Cold Hearted (Cold Justice Book 6) (24 page)

She snorted. “You can take the boy out of England, but you can’t take England out of the boy?” She dug into the drawer again, and something hit him in the stomach.

He grunted as he took it from her. “Thanks.” He turned it on and shone it around the huge kitchen. “Doesn’t it bother you, living so far from other people?”

She headed toward a door on the opposite side of the kitchen. It creaked when she opened it. “It took a bit of getting used to after growing up in Queens, but I’m okay now. The house shrieks and groans in the winter, but
this
doesn’t normally happen.”

“You think it’s a coincidence that there just happens to be a killer on the loose?” Darsh asked softly.

“Chief says we have the killer in custody.” She headed into the black pit of her basement.

“Which you don’t believe.” He followed her down the steep steps, not ashamed to have his SIG Sauer in hand.

She walked over to a fuse box, and he shone the flashlight into every crevice, behind every packing box.

“Got it.” The light in the kitchen came on and flooded down the wooden steps. “The kitchen lights and the clothes drier are on the same electrical circuit. I left the drier running this morning after I washed the sheets and headed out. Must have tripped.”

He nodded. “Maybe we should clear the house anyway?”

“Afraid of the boogey man?”

“They exist,” Darsh told her sincerely.

“You don’t really think someone would target me, do you?”

“Why risk it?”

“There were no tracks in the snow.”

“It only started falling this afternoon. Someone could have broken in earlier in the day and waited for you to come home.” Snow was both a blessing and a curse. It might tell someone about recent visitors to their door, but it wouldn’t tell them whether or not someone was hiding in a cupboard—or sitting a kilometer away in a tree with their crosshairs lined up on your center mass. People got complacent, and then they died.

“Fine. Okay.” She pulled her weapon. “Now that you’ve freaked me out, I won’t be able to sleep until we check anyway.”

They worked their way through a massive dining room, which had a fancy light fixture and not a lot else. Paint splotches were on the wall, but she obviously hadn’t decided on what color to go with yet. A treadmill sat in one corner and a music system next to it on the floor.

His footsteps echoed across the bare wooden boards. “I like what you’ve done with the place,” he noted dryly. “You just move in?”

There was a defensive pause. “Three years ago.”

Silence was his best option here. The living room had a couch in it but also a dozen panels of sheetrock stacked against the wall. She had told him it had been a lot of work. She hadn’t been lying.

They headed upstairs, and he kept his eyes high rather than getting distracted by Erin’s shapely backside. At the top of the house, the attic was bare, aside from insulation. From there they moved down to the second floor and went from room to room, weapons drawn, reaching out with heightened awareness, checking for signs someone else was in the house. Training kept him calm and alert, even though there was probably no one here except the two of them. He’d learned in Scout Sniper training never to ignore his instincts, especially those relating to survival.

They ended their search in the master bedroom. He looked under the bed while she cleared the walk-in closet. No one here. Just the two of them. Standing in the bedroom with the light shining in from the hallway. He holstered his weapon and looked around. The room was finished and the walls painted. A big bed dominated the room, massive wooden headboard and crisp, white sheets.
Don’t think about the bed
.

“Looks good up here.”

“Thanks.” She placed her Glock on the bedside table and then sat on the bed and pulled off her boots, dropping them on the floor with a tired thump.

She
looked really good, on that bed he wasn’t looking at.

“Like I said, I had great hopes of being the next Mike Holmes. It turns out I’m better at demolition than construction.”

He ran his eyes over the high ceiling, knowing he should leave. Not wanting to. “Why’d you buy something so big?”

This time she actually laughed, and it gave him a warm feeling inside. “I grew up in a three-bedroom house in Queens. I have four brothers and one sister and literally thought I’d suffocate from the lack of privacy and personal space when I was a teen.” She grimaced and looked around. “Turns out you can have too much of a good thing.”

“You could sublet. Get a roomie.”

The moonlight streamed through the open drapes and made her look like an ice princess. “As the most unpopular person in Forbes Pines last year I think finding a roomie is pretty unlikely. Plus, I like my privacy.”

