Read Deception (Southern Comfort) Online
Authors: Lisa Clark O'Neill
Deception (Southern Comfort) (13 page)
Sam laughed, lightly at first, and then harder. Apparently he’d cracked her up. “Oh, just a bit,” she said cryptically, between fits of amused laughter.
Frustrated, Josh sank to his knees, then rocked back onto his heels. “Look, Sam, just because a guy has money or seems nice doesn’t mean that he isn’t capable of this. You know that.”
She laughed even harder, which pissed him off. Why was she defending this asshole?
“I’m sorry,” she finally responded to his scowl. “It’s just that my boss is Dane Wilcox.”
“Of the Wilcox Corporation Wilcox’s?”
“That’s the one.”
Well shit. That made things considerably more complicated. Dane Wilcox was one of Charleston’s favorite sons – a golden boy who’d been blessed with the finest and best of everything – and heir to a considerable local empire. His father, Alan, owned a sizable chunk of the city,
it seemed, and was good friends with a number of important movers and shakers.
Including his good friend, the mayor.
And his brother-in-law, the Chief of Police.
Josh cursed Chris for not paying more attention.
“You know,” he reminded Sam, “just because a man’s wealthy and well-connected, it doesn’t mean he can’t be this kind of criminal. In fact, sometimes men in his position feel that it entitles them to take whatever they want, or maybe makes them somehow above the laws which govern the regular Joes.”
Sam was shaking her head before he’d even finished his sentence. “I’m sorry, Josh, but Dane wouldn’t pee all over my toiletries.”
Josh frowned, not at all happy that she was still defending him. And while urinating on Sam’s intimate necessities did strike him as a little odd, he still thought there was enough evidence to warrant checking the guy out. He made a mental note to talk to Clay, who was a behavioral specialist and had a wide knowledge of stalkers and other sexual predators. It made him sick to think that he and Chris had been joking about that – however innocently – and yet Sam seemed to be experiencing the real thing.
He turned to face her, careful not to touch her again. The last thing she needed right now was to be crowded by a man. And the last thing he needed was a biological reaction he couldn’t control. “Okay.” He’d drop the Wilcox thing for the moment. “I want you to think, Sam. Have you noticed anyone else acting strangely around you lately? Maybe had the feeling you were being watched?”
“Actually,” she admitted reluctantly, “there have been a few times over the past couple weeks that I’ve been… uncomfortable in the hospital parking lot. I’ve sensed another presence – not a, uh, friendly one, if you know what I mean.”
Damn. Now her behavior the other night made perfect sense. “Anyplace else you’ve experienced that feeling? Work? Or here at home?”
“No.” She chewed her bottom lip, ran a sweaty palm down one jean-clad thigh. “Not really. Maybe a few times I’ve been a little jumpy here, but I think that’s only to be expected. The neighbors aren’t exactly the borrow-a-cup-of-sugar type.”
One more reason to get her the hell out of here.
“You have a couple broken slats in your blinds,” he pointed out, motioning toward the window. “I noticed it from the alley. There was probably just enough space to enable someone who really wanted to to see in.”
“Great,” she hissed between her teeth.
“Ever notice any cars in the area that didn’t seem to belong?” He thought of the expensive boutique from which the negligee had come. Still liked Dane Wilcox for that one. “Maybe nicer than you’d expect to see around here? Or possibly one you may have seen at the hospital?”
She laughed, completely without humor. “You wouldn’t believe what I’ve seen in this neighborhood. Let me tell you, vice doesn’t limit itself to the lower class. One of my upstairs neighbor’s most frequent visitors is a man who wears an Italian suit and drives a high-performance German sports car. You can’t miss the distinct noise of the engine when he comes roaring in. And from the sounds that filter down through the heat vents when he’s around, cars aren’t the only things he pays well in exchange for performance.”
Josh felt heat sting the back of his neck. Not that the behavior shocked him – he’d seen far, far worse over the years – but he despised the fact that Sam was subjected to it.
