’t run out on us.”

Daniel shrugged. The first responders’ competition was just for bragging rights. No one took it too seriously, but it did keep the three departments in touch with each other.

“So, what’s the story?”

The waitress provided a brief respite by bringing Daniel a glass of pulpy orange juice poured over ice. He didn’t have to ask to know it was freshly squeezed. Archer wouldn’t drink it any other way, and so, beyond a one-time try in middle school, Daniel never had, either.

After a long, sweet drink, he set the glass down and shrugged. “Nothing much. Old girlfriend. Wanted to talk.”

“So, your old girlfriend from Los Angeles just happened to show up in Cedar Creek, Oklahoma, and tracked you down not once, not twice, but three times, and it was nothing much?” Ben gave a sorrowful shake of his head. “You’re a cop, Daniel. People lie to you every single day. Surely you can do better than that.”

He wished he was more comfortable with lying, because he really would rather not talk about Natasha. Or think about her. Or remember. Or wonder...

Nope, he wasn’t going there. He’d spent half the night wondering. How good things had been. How bad they’d become. How they could have turned out differently. How much happier he’d been with her. How she’d shattered his hard-won contentment simply by walking through the police station door.

Whether he was in danger.

Whether she was in danger.

The man in him wanted her to go away, to leave his memories as well as his life this time. The detective in him was curious about the events she’d described, and the cop in him felt an undeniable need to do what he’d always done: protect people. Not her specifically, just people. That was why he wore a badge and carried a gun, why he’d become a cop, why he’d committed so much of himself to the job.

That was what he’d been telling himself the past ten hours.

Ben was waiting, and Daniel knew it wasn’t just the detective in him that was asking. They were friends. Not bare-your-soul-share-all-your-secrets friends—Daniel had only ever had that sort of relationship with his fathers and, he grudgingly admitted, Natasha. But still friends. And if there was any real threat from her stalker...

“Long story short,” he began, scratching that bit of hair on his jaw again, “we were engaged. She changed her mind a week before the wedding. Ended it at a pre-wedding party with all of our friends and families there.” A pause as Ben grimaced. “By proxy. She sent her sister to give me back the ring.”

“Damn.” One word, a lot of sympathy. “I’m guessing that happened about five years ago.”

Daniel nodded.

“Why is she here now? Did she change her mind?”

A snort escaped him. “Oh, she’s good at that. I’m the third of four jilted fiancés.”

This time it was Ben who snorted. “Did you know she’d dumped two other guys before you?”

Daniel grudgingly nodded. “I did, but...it’s complicated.”

“Women always are.”

The waitress appeared, delivering eggs, bacon, biscuits and gravy to Ben and the biggest omelet Daniel had ever seen. She grinned at his wide-eyed look. “Cheese, bacon, sausage, ham, chorizo—oh, and veggies and avocado for our California boy. Miz LB says that’ll give you the energy to get through the day. Eat up.”

“Or die trying,” Ben added.

“That’s a distinct possibility.” Daniel took his first bite. The omelet was hot and steamy and meaty; the seasoning perfectly balanced; the cheese melted and smooth; the tender-crisp vegetables just the way he liked them. “Man, your mom can cook.”

“Good thing, too. This restaurant supports our whole family, except Great-Aunt Weezer.”

Weezer might be the only member of the extended Little Bear family that Daniel hadn’t met. She hadn’t been particularly sociable before she won half a million dollars in the lottery, and she was even less so afterward, afraid people wanted her money.

Daniel didn’t have to worry about that. He would never make the kind of money his fathers did, but he got by. The cost of living in Cedar Creek was nothing compared to LA, and generous people like Ben’s mother gave discounts or free meals to officers. It helped a so-so salary go further.

They were finished eating and Daniel had half of his omelet in a box when the sound of a Federal siren winding up caught his attention. He and Ben both looked toward the fire station across the street, where one engine was pulling out of the station and a second, lights flashing, its own siren engaging, waited to follow.

“As wet as it’s been, you’ve got to be determined to burn something,” Ben remarked as they walked out to his car.

