The Heat Is On (Boston Five Book 1) (22 page)

Even though Shane was a detective with the homicide squad, he’d insisted on being here for the interrogation of the attacker. He was still in the house, and everyone outside could hear his angry voice yelling at Mr. Miller. Kyle was inside, too, grudgingly examining the offender.

“I wish I could have seen you kick that jerk in the balls,” Kayleigh said. “Was there a cracking sound? Did he scream really loud?”

“Kayleigh, please stop with the gross details already,” her little brother demanded. He’d flinched at the mention of cracking balls.

Hayden pushed Kayleigh’s hand away. “I’m okay.”

“We have to record everything,” Ryan explained, using the authoritarian voice of a policeman who took his job very seriously. “You need evidence when you file charges, and—”

“What evidence?” Hayden shook off the hand that tried to feel her pulse. “I don’t have any injuries. He just shook me really hard. Before he could hit me, I fought back.”

“Yes.” Kayleigh barked out a dirty laugh. “With Windex. But what else is a girl to do if she doesn’t have a can of mace handy?”

Ryan cocked his head to one side, curious. “Is it really possible to be blinded by Windex?”

Hayden quickly looked to Kayleigh. She didn’t care if Mr. Miller was in really bad pain, or if he went to jail, but she didn’t want to be responsible for the loss of his eyesight.

“Unfortunately, no,” Kayleigh grumbled. She’d finally stopped prodding Hayden. “He would have deserved it, though.”

“Kayleigh!”

“Well, it’s true,” she snapped indignantly. “The bastard practically breaks into your house and then threatens you with violence. Ryan should have shot him!”

Her little brother rolled his eyes. “When I got inside, the guy was lying in a puddle of dirty cleaning water, clutching his balls and whimpering for mercy, with his eyes all red and swollen. At first I thought he’d wet his pants! I simply can’t shoot someone in that condition.”

“You could have fired a warning shot,” his sister protested. “In the foot, for example.”

Ryan crossed his arms. “And what reasoning would I have given afterwards? That he threatened me with his stinky feet?”

Kayleigh wrinkled her nose. “Surely you could have thought of
something
. Just think of the corrupt cops on TV.”

“Look to TV for inspiration? Great idea,” he teased. “And when I need an operation, I should look to an actor to perform it, right, Dr. Frankenstein?”

“Guys.” Hayden sighed and ran a hand over her tired face. “Please stop bickering. I can’t handle it. My house is a pigsty, the not-quite-blinded father of my worst student probably peed on my rug, and—”

“Your beautiful rug,” Kayleigh interrupted with a sigh. “I would burn it.”

At that moment, Kyle and Owen brought Mr. Miller out on a stretcher. Both his hands were tied to the frame with handcuffs, but that wasn’t much of a comfort to Hayden. She was still trembling with fright, and she would certainly sleep at Kayleigh’s place tonight. Seeing the intruder up close in his helpless and pitiful state, she idly wondered what exactly she was afraid of, but she simply couldn’t be on her own tonight.

As soon as the man spotted her through the narrow slits of his swollen eyes, he groaned and pleaded with the paramedics. “Help me! That woman wants to kill me!”

Hayden’s face flashed red with indignation, and she put her hands on her hips. “
You
invaded
my
house!”

Mr. Miller hunched sideways on the stretcher and whimpered. There was a big lump on his forehead, probably from her whack with the spray bottle. She flinched at the thought of what he’d look like now if the bottle had been glass. It was hard to believe how much damage a simple plastic bottle could do. The worst, however, was his face.

She was torn between sheer horror and the urge to laugh. His eyes reminded her of the red butts of the baboons she had recently seen with her class at the zoo. Swollen red skin rimmed two tiny slits, where a few blond lashes stuck out. He looked worse than little Billy with the peanut allergy after he’d eaten a granola bar earlier in the year and his face had swollen like a balloon.

“She came at me like a banshee and tried to kill me!”

