Her Colton P.I. by Amelia Autin

Author:Amelia Autin
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2016-05-08T07:00:00+00:00

Chapter 12

“I wasn’t going to cry,” Holly insisted as Chris held the passenger door of his truck for her.

“Weren’t you?” His voice held tenderness and understanding.

“Well...” She gave a little huff of semitearful laughter as she buckled her seat belt. “Not where the boys could see me anyway.” Then she realized something. “Wait. My SUV is here.”

“Yeah, I know. Give me the keys.” When she did, he closed the door and left, but was back a minute later, climbing into the driver’s seat. “I gave Joe your keys. I think it’s best for now we leave your SUV here, rather than at my house.”

He was already putting the truck into gear as he said it, and Holly asked, “Why?” Wanting an answer before they got too far away.

“Because I don’t want the McCays to know you’re at my house, not until we’re ready to spring the trap. Do I think they suspect anything yet? No. Am I willing to risk it? No. I told Joe to park your SUV in their garage so no one can see the license plates.” He glanced at her. “We’re not that far away. If we need it, we can get it. But I don’t think we will.”

She didn’t know why a little dart of panic went through her. She was so used to having the freedom of her own wheels—was that it?

“Besides,” Chris said drily, breaking into her thoughts, “this way you can’t sneak off to visit the twins when my back is turned.”

That made her laugh for some reason. “I wouldn’t do that,” she protested. “I already agreed it would be safer—”

He reached across the seat and clasped her hand for a moment. “I know you did. But this way you won’t be tempted.” Then he let her hand go so he could shift gears, saying softly, “You’re a good mother, Holly.”

“I try to be.”

“You remind me of my own mother.”

When he said that, she remembered Chris had been eleven when his mother died. Old enough to have vivid memories of her. “What was she like?”

He didn’t answer right away. Then he said slowly, “Beautiful...to me. Now when I look at old photos, I realize she wasn’t really beautiful. Not classically beautiful. But if ever a woman’s heart reflected in her face, hers did.”

She gathered her courage and asked, “Why did your father kill her?”

At first she thought he wasn’t going to answer at all. Then he said, “No one can really answer that except him. She loved him through everything—the loss of his ranch, financial hardship, seven children. And for the longest time no one had a clue why he did it, because he refused to say. Not even when he was convicted of her murder. He finally told Ethan back in February—Ethan was the one who found her dead—that she figured out he was the bull’s-eye serial killer.

“That’s how my father used to mark all his victims,” he explained, “with a red bull’s-eye drawn on their foreheads.” She heard him breathe deeply in the darkness.

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