Blazing Hotter (Love Under Fire Book 2) Read online

  Cassie easily paced him, and the smile on her face was a match for the one he felt spread across his own. For the first time since he’d met her, they were equals, walking side by side. Even the looming threat of the flowers couldn’t take away the joy he felt at that.

  They reached the table, and Cassie released his hand. “Hang on. I have some plastic gloves in the kitchen I use when I cook with peppers because they burn my skin. I’ll grab a pair so we can preserve any evidence.”

  “You’re considering going to the police, then?” Frankie didn’t know why he was surprised, except Cassie seemed like a rather stubborn person. Despite his pleas to report things to the cops, she’d consistently refused. It was no different than the way she acted when they were in the therapy room together and she thought he could do something he didn’t want to do.

  “I want to go to the shooting range first,” she clarified. “And if we can figure out who the stripper is, I want to speak with her as well. However, I really feel that someone working her ass off as an exotic dancer wouldn’t have reason to come after me for being a whore. I think a more likely scenario is this woman was hired to order the flowers, not knowing what the note she put inside them said.”

  “I tend to agree,” Frankie said. “I don’t know why you’d even come up on one of the dancers’ radars. Well, unless you stole a man from her or something.”

  Cassie snorted. “Even then, most women aren’t quite that psycho. Sure, she might confront me and punch me out or something, but this seems too elaborate for that.” She opened a drawer, pulling out a set of clear disposable gloves. “This feels more like what Kenneth did to me when I refused to speak with him.”

  “Kenneth?”

  “Kenneth Morgan, the doctor I had issues with before,” she clarified.

  Frankie nodded, wondering if she hadn’t given him the doctor’s name before on purpose because she didn’t trust him as much yesterday as she did today, or whether it was an oversight. “You never told me what ended up happening. I mean, he stalked you and then convinced the police you were the stalker, but why did it stop?”

  She shrugged, returning to the table. “Once the cops were involved, even though the entire hospital ended up making me the butt of their jokes for a while and everyone took his side, it did have the desired effect. Claiming that I was the one making threats and following him around, he couldn’t very well be caught anywhere near me after that. An occasional phone call from a number inside the hospital where the person just breathes on the other side of the line is all the more I’ve had happen since the entire thing blew up.”

  Frankie whipped his head sideways to look at her. “He still calls you?”

  She nodded. “About once a month I get one of those calls, like he’s keeping tabs on me and making sure I’m home and by myself. That’s why I feel so strongly that this is him.”

  “What would have set him off again? Why come after you now?” Frankie made a mental note to look up a picture of Kenneth Morgan at Sayle Regional’s website so he could be sure to keep an eye out for the jerk.

  “He was dating one of the nurses the past few years,” Cassie said, carefully removing the top of the box of roses. “I heard she dumped him and moved back east somewhere last month. I’m guessing with her out of reach for his craziness, he decided to return to tormenting me.”

  “How can someone that unstable be allowed to work as a physician?” Frankie ground his teeth together, frustration all but oozing from his pores.

  “He seems normal,” she replied. “The cops believed him, and now if I report anything else I seem like an insane person. His patients love him, so obviously he’s able to handle both aspects of his weird assed personality.”

  “The murders started after Morgan’s girlfriend left him,” he said, thinking it over. “What if her leaving unhinged him just that little push he needed to go from stalker to killer?”

  “And what?” She looked up, her eyebrows scrunched down and anger plain to read on her face. “He’s killing girls who look like me as surrogates because I’m the one he really wants to kill? Well, and Lynn looks a lot like me. It might be that he wants to kill me because of that.”

  Lynn must be the ex-girlfriend. It made sense. The man’s girlfriend left him and he couldn’t reach her across the country. However, the woman who had scorned him all those years ago and tried to make a fool of him with the police, the one he still checked up on and who looked similar to his ex, was in town where he could get to her.

  A piece of white paper was visible through the stems of the thorny roses. Frankie pointed at it. “Read the note, and then let’s watch the recordings from last night. Whether you want to or not, it’s time to go to the cops. We have proof this time, so they can’t ignore you.”

  ***

  Cassie knew Frankie was right. It was reckless to think she could handle this by herself. She might not trust the cops, and she still wanted to investigate this on her own, but she’d have to let them in on it.

  Grabbing her cell phone, she took pictures of the roses and the letter poking out from between the long stems before removing the small envelope.

  After taking a deep breath, Cassie opened it, unsurprised to see the same red skull and crossbones symbol drawn at the top. Clearing her throat, she read the card out loud to Frankie. “You think you can bring a man home and let him into your bed, whore? Get him out of there now or I’ll take care of that crippled prick myself.”

  Frankie let out a long hiss of air. “Guess I don’t deserve a poem, huh?”

  “Shit, Frankie.” Cassie blinked back tears, refusing to let some jerk who wanted to scare her succeed. She wouldn’t cry and give him the satisfaction of that. Even if she trembled on the inside, whoever was doing this to her would never know it. “Maybe we should move you back to the rehab center.”

  “Yeah, right. I’m not leaving you alone, Cassie. We’re in this together. Until we catch the person behind this, I’m not leaving your side.”

