Part 19 (2/2)
He stopped by the garage and got out of the truck. He hadn't been this tired since his early days in the mountains of Afghanistan as a new Marine.
After speaking to the clerk at the Texaco, Zack and Wyatt came back to the office to watch the surveillance footage. Unfortunately, the man's face wasn't visible in the grainy black and white frames. The cameras were angled all wrong or set too high. He also had worn a wide brimmed hat.
Now, he had to hope the thief had DNA on file. However, he still had no idea who the other men in the trucks were. Nor could the authorities prove Zack's horse theft was connected to the cattle rustling. As he knew, with police work nothing was ever cut and dry. Often one clue only answered half the riddle and produced a whole slew of other possibilities and questions.
With a sigh, he rang Tracy's doorbell and waited. When the door opened, he expected to find an anxious Mandy. She would be late for school at this rate. Instead, Tracy stood there looking beyond great in a pair of jeans shorts and a t-s.h.i.+rt with a large flower over her chest.
”Hey.” He pulled his hat from his head.
”Come in.” Tracy moved away from the door and smiled. ”I have coffee on. You look like you need some.”
”I do, but I have to get Mandy to school. Then I'm going home and cras.h.i.+ng for a long, long time.” He looked around. Where was the little tornado?
Tracy clasped her hands before her. ”When you were so late, I decided to take her to school. The princ.i.p.al had a fit because I wasn't on her pickup list, and I tried to explain I wasn't picking her up, but dropping her off. I swear sometimes Mrs. Longoria takes the rules a little overboard.”
He reached out and pulled her to him. Her surprised gasp as she came up against him brought a chuckle from his throat, which ended on a groan as his lips touched hers. She opened under his questing tongue as he drank her in.
She moaned and threaded her fingers into his hair. The need for air forced them apart, and they gasped for oxygen. He held her to him and rested his forehead on hers.
”Good morning to you, too.” Her voice was a s.e.xy purr that had him wis.h.i.+ng he could strip her and have his way with her.
”It is now. Thank you for taking care of Mandy. I'll have to make sure Mrs. Longoria knows it was alright for you to bring Mandy to school. I was worried she'd be late.”
She moved away, but took his hand. ”C'mon, I have fresh coffee, and I can make you something to eat. Melissa can open the shop.”
He stopped short when they entered the kitchen at the end of the entrance hall. The other night when he'd been here, the kitchen had seemed so sterile. This morning, bits of multi-colored construction paper, crayons and markers covered the table and artwork that could have come from only Mandy decorated the refrigerator. As Tracy headed for the coffee maker by the sink, he went to the stainless steel door and stared at the homemade frame around a picture of Mandy. Her hair cut in a style similar to Tracy's with bangs and her face framed by long dark locks.
”I want you to know I loved having Mandy. We had so much fun.”
He glanced up from the picture to Tracy.
She held two mugs of coffee and smiled. ”I hope you don't mind. I got my digital camera out and took pictures of her and Bobby last night. Then this morning she wanted to make frames for the pictures. You'll be getting one tonight. I put it in her book bag. Oh, and I helped her study for her spelling test.”
His throat swelled shut. He hadn't even given her homework a thought. Before he could speak, he had to swallow down the lump. ”Thanks for helping her. I guess this is her first spelling test.”
”Yeah. She's a smart little girl, so she caught on quick. Bobby has a test today, too. I made a game of it and they studied together. It was a hoot, her trying to spell his words.”
He looked down at the photo with its gaudy frame of pink and blue construction paper and crayon-colored purple flowers. ”I like her hair. It's cut just like yours.”
Tracy glanced down at the coffee mugs in her hands. ”She wanted it like mine, so that's what I did.”
”I like it.”
”I'm glad.” She looked up with her bottom lip caught between her teeth, so d.a.m.ned unsure of herself.
After a moment, she said, ”Let me make you some eggs and bacon. I'm not much of a cook. I'll admit that right now. But I can fry eggs and bacon.”