She stood up and walked toward him. “Let me show you where you can sleep.”

He didn’t say anything. He wanted to stay here. With her. He hadn’t realized quite how much he wanted it until he saw her sitting on that bed. His thoughts must have been written plainly on his face because she swallowed tightly and veered away from him. She walked to the window that overlooked her yard.

“It’s not a good idea.” She hugged her arms around herself. “Last time didn’t end well.”

“So let’s give it a better ending.” His voice sounded rough even to his own ears.

She laughed, a small bitter sound that dug into his gut. “You just want to get laid.”

“No.”

She looked at him doubtfully.

“No. I’m more than capable of getting off any time of the day or night if I want to.” He held those big eyes of hers that looked so unsure and so uncertain. “You
know
I’m attracted to you. I’ve been attracted to you from the moment we first met. Nothing’s changed.”

Lines appeared between her brows. Suddenly she seemed delicate and almost ethereal in the moonlight. “I don’t want to get involved, Darsh. I’ve got enough going on in my life.” Her voice was small. Almost a whisper.

She didn’t sound like the Erin Donovan he’d come to know. She sounded beaten, like she’d given up on relationships—even purely physical ones. “Because of your ex?”

Her lips pinched. “Maybe,” she admitted.

It pissed him off that she was letting the bastard ruin her life from beyond the grave.

“Chances are I’m going home tomorrow, so I’m about as uninvolved as it gets.” Okay, he’d asked to stay longer, but she didn’t need to know that. Regardless of whether or not the DA thought this vagrant was guilty, there was an expiry date on his time here.

And even if the cases were related, even if Hawke had been set up, he didn’t believe Erin had been at fault during the last investigation, and he was willing to go on record saying so. She’d done everything by the book and was a damn good cop. The fact she’d been heading to the shelter when he’d caught her leaving earlier proved she didn’t take things at face value. But he didn’t think this was about her job. “When was the last time you had a relationship with someone?”

She rubbed her arm, and he watched a ripple move down her throat as she swallowed. “I wouldn’t exactly call it a relationship.”

“Another hook up?” Jealousy shot through him, which was garbage as he’d had hook ups and short-term relationships with other women since Erin. Three years was a long time, and he’d never expected to see her again.

Her gaze rose to meet his. “Not
another
hook up.”

He frowned, not getting it at first. Then his mouth went dry. “You haven’t had sex since we were together?” And he’d accused her of being the one with shaky morals?

She bit her lip and turned away.

“Why the hell haven’t you dated anyone?”

Her shoulders bumped. “It’s not illegal to be celibate.”

“It should be, for someone who looks like you.” He tried to keep it light. There was a deep well of hurt beneath Erin Donovan’s beautiful exterior, hurt he’d added to by being a judgmental asshole.

She turned and rolled her eyes. “That’s the stupidest thing you’ve said to me, and trust me, you’ve said some zingers.”

He shrugged out of his heavy jacket and draped it over a nearby chair, then went to her. Outside was a winter wonderland. Inside was warm and snug and private. He reached out to gently touch her upper arm. “Why haven’t you been with anyone? Look at me.” He wasn’t about to drop this. She was too young and too much of a fighter to run away from such an important aspect of life. “What did your ex do to you?”

She flinched.

“Tell me, because I know what you and I did together didn’t leave you with any scars.” He lowered his voice and hooked her hair behind her ear. “I still dream about our time together.”

She stared at him, searching for the truth in his statement. He let her see it on his face, in his eyes.

She drew back and pulled in a shuddering breath. He thought she was going to tell him to mind his own business like she usually did. Instead she wrapped her arms tighter around herself and leaned against the wall.

“Graham was the macho type—you know, loved beer, guns. One of the guys, but always with an eye for the ladies. A bit like you.”

He raised his brows. It might be true on the surface, but there was more to him that that.

“He was a good guy, or at least he seemed to be at the start. It was a whirlwind romance. Intense. He was completely devoted to me, and I felt like the luckiest woman alive. Things changed after we got married. At first it was my job. ‘Why didn’t I quit and have a baby?’” Pain crinkled her eyes at the corners. “I wanted kids one day, but I was committed to my career at that point. I wanted to make detective before I even thought about having a baby.”