“Determination might be the number one character trait of criminals.”

“Or stupidity. It’s funny how often you hear the phrase ‘criminal mastermind,’ but in all my years on the job, I’ve never met one. I think Mila’s stalker came closest.”

Daniel agreed with him there. Though Sam had passed on information to various police departments, the number of murders that one had committed was still unknown. There had been three in Cedar Creek alone, plus two attempts on Mila and one on Sam.

Mila’s stalker had been deadly. Was Natasha’s?

A black plume of smoke rose to the west above downtown. Ben’s expression went grim as he turned onto First. They would have headed in that direction anyway, but to the police station, not a fire. Daniel hoped it was just a small fire and nothing that required their presence.

The smoke grew thicker, dimming the emergency lights on the engines parked half a block from the courthouse. Ben set the siren to yelp, easing past cars stopped in the street, parking sideways to block the nearest intersection.

“Looks like a car fire,” he said, shutting off the engine. “Damn, and the rain’s starting again.”

Daniel pulled his slicker closer as he got out. A sedan parked across from the courthouse was engulfed in flames, patches of its bright red paint blistering and peeling off, a Dodgers sticker on the rear bumper melting from the intense heat.

He stared at the ruins of the sticker. He knew that sticker—had seen it just last night. Firefighters wielding a powerful line blocked his view of the license tag, but he didn’t need to see it to know it was white with blue numbers and the state’s name in red script across the top.

Natasha’s stalker had set her car on fire.

Now where the hell was she?

When the first raindrop splashed on the tip of Natasha’s nose, she wasn’t surprised. She didn’t even stifle a groan. The dreariness seemed fitting. Her life was figuratively pretty dark. Why shouldn’t it be literally dark, as well?

Grumbling, the people around her started moving away, going on about their day or seeking shelter. Most of the buildings farther down the street had awnings that would keep them dry, but the closest ones were beyond the firefighters’ barrier. Here by the courthouse, there was nothing but sidewalk and grass, and her feet had rooted themselves there. She didn’t like being in the open, but at least no one could approach her stealthily. No one could sneak up and scare her. No one could observe her fear closely.

Not no one. RememberMe. He couldn’t sneak up.

But he’d already scared her.

She wore her slicker, zipped to her chin, and hugged the purse tucked underneath with both arms, her gaze locked on the flames with macabre fascination. Firefighters called to each other and to the police officers who had arrived to assist, and the engines’ sirens droned in a low hum, matched by a toneless numbing hum inside her.

He was here. Maybe in one of the groups of gawkers, maybe down the block or in one of the nearby buildings. Maybe he’d driven away after starting the fire, but he wouldn’t have gone far. He could be parked on a side street, watching his handiwork. Watching her.

She didn’t glance around. It was too damn hard to look at strangers’ faces and wonder, Is it him? Is it that man wearing the suit that looks like a lawyer? Is it the mechanic-looking guy with the grease rag hanging out from his back pocket? Could it be that firefighter in all that gear? Is one of them capable of doing this? Are all of them capable?

Was it even a man? She had assumed, and Stacia and Felicia Martin, but none of the communications made that certain.

Hey, RememberMe? How about a new name? I’m thinking ScrewYou.

Yeah, she liked the sound of that. It made her sound brave and bold, even though she was quaking inside.

She saw two figures approaching in her peripheral vision, but she couldn’t make herself look their way. Strange that, even after five years, she needed to see no more than that dark blur to know the shorter of the two was Daniel. She needed no more than to remember the way he’d left last night to know his expression was going to be as dark as the smoke, that he was going to be wound as tight as she was and more ready to explode.

He stopped directly in front of her, too close, invading her space. She wanted to step back, but her feet wouldn’t move, so she slowed her breathing and dragged her gaze slowly to his face.

Dark. Angry. Hostile. Very tightly controlled.

“Are you all right?”

