Yuletide Protector (Love Inspired Suspense) (9 page)

“He wouldn’t say. But I gave him what I had saved for the house and he used that. It was almost twenty thousand dollars at that point.”

Kevin whistled in surprise.

“I know. I’d been saving for a while.” She shrugged off the memory of turning over the money to her ex-husband. They’d been married. Of course what was hers was his. Even after all this time she had to fight to keep her anger over the whole thing from souring her mood.

“I’m going to be a few minutes in here,” she said. “Why don’t you take my mug and bring it into the living room and I’ll be there in a few minutes.”

“Okay,” he said quietly. He took the mug from her hand and left the kitchen.

Daria closed her eyes, relishing the moment alone. Kevin was trying to help her put George behind bars and keep her safe. But she didn’t want to have to relive the mistakes of her past to do it. She didn’t want to talk about her marriage to George. She wanted to have a
simple night where she didn’t need to be afraid. She wanted to be happy in her own home again and enjoy the company of the man who made her smile.

Kevin had a smile that was warm and genuine and put her at ease. She should be terrified out of her mind after hearing the things George had said and done. But with Kevin, she wasn’t.

She chose one of her tried-and-true recipes of sweet-and-sour chicken stir-fry over white rice not only because it was quick and she could prepare it without fail, but because it was the only thing she had all the ingredients for in her kitchen.

Glancing in the living room, she saw Kevin had taken her up on her suggestion about putting his feet up. The prospect of sitting on the sofa with Kevin, just talking for a while, was inviting. She wanted to know the man, not just the cop. She wanted to talk like normal people do, about normal insignificant things that had nothing to do with murder or danger.

Kevin wanted to talk about George. She’d meet him halfway. If there was something in her brain that he could use to put George behind bars and end this craziness, she’d have to find it. But she had no idea what that might be.

With dinner simmering, she wiped her hands with the dish towel and strode into the living room to grab her root beer.

She stopped short at the door.

Still clad in his black jacket, Kevin rested with his body reclined back and his head slightly tilted to one side. One foot was propped up on the coffee table, the other limply rested on the floor. His eyes were closed and his mouth was slightly parted. Relaxed in sleep as he was, Daria found it hard to tear her gaze from him.
He had to be dead on his feet. How could he possibly keep up the pace that he’d been maintaining these last few days? He looked so peaceful that Daria questioned whether she should even enter the room for fear she’d disturb him.

But she did. She couldn’t help herself. Kevin had only been inside her home a few times. Each time for just a short while and each time under strained circumstances. Kicked back on her sofa, he looked as if he belonged here. Almost as much as she belonged here herself. She wanted to get closer, enjoy the sight fully.

Letting out a slow breath, she gently sat down on the sofa, keeping enough distance from Kevin so as not to disturb his sleep.

Guilt stabbed at her. It was her fault he was so exhausted. She thought the loan would help her get away for a little while, but that hadn’t worked out. She’d have to find another way.

She looked at the tree propped against the window. This Christmas was her first of what she’d hoped would be many Christmases in this house. And regardless of whether or not George still meant her harm, it looked as though she would be spending Christmas here. Alone. She couldn’t expect Kevin or any of the other police officers Kevin had counted on these last few days to give up their Christmas for her. And it was only a matter of time before Kevin’s body and his bank account would give out on him. There had to be another way. She just had to find it.

T
he steady drone of a drill penetrated Kevin’s mind like a piece of wood splintering apart. He opened his eyes to the shock of light blinding him from the wrought-iron lamp on the end table. Confusion made him dizzy until his eyes focused enough to register his whereabouts.

Shielding his eyes, he took in the room and remembered. He’d come into Daria’s house for dinner. A quick glance out the window showed that it was dark outside and it was still snowing. Out the window, the light from the street lamp shone down on crystal flakes that were still falling heavily. They’d probably have a good amount of snow on the ground before tonight’s storm was over.

One foot was propped up on the coffee table, the other on the floor. His mug of root beer rested on a white napkin next to the foot resting on the coffee table. The napkin was now saturated from dripping condensation. A large bowl of already strung popcorn garland lay next to it. Daria was nowhere to be seen.

Rubbing his face, Kevin realized he must have dozed off before dinner had even begun. There was no use beating himself up over it. He knew it was only a matter
of time before his body gave out from running on practically no sleep. Although he’d worked many double shifts on cases before, and sat long hours on stakeouts, nothing had drained his energy quite as much as this case.

This one was different. There was no secret who the perpetrator was or the motive behind his actions. The only missing piece was evidence to nail him.

Kevin put in the hours at work, diligently combing through files, checking on leads that would give him even the smallest nugget of information about George Carlisle, anything that could help make an arrest against him for any crime stick. And while he kept his mind focused on his duty, there were visions of Daria meeting the same fate Lucy had.

He wouldn’t let that happen. He’d do everything in his power to make sure Daria was safe from harm.

And he’d fallen asleep.
Good going, Gordon.

