smaller, so maybe it was a foreign make.”
“Anything else you can remember?”
Jerry thought about it for a while, then shrugged. “She was really nice to me,” he offered.
“All right,” Dec said. “I want you to keep this between me and you. Don’t tell anyone else. Do I have your promise on that? I’m going to call someone from my firm over to see if you can pick out a photo of the type of car it was, or maybe make a drawing. Will you do that?”
“Only if you promise to give Dr. Devine that letter,” Jerry said.
“All right. But I’m going to read it first.”
A flush crept up the young man’s cheeks. “Sure. I guess.”
Dec made a quick phone call to the investigator he’d assigned to Rachel’s case, then turned and walked back to the control room. He slipped through the door and took a seat in the shadows again. Rachel’s voice came over the station speakers as she explained the proper and improper ways for men to masturbate. Dec hadn’t realized there was an improper way, but then he learned something new from Rachel every day.
Finally, he had something new to offer her. Her stalker wasn’t a man, but a woman. His buddy at the FBI had been right all along. So that seriously cut down on the number of suspects they were looking at.
This woman had struck at the university, at the radio station and at Rachel’s home. There had to be a way to connect all these dots, Dec mused. Somehow, he sensed that if he’d been working on the case full time and not spending his time protecting Rachel, he’d have been able to work this out. But his mind had been completely distracted by her.
The best thing to do would be to put a different detail on her, give her another bodyguard so he could go back to doing what he did best-investigating. But the thought of putting Rachel into someone else’s care, even one of his own guys’, wasn’t really an option.
For now, he’d have to do both jobs, starting with a thorough interview with Rachel. He was beginning to think her stalker knew her well, that there was a reason beyond just some crazy obsession that she was doing this. Rachel couldn’t know that many women personally, and of those she knew, how many of them could she have angered enough for someone to want to take revenge.
The minute he got her home, they’d begin. And he wouldn’t stop questioning her until he was sure he knew everything about her.
9
RACHEL ROLLED OVER IN BED, then pushed up on her elbow and shoved her hair out of her face. A persistent ringing had drawn her out of a deep sleep. As she looked around, she realized the sound was coming from Dec’s jeans, which were draped over the end of the bed.
Dec was lying beside her, his naked body sprawled across the mattress. She loved the way he slept, completely vulnerable, his body open to her touch. He was always so watchful when he was awake, but asleep, he let down his guard and she could get a sense of the man he’d be once he didn’t have to protect her anymore.
They’d been sleeping together like this for three nights now, discarding the last pretenses of propriety. They’d both accepted the fact they were sharing a very intense sexual relationship and in order to continue that, it was best if they shared a bed every night.
Sleeping in his arms, his long, lean body curled against hers, gave her a wonderful sense of security. And she liked having him there to touch and to kiss when her dreams woke her up. The nightmares had eased, but Rachel still had strange dreams, fitful images of danger that often made her wake up trembling.
But he was with her now and all she needed was to snuggle against his body to know that she was safe. She did that, throwing her arm around his waist and kissing his bicep.
Dec shifted, then opened his eyes and looked at her. A tiny smile curled the corners of his mouth and he groaned softly. “Morning.”
“Your cell phone was ringing,” she murmured.
He flopped back into the pillow and groaned again. “What time is it?”
“Close to nine,” she said.
“Why did we sleep so late?”
“Because we didn’t get to sleep until three in the morning,” Rachel said.
He grinned and gave her a satisfied chuckle. “Yeah, you’re right. I remember now. You were trying to convince me that your tongue was better for seduction than my hands. How did that work out? Who ended up being right?”
Rachel leaned forward and drew his nipple into her mouth, teasing at it with her tongue. “Me. You just have to admit that I know more about sex than you do.”
“Book knowledge,” he said. “I’m more of a hands-on kind of guy.”
“Just how many women have you slept with?” she asked.
“You really want to know?” he asked.
Rachel nodded. “I don’t think you’d be able to surprise me. And I probably could give it a good guess.”
“I’ll tell you,” he said. “Just one.”
“One?”
He nodded. “You. You’re the only one. The rest, they don’t count because it was never the way it is with you. That was just…gratification. This is incredible, crazy, intense sex. There’s a big difference.” He dropped a kiss on her lips. “So how many men have you slept with?”
“One,” she said with a playful smile.
“We’re damn near virgins then, aren’t we,” Dec said.
His phone rang again and Dec cursed softly. “I should get it,” he said.
“I’ll get it for you,” Rachel said. “I’m going to go make some coffee.” She crawled over top of him then found her robe and wrapped it around her naked body. On the way to the door, she grabbed his phone out of his jeans and tossed it over to him. “One of these days, you should probably go in to your office,” she said. “I don’t want your employees to think I’ve turned you into my own personal sex slave.”
“Now there’s a fantasy we have to explore,” Dec teased.
Rachel stopped in the bathroom to brush her teeth, then looked at herself in the mirror. She couldn’t help but smile. This had become her life, here in this house, with Dec. She didn’t even miss her own place and had only made quick visits home to pick up some clothes and the mail.
She reached out and set her toothbrush on the edge of the sink next to Dec’s. Her make-up bag had a place on a shelf above the toilet, and her shampoo and conditioner sat on the bench in the shower stall beside Dec’s.
This was what it was like to have a real relationship, one that was going somewhere. But even the growing familiarity between them hadn’t entirely dispelled her doubts. What would happen once her stalker was caught? They obviously wouldn’t spend their days together. Dec had a job and so did she. And they wouldn’t need to live together. He’d probably want his privacy back. Would they go back to a more traditional relationship-dinners together during the week, a couple overnight stays and weekends spent together? She wouldn’t be disappointed by that. But she’d grown fond of this closeness they’d developed and the intimacies that had followed.
She walked through the kitchen and opened the cupboard where Dec kept the coffee. She poured a good measure into the filter, then grabbed the pot to fill it with cold water. It was such a mundane task, Rachel thought, but satisfying. Once the coffee was done, she and Dec would relax in bed and read the morning paper. Yesterday they’d made love before getting in the shower together. Today, she wasn’t sure what would happen and she liked that.
When she returned to the bedroom with the coffee and the paper, Dec was sitting up, his legs hanging over the side of the bed, a frown on his face.
“What’s wrong?” she asked.
“That was my office. One of the investigators I put on your case turned up something.”
“What?” she asked.
“One of your clients was arrested last year for stalking. Her name is Janice Krandall. What can you tell me about her?”