  Carefully, she placed the note back inside its envelope and put the entire thing into the box. She then stripped off her gloves before turning to Frankie. “I can’t handle it if something happens to you because of me.”

  “Then we’re even. I can’t handle it if something happens to you because I’m not here to help protect you.” He turned his chair to the side, readjusting it before holding out his arms. “Come here.”

  Not needing more invitation than that, Cassie launched herself at him, allowing him to hold her close. Relief descended down on her, knowing she could count on him. While she didn’t want him caught in the middle of her mess, it was obvious Frankie didn’t think of this as a problem she needed to handle on her own.

  There had only been one other man in her life she could ever trust, and that had been her stepbrother, who was there for her no matter what was going on. Early in life, she learned that dads left to never be heard from again, boyfriends got pissed off when you didn’t spread your legs in the back seat of their cars, and in general, men thought their shit was more important than hers. Her stepbrother was the only one who ever stood by her no matter what was going on.

  Now, it looked like she had someone else who would be there. And there was no way she’d let Kenneth Morgan do something to take Frankie from her. Time might do that on its own. Maybe she and Frankie would decide they really had nothing in common other than lust and a desire to help each other, with the romance side fizzling out, but Kenneth Morgan would not control the situation or dictate the time she and Frankie spent together.

  She laid a kiss on his neck before pulling back from his warm arms. “You’re a different man than I imagined you’d be.”

  A grin twitched at the corners of his mouth. “Is that a good thing or a bad thing?”

  “A good thing,” she said. “I trust you, Frankie, more than I think I’ve been able to trust anyone in a long time. I’m glad you’re stubborn enough to demand to come with me. And you’re entirely right about the cops. Let’s wat
ch the video, then take it with us to the firing range along with the flowers and notes. We’ll stop by the police station on our way back, giving them the information before we try to track down whoever the dancer is that ordered the first set of flowers.”

  “You’re going to trust the police force?” he asked, obviously surprised.

  She shook her head. “I don’t trust them, but I trust you. If you think that’s what we need to do, I’ll do it. That said, I still want to investigate on our own, find out whatever we can.”

  “Our first compromise?” he asked. “Back when my parents were, well, together, they always said the sign of a great relationship was being able to talk to each other and compromise. I like where this is headed.”

  Cassie shook her head and punched him lightly in the chest. “Don’t get ahead of yourself, Romeo. Now we’re both being threatened by this nut. Relationship conversations will have to wait.”

  Chapter Ten

  Frankie stood behind Cassie at the firing range, loving the functions of his new chair. He brushed his fingers lightly against her neck. All innocent enough as he moved her hair behind her shoulder, but he didn’t miss the slight tremble that went through her body at his touch. She could say what she wanted about waiting, but Cassie wanted him as much as he wanted her.

  “Spread your legs more,” he said. “This gun has a bit of a kick, so you want your stance to be secure.”

  “Is it going to come back and hit me in the face or something?” Her wry laugh let him know she wasn’t too concerned about that.

  “Only if you totally relaxed your arms, and even then I don’t think it would be that bad. Remember what I told you about how to hold it.”

  Cassie adjusted her grip slightly, sliding her left thumb upward. “Like this?”

  “Exactly. Now line that target up in your sights. Remember the kick will throw your aim off slightly, so it takes a little practice. Don’t worry if you miss the target the first time.”

  “Yeah, right,” she muttered almost too quietly for him to hear. “The only thing I’m worried about making me miss is your hot breath on my neck.”

  Satisfied with the effect he’d had on her, Frankie hooked her earphones back down on her ear and bumped the control of his chair to back away. “Just squeeze the trigger gently until it fires,” he said loudly. “Don’t be afraid.”

  Well, not afraid of the gun anyway. Unfortunately, despite all their surveillance and precautions to catch the person sending her threats, what they caught on the camera was nearly useless. Maybe the cops had a way to clean up the video and get a clearer picture, but from what Frankie saw, whoever was stalking Cassie knew what he was doing.

  The person came in the early morning, just as the sun rose. It was already light enough outside that the motion-sensed lights didn’t make a difference in the level of visibility, and the rays of the weak morning sun did more to hid the shadowy figure that stole across the yard than the person’s nondescript black sweatshirt with the hood pulled tight around their face.

  The entire delivery took a matter of seconds, all caught on the camera, but it was impossible to tell if the person was male or female. If they had a car somewhere, it was off camera and no one drove past the house until nearly an hour after the delivery. There was really nothing to go on, but at least the cops could see how shady the person was who brought the flowers. Well, other than the notes inside both sets of flowers, which should hopefully convince them that Cassie was telling the truth.

  It still pissed Frankie off that they’d taken Kenneth Morgan’s version of what happened as the truth in the past. Probably just because the prick was a doctor. Maybe even a friend of someone on the force.

  Frankie wouldn’t let them dismiss Cassie this time. They would do their damn jobs. If they refused, it wasn’t like he didn’t have friends in high places after the fiasco last year with the arsonist. The new mayor essentially owed her job to Thayne and Frankie. He was sure she’d be willing to put pressure on the cops to do their job if they weren’t inclined to do it on their own.

