Protecting Her Own. Margaret Daley
to slip into place, but the sight of the damage the explosion had caused shoved his concern to the foreground. Fear spurred his heartbeat.
Lord, in spite of our history, I don’t want Cara hurt.
Climbing from his Jeep, he surveyed the quiet, well-to-do neighborhood. Several people stood on their lawns observing the commotion. His long strides ate up the distance between him and Sean, who had finished talking to a firefighter and was heading toward the gaping hole in the house.
Check to make sure she’s in one piece. Then leave.
“A gas explosion?” Connor asked, taking a whiff of the air. Nothing hinted at that, but he did smell a faint odor of sulfur as though someone had recently shot off some fireworks. Alarm bells went off in his mind. “Since C.J. had his stroke, is he still working for Global News?”
“You smell it, too, don’tcha?”
“Yup, black powder.”
“He’s still at Sunny Meadows, but if I know C.J., he’ll be back to his old desk as soon as humanly possible. He was supposed to be home today.”
“Where’s Cara?” What if she’d passed out somewhere in the house after she made the 911 call? What if there was another bomb? He quickened his steps toward the front door, which was barely hanging on its hinges.
A hand on his arm halted his progress. “I’ve called the tri-county task force’s bomb squad. Also, ATF. I don’t want anyone inside until they clear it. Even the firefighters will stay back unless a fire breaks out.”
“But Cara?” Lord, she has to be okay.
Sean tossed his head in the direction of the side of the house. “My deputy has her. He found her out back. She’s okay.”
Connor turned and saw one of the deputies and Cara making their way slowly across the lawn. For a few seconds his heartbeat pummeled against his rib cage at the disheveled sight of her—alive but hurt. He forced his emotions concerning her into a box and slammed the lid closed, searching for that professional facade so necessary for him to do his job.
The officer had his arm around Cara and supported most of her weight. The sight of tiny cuts scoring her face constricted Connor’s chest. He forced a stabilizing breath into his lungs, but the band around him contracted even more as the sounds of her coughing competed with the murmurs from the neighbors gathering. Her blue eyes were huge as though she’d been caught at a surprise birthday party. Her short russet hair, which had always been long when he’d known her before, was dusty gray to match the rest of her.
His gaze zeroed in on her full lips, the corners turned down at the moment. He could remember that when she’d smile at him, it would take over her whole expression. The knot in his gut hardened at the pain reflected in her expression.
As he neared her, he noticed the trembling in her arms dangling at her sides, the slight limp as she favored her right leg. Her owlish gaze locked with his, and for a few seconds no recognition dawned in them. Had he changed that much? He hadn’t thought so.
Then a light flickered in the blue depths. Her mouth curved up briefly. “Connor, you’re home,” she said in a raspy voice.
He had thought his stomach couldn’t tighten any more than it had. But it did. Into a ball of steel, burning its way clear up to his heart.
No way! I won’t go to that place ever again. The vow tempered the fiery need to hold her and run his arms over her to make sure she wasn’t seriously injured.
He cocked a grin, stopping a foot from her and the deputy. “What kind of trouble have you gotten yourself into this time?”
She swallowed hard, tried to smile again and failed. She squinted and focused on his lips, then shook her head and pointed to her ears. “Can’t hear you.” A thread of panic edged her words.
The sheriff wrote on his pad that he’d sent a deputy to Sunny Meadows to stay with her dad and held it up for Cara.
“Thanks.” Relief flittered over her face, only to be replaced by the pain again.
Sean jotted something on his pad then showed Cara.
“Not a gas explosion. House is all electric.” That word ended on a cough.
Out of the corner of his eye, Connor saw a car pull up to the curb behind the fire truck and Doc Sims climb from the vehicle.
The short, portly man leaned in, withdrew a black bag, then hurried around to the other side and opened the back door. “Let’s get her over here so I can check her out.”
“I’m sure you have something to do. I can take her from here,” Connor said to the deputy, a part of himself amazed that he’d volunteered to hold Cara, have her flush up against him.
His arm coiled about her. The fragrance of lilacs, mingling with the odors of sulfur and dust, wafted to him. The flowery scent teased his memories of days gone by and vied with another—the apple-scented shampoo she’d always used. Some things hadn’t changed. These smells brought up memories of the past when he’d loved her.
But she’d killed that feeling the day she’d left town without even saying goodbye. She’d disappeared from his life only to reappear several years later reporting the news from a Southeast Asian country in the midst of a rebellion. Chaos had ruled the scene behind her. And yet she’d been calm, totally charged with the action occurring around her. So much like her father when he’d been reporting about a volatile situation.
That had been his Cara. A thrill seeker. Restless. Needing something she couldn’t find in Clear Branch.
But it felt right with her in his arms again.
His thoughts prodded his steps faster until she halted, making him stop, too. She blinked as though trying to orient herself to her surroundings.
“Slow down,” she said in a voice that had been heard around the world for years until she suddenly dropped out of sight five years ago. “Dizzy.”
He’d let her get to him. Angry with himself, he clenched his jaws and nodded. At a much slower pace he covered the distance to Doc Sims and eased Cara onto the backseat. The doctor whipped out a blanket and draped it over Cara’s shoulders, sending up a cloud of dust that aggravated her coughing. Connor stepped away as the doctor began examining her.
“Do you hurt anywhere?” Doc Sims asked.
Her face crunched up into a frown and she started to say something when Connor replied, “She can’t hear. The blast.”
“I was hoping she hadn’t been that close to the explosion.” Doc looked from her to Connor. “I’ll take it from here.” A smile accompanied the dismissal.
Connor backpedaled for a few paces then swung around and went in search of the sheriff. Nothing would be discovered until the bomb squad arrived, but he was itching to do a walk-through. This wasn’t his area of expertise, though, and he would have to wait.
Was the bomb meant for Cara or her dad? Most likely her dad. But if Cara was still working as a bodyguard, it was possible she had angered someone.
The sheriff rounded the corner from the side and strode to Connor. “I got a call that the bomb squad should be here shortly. I didn’t find anything suspicious in the backyard. I looked in the kitchen window and saw part of the ceiling on the floor. Cara’s lucky she got out okay. Is Doc going to call for the ambulance in Silver Creek or take her to his clinic?”
Since Clear Branch was small with a population of four thousand, the ambulance would have to come from the larger town twenty minutes away. “I don’t know. He dismissed me.”
“That’s our doc.”
“Do you think the bomb was meant for C.J.?”
“For over thirty years he was in the middle of any important newsworthy situation in the world working for Global News Organization. His exposé on the Mafia alone would have ruffled people’s