Power (32 page)

Her shoes hadn’t been found. Damn it. She had liked those ivory-colored pumps. Now she’d have to find something else to wear with this suit. Damn it.

Right now, though, she just didn’t care. She relaxed in Dan’s arms and savored the smell of his skin. God, she loved the way he smelled.

When they reached her door, she dug around in her bag until she found her key.

In the room he settled her on the bed.

“I’ll start you a bath.”

“Thanks.” Too bad she didn’t have any wine. Wine would be good right now.

The water started to run in the bathroom and the sound soothed her. She leaned into the comforter and closed her eyes for just a second. A smile tugged at her lips as she thought of how happy Mr. and Mrs. Simmons had been to see their grandson.

Dan had promised them he would see to it that no charges were filed against DeShawn as long as he agreed to counseling.

Jess was glad. DeShawn had made a mistake. He’d fallen in love with the wrong girl.

Nina’s injury hadn’t been life threatening. Jess imagined that before she got out of prison she might wish it had been.

God, she was so tired.

She’d wrapped up two cases in one week.

It wasn’t her usual closure rate but it was a good start.

Next week would be better.

Sunday, August 1, 7:00 p.m.

Jess should never have allowed Dan to talk her into this.

Dan.
She glanced at the man driving. When they were off duty and she wasn’t mad at him, using his first name was automatic. Instinct.

Funny how those little habits just sort of crept up on a person.

He’d been so sweet yesterday morning. She’d fallen asleep five minutes after they got to her place. He’d covered her up and settled in the chair in her room and gotten some shut-eye himself. He’d stayed with her all morning. Brought breakfast from the Waffle House down the street and run a fresh bath for her before leaving.

He’d left without even a kiss.

On some level she had appreciated his sensitivity but then… she’d wondered. Were he and Annette growing closer? Finally Jess had let it go and just decided to enjoy the weekend.

“Did you and Wells see anything you liked today?”

“She can’t make up her mind if she wants a condo or a house.” Jess pulled down the sun visor and checked her reflection in the lighted mirror for the third time. They were almost
there
.

Maybe she should have bought something new to wear. But this old sleeveless A-line had two things going for it. The pale turquoise color was her favorite, and the cummerbund-like pleated waistline that flowed down into a form-hugging skirt hit just the right spot three inches above her knees. She’d had the thing at least ten years.

She flipped up the visor. Why in the world had she agreed to have dinner with his parents?

Didn’t matter. It was too late for second thoughts now.

“What about you?” he prodded. “Nothing you toured struck your fancy?”

Ten houses and six condos. She and Lori had spent the entire day with a Realtor who understood Jess could not live on the same street with her sister. That was simply impossible.

She also could not live anywhere near Dan’s neighborhood. Or his parents’. Or Annette Denton’s.

The price had to be as low as possible and well… that was it, she supposed. She had no other requirements.

“They were all in my price range. My preferred neighborhoods. But nothing that made me want to make an offer that probably wouldn’t be accepted.” Most sellers hated when contingencies were added to an offer. But, in her case, there was no choice. Her ability to purchase hinged on selling the house in Stafford.

“You’ll know it when you see it.” He slowed for the turn into his parents’ drive.

Jess cringed. How would she get through the next two hours without doing or saying something she would regret? Really, it didn’t matter what she said or did. Katherine would make something of it.

“Tell me again why we’re doing this.” Her pulse rate had escalated considerably since he put the Mercedes in park.

“Because”—he turned to Jess and smiled patiently as the interior light faded—“the Chandlers are dear friends of my mother and she wants to show her gratitude to you for not giving up on finding the truth.”

Jess exhaled a big breath, wishing the tension could be so easily expelled. “She could have gone the Hallmark route. I love those cute little cards.” God, she did not want to do this. Dan got out and walked around to her side of the vehicle. She considered making a run for it when he opened the door.

“The deputy chief,” Dan said as he waited for her to unfasten her seat belt and climb out of the car, “who allegedly told Salvadore Lopez that she didn’t care whether she took him dead or alive is afraid of my little old mother? Come on now.”

