LITMIR.BIZ

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he was still on his game. “Chief Taylor wanted me to run through some safety precautions with you—make sure you’re all ready to go for Monday, or whenever you get called to the stand.”

      “So you are worried. You don’t think I’ll go through with this, either, do you?”

      The accusation stopped him in his tracks and Spencer turned. “This is an important case, Bailey.”

      “It’s important to me, too.” She shoved her keys into her pocket and faced off against him. “Everyone thinks I’m going to freak out on the stand or run away and hide somewhere. But I have to do this. There has to be a reason why this happened to me.”

      Spencer’s eyes narrowed at the emotion staining her cheeks. If she got worked up arguing with him, how was she going to handle it if Kenna Parker tried to rattle her on the witness stand? “That’s a lot of pressure to put on yourself.”

      “Yes. But I can handle it.”

      He pulled his hand from his pocket and tapped the fingers fisted around the strap of her purse, silently arguing her cool-under-fire argument. “Have you ever done anything like this before? Have you ever bared your fears and soul and worst nightmare in front of the man who made you afraid?”

      “No. Of course not, but...”

      He let the reality of what they were asking of her set in, and watched her cheeks pale and her gaze drop to the center of his chest. “This is going to get messy before it gets done. Are you sure you’re up for this?”

      “You’d think I’d have at least one person cheering me on and bucking up my confidence instead of telling me all the reasons why I can’t or shouldn’t do it.” She tilted her chin up, venting a mixture of temper and frustration. “Since you’ve been so obsessed with catching this guy, I would have thought you’d be in my corner. But you’re as much of a doubting Thomas as anybody else.”

      “I’m not the kind of man to give pep talks, Bailey.” As Bailey’s voice grew louder and more animated, Spencer’s hushed, articulating every word as he dipped his head closer to hers. “There’s a lot that can happen between now and when you’re called up to that witness stand. Besides you ‘freaking out’ and deciding not to testify, there’s a possibility Brian Elliott’s accomplice may do something to try to stop you.”

      “You’re talking about The Cleaner, aren’t you?”

      “Yes, I’m talking about The Cleaner—and she’s nobody you want to mess with. You need to lock your doors and windows. Don’t go out by yourself at night. Have someone walk you to your car. Hang with people you know and trust. And if something does happen, call me or 911 before it’s too late to do anything about it.”

      With every sentence, her eyes widened and her skin cooled to a pale porcelain color. “Too late...?”

      “I’m not here to sugarcoat anything. I’m just stating the facts.”

      After an endless moment of silence she tore her gaze from his and focused her attention on buttoning her coat. “Don’t worry, detective. No one would ever mistake you for a warm and fuzzy kind of guy.” She tied her orange belt with equal fervor. “Now, was that the lecture you were supposed to give me? Watch my back and don’t be stupid? Or do you have some more doom and gloom you’d like to share? Let’s get it over with because I really do need to get home and hide away in my little ivory tower of naïveté and incompetence.”

      “I didn’t call you stupid.”

      “No, you’re just intimating that I can’t take care of myself.”

      Really? This defiant little show of sarcasm was supposed to convince him to trust her to close his case? Was this an attempt to show her strength? By butting heads with him? And since when did he get in anyone’s face and argue back?

      Spencer’s blood was still pumping hard through his veins when he heard a door open in the hallway behind him. He saw the shock register on Bailey’s face and instinctively went on guard against the unseen threat as he spun around.

      Two uniformed officers led Brian Elliott out of the nearby interview room. He’d changed into an expensively tailored suit and a smug untouchability that made him look more like a Forbes 500 mogul than the prisoner wearing a pair of handcuffs and ankle-band tracking device he truly was. An entourage of his attorney, Kenna Parker, and Elliott’s ex-wife, Mara Boyd-Elliott, followed behind. One a dark blonde, the other, platinum, both women wore business suits and carried winter coats and attaché cases, looking like they’d all just finished a business meeting instead of a legal debriefing.

      Spencer’s arm went out to push Bailey behind him as the group came closer. He felt her fingers curling into the back of his jacket and something inside him shifted, grew wary. When Elliott spotted Spencer, the bastard grinned in recognition. The other man slowed his stride and the soft gasp at Spencer’s back made him reach down to fold his hand around Bailey’s wrist beside him.

      “Keep walking, Elliott,” Spencer ordered.

      “Now, now, detective. I’ve missed our little chats in the interrogation room” the man taunted. “Arrest any other innocent people lately?”

      “Brian.” That was the ex, laying a hand on his shoulder. “Don’t make me regret my investment. I’m willing to support you to a point, but antagonizing the police won’t help your case.”

      Elliott shrugged off her touch. “You only posted bail so your paper could report on the trial without it looking like a personal vendetta against me.”

      Mara eased a calming sigh behind his back. “Unbiased reporting isn’t the only reason. There’s still a place in my heart for you. And I believe in...your innocence.”

      Innocence? The newspaper publisher could barely choke out the word. Spencer wondered how the woman could live with herself, putting Elliott out on the street just so she could sell more papers.

      Did he need to remind them about blood matching Elliott’s type being found at the scene of one of the assaults? Had they forgotten his DNA matching the child of a woman who claimed to have been raped by the Rose Red Rapist? Did any of them think Elliott could deny kidnapping a woman and being captured by the K-9 cop and his German Shepherd partner on Spencer’s task force?

      Spencer could easily imagine the arguments Elliott’s attorney would bring up. The blood sample had been corrupted and could match any number of suspects. The child’s birth mother, who’d never reported being raped, had had a nervous breakdown and been committed to a mental hospital, so her version of events was suspect. The abduction could be pled down to a lesser crime and argued that it was a solo occurrence, not the culmination of a reign of serial terror through the city.

      But there was no arguing away the eyewitness testimony of the courageous woman digging her fingers into his shoulder blade right now. Or Spencer’s driving need to protect the truth she represented.

      “Get him out of here, Ms. Parker.” Spencer repeated the command to move the handcuffed man.

      But when the uniformed guards urged the prisoner forward, Brian Elliott planted his feet and turned. “Wait. Do I know you, miss?”

      Bailey released her death grip on Spencer’s jacket and slid her right hand down his arm. At the brush of her chilled skin against his, he turned his palm into hers, lacing their fingers together, offering his protection and support against the man who’d terrorized her a year earlier. When she latched on to him with both hands, Spencer tightened his hold.

      Be tough, Bailey, he wanted to say. He could feel her trembling beside him. Be just as strong as you claim to be.

      Kenna Parker nudged aside one of the uniformed officers and moved in front of her client. “You shouldn’t have any contact with the opposing witnesses.”

      Damn straight.

      But Elliott ignored his attorney’s plea. “You’re Jackson Mayweather’s daughter, er, stepdaughter. I’ve had a few business dealings

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