chapter 14
After giving her statements to the police about the shooting and despite Neil’s protests, Linda went back to the office to pick up her files before she headed home. Aching and sore and still troubled by everything that had happened with Tony, however, she decided at the last minute to leave the files on her desk. She didn’t want to read any more files. What she wanted was to figure out what was going on with Tony. How he could be so aloof and cruel one minute, and then risk his life to save her in the next.
Linda was still contemplating the question when Cynthia McCall, the receptionist, called her.
“Hey, Linda. You just got a fax.”
“I’m heading home in a bit. I’ll grab it on my way out.”
“Okay...but the fax, it’s pretty weird. I think you’ll want to take a look at it right away.”
What now, Linda thought. She gathered her things and quickly walked to the lobby and receptionist’s area that housed the office fax machine. When she got there, she frowned. Brian Heald was inside Cynthia’s office, leaning against the doorway and grinning. Cynthia was laughing, obviously pleased by the man’s attention. When she saw Linda, however, Cynthia immediately straightened and slid a white piece of paper underneath the receptionist’s tellerlike window.
“Thanks,” Linda murmured, simultaneously turning away and wincing when she heard Heald murmur something and Cynthia giggle. Heald had to have heard what happened to her, but God forbid he express any concern. Why women kept encouraging the man was beyond her, but she supposed there was someone for everyone.
Linda flipped the cover page of the fax up and frowned.
Tony Cooper is a good man. You know this. Trust your instincts about him, Linda.
Linda looked at the top of the page, searching for information about who had sent the fax and when. She kept her face calm for Cynthia, who was watching her closely. “Thanks, Cynthia. I’ll check into this.”
She turned around and walked back to her office, her steps keeping time with the pounding beat of her heart. She made several phone calls but still wasn’t able to track down who had sent the fax. The outgoing fax number belonged to a copy store in Vacaville and the man on the phone had no idea who had sent it.
Linda struggled once more with indecision.
The fax alluded to her prior relationship with Tony. Obviously she didn’t want that getting out. But the fax verged on being Brady material. Nothing about it expressly said Tony was innocent, but she should still tell Neil and Lock about it. Shouldn’t she?
If she kept the fax a secret and someone made a stink about it, valid or not, losing her bid as a judge might just be the first step. She could lose her job. Her reputation. Everything she’d worked so hard to protect.
Plus...she didn’t just have herself to think about. She needed to think about Tony.
Someone obviously thought he was innocent of what he was being charged with. Coupled with the way he’d saved her earlier, she was more than willing to believe it.
No, she reasoned. She couldn’t just think of herself.
She’d show Neil the fax in the morning. But what was she going to do in the meantime?
Undecided, she went home. Paced and worried. After an hour of that, she opened her closet door. She grabbed a banker’s box from the top shelf and placed it on the bed. Sitting cross-legged, she pulled out a smaller shoebox, and then a silver-framed picture.
It was of her, Tony, Mattie and Jordan. Tony’s hair was as curly as Mattie’s and flirted with the collar of his shirt. His eyes reflected a serious quality, but the sheer joy of his smile gave him an undeniably youthful appearance.
This was how she remembered him most of the time. Not as the man who’d sat at her kitchen table looking longingly at those pills. Yet at the same time, it was the second image that had the most power over her. That caused her to feel honor bound not to give in to her feelings for him.
But oh, how she longed to. Her chest ached at seeing not only how happy he’d been, but how happy she’d looked. He’d wrapped one of his arms around her from behind, resting his chin on the top of her head. She looked up at him, laughing, her eyes shining with happiness. Linda traced her smile with her finger, then her gaze shifted to Mattie and Jordan.
How she missed them and wished Mattie was here to talk to.
But she wasn’t. Linda didn’t have anyone but herself. She’d have to figure this out alone.
Linda gently placed the picture back in the box and closed the lid.
Well, maybe not completely alone, she thought.
There was still someone she could talk to. Someone who still had answers, and she couldn’t give up until she got them from him. Determined, she changed her clothes, gathered her things and left her house. Instead of taking her car again, she’d walk the two miles to her office. It would give her a chance to clear her head, then she’d get Tony’s file and the bail form that should list his address.
She’d walked about four blocks before she froze dead in her tracks.
And stared straight at Tony.