Jess unfastened the seat belt and did what she had to do. When she was on the ground and the door was closed, blocking her escape back into the vehicle, she eyed Daniel Burnett with blatant speculation. “Remind me to remind Harper that he isn’t allowed to talk out of school. And your mother is far scarier than any gangbanger I have ever encountered.”

Dan laughed good-naturedly. “How is that possible, Jess?”

She harrumphed as he guided her with his hand at the small of her back toward the front door. “That’s easy. With a gangbanger you know where you stand. He wants to kill you before you can kill him. With your mother”—she shot him a sideways glance—“you never know.”

Dan senior greeted them at the door. Katherine waited in the formal living room with a bottle of wine already uncorked. Surprisingly, the house smelled of fried chicken. Had to be something else. Katherine Burnett would never in a million years fry a chicken in her high-end gourmet kitchen.

Stemmed glasses filled with a crisp chardonnay Dan senior had selected just for the occasion were passed around.

Jess resisted the impulse to drink hers down and demand a refill.

Katherine lifted hers. “Thank you, Jess, for helping my friends find the truth in the midst of this horrible tragedy.”

Both Daniels echoed a hear, hear.

A broad smile flashed across Katherine’s wrinkle-free face.
Figure that one out
.

“To you, Jess,” she offered, “for having the relentless instincts of a coonhound.”

Oh, yes, she was going to need a lot more wine.

When glasses had clinked and all had sipped their wine, Katherine grabbed Jess by the arm. “Let’s eat, dear. I’ve prepared a meal that will remind you of the good old days when you and Lily were just kids.”

Jess snagged the bottle of wine with her free hand before allowing the woman to usher her toward the kitchen. “You don’t say?”

“Fried chicken,” Katherine touted. “Buttery mashed potatoes, green beans, and turnip greens. Dan senior even made corn bread.”

Jess propped a smile in place. “That’s just… incredible.”

Whatever the menu said about Katherine’s opinion of Jess’s lower-middle-class roots, the food was quite tasty. Jess actually hadn’t had fried chicken like that since she was a kid. She would, however, go to her grave believing that Katherine had hired someone to prepare the chicken and deliver it to her kitchen.

In the end it hadn’t really mattered. Three, four, maybe five glasses of wine later and Jess was in a calm and happy place, filled with fried chicken and mashed potatoes.

• • •

10:08 p.m.

Jess liked watching the stars go by as Dan drove through the darkness. No matter how long she’d been away, she never forgot the way it felt to rush through the night with him. In high school he’d had a convertible Thunderbird. Between the promise of the night and the sultry summer breeze it had felt like they could do anything.

How in the world had the two of them ended up together during their high school years? He had been Mr. Popular. Captain of the football team. President of his class at the city’s ritziest private school. She had been no one with a capital N-O at public school on the low-rent side of town.

They’d literally bumped into each other at Birmingham’s Central Library. Her books and papers had gone every which way. He had apologized profusely while attempting to gather her things into a manageable armload. She had been totally and completely mesmerized. She hadn’t been able to take her eyes off his face.

She’d seen him around at various hangouts of course. But not up close.

From that moment she had been completely, utterly in love with him. And he had loved her relentlessly. They had been inseparable.

But that was then and this was now.

She studied his profile, the dim glow from the dash giving her just enough illumination to see the details that had captured her heart so totally all those years ago. That strong, square jaw. The straight nose and full lips. More than just classically handsome, he was pretty damned hot. Had been at seventeen and he still was. It was so unfair that men aged so well while women… grew frumpier and crinkly.

Jess turned her attention forward and laughed. Once she started she couldn’t stop. It was just too incredibly hilarious.

When she finally had to catch her breath and swipe her eyes, Dan demanded, “What’s so funny?”

“Your mother.” The giggles started again. A whole minute was required to regain control. “She compared me to a coonhound.” Jess giggled some more. “But at least she didn’t call me fat.” She dissolved into hysterical laughter. There was just no stopping it.