The question startled her, making her blink slowly. The unexpectedness of it struck her at the same time the ridiculousness of it did. She was standing there unharmed, wasn’t she? The firefighters weren’t offering her medical care, were they? Of course she was all right. Though how the hell could she possibly be all right when her stalker had just set her damn car on fire?

She wanted to laugh and to cry, but instead clenched her jaw tightly and nodded.

“Do you know what happened?”

Before she could remind herself to maintain her control, an answer slipped out. “Well, it didn’t spontaneously combust. I’m guessing he did it.”

“Who?” That came from the second man, a few feet behind and to the side of Daniel. He’d been at the desk beyond Daniel’s yesterday afternoon when she returned to the police station, and seeing him now confirmed her first impressions: he was big, dark and gave off a calm, solid sense that nothing ever got past him.

How much did he know? Had Daniel told him anything? Everything?

Squeezing her eyes shut, Natasha wished herself someplace else. It didn’t work, of course. When she opened them again, the big man was waiting for an answer. Daniel was looking hard at the people who watched the firefighters working.

“Someone’s been harassing me,” she said stiffly.

He politely reworded it for her. “Someone’s stalking you.”

She nodded.

“And you think he followed you here from California?”

Yes, Daniel had told him something. She couldn’t tell by the man’s impassive expression how much he’d confided, how much of his hostility he’d passed on.

Wishing for a deep breath that would erase the tension contracting every muscle in her body, she nodded. “He sent me an email saying that he would find me. After all, Cedar Creek isn’t very big.”

The other detective’s expression didn’t change. “When did you get here?”

“Yesterday, around noon.”

“Who knew you were coming?”

“My sister.” She hesitated, glancing at Daniel, still intensely observing the bystanders as if she and his friend didn’t exist, then added, “Daniel’s parents.”

“Who would they tell?”

“Nobody.” Stacia was scared to death for her and viewed anyone who even casually mentioned Natasha with suspicion and wariness. Archer and Jeffrey didn’t know about the stalker, but she’d asked them not to tell anyone about her visit. They hadn’t even told Daniel, so they certainly wouldn’t have confided in anyone else.

Abruptly, Daniel turned back to her. “You should get inside.”

“The fire department evacuated the hotel. Besides, the chief said the fire marshal would want to speak to me. He told me to wait here.”

“I’ll go find Jamey and tell him she’ll be at the station.” The other detective walked away before either Natasha or Daniel could protest.

Though the flames were apparently out, the firefighters continued to spray the wreckage. As if the clouds had decided to help, the scattered raindrops multiplied into a deluge. Water running over her scalp and pouring down her neck, Natasha gave her car one last woeful look then turned toward the police station. She didn’t want to go there, but where else could she go?

Daniel walked beside her, turning several times to study the people scurrying behind them, before he spoke. “So you weren’t wrong.”

The last thing in the world she expected was a smile, but a wry one pulled at her mouth. “Some people might say I was actually right.” God help her, she wished she hadn’t been.

His only response was a grunt.

They passed the gazebo, pretty and invitingly dry underneath its roof, then approached the steps to the police station. Still hugging her purse, she was thinking of her ruined plans for the day—heading out of town—and wondering if RememberMe was Karma’s way of repaying her for her fickleness in love and dreading having to replace the car, which she’d just paid off six months ago, when a short, sharp curse from Daniel drew her out of her gloom.

She’d gone a few strides past him and turned back to see him lifting one foot from a puddle at the base of the steps. His pants leg was drenched to the calf, and water streamed from his boot.

“That’s a word Archer would say,” she commented mildly. How had he not seen the puddle? This was only her third visit here, and she’d noticed it.

“Where do you think I learned it?” Grimacing, he shook his foot to dislodge the excess wet then looked back toward the courthouse. “You don’t need to mention that to Ben. Forgetting it’s there three times in two days isn’t a very detective-ly thing to do.”

Her smile came back, this time without the wryness. “So that’s why you were barefoot yesterday.”