She yawned, and spotting her growing weariness , Josh figured they could talk more after she’d gotten some sleep. “Look, Sam, I don’t mean to be pushy, but it would make me feel better if you’d be willing to stay with me.” It was the understatement of the century. He’d be ecstatic if she stayed with him.
On a completely permanent basis.
“Please, Sam” he said quietly. “Let me help you.”
SAM
looked at this man – this wonderful, impossible man – who was offering to open his home to her, at absolutely no benefit to himself. He wasn’t looking to use her body; he wasn’t looking to make a buck; he wasn’t looking to control her. Other than Donnie, and maybe Justin, Josh was the only man she’d ever known who seemed to actually have her best interests at heart. And she’d be foolish to refuse him.
Looking around her ruined apartment, she realized she had little choice. “Okay,” she finally agreed, noticing his shoulders slump in relief. “If it’s okay, I’ll stay with you until I can figure out another arrangement.”
“Sam –”
She cut him off before he could even finish his protest. “I know it’s difficult for you to understand, but I just can’t allow myself to be dependent on a man. It may sound foolish, but I’ve learned the hard way that I’m much better off if I’m responsible for myself. And while I really, truly do appreciate your help, it has to be a temporary situation, Josh. It just… does.”
BITING
back the hurt that he knew she hadn’t intended to inflict, Josh nodded and rose to his feet. He understood her position, but it still stung. He was nothing like the men who’d come before him – he was sure there was more to the story than just Collin – and he wanted to hunt the bastards down and kill them for what they’d done to Sam.
But for now, he’d simply offer her friendship, and hope that in time he could convince her that she didn’t have to do this alone.
“I would say give me a minute to pack my things,” she remarked dryly, “but it would seem I no longer have any.”
Josh glanced at his watch. He had a couple hours yet before he had to be at work. “We’ll hit a store and pick up a few things before we head to my place.”
Sam looked skeptically at his expensive clothes. “Wal-Mart’s probably the only thing open at this hour.” She knew him well enough to expect him to grimace. Instead he merely nodded his head. “Wal-Mart it is.”
He extended his hand to help her up.
CHAPTER NINE
SAM
noticed Josh rubbing his shoulder as he lifted a heavily-laden bag from her backseat. He’d done so several times over the past couple hours, and she wondered if he’d hurt himself climbing in and out of her window. “Are you okay?” she asked, grabbing a second, lighter bag from the car before shutting the door and locking it. She’d parked in a metered space in front of Josh’s building – a renovated warehouse near the waterfront that had been converted into trendy lofts – while he’d gone to the office to get a guest pass for her so that she could park in the garage without getting towed. He’d come back empty-handed – the manager wasn’t in yet – so he was feeding quarters into the meter with the hand not holding the bag.
“What?” he asked as he turned around, the salty breeze coming off the water ruffling his hair.
“Your shoulder,” she clarified. “Did you hurt it?”
“Oh.” Josh took the other bag from her, completely ignoring her protests, and steered her toward the lobby of his building. “Gunshot wound,” he told her casually. “Souvenir from a little party I
would rather not have attended this past July.”
“You were shot?” Sam stopped walking, horrified. She knew he was a cop, but the fact that he could be so grievously injured in the line of duty hadn’t fully penetrated. He was a police artist, for goodness sake.
“It happens. Occupational hazard and all that.”
His face showed a whole lot of No Big Deal, but Sam knew he couldn’t possibly have taken it that lightly. “It’s your right shoulder,” she noted. “Your drawing hand.”
“Yep. Guess I’m lucky the bullet didn’t hit any lower. Or permanently sever any nerves.” He started nudging her along.
“Josh,” she persisted softly. “What happened?”
Sighing, Josh shifted both bags to his left hand. “Why don’t we go upstairs and get settled,” he suggested. “I’ll make some coffee, and tell you all about it.”