Hayden gasped, and her mouth fell open in horror at that claim.

When Mr. Miller looked around, his eyes lit on Shane. “Officer, please …”

“Don’t ask me for help, man,” Shane dismissed him. “She’s my sister-in-law. And it’s ‘Detective,’ actually.”

“Don’t look at me, either,” Ryan added, his hands on his hips. He took a step toward the stretcher. “She’s my sister-in-law, too.”

Mr. Miller paled beneath the bruises and rashes on his face. He turned to Kyle and Owen, croaking, “Could you take me to the hospital, please?”

Kyle nodded cheerfully. “I’ll ask the guys in the ER to do a few urologic tests, so we can eliminate the possibility of a penis fracture. And I’m going to start an IV right in the ambulance, which might hurt and take a really long time, because it’s difficult to find the vein with all the rattling and shaking that goes on while we’re driving.”

“But—”

“Oh”—Kyle patted the man’s shoulder patronizingly—“just to let you know: she’s my sister-in-law, too.”

Mr. Miller screamed bloody murder as Kyle feigned innocence, nonchalantly pushing the stretcher into the ambulance.

“Miss O’Malley? I still need your detailed testimony,” the policeman said. The only policeman who was officially assigned to come here, that is. “By the way, you’re a dangerous woman. I’m sure that by tonight, everyone in the department will know about the Windex attack.”

She didn’t answer that, but instead asked tiredly, “Do I have to do this right now?”

“I’ll take care of this, Officer,” Shane cut in, authority lacing his voice.

The older colleague immediately nodded and backed down. Hayden thanked the patrolman, who got in his car, where another policeman was waiting, and drove off. Ryan patted her back once again before he, too, left with his partner.

But Kayleigh and Shane were still there, studying her with unmistakable concern.

“I’m fine, really.” She gave Shane a friendly nudge. “Can we get that testimony thing over with? I still have to call the realtor and cancel the showing.”

“What showing?” Shane asked.

She ignored his hostile tone, shrugged, and pushed past him and Kayleigh to get back into the house, where the chaotic effect of her fight with Mr. Miller was waiting for her.

“Hayden, what showing?”

“A showing of the house, what else?” She sighed and bent down to pick up the overturned bucket. “There are buyers interested in the house.”

“God, Hayden …” Kayleigh heaved a disappointed sigh. “Are you serious?”

“Yes, I’m serious.” She turned to face them, annoyed with their reactions. “I’ve been talking about this for weeks. Heath doesn’t want the house, and I don’t want it either. So I’m going to sell it, and we’ll split the money. Game over.”

“Heath was suspended,” Shane announced abruptly.

Hayden’s stomach did a flip-flop, and worry began to seep through her veins.

“But I think he’ll be back on track again soon,” Shane quickly added. “Please talk to him.”

“Shane, please leave me alone,” Hayden said. She hadn’t heard about Heath’s suspension yet, but she refused to let the budding worry get to her. What he did or didn’t do was none of her business anymore.

But of course, Kayleigh chimed in, too. “Hayden, selling the house is a huge step. Have you really thought this throudgh?”

“Your brother and I are finished,” Hayden said purposefully. “That was his decision, and now we all have to live with the consequences.”

She didn’t miss the glance the siblings exchanged, but she didn’t acknowledge it, either. Instead, she focused her thoughts on the steps necessary to get her house back in order.

Just when she felt she’d calmed down sufficiently to tackle the mess, she heard something.

“
Hayden
!”

It sounded like … Dumbfounded, she turned around and watched Heath bolt across the lawn and up the front steps. He stopped in the doorframe and stared at her, panting and wide-eyed with fright.

“I only just heard the news! Are you alright?”

His sudden appearance and worried eyes were the very last straw. She was about to explode. Her whole body was tense as she stepped toward the door and shut it right in his face.