He shrugged before climbing the rest of the steps, holding open one of the tall doors, then following her inside. This time, instead of stopping at the counter, she walked behind him around the end, down a hall and into a conference room. Silently he extended one hand, and she slipped out of her jacket and gave it to him, then he left again.

After going to the far end of the table, she sat in the single chair there to survey her surroundings. The room was about as dull as any she’d ever seen. It looked like the place office furniture went to die: a table that had clearly seen better years, file cabinets with broken drawers, mismatched desk chairs—not wooden ones that got better with age but the cheap kind with five wheels and ugly vinyl or fabric seats—and lamps of varying sizes and styles.

Ironically, the bones of the room were beautiful. The walls needed something more imaginative than drab white paint that looked as if it had come out of the can already dirty, and the ceiling could definitely benefit from a new coat of paint as well, but the vintage black-and-white floor tile and the elaborate trims around the doors and windows were lovely, and the eighteen-inch-wide crown molding was incredible. She should take a picture to send her brother, Nick, a finish carpenter, who complained he’d been born in the wrong century to do really beautiful work.

It was nice to let her mind wander from her current problems, but voices at the door snatched her back to the seriousness of the moment. Daniel came in first, carrying a couple of fat white bath towels and a space heater. The other detective, Ben, was behind him, improvising a clipboard as a serving tray.

No one said anything. Daniel handed the towels to her then plugged the heater in nearby, turned it toward her and flipped the switch on. Ben set a cup of coffee in front of her, along with packets of sugar and tubs of cream, then took a seat on her right. He turned toward her and began writing on the clipboard’s legal pad, adding to the stuff that already filled half of the page.

Daniel sat down on her left, sipped his coffee then leaned back in his chair. He didn’t speak. Ben didn’t. Natasha felt oddly as if she shouldn’t, at least not until the coffee, the towel wrapped around her shoulders and the warm air of the heater chased away her chills.

Rain lashed the windows behind her. She turned to glance out. Second Street wasn’t nearly as busy as First, but there was an occasional vehicle passing and cars were parked across the street. Someone was waiting in one of those cars, visible only as a vague shape through the side-to-side swipe of the windshield wipers. Goose bumps appeared on Natasha’s arms. The car’s engine was running, sending little puffs of exhaust into the chilly air, and the headlights were on. Could that be him? Could he have seen her and Daniel come to the police station? Could he have known they would wind up in the conference room and which windows looked into it?

Suddenly a small blur of energy raced out of the building where the car was parked. Between the rain hat, slicker and boots, it was impossible to see anything about the child, though the pink of the clothing suggested a girl. She ran through puddles instead of over them, pulled the car door open and flung herself into the front seat.

You’re paranoid. Are you going to start cringing from old people and their canes next?

She hated paranoia.

The door opened once more to admit a woman in uniform, a smile wreathing her face and blond hair showing gray roots, and a man dressed in the same uniform as Daniel and Ben. He couldn’t be much older than them, but Natasha assumed he was their boss. His quiet, confident demeanor just said so.

He sat next to Daniel, the woman next to Ben. Natasha regretted picking the seat at the head of the table. It put her at the center of their focus and gave her an instinctive me-against-them response. She should have chosen a chair along the side, where someone would have been forced to sit next to her.

“Close those blinds, will you, Daniel?”

Natasha hadn’t thought to do it herself or to ask, but the instant the gloom deepened in the room, she felt better. Safer. “Thank you.”

“I’m Chief Douglas. This is Officer Gideon, you’ve met Detective Little Bear, and of course you know Detective Harper.”

Daniel’s jaw tightened in her peripheral vision, so she shifted her gaze the other way, to Detective Little Bear. The bear part suited him well; being fierce would be no stretch for him. But at six foot four and all broad shoulders and muscles, he’d surpassed the little part a long time ago.

“Let’s start with the car,” the chief said, “since that’s our immediate issue. We were waiting for the fire marshal to join us, but he’s tied up elsewhere. Tell us what you know, Ms. Spencer.”

She took a long drink of coffee then wrapped her fingers around the edges of the towel around her shoulders and held it tightly as she began to talk.

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