Dan joined her, his deep, smooth laughter filling the space around her, making her feel warm and safe.

Before Jess had composed herself, he’d taken an unexpected turn and was heading in the opposite direction. “Where’re we going?”

“I’m taking you to a special place.”

That he said this with such mystery aroused her curiosity. “What special place? You know I don’t like surprises.” She hated surprises. She’d had a few too many in her life. But the feel-good factor of the wine and the solving of two cases had made her agreeable. Actually it could very well turn out to be three cases, since the Michelle Butler case had been reopened.

“I think you’ll like this surprise.”

Jess sat up straighter and surveyed the landscape. When he took the exit for Thirty-First Street and meandered around to Thirty-Third, she gasped. “You wouldn’t!”

He flashed a grin. “You dare me?”

She dropped back against her seat, still stunned that he would even consider it. “I double-dog dare you.”

True to his word he drove straight into the parking area for Sloss Furnaces. “We could be arrested,” she warned.

“Not if we don’t get caught.”

With all the public tours and television hype around Sloss Furnaces, one of Birmingham’s oldest and most famous historic landmarks, it was a bit more complicated to enter these days. The old iron blast furnaces once used for turning iron ore into steel served as an open-air museum, but the rusting industrial park was best known for its numerous and infamous accounts of hauntings.

Dan easily found a way onto the property. The old smokestacks and slag buckets were a sight to see in the daytime. At night it was the platform atop Furnace One that had always drawn them. They climbed the ladderlike stairs and settled in their favorite old spot.

“Oh my God,” she murmured as she stared at the city from their perch. Emotion swelled in her chest and she fought the tears that threatened. “I used to stare at those tall buildings and all those lights and wonder how Birmingham could be so big when it felt so small and confining to me. When a train would go by and we were up here all alone and away from everything, the sound just sort of went through me. Made me wish I could jump aboard and go with it.”

He was watching her. She shivered. He’d always been able to do that to her.

As if he feared the breeze that had suddenly kicked up had made her shiver, he shouldered out of his jacket and wrapped it around her. His arm lingered on her shoulders and she couldn’t help leaning into him.

“Your top priority was to get away,” he agreed. “I’m glad you’re back. What you did this week was why I became a cop. You didn’t let the absence of evidence or the unclear motives deter you. You refused to give up. We’re lucky to have you on our team.”

She pressed her lips together to stop their trembling. When she could speak without her voice quavering, she responded to his generous compliment. “I just never could quit picking at anything that didn’t feel right to me,” she confessed. “But I feel like there’s a lot more to do. This gang business is out of hand.”

“That story isn’t over yet.”

Jess looked up at him. “Has something else happened?” Salvadore Lopez was in federal custody but refused to talk, while his sister was giving up all she knew on him and her father.

Dan shook his head. “Unrest is brewing in the community. Families like DeShawn Simmons’s and Jerome Frazier’s are sick of the gangs taking over their neighborhoods and the cops seeming to turn their heads the other way. I think we’re in for a war.”

She didn’t doubt it. “People are weary of waiting to be rescued.”

“People are tired of a lot of things, but maybe there’s more we can do about the rescue part.”

That made her smile. “You’re a good guy, Daniel Burnett. Rescuing is what you do best.”

He’d rescued her after her fall at the bureau. That was for sure.

For a long time they just stood there, enjoying the present and remembering the past. How he remembered so much about the crazy things they did she would never understand. Maybe he remembered more because he had been here all this time…
home
… where they’d made all those memories.

They climbed down the rusty old ladder slowly and found their way back to the parking lot. The traffic on the nearby interstate overpass hummed and vibrated the air as they climbed into his Mercedes.

“You know that buying this vehicle means you’re turning into your parents,” she pointed out. “And that house, too.” She turned in her seat to face him. “Both scream
Katherine, Katherine!
”

“I bought this vehicle because it’s big and roomy.” He pressed a button and his seat moved back farther from the steering wheel. He pressed another button and it moved forward once more. “It’s comfortable and I just liked it. My mother had nothing to do with it.”