  After a few more seconds, Cassie raised the barrel of her gun slightly higher, the loud shot penetrated his noise-canceling headphones, and a small hole appeared in Cassie’s man-shaped target right near the X on the chest.

  Frankie expected her to have a momentary freak out after her first successful shot, but Cassie merely tightened her grip on the gun and continued successive shots until the clip was empty. Setting the gun on the partition between the firing box and the range, she pushed the button to bring her target back in from its twenty-five-foot position.

  “Are you sure you’ve never shot before?” Frankie asked, staring at how many of the bullets hit their mark. Five of the ten holes in the paper were within range of the chest. The others went wide but still hit the paper man.

  Cassie removed her earphones, shrugging as she turned around and brushed hair behind her ear. “I’ve never shot, but I do understand how things work. I’m confident I’ll be able to hit what I’m aiming for. The real question is whether or not I can pull the trigger if there’s a person on the other side of my gun.” She shook her head and stared down out her hands, which Frankie noted shook slightly. “Even to save my own life, that seems like more than I can handle.”

  He reached out to enclose her trembling hands in his. “This is a precaution. You’ll probably never have to shoot that gun, but I want you to know how. Truthfully, you’re a better shot than most people, and I know you’ll be better than me. I’ve never used my left hand before, but I’m hoping if the need arises for me to use a gun, I’ll be okay at close range.”

  “You’re right. This is just in case, not because you think I’ll have to use it. I’m glad you’re teaching me. Especially with the new...” Cassie’s eyes went wide and she shrugged. “You know.”

  He did know. The new threat had them both more freaked out. At least it had knocked sense into Cassie and she was now willing to make a report. There was a difference between not trusting the cops and being plain stupid. He was happy to see she understood that difference and was every bit as smart as he always thought she was.

  Cassie pulled her hands from his grasp and turned around, replacing the target with a new one with a greater air of confidence. “Your dad loaded three different clips, and I’m sure I can figure out how to reload them for you so practice all you need.” She pressed the button, sending the target out half the distance from where she had practiced. “Let’s see what you got.”

  She stepped out of his way, and Frankie nudged the control of the wheelchair to get him into place. When he first planned to come to the firing range, he figured he’d be stuck sitting down and struggling to look over the top of the lower partition in the spot designated for differently-abled people. This chair made a huge difference. He could stand beside Cassie, as an equal. Sure, the straps beneath his armpits that did most of the work of holding him upright put pressure against his arms and he couldn’t stand like this indefinitely, but it was a vast improvement to what he’d expected. Cassie really was the most remarkable woman, more practical and thoughtful than he’d imagined her to be.

  With a shaking hand, he held the gun in the awkward grip of his left hand. The barrel jerked around so much, Frankie knew he didn’t have a chance of coming close to the target, even with the shorter distance. In the past, he never cared what Cassie thought of him, whether she believed him to be less of a man for not being able to do the things she asked of him. Now, everything had changed. He wanted to be the man she could count on. Was that possible if he couldn’t even manage to squeeze out one bullet from a damn gun?

  Suddenly, Cassie was beside him, pulling back his ear protection. Her hot breath rushed against his ear and neck. “You’ve got this, Frank. I know you can do it. You learned to eat with that left hand and everything else that you really need to be able to do. You’re one of the strongest men I’ve ever met, living through what you have, and I know you can figure this out too.”

  She
replaced the earphone and he sensed more than saw her back away. The warmth of her words stayed with him, though, echoing throughout his mind.

  He took a deep breath, forcing his hand to steady. She believed in him, and regardless of the mistakes he’d made in the past, he believed in himself too.

  His right hand might be nearly defunct, but that didn’t mean it couldn’t help out some. Frankie raised it, ignoring the shooting nerve pain that traveled along his arm when he moved it. Holding it against the butt of the gun, he used his palm to press against it, stopping the trembling of the barrel.

  After another deep breath, Frankie looked down the sights along the top of the pistol, raised it up slightly, and slowly depressed his left index finger against the trigger. The recoil, mild as it was in the lower caliber gun, jerked it nearly out of his grasp, but he recovered control before looking at the target.

  “You did it!” Cassie’s muffled voice sounded full of excitement. “You hit it!”

  She might be excited, but Frankie had only hit the blank white paper at the top of the target, not the figure. He could do better than that. He had too.

  Taking another breath, Frankie steadied the gun between his hands and continued firing.

  ***

  “I’m so proud of us.” Cassie grinned at Frankie as she lowered the lift to his new van. “We’re bad asses.”

  Frankie laughed, just like she’d hoped he would. For a few minutes there, she hadn’t been sure he’d try to fire his weapon. It wouldn’t have been the first time he refused to do something, simply because he wasn’t sure he’d be successful. This new side to him, the one willing to do whatever it took to protect her, was exciting and only made her attraction to him grow.

  It was one thing to have a crush on a vulnerable man who depended on her and needed her help. That had made her feel rather dirty and unethical. However, the new and improved Frankie was not an injured bird in need of her care. Cassie liked the changes.