Could almost smell it. It was like something left too long on the burner.
The exterior of her house looked the same as when she’d left this morning at dawn to work on the cakes for Danny’s party. She’d cranked open the miniblinds on the front window so her houseplants would get some sun, and they were still open. No lights shone from the inside.
On the porch, she realized she wouldn’t need her key. The red-painted door was ajar. Her home had been broken into. Her premonition of danger became reality.
A jolt of fear hyped up her senses. Behind the trunk of the crab apple tree, she saw a hiding place for a man with a gun. The wind through the shrubs whispered a warning. The rush of traffic from Eighteenth Street sounded like an approaching army.
The two officers reacted immediately. One on each side, they rushed her to their patrol cruiser and shoved her into the backseat. Cody was beside her.
“What’s happening?” Her voice trembled.
“They’re making sure you’re safe,” Cody said as he wrapped a comforting arm around her shoulders. “Calling for backup before they enter the house.”
She clung to the unraveling threads of her self-control. Already today, she’d fallen apart in this man’s arms. Not again. Damn it, not again. She wanted to touch him, but not like this. Not in fear. “This isn’t fair. Why is this happening to me?”
“You said it yourself, Rue. You were in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
Police sirens converged on her neighborhood. Her home! Two more patrol cars pulled up at the curb. The officers poured out, guns drawn. It was like watching an action-adventure movie from inside the screen.
She swallowed her fear. “I guess this settles it. I won’t be staying at my house tonight.”
“Where will you go?”
No idea. There were friends she could call. And people who worked at her shop. But the break-in meant somebody really was after her, and she didn’t want to put a friend in danger. “I could get a motel room.”
Very gently, he touched her chin and turned her face toward him. “Come home with me.”
Her first instinct was to throw herself into his arms and shower him with grateful kisses. But the sane part of her mind objected. She barely knew Cody. “I couldn’t.”
“I live in a high-rise with a twenty-four-hour-a-day doorman and surveillance cameras. And I have an extra bedroom. And it’s not far from here.”
She didn’t understand his motivations. He’d already gone well beyond polite support. He was acting as if he really cared about her. “Why are you being so nice?”
“Call it the Christmas spirit.”
“Thank you.” She might regret this later, but right now, staying with Cody sounded like the best alternative. “And when this is over, I’m going to bake you such a huge cake. Big enough for your whole family.”
“Not the low-fat recipe,” he said.
“Pure cream and butter and imported chocolate.”
On the street, a swarm of uniforms approached her front door. She saw an officer escort the people who lived in the other half of the duplex, a young African-American couple, to safety. She owed them a cake, too.
If she dumped enough sugar and flour on this situation, it would have to get better.
AS HE UNLOCKED the door to his seventeenth-floor condo, Cody wondered if he’d gone too far in offering to let her stay at his place. Asking her for a date had been an expedient means to an end—getting close to Danny. That should have been enough. Instead, he’d waited until she was done with her police interviews. Then he’d driven her home. Now she was here at his condo. Step by step, he was proceeding down a path that wasn’t part of his agenda.
The honest truth—something he tried to consider as little as possible—was that he liked being with her. She was quirky and made unexpected moves. Her lack of polish was refreshing.
She dropped her overnight bag and walked across the carpet into the sunken living room, then skipped up the stair to the wall of windows overlooking the lights of Denver and the mountains beyond.
“The penthouse,” she said. “Classy.”
In spite of everything that had happened to her in the past hours, she beamed a wide grin. Most women would be fearful and traumatized, but not Rue.
“You’re handling this well,” he said.
“No point in dwelling on something that can’t be fixed.”
“Your house was trashed. And you’re not scared?”
“When you grow up like I did, moving around and changing families, you learn how to keep your problems to yourself.”
She sure as hell didn’t look like a woman of mystery, but she was an enigma. He wanted to know her secrets and to find out what made her tick.
“Can I get you something to drink?” he asked. “Water? Herbal tea?”
“Vodka with a splash of juice. Any kind of juice.”
Again, unexpected.
She followed him into the kitchen where she gushed over his double-sided refrigerator, inspected the inside of the oven and told him exactly how his top-of-the-line appliances were capable of performing.
He prepared the same drink for himself and handed her a tumbler with vodka, ice and orange juice. He held up his glass in a toast. “Here’s to better luck.”
“Being in the right place at the right time.”
When he gazed into her greenish-blue eyes, he saw a glimmer of sensuality. She tossed her head, sending a ripple through her long chestnut hair. Those thick strands would slip through his fingers like the finest silk.
A warmth generated between them. Not cozy or comfortable, this was a purely sensual heat. Acting on this urge would be insanity. He wasn’t really dating Rue and wasn’t looking for a relationship. He didn’t want to lead her on.
Turning away from her, he set his drink on the polished granite countertop that separated his kitchen from the living room.
“I feel safe here,” she said.
“Good.”
“But I’m still angry.” Her tone sharpened, reminding him of her mother. “I want the guy who did this to suffer.”
“I don’t blame you.”
The damage at her house had been mostly malicious—obviously meant as a warning. The intruder had slashed the cushions on her flowered sofa, had pulled books off the shelves and had broken all kinds of glassware. Her closets and drawers had been emptied into a pile on the floor. Some of the fabrics were torn. She’d been lucky to find the long-sleeved T-shirt and a pair of jeans that she’d changed into, along with a few other things.
“That creep touched my clothes,” she said. “Even this shirt I have on. I want to burn every stitch so I won’t be reminded. He stabbed my sofa. And you want to know the worst part? The very worst? He used my chef’s knives to do it.”
“Why is that so bad?”
“I use those knives for cooking. Baking cakes is my favorite thing, but I love all kinds of cooking, from vegetarian quiche to rack of lamb. I’ll never be able to touch those knives without thinking of him. Some faceless man in a hooded sweatshirt. A murderer.”
“He won’t get away with it. You saw how fast the cops responded. Every officer in Denver is after this guy.”
“Which doesn’t mean he’ll be caught.”
Cody knew from experience that was a true statement. His father’s killer had never