He closed his eyes and offered up a prayer. Speaking softly he said, “Lord, I’m only one man. Obviously not nearly strong enough to carry this load alone.” He continued his prayer to watch over Daria’s home and for the Lord to give him wisdom and strength.

As Kevin finished, he thought of Daria smiling in the kitchen earlier when he brought in the Christmas tree. He couldn’t deny there were feelings that went deep. Her smile played in his mind while he was sitting out in his SUV or when he was checking around the house in the early hours, just to give him something to do and keep himself warm.

A man’s heart deviseth his way: but the Lord direct-eth his step.
He needed direction on this one. The more contact he had with Daria, the more he was drawn to her.

As if his dreams had willed her back from wherever
she’d been, Daria appeared at the doorway. The sweatshirt she was wearing had definitely seen better days. It must have been adorned with a college logo at one time or another, but constant wear and laundering had worn off most of the decal. In addition, paint stains were splattered down the front. The loose, faded blue jeans were just as well-worn and abused. The only thing that seemed untouched by paint were the white socks that were now slouched around her ankles.

“You’re awake. I hope I didn’t disturb you. I just thought I heard you talking when I turned off the drill.”

She’d heard him in prayer. And by the warm look on her face, she’d heard his words. Kevin had never been shy about showing his faith. Yet he never pushed it on someone who wasn’t open to receiving God’s grace. Daria’s curiosity was overwhelming and free of the judgment he sometimes saw in other nonbelievers. It gave him hope.

“I’m sorry I fell asleep on you. I hardly remember sitting back on the sofa before waking up.”

“Despite the age and appearance, the sofa is comfortable. I should know. I slept many nights on it before I was able to afford the bed.”

“You don’t have to let me off so easy.”

The smile he’d seen when he woke up was now replaced with a frown. “You can’t keep this up, you know. Even you have to see that.”

Daria must have thrown an afghan over him while he slept. As Kevin lifted himself to a seated position, the blanket fell until it was half on the sofa and half on the floor. He picked it up, taking in the scent of it as it drifted to him. It smelled like Daria.

He made a tired attempt at folding the blanket, and
set it next to him. But it ended up looking like a crumpled ball.

“I’ll be fine. I just needed a catnap.”

Daria leaned against the doorjamb. “I kept dinner warm. I figured you’d wake up at some point and be famished.”

He scrubbed his hand over his face. “What time is it?”

“Around ten-thirty or so. Maybe later.”

“Wow. I didn’t mean to sleep that long.”

“I found the Christmas decorations upstairs. There’s not nearly as much as I thought I had. So the tree will be a little bare. But I strung some popcorn, and Christmas-tree lights always make a tree look festive.”

“You dressed like that for popcorn garland?”

She quickly glanced down at her sweatshirt and made a face. “I finished quick, then got a little sidetracked working on the bathroom.”

Kevin looked at her quickly and blinked. “I can’t believe I’ve been asleep for four hours.”

“You were exhausted. I’ll get your dinner.” Daria scuffed her socked feet against the floor as she made her way to the kitchen.

Kevin started to follow on her heels and looked back at the tree propped up against the window.

“Why don’t I get the Christmas tree set in the stand while you get that plate?”

He was starving. But he didn’t want to eat his dinner while she watched. Getting the tree ready would give Daria the opportunity to decorate the tree while he ate.

Within a few minutes Kevin was on his knees tightening the last screw against the tree trunk. The smell of hot food had his stomach growling.

“It’s crooked,” Daria said, putting his dinner plate on the coffee table.

“I know,” he said, climbing out from under the branches. “But the tree is crooked so if you try to straighten it, it’ll be too heavy and off balance anyway. This is the best I can do to keep it standing.”

“Oh. I wasn’t paying too much attention to how straight it was. I just wanted a nice tall tree that was full.”

Kevin brushed the pine needles from his shoulder. “You got that.”

He pointed to the plate that seemed to be calling out to him. “Do you mind if I dig in while you decorate?”

“Knock yourself out. But you’re not off the hook. I want you to help me when you’re finished.”

Daria felt giddy as she rummaged through the box of decorations. The room seemed to come alive again now that Kevin had woken up from his nap on the sofa. All the same, it was hard to keep from feeling guilty for wanting his company when he so clearly needed the rest.

Daria liked seeing him sleep, but liked even more when he was awake and she could gaze into his expressive eyes. She loved his eyes—their depth, crystal-blue color and the light that danced in them when he looked back at her. His hair was still tousled from sleep. Strands of gold and brown had fallen forward, giving him a rumpled look. The effect was completely adorable.

She’d been happy living alone in this house. Or so she’d thought until Kevin had shown up. In truth, she’d kept herself too busy to think about loneliness. It wasn’t until she was sitting beside Kevin as he slept that she realized just how empty the house felt.

Shaking off the feeling enveloping her, she settled on
the box of Christmas decorations she’d pulled out of the attic and began searching for the lights.

Without a word, Kevin sat down on the sofa and gave his attention to the dish she’d placed on the coffee table.

“Aren’t you going to eat?”

“I ate earlier.”

Funny how in the last six months she’d been alone here. But tonight, for the first time since she’d moved in, her house breathed with life. It felt like a real home.

