Cindy Dees - Navy Seal Cop

“You mean like a ransom call?” she blurted, surprised.

“Correct.”

“No”

“I’d like to stay with you through the day today. If there’s going to be a ransom demand, it usually comes in the first twenty-four hours after an abduction.”

“Do you want to hook up my phone to a machine that can trace the call?”

“Kidnappers worth their salt know how to disguise the location of calls these days. They use voice-over-Internet protocols and bounce the calls off a bunch of IP addresses. Long story short, we can’t trace calls if the caller doesn’t want to be traced.”

“That sucks,” she commented. “You’d think technology would help the police catch more criminals.”

“What works for us works for them.”

“Just a heads-up for you,” she said reluctantly. “When word gets out that Gary’s been kidnapped, it’s likely to draw some media attention.”

“How much media attention?”

“News crews, journalists, probably some tabloid photographers,” she answered grimly. She would have to find a way to stay behind the scenes. Off camera. At all costs, her face could not be broadcast nationally.

Bass swore under his breath. “Look. I can’t be put in front of cameras or have my picture taken. I may have to hand this case off to someone else—”

“No!” She interrupted him sharply, “I want you!”

His sapphire gaze snapped to hers, flashing blue fire, and for an instant, raw attraction flared between them. Then his expression shuttered once more, going implacably distant.

“You believed me last night and didn’t wait to act,” she babbled. “I trust you. And I don’t usually trust police at all—” She broke off, appalled at oversharing like that.

“Why not?”

Well, fudge. She hadn’t meant to blurt that out. “Umm. It’s nothing. Never mind.”

“No, I do mind. Why don’t you trust cops?”

“It’s an old story that should stay buried. I didn’t break the law if that’s what’s worrying you. I just had...a bad experience.”

“Not all cops are alike, you know. Take me, for example. I’m better looking than most.”

She had to smile a little at that.

“What would Gary normally be doing today?” Bass asked, interrupting her turbulent emotions.

“He would sleep through the morning and wake up around noon. He putters around doing nothing all afternoon, goes out for supper, and then we head over to the next shooting location and set up for the night’s shoot.”

“And where is that scheduled to take place tonight?”

“An old house in the French Quarter that has been converted to a bed-and-breakfast. It’s supposed to be haunted, of course.”

He pounced on her choice of words. “You don’t buy into the haunted bit?”

“I suspect the owner is mainly interested in getting free publicity for her business. I thought the legend of the ghost in her parlor that she submitted to the show was pretty thin. It felt made up to me when I first heard it, and our researcher in New York wasn’t able to find any record of this supposed ghost anywhere else.”

His mouth twitched, but he asked seriously enough, “Are some ghost stories not made up?”

She rolled her eyes. “Don’t get me started. Gary is a hard-core believer, but in my three years with him, I have yet to see a real ghost.”

“Thank God,” Bass muttered under his breath. She wasn’t sure whether or not she was supposed to have heard that remark, but she responded to it anyway.

“You didn’t think I actually believe in all this woo-woo stuff, did you?” She burst out laughing at the notion. “Filming America’s Ghosts is just a job...in an industry where getting steady work is a rare gift.”

He grinned. “You have no idea how glad I am to hear that.” Their gazes met and the sparks exploded again. Lord, he was attractive. And this funny, friendly version of him was darned near irresistible. Men never flirted with her. She was the mousy one they looked past to find the hot girls.

“I thought folks in New Orleans were superstitious,” she countered. “That they go for voodoo and fortune-tellers and ghosts.”

“I’m not from New Orleans. I’m from the low country west of the city.”

“As in bayous and alligators?” Her eyes went wide. No thank you to either of those!

He grinned broadly. “Everyone gets all hepped up about a few bitty ole’ gators. You stay out of their way, they’ll pretty much stay out of yours.”

“They still scare me to death,” she declared. “They eat people.”

“Only the big ones actually eat people. The smaller ones might bite your leg off or take a chunk out of your side, but they can’t swallow you whole.”

She snorted. “If you’re trying to make me feel better, you’re failing spectacularly.”

He shrugged. “Gators are primitive, and they are predators. But they’re not completely stupid. And they perceive us as predators in return. They honestly do try to stay out of our way for the most part. Now, if you want to worry about critters where I come from, those would be snakes. We’ve got ’em all. Copperheads, cottonmouths, even rattlesnakes. Sometimes they’re so thick you can’t go thirty feet without seeing one.”

“Nope. Nope, nope, nope, nope, nope. I do not do snakes.”

He laughed. “City slicker.”

“Guilty as charged. I’m a city girl all the way.” She slugged down the last of her coffee and finished off her beignet with a lick of her fingers.

“What would you normally be doing at this time of day?” Bass inquired.

“Sleeping. We work late at night, and I often sleep till noon.”

“God, that sounds decadent,” he mumbled.

“It is. Then I get up, go for a run, eat, and spend the afternoon editing dailies.”

“Dailies?”

“The raw footage I shot the night before. I do a rough cut and pull together all the best footage, then I send that video and the rest of the raw video to the post-production folks back in New York. They create the finished show.”

“Do you want to go back to your place now and crawl into bed for a few hours?”

Her shocked gaze shot to his. She swore she caught a momentary glint of amusement behind those bright blue eyes, but she couldn’t be sure. Jeez, Carrie. Not everything the poor man says is an invitation to have sex. She must be even more attracted to him than she realized—or admitted to herself.

“Umm, no. No time to sleep,” she answered belatedly. “I’m going to have to reschedule tonight’s show shoot until tomorrow and hope Gary turns up in the meantime. Besides, I’m too worried to sleep, and that cup of coffee’s gonna keep me revved up for a few hours.”

“Then how about we head back to Pirate’s Alley? You can walk me through what happened.”

Like she was going to refuse to cooperate with the police investigation? She followed in his wake as Bass elbowed his way through the morning coffee crush, and she breathed a sigh of relief as they stepped onto the sidewalk once more. Along with her fear of snakes, she wasn’t a particular fan of being crushed in crowds. She supposed that came from being small and easy to overlook.

“Claustrophobic?” Bass murmured.

“How did you know?”

“The look of relief on your face when we made it out of that crowd.”

Note to self: the cop is definitely as observant as I am.

“Jackson Square’s not far from here,” he said. “Are you up for a walk?”

Stretching her legs after all the stress of the past few hours, maybe burning off a little adrenaline, sounded great. She nodded and he headed out.

She was impressed that he shortened his stride so she could keep up. Thank God. She hated having to racewalk or half jog to keep up with people.