He put the paper frame back under its magnet on the fridge door and grinned as he took the cup she held out to him. He'd let her take care of him, just this once. ”That sounds good. I'm starving.”
Forty minutes later, he'd devoured his breakfast and drank a half a pot of coffee loaded with sugar. The two excited Yorkies had come in from outside, yipped themselves out over his arrival, and now lay in the sunlight by the French doors. Tracy had to get going to her shop, and he had to go home and sleep, but neither of them wanted to leave the kitchen.
She set her cup on the countertop of the bar. ”Wow. I just thought of something.”
He chuckled and arched a brow. ”And we blondes are the brunt of all the jokes.”
She poked him in the side with her elbow. ”If I ever hear a blonde joke about a ditsy blond guy, I'll make sure I remember to tell you about it. But what I meant was today I can officially start calling myself by my maiden name again.”
”You had your name changed?”
”Oh, I guess I didn't tell you.” She tilted her head and looked at him. Her hair fell over her shoulder, and the sun s.h.i.+ning through the windows picked out the highlights she'd added to her brown hair. ”When I talked to Logan about taking on my case, I asked him to file the paperwork to change my name. I guess it's not officialI don't have the doc.u.ments from the state and Social Security office yetbut he said I could start using Quinn again. I can't believe he was able to get it done this fast.”
He glanced away before he lost something to her he could never give her, and finished his coffee. ”My little brother is a good lawyer.”
”Well, I'm not really sure why I ever kept Parker. I told everyone it was because of Bobby, but I don't think it was really for him.”
”Sentimentality makes us do strange things.”
She snorted and shook her head. ”Trust me, Zack, there is nothing about Jake Parker that I'm sentimental about. I haven't even kept a single wedding picture. So, my keeping his name was really a jokeon me.”
He studied her with his breath caught in his throat. ”What do you mean, you didn't keep any wedding pictures?”
She met his gaze again and shrugged. ”I burnt them.” She sipped her coffee, and instead of explaining more, she shook her head. ”Did you find anything out last night?”
”Yes, but nothing concrete.” What the h.e.l.l did Jake do to her?
”Can't talk about it?”
He shook his head and winced at her wide eyes, but he couldn't discuss the case with her. ”No, I can't.”
She surprised him again by not pus.h.i.+ng, and simply changed the subject. ”I wish Bobby didn't have a game tonight. I'd love to have you and Mandy over for dinner again.” She then let out a giggle. ”But this time we'll order pizza.”
He smiled at her. ”You really can't cook?”
”Nope. Mom tried to teach me when I was a teenager, but I never took much interest in it. And after we moved in here with Granddad and Maddie while Dad was overseas, Maddie wouldn't allow Mom anywhere near the kitchen. She considered it beneath Mom to want to be a chef. I was a kid and thought maybe Maddie was right.” She blushed and glanced away. ”Maddie was one of the most glamorous women I knew. She took me under her wing, in a way, and... Well, she helped me. But I never learned to cook.”
He remembered Madeline Ferguson, the daughter of a Houston oilman and only two years older than her stepdaughter, as mostly a b.i.t.c.h on wheels. However, Tracy had been close to the woman who was more like an aunt than a grandmother.
”Josie insisted on Logan and me learning to cook. You remember Josie, Mom and Dad's housekeeper when we were kids?” Tracy nodded, and he went on. ”I'm glad she taught me something. Mandy would've starved otherwise.” He looked at his watch. ”Let me help get the dishes cleaned up, then I'd better get going. You still have to drive to town.”
When the kitchen was spotless, she walked him to the door, and he turned toward her. ”You'll be at the game tonight?”
”Yeah, it's in Valley Mills.”
The thought of Tracy and Bobby away from home, and Jake coaching a whole team of little boys made his blood run cold. ”Let's go together. Before the game, we can stop and get pizza. Afterward, we can get ice cream to celebrate Bobby's big win against the Valley Mills Bulldogs.”
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