“What made you decide to buy this beat-up old place anyway?”

She lifted an eyebrow in challenge. “Why? You don’t like my house?”

Kevin chuckled, wiping his mouth with his napkin. “I can see I’m going to have to tread lightly on this subject. All I meant is there is a lot of work here for one person. And it looks like you’re doing most of it yourself. That has to be hard.”

“You don’t think I can handle it?”

“I think you can handle pretty much anything you put your mind to. I just can’t figure why you’d want to bother with all this work in such a big house. Why not a smaller house that was move-in ready?”

She looked at him wistfully as she set another wound-up strand of lights on the chair by the tree. Satisfied she’d found all the lights, she put the box down on the floor.

“There’s something about getting your hands dirty, building your own space to call home. It may not look like much now, but it’s shaping up to be a nice home. One day I hope it’s filled with a lot of kids.”

“You planning on having a husband with those kids?”

“That’s the plan. But not for a while.” She sighed,
pulling at the first string of lights to untangle it. “There’s a lot I need to get through before that can happen.”

He nodded his understanding. How could she even think of having a husband and family while George was after her? She hated the idea that her life was on hold this way, especially when she wanted to explore the possibility of something more with the man sitting in her living room right now.

Kevin seemed oblivious to her musing.

“At most I think I’ve lived in three different places my whole life,” he said. “And the first one had no space at all. It was probably the size of your kitchen and living room total. When I was real young, I shared a room that was about the size of a broom closet with my older sister, Judy.”

“You must have hated that.”

He shrugged, watching as she struggled in vain to untangle what was a massive nest of Christmas-tree lights. “It wasn’t so much sharing space as fighting for it. Between my sister’s mountain of stuffed animals and her endless supply of perfume and girlie things, I barely had an inch of space to my name. I still don’t know what half of that stuff was.”

“We girls do tend to collect things.”

In frustration, she gave up on the string of lights she’d been working on that refused to come untangled and picked up the next set, holding one end and bouncing them up and down in the hopes they’d fall loose.

“When Mom married my stepdad,” Kevin continued, “we moved into a house in a neighborhood a lot like this one. I was about eleven then. It’s actually not all that far from here.”

“Really? Do your parents still live there?”

“No. They moved down south. Dad couldn’t take the cold and he likes his fishing. He can do that year-round in Florida.” He dropped his fork on the empty plate along with the crumpled napkin. “This was really good. Thanks.”

Kevin started to get up with the plate still in his hand, but she waved him back.

“Leave it there. I’ll get it later when I finish the rest of the dishes.”

Kevin settled back on the sofa, rubbing his stomach as if he was satisfied.

Daria smiled. “Tell me more about your family.”

“Dad married Mom when I was eleven. I wasn’t too happy about it at the time. I figured I’d lived without a father my whole life to that point, why bother having one at all? But he raised me. He’s the only father I know.”

“You get along well with him?”

“Now I do. Not in the beginning, though,” he said, reaching across the sofa to rummage through one of the boxes she’d taken down from upstairs. One by one he pulled her carefully packed ornaments out of the box and placed them on the coffee table as he talked. “Making us a family was a hard job for my mom. But she did it. I know it’s stupid, but I sort of felt a little left out when Mom got remarried. But I think Dad knew that.”

“What changed things?”

“Sailing,” he said, a smile splitting his face. “Have you ever gone?”

Daria shook her head.

“Ah, that’s too bad. You really should sometime. There’s nothing like catching the wind and flying with it.”

He stopped what he was doing only for a brief moment. His hands went up in the air as if he was mimicking his words and he was flying. Then he went back to his task.

“I remember one day a few months after we moved to the new house I was sitting in my new room with all this space, feeling pretty pitiful because I didn’t know anyone in the neighborhood yet. I heard my stepdad pull into the driveway towing a small dinghy. Nothing special. Just an eleven-footer. They’d just bought the house and it was all he could afford. I’ll never forget the look on his face though. It was if he’d just bought the
Queen Elizabeth II.

“Mom was pretty ticked off he’d spent the money on the boat since she’d been eyeing some new furniture. Judy couldn’t have cared less about taking a sail, but me, I just about jumped on the back of that thing. I would have ridden all the way to the boat ramp sitting in the back of the trailer if I could have.”

Kevin laughed at the memory. “It was the first time me and my stepdad ever spent any real time together. Before that I was mostly afraid of him. He yelled a lot, had a short fuse where kids were concerned. He didn’t have any kids of his own and then in one fell swoop, he got two.”

“It must have frightened you when he yelled.”

“A little at first. But I quickly learned how much he cared about us. He taught me a lot, mostly about God and faith.”

She paused in her efforts to pull the lights free. “Your mom wasn’t a Christian when they got married?”

“Not when they first met. Dad used to say that Mom was looking for something and needed direction. He just pointed her in the direction of the Lord. By the time they got married she’d become a Christian. It took a little longer for me though. I credit my stepdad for bringing me to the Lord at a time in my life when most kids think they know everything and need no one.”