“Wow,” she said as they entered his coveted corner condo – all those extra windows – on the third floor of the former warehouse. “I didn’t realize cops made so much money.” She didn’t have the exposure to be able to recognize high-end designers, but his furniture looked pretty damn nice. Twin leather sofas sat facing each other in the airy, open living area, separated by a plush oriental carpet that softened the industrial feel of brick walls. Off to the right, a dining table crafted out of what looked like a giant piece of driftwood gave way to the clean lines of maple cabinetry and lots of stainless steel.
“We don’t,” he confirmed ruefully, pushing the door shut with his foot and then locking it behind him. Sam noticed the blinking light from an alarm system set on standby next to the front door.
“So… what,” she asked, following him deeper into the apartment, where he sat her bags on the kitchen counter. “You have a sugar daddy?”
Temporarily
sidetracked from his mission to procure caffeine, Josh straightened away from the coffee pot, blinked at her. “No,” he said slowly. “Although I guess you could say I have a sugar brother-in-law.”
Seeing Sam’s confusion, Josh laughed. “My older sister – Beth, do you remember me talking about her? – well anyway, her husband Brent is a videogame
designer.” Remembering what he was doing, he filled the pot with water, then loaded a grinder with beans. “Sorry,” he apologized over the noise. “I’m a coffee snob.” When he was finished, he dumped the grounds in the filter basket. “So about five years ago, Brent was getting fed up with the company he worked for, and he decided to start a venture of his own. All of us family members got suckered into ponying up whatever we could scrape from beneath the sofa cushions and Brent struggled through a couple years of obscurity. We all thought our contributions were a loss, but lo and behold, two years ago he created a game that just happened to be on every kid over the age of five’s wish list for what they most wanted Santa to drop down the chimney.”
“Wow,” Sam concluded as she eased herself onto one of Josh’s stools, “I don’t know anything about video games, but I guess that was a pretty big deal.”
“You could say that,” Josh agreed with a smile. “He sold the rights to that game for a small fortune, and he’s had a couple other hits since then that have done almost equally well. My contribution to his effort was relatively small, so I’ll never be independently wealthy, but the dividends were enough to make me comfortable. I wish I could say I’d come by all this through some momentous effort of my own, but, you know, I’m not going to complain about it either way.” The mouth-watering aroma of fresh coffee filled the room. “Ah,” he drew in through his nose. “How do you take yours? Still loaded?”
“Yes,” Sam admitted, taken aback that he remembered.
Josh got two earthenware mugs down from the overhead cabinet, then brought out a small sugar bowl and a couple of spoons. He walked over to the refrigerator and procured creamer before fastening greedy eyes on the dripping coffee.
“You know,” Sam interrupted his communion with the coffeepot, drawing those piercing blue eyes to her face – why did the man have to be so beautiful? – “you still haven’t told me what happened. How you were shot.”
“You noticed that, huh?”
“I may be exhausted but I’m not incapacitated.”
Josh laughed, pouring the coffee. Then he pushed the fixings toward her and asked if she was hungry.
“No, thank you. I’m not sure if I’ll be eating ever again.” Finding out you may have an obsessive stalker tended to kill one’s appetite.
“I’ll do everything I can to get to the bottom of this,” Josh promised her, reaching out briefly to stroke his fingers along her cheek. Then he broke the contact all too soon and said, “Come on. We’ll be more comfortable in the living room.”
And so they sat, each on their own sofa, and Josh told her about the day he almost died. Three bullet wounds – one to the shoulder, one to the thigh, and one a fraction of an inch lower and it would have been through his head.
“Oh my God,” she said when he was finished, her stomach roiling uneasily at the thought of what he’d endured. “And all of that was because some sicko was kidnapping little girls and selling them?”
“Well,” Josh took a bracing sip of coffee and almost sighed at the heady rush. “It was two sickos, but in a nutshell, yes.”
“And that’s how you met… the friend who’s getting married.”
Josh looked up from his mug. “That’s how I met Clay, yes. We worked together on the investigation. And afterward, I got to know the Murphys and Justin Wellington, because we all played a role in the case.”