Darsh let her talk. Finally talk. The dam had broken and everything was rushing out.

“Then he started getting pissy about my buddies who were mostly guys from the job. I ignored the warning signs, even when he started telling me he didn’t like me spending so much time with my family, and then he started tracking my every move. But the first time he hit me was devastating.”

Darsh wanted to haul her close. He had to force himself to hold back, to not scare or smother her.

“The first time?” Rage moved through him, but he shoved it aside. It wasn’t about him. “Why didn’t you leave him? Report him?”

He put his arms around her, and she leaned against his chest, her cheek pressed next to his heart. “He’d have lost his job and I…I was ashamed.” She gave a laugh that sounded like a sob. “How many domestics had I attended? Hundreds, if not thousands. The stupid woman always fails to press charges, and the cops end up back there week after week until one of them kills the other, or one of them gets arrested for something else.”

Her breath was warm through his shirt, stroking his skin. “After Graham hit me, he broke down crying. I mean he was a tough macho guy. I’d never seen him cry before. He was devastated to have lashed out. He came from a poor working class family where his dad solved all his problems with a fist. I’d known that going into the relationship, I just hadn’t realized Graham dealt with things the same way.” She pulled back, wiped tears from her eyes but wouldn’t look at him. “I told him that if it ever happened again I’d leave him, but I should have done it then, that first time. I knew it, but the damn Catholic guilt got to me.”

Darsh held his silence and just let her talk. Let her get all the ugliness out.

“So one beautiful September day he comes home after a shitty day at work, and he starts picking a fight. I knew it was going to be bad, but something inside me needed it to play out. He finds my cell and goes through my texts like some overprotective father. One of my buddies had sent me a heart smiley just as part of the conversation, harmless. It didn’t mean anything, but Graham lost it.” She shook her head, and he couldn’t resist sliding his fingers into the silken tresses of her hair, trying to soothe her agitation.

“He hit me again. Tried to force himself on me,”—
good thing the fucker was dead
—“but I didn’t hold back this time. I fought back with everything I had. He broke two of my ribs, but I’d upped my training with a martial arts instructor I’d been going to. I gave him as good as I got, and he wasn’t expecting that. I kicked his ass and when he was down, I ran out of that house faster than you can say ‘divorce proceedings.’ I got patched up by a doctor I knew from high school and went home to my parents.”

His fingers clenched against her waist, pulling her closer.

“He came around the next day with flowers and some made up story about our ‘little’ argument. But I’d told my parents the truth about what happened by then—he hadn’t expected me to do that. He’d expected me to be too ashamed to admit it, as if
I’d
done something wrong. My dad and my brothers were all there waiting for him in our little front room. Five badass cops with a personal grudge.” Humor touched the side of her mouth. “Let’s just say he was lucky to make it out of there alive, and he knew it. After that I started getting incessant messages about how he was sorry—like when I was in Quantico that night.” She’d gotten a dozen texts at four in the morning, which was how the subject of a husband had come up. “Then, when I was obviously not falling for it, the messages started saying if I didn’t come home to him he was going to kill himself.” There were tears is her voice. “And then he did.”

He hugged her close again. She felt good there tucked in beneath his chin. Like she belonged.

“So what was I?” he asked after a few moments of silence. “Some sort of declaration of independence?”

She laughed, but the way she clung to his shirt and refused to look up made something in his chest tighten. “That’s exactly what you were. I went to that bar determined to reclaim ownership of my life and my body. When you walked in…” She finally looked up and met his gaze. “Well, you know what happened next.”

She licked her lips, and his eyes tracked the movement. Three years ago he’d been blindsided by the beautiful blonde smiling at him in that bar. Now he knew the kind of person she was, hardworking, smart, dedicated. She blew his mind.

“This is why you connect so well with the victims, you know,” he said.

The shadows in her eyes flickered. “I don’t like being thought of as a victim.”