Then she drew in a huge breath and screamed at the closed door, “
BACK OFF! GET OUT OF MY LIFE!
”

Kayleigh and Shane both gasped in shock while Heath’s muffled voice spoke through the door. “Hayden! Please … I’m worried.”

She turned her head to his siblings, her face a contorted mask of rage. “Did either of you call him?”

Both hurried to shake their heads.

“No!”

“Of course not!”

“I was at the station,” Heath called from behind the door. “Sam told me Kyle and Owen were called here. What happened?”

“Nothing! And now stay away from me and my life!”

“Please … can we talk?”

She didn’t care that his voice sounded pitiful, or that his siblings were listening. All she cared about was yelling. “If you’re looking for someone to screw, you’ve got the wrong address! Back off and never speak to me again!”

Kayleigh, normally the toughest of the lot, looked as if she might burst into tears at any moment. “Please, Hayden,” she pleaded. “Just talk to him.”

“You talk to him,” Hayden spat angrily, hating herself for trembling again. “The only thing he’ll get from me is a check. For half the amount we make selling the house and the car, and that’s it.”

“I don’t want the money,” Heath called from outside. “I want you!”

For a moment she was scared that her legs might buckle under her. She took a deep breath and proclaimed as strongly as she could, “But I don’t want
you
anymore.”

Chapter 14

When he entered the house, he found his sister in the kitchen. “Mom’s in the garden waiting for you,” she told him bleakly. She looked about as cheerful as he felt: absolutely disconsolate.

It had been four days since Hayden had shut the door in his face and banned him from her life for good. Maybe it was really for the best, he told himself once again. He was still trying to convince himself that Hayden would lead a happier and less fearful life without him in it. He’d hurt her to her core, which was ironic considering that’s what he’d been attempting to avoid all along, and now he had to pay the price for that. It was okay, though. Because he deserved it.

“How was your appointment?” Kayleigh asked.

Feeling sheepish, he ran a hand through his hair. “It was okay.”

“Well?” Kayleigh looked at him impatiently. “Did you get the necessary documentation?”

Heath nodded, smiling weakly and pulling an envelope from his back pocket. “Here it is.”

“Does that mean you can go back to work now?”

“Yes.” He cleared his throat, not feeling all that thrilled, even though the psychologist had just attested that he was fit to do his duty, without reservations. “I’ve already spoken to Chief. He said I can come in immediately, or whenever I’m ready.” Even though the psychologist had cleared him for duty, he’d also suggested Heath come talk to him a few more times in the coming weeks. Heath was actually thinking of taking the man up on the offer, now that his whole life had come apart.

His sister was silent for a moment. “You don’t sound as if you want to go back to work,” she observed quietly.

“To be honest,” he sighed, “at the moment, there’s nothing I really want.”

“Heath.”

His shoulders were drooping as he opened the fridge and grabbed a can of Sprite. As soon as he closed the fridge door again, he felt his sister wrap her arms around him and hug him tightly from behind. He had to admit that that was damn comforting, but he didn’t feel like he deserved her comfort. His life was a mess, all because he’d scared off the only woman he’d ever loved. He probably should have been glad that Hayden was carrying on without him. At least she no longer ran the high risk of having to bury her own husband, as her own mom and his mom had done. Still, he didn’t want to lose her. He was that selfish.

He knew it was far too late, though, and that she felt nothing but disdain for him now. He had acted like an insensitive asshole for three months, and now she believed that’s what he had become.

“Thank you.” Heath inhaled deeply and patted his sister’s hand. “I’ll go outside and see what Mom is up to.”

His mother was sitting in the sunshine with her eyes closed, a book face down in her lap. He was glad to see her smiling and obviously enjoying the day. He pressed a light kiss onto her forehead and sat down in the chair next to her, before taking a sip from his can.

“Hi, Mom.”

“Hello,” she murmured and opened her eyes slowly, blinking at the brightness. “Honey, how was the appointment?”

“It was okay.” He sighed heavily.