* * *
Tony cursed when he saw Linda walking toward him. Instead of one of the suits she’d worn over the past week, she now wore casual clothes. Jeans and a light sweater. Sneakers. The outfit made her seem approachable in a way her professional clothes hadn’t. And after having been in jail the past few days, and without her for three-and-a-half years, the picture of her walking toward him in the quiet residential neighborhood seemed surreal.
He literally shook his head to clear it.
Where the hell was she going? And why was she going anywhere, alone and unprotected, after she’d just been shot at?
He supposed she didn’t think of it that way, though. He’d told her he’d been the one getting shot at. But yet she was still walking toward him.
She stopped a mere five feet away. Close enough for her scent to cling to the slight evening breeze and wrap around him.
He felt his knees weaken and, just as he had when she’d come to visit him in the jail infirmary, he automatically reached for her. This time, however, before his skin could touch hers, he curled his fists and pulled back.
You can’t have her, Tony. Not if you want to keep her safe. Wasn’t having her shot at today enough to make you remember that, damn it? Knowing he had to keep her at a distance, he forced himself to imagine her with her coworker, Neil. He tortured himself with the image of them together, not just making love, though God knew that was almost too much for him, but growing old together. Of them living years and years together, with not just a cat, but a whole slew of animals and photos of their children and grandchildren. Of them getting to have the life that he’d so badly wanted with Linda. The images flooded through his mind until he almost thought he hated her; only then did he speak. “Well, well. Where are you off to this evening, Linda? Heading out to meet your D.A.?” He made a great show of looking around him, as if Neil would suddenly materialize out of thin air.
Smiling tightly, Linda placed her hands on her hips. “Which one? There’s more than one interested in me.”
Damn her, he thought, for fueling his jealousy. “I’m not surprised,” he forced himself to say. “So besides Neil, who’s the lucky guy in the running?”
She stared at him then shook her head. “No one, believe me. So, Tony... You come here often?”
The woman had no sense of self-preservation. Just a steely determined expression on her face that told him quite clearly she intended to pin him down for answers to all her questions.
He turned swiftly, striding away and hoping she’d let him go without a fight.
But, of course, she didn’t.
He heard her scampering after him right before she grabbed his arm. “Wait just one second. What are you doing here, Tony? Were you coming to see me?”
Of course she’d jump to that conclusion. It was the only reasonable explanation for being here. But reason and logic had nothing to do with his life anymore. He was pretending to be a hard-core murderer, for God’s sake.
He jerked his arm away from her. “Get over yourself, Linda. I was here to see someone else and just had the misfortune of running into you.” He looked around. Still didn’t see anyone. But that could change at any moment.
She narrowed her eyes at him. “You must really think I’m a fool. When are you going to stop with your ridiculous lies? You saved my life this afternoon, Tony, and I—”
“Then don’t have it be for nothing,” he clipped out, no longer able to control himself. “Turn around and haul your butt back home, Linda. And stay there. For God’s sake, you’re a sitting duck out here.”
“So are you.”
“Yeah, but if I got shot and killed the world would be a better place. If you did—”
Her eyes widened at his inadvertent compliment and he mentally cursed. Shit. He was losing it. Messing things up big time.
“Jesus,” he murmured, then gently took her arm and started walking back to her house. “Go home, Linda.”
She stopped and wrenched her arm away. “No,” she said.
“Damn it!”
“Not unless you come back with me,” she challenged.
His eyes widened. “What?”
“I told you when you were still in jail, Tony. I want answers. I need them. Come back to my house. Talk to me. Convince me that you’re the baddie you’re trying to pretend to be. Only then am I going to let this matter drop.”
“This matter, meaning what?”
“This matter, meaning the little charade I think you’re playing. I want answers about why you’re playing it.”
Tony stared at her in frustration, then swept the street again. He’d wanted to make sure her neighborhood was clear of any obvious threats. And he’d wanted to call Yee and make sure Linda got some protection. The last thing he’d wanted—no, the last thing he could allow himself to want—was more alone time with her.
Especially out in the open. Exposed.
If anyone drove by and saw them together...
She’d left him no choice. “Fine,” he said. “Let’s go back to your house. Ask your questions. I’ll give my answers. And believe me, Linda, after that, you’ll finally accept I’m exactly who I say I am. Don’t blame me if you get all the answers you never wanted to hear.”