Paula Graves - Kentucky Confidential

“I’m sorry. It wasn’t supposed to happen that way.”

He took a deep breath and let it out slowly, raking his hand through his already-tousled hair. “Okay. You didn’t expect the crash. But what about after that? You couldn’t let me know you were alive?”

“Dal said—”

“I don’t care what Dal said!” His voice came out in a pained roar. He turned his back to her, visibly trying to regain control. She waited silently, giving him time and space to do so.

Finally, he faced her. “I’m sorry. What did Dal say?”

“It doesn’t matter. I should have contacted you. I was just—it was one thing to think I was being targeted. But to know that they’d kill over two hundred people just to kill me—”

“Pretty shattering, huh?” For the first time, Connor sounded sympathetic.

“Very shattering.” She pressed her palm against the curve of her belly, taking comfort in the gentle wriggling of the baby inside her. He—or she—could probably sense her tension. Not for the first time, she wondered whether she was carrying a girl or a boy. Her ob-gyn had offered her the chance to find out the baby’s sex, but she’d wanted to wait until birth.

Until this moment, she hadn’t known why she’d wanted to wait. But watching Connor’s gaze follow the movement of her hand, she realized she had always hoped that somehow, against all odds, she’d be able to share the birth of this child with her husband.

He might never forgive her for letting him believe she was dead so long, but she had no doubt whatsoever that he’d love their child.

“Why are you here in Cincinnati, pretending to be a Kaziri widow?”

She sighed. “Sometimes, I wonder that myself.”

Connor looked at her through narrowed eyes. “You look tired.”

“I had to walk eight blocks for my doctor’s appointment this morning, and then I was on my feet for hours at work.”

“And then you followed a couple of men down a dark street.”

“Yeah. Not my finest moment.”

He pulled a chair away from the table. “Take a load off.”

She took a seat, swallowing a sigh of pure relief. She looked down at her feet and saw that her ankles were looking a little puffy. “Ugh, whoever said women glow when they’re pregnant was probably blind or demented. I’ve just inflated.”

Connor smiled, giving her the first glimpse of his dimples in forever. Her heart turned a couple of flips in her chest at the sight, just as it had the first time he’d smiled at her. “You look beautiful. You always do.”

The kindness in his voice, the sincerity of the sentiment, drew hot tears to her eyes. “I shouldn’t be glad you’re here, because you’ve probably put yourself in terrible danger. But I am. I’m so, so glad you’re here.”

He started to reach out his hand toward her, but he stopped midmovement and let his hand drop to his lap. “Are you?”

She swallowed her disappointment. “Yes, of course. But how did you find me?”

He reached down and pulled a battered-looking briefcase up to the table, unfastened the buckle and pulled a tablet computer from inside. He swiped his finger across the screen, then tapped a couple of times before he handed the tablet to her.

She looked down and saw a photo of a Free Kaziristan rally that several people in the community had held a couple of weeks earlier. She hadn’t attended the rally herself, not wanting to put herself in the spotlight of refugee politics in any way, but the rally had taken place on the street in front of the restaurant. She’d had to pass through the throngs to get to work.

She looked lifeless in the photo. Was that how she always looked?

“I kept telling myself it couldn’t be you.” Connor’s voice rumbled low and soft, like thunder in the distance. “You wouldn’t have let me think you were dead. But there you were.”

“Connor—”

A loud trio of raps on the door cut her short, the sound sending a hard jolt of alarm down her spine.

“Go to the bedroom,” Connor said softly, already on his feet. He pulled a large Ruger pistol from his bag and tucked it in his waistband behind his back, letting his jacket drop to cover it.

Risa hurried down the hallway into the bedroom, her heart fluttering with fear. If someone from the community had seen her come into this apartment with Connor, everything she’d spent the past few months trying to set up would be destroyed.

And she and Connor would be in the worst danger of their lives.

* * *

CONNOR LOOKED THROUGH the security lens and saw a familiar face staring back at him. He turned the dead bolt and disengaged the security chain, then opened the door to a bearded man wearing a high-collared shirt and plain khaki pants. His visitor’s hazel gaze swept the room quickly.

“Where is she?” he asked.

“Nice seeing you, too, Quinn.”

Alexander Quinn didn’t wait for an invitation, entering and nodding for Connor to close the door behind him. As Connor reengaged the locks, Quinn crossed to both of the street-facing windows and shut the blinds.

“Heller says it’s her. So I tried her apartment. She wasn’t home. Then I tried her workplace, and she wasn’t there, either.”

“I told you I’d handle things my own way.” Connor heard the tight annoyance in his own voice but couldn’t seem to care. “So why are you here, anyway?”

“Because Martin Dalrymple has been murdered.”

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