Mariah Stewart - Cry Mercy

“So are you packing now?”

“I don't have a license to carry concealed in Pennsylvania yet,” she told him. “I've applied though.”

“That isn't what I asked. Slick answer, though.”

“I bought one of my handguns from the department before I left California. Right now it's in the trunk of my car. I can't take the chance of Chloe finding it, but at the same time, I can't take the chance of…” She paused again. “The chance of needing to protect us and not being able to. What can I say?” She tried to make light of it. “I guess it's a cop thing.”

He looked as if he were about to comment when her phone rang. She pulled it from her pocket quickly before it rang again.

“Hello?” She waited a moment, then said again, “Hello?”

There was no response, but it was clear someone was on the line. “Who is this?”

For a moment before the line went dead, she thought she heard music in the background. Then… click. The line went dead.

Frowning, she scrolled up the number on her caller ID list. Henry Carroll-Wilson's name came up.

“What's wrong?” Nick asked. “Who was that?”

“Henry.” She hit redial, but the phone rang and rang. When the call went to voice mail, she left a message. “Henry, it's Emme Caldwell. Your call was apparently dropped. I'm trying to get back to you but seem to be having a problem. I'm sorry we missed meeting up today but hopefully you're calling to reschedule. Please call me back so we can set something up.”

She was still frowning when she ended the call.

“What?”

“It didn't sound like a dropped call. There was someone on the line, I'd swear to it.”

“Maybe it was just one of those screwy connections you get sometimes.”

“Mommy?” Chloe called from the bedroom.

“I'm right here, honey.” Emme put the phone down on the table and excused herself to Nick. “I'll be right back.”

“Who are you talking to?” Chloe mumbled and rubbed her eyes, her feet sticking out from the blankets on one side of the bed.

“Nick.” Emme pulled the covers back over her and leaned over to kiss the top of Chloe's head.

“Nick didn't say good night to me.” Chloe's eyes were opening.

“Nick,” Emme called to him. “Would you mind saying good night to Chloe?”

“Good night, Chloe,” he said from the doorway.

“′Member you said we could go to an amusement park?”

“Sure. As soon as your mom and I can arrange the time, we'll go.”

“Yippee! Can we go to one that has-” she began to sit up.

“Back to sleep, Chloe.” Emme gently coaxed her back down. “We can talk about that some other time. It's late now, and we have to meet the Realtor in the morning, remember?”

“Are you going to sleep now, too?”

“In a minute,” Emme told her.

“I was just leaving,” Nick said. “I can let myself out. I'll talk to you tomorrow, Emme. Let me know if you hear from Henry or Lori.”

Before she could protest, Nick had turned his back and she heard the door open and close softly.

“Who are Henry and Lori?” Chloe asked sleepily.

“The people we were supposed to meet at the zoo today.” Emme curled up next to Chloe.

“I'm glad they didn't come.” Chloe yawned and snuggled closer to her mother. “We got to be with Nick.”

Well, there was that .

“I like Nick,” Chloe murmured as sleep reclaimed her.

“So do I, sweetie,” Emme whispered. “Now go to sleep.”

When Chloe's breathing slowed, Emme climbed off the bed carefully and locked the door. She turned off her computer and turned out the lights, then changed into a nightshirt. She slid back into bed and lay in the dark, her hands clasped at the back of her head, staring at the thin outline of the window drawn by the lights in the parking lot, her mind bouncing from one thing to another. She could hear car doors slamming and engines starting up and wondered if one of them was Nick.

Her tired mind settled on him for a moment, then warned her that this was not safe territory. She concentrated on finding something objectionable about him, but she was having a hard time coming up with anything. The fact that he was a client could have been enough to deter her, but she reminded herself this wasn't a criminal case she was handling and she was no longer a cop. Did the same rules apply in this situation?

It was hard to overlook the fact that they'd had a perfect day. There'd been no strangeness and no awkwardness. He and Chloe had taken to each other like the oldest of friends. They'd laughed and strolled around the zoo, looking like any of the families that strolled along with them.

She shook herself out of that thought in a hurry.

She'd never had much luck at relationships. It wasn't hard to figure out why. Success in interpersonal relations depended largely on the ability to trust, and that was one thing she'd never learned how to do. She'd taken her share of psychology courses at the community college and she understood that her unsettled childhood, where no one had ever claimed her and no one had ever asked her to stay, made it difficult for her to believe that anyone would ever want to keep her around for more than a little while. Until Chloe, no one had ever been a constant in her daily life. She looked back on her decision to take Tameka up on her offer to sign over the parental rights to her child as the luckiest day of her life.

When Tameka Jackson had asked Emme to take her child, Emme'd been stunned. She'd never thought of having a child, and her first instinct was to brush her off and pretend the offer had never been made. But Tameka had already gotten it into her head that the cop who'd tried so hard to help her get off the streets and get her life together would give her baby a better life than anyone else she knew, and she wasn't about to give up. With the assistance of a social worker, and a lawyer Emme knew to make it legal, Tameka's baby girl left the hospital as Chloe Nolan. And whatever premonition Tameka had had become reality. Ten days after the birth of her baby, Tameka had been stabbed to death in the shower in the county prison. No one had ever been charged with her murder.

Like that was some big mystery. Her trial for the sale and distribution of cocaine was drawing closer, and word on the street was that Anthony Navarro wasn't taking any chances that Tameka would talk. At the time, he hadn't shown the least bit of concern for his baby. Now he was willing to pay thousands to get her back.

“Over my dead body,” Emme whispered.

Chloe was hers now, and no one was going to take her.

Not for the first time, she wondered at the wisdom of having begun to play such a precarious game. If anyone came for Chloe, who would have her back?

Her fingers followed the path Nick's thumb had traced along her bottom lip, and thought that maybe-just maybe-there might be one person she might be able to count on.

“What are you doing here so late on a Sunday afternoon?” Having stopped at Robert's to return Trula's cooler on her way back from looking at houses, Emme had made a quick run to her office to pick up the file she'd left on her desk. On her way down the hall, she'd been surprised to find Mallory's door open, and even more surprised to find Mallory at her desk.

“I can't keep up with all the applications,” Mallory sighed. “They're coming in faster than I can field them.”

“Anything I can do to help?” Emme stepped into the room.

“You are helping. You're investigating our first case.” Mallory rubbed her eyes. “How's it going?”

“Two steps forward, three steps back.” Emme brought her up-to-date on everything she'd learned that week, right up to the Carroll-Wilson kids not showing the day before. The only thing she left out was the part about Nick following her back to the hotel.