“I want you to know, Mr. Fisher, that I’m going to let Rogue take very good care of me. Also, I don’t think she’ll allow me to be hurt either.” Dad laughed and shook hands with Quin. After telling him to call him Roger, they settled down for a short but very needed talk. “You’ll stay with us, of course. We have plenty of room and enough family around that you won’t feel like a stranger at any time.”
“I’d like that. If it’s no trouble.” Quin assured her dad that it wouldn’t be. “Thank you, young man. You’re just about what I expected for this one. A good man with a heart big enough to accept her challenges. She has a few too. I’ll tell you about them sometime.”
Showing her parents to their room, Quin held her hand as they walked to the living room again. Lily and her family went to their new home. The others had left just before her parents had been shown their rooms. Quin walked her to the living room and sat down on the floor in front of her. She was nervous about what he was going to tell her.
“Don’t think the worst. All right?” She told him she’d try. “I’m in love with you. It’s not been a gradual thing like I expected, but is hitting me right in my heart, so there was never going to be any room for anyone else. I know we have a long way to go in getting to know each other. But I would very much like for you to consider marrying me, for a lot of reasons. One of them is that I love you, but also because I need to know you’re mine. Forever.”
“Yes.” He laughed and asked her what she meant. “Yes, I’ll marry you. I love you as well. And like you, it was sort of like a slap in the face that I’m sitting in this big house with you and not enjoying all the benefits we could be sharing.”
“Do you mean sleeping with me?” She asked him if he really thought there would be any sleeping going on. “No. Not much anyway. Christ, you have no idea how…well, maybe you do. I’ll race you upstairs.”
~*~
Quin wasn’t mad. Not anymore. He was intrigued with what Rogue was doing at the crime scene she was working. While he didn’t speak to her, he had a feeling she was getting more than she usually did as she stood over the bodies of three men with her camera pointed at them. Finally, when she looked at him, she asked the lead detective if she could have just a moment.
The phone call had come for Rogue almost as soon as they stepped into their bedroom. It was an emergency—in another state. She was to meet them in the back field in five minutes, or the police would come and get her. They opted for the chopper. Quin was happy when she said he was coming with her.
“Sure, Agent. You go right ahead. It’s not like they’re going anywhere.” She glared at the younger man, and he shook his head and told her he was sorry. “I’m as sorry as I can be, ma’am. I’m new at this sort of scene and making jokes, however inappropriate, is my way of dealing with it. I swear I’ll work on it from now on. I’m sorry. You go on ahead and take as long as you want. We’ll wait for you.”
She laid her camera on the table that had been set up for her. There were other pieces of equipment on the table—he recognized very little of it. When they were far enough away that he supposed they could talk, she put her head on his chest and spoke quietly.
“I can smell the person who did this. I don’t know who it is, but I have a feeling I could find them if they were to walk past me. Not only that, but I can see things on the bodies that are giving me the willies.” He asked her what she saw. “Fingerprints. I can see them as clearly as I can see you standing right here. Also, this is the worst. I can see not only how they were murdered but the order in which he cut them up and killed them. I’m not sure what to do with this, Quin. It’s really important stuff, but I can’t just tell them it’s new to me too, and this is what I can see.”
“Take the pictures.” She looked up at him. “Just take the pictures that you do and make observations as you go. Sort of like hinting, but more than that. Point out things you say you find on the camera lens, but it’s really just you seeing it.”
“I don’t understand.” Quin tried to think of a way to explain it to her without being more confusing. “Are you saying I should fudge it up? Tell them there are markings where I see prints, and I want them dusted? I can do that. Yeah, I can do that. Thanks.” She kissed him and went back to work.
“Doctor Foster?” He turned and looked at the man standing not five feet from him. “I didn’t mean to listen in, but I can help her too if she’ll allow it.”
“That’ll be up to her, I’m thinking.” The man, an Agent Carlson with the Feds, nodded. “You’re a bear, correct?”
“Yes. Most of the people I work with are aware of it. Also that I can smell out things they normally wouldn’t be able to. That’s why I was assigned to Doctor Foster.” He smiled. “I’m betting that gets confusing at your house. But she doesn’t know. She might now, but she hadn’t known that I was also here to protect her.”
“I can’t thank you enough for that. But as for you helping her, I
