Undercover Protector. Cassie Miles
pleasant old house on Myrtlewood Lane. For the first seventeen years of his life he’d ached to live in an orderly neighborhood like this one—a safe haven where nobody drank too much or yelled all the time.
“It’s been eleven years,” Annie said as she came toward him. “I believe this is the first time you’ve come home.”
“Bridgeport was never my home. I just lived here.”
She stopped a few feet away from him. Her eyes narrowed as she demanded. “Who is Drew Bateman? What does he have to do with my grandpa?”
“What did he say to you?”
“Don’t answer my question with another question. You knew him right away. Who is he?”
“Somebody who used to live around here.”
“A logger?”
“I don’t think he ever worked at the mills.” Bateman had probably never worked at all. His profession was criminal.
Curtly she nodded encouragement. “What’s with the chewing gum?”
“He has a bit of a sweet tooth.”
“That’s good to know.” In spite of her visible anger, she eased into an interrogation mode. Like a good cop she used the slight information she’d garnered to push him toward more revelations. “And why was Bateman in prison?”
“Aggravated assault on a police officer. He shot a cop.” Though Michael didn’t want to scare her, she needed to understand that Bateman was a serious criminal, not just a small-town bully. “Annie, I think Lionel should be a part of this conversation.”
“No.” She shook her head. “I don’t want to upset him.”
“He has a right to know.”
When Michael had arrived at the house half an hour ago, he’d been shocked by Lionel’s frail emaciated appearance—so different from the gruff invulnerable man who’d coached him in football and taught him the meaning of honor that went deeper than sportsmanship. It hadn’t taken long for Michael to realize that Lionel’s willpower and dignity were still there, stronger than ever. A lesser man would’ve given up and died. Lionel was alert enough to know he needed help, wise enough to call on Michael.
Michael turned to Annie and said, “You can’t treat your grandpa like a helpless invalid.”
“Excuse me.” Her voice turned hard and brittle. “You know nothing about what’s gone on here. You’ve been gone for eleven years, Michael. Why now? Why are you here?”
“Because your grandpa needs me.”
“Are you telling me what Lionel needs? Are you suggesting that you know how to take care of my grandpa?”
“I guess I am.” Giving orders came naturally to him, and he wasn’t accustomed to dealing with women. He probably needed to be more careful about how he phrased things. “Let’s go see Lionel.”
“Just a minute.” She dug in her heels. Though she wanted to resist anything Michael suggested, Annie knew he was right about her grandpa. She had to protect him without smothering him. Still, she didn’t want him to worry. He needed to concentrate on getting better. “Lionel has been hurt enough.”
“He’s still a man.”
“Don’t I know that,” she said. “An ornery old buzzard, if you ask me. When he was in the hospital, he refused to take his medicine. And he bribed one of the orderlies to bring him one of those big stinky cigars he loves so much.”
Actually it had done her heart good to walk into his sterile white hospital room and see Lionel with a naughty grin on his face, puffing away like a chimney. “He’s a man, all right. Grumpy. Inconsiderate. Stubborn.”
“That’s exactly what he needs to make him well.” Michael gestured toward the staircase. “Shall we go upstairs?”
“I suppose. If that’s the only way I’ll get straight answers.” She crossed the foyer and automatically reached for the railing with her right hand. When she bumped the splint, she winced.
“Looks like you’ve been hurt, too,” he said.
“I got mugged.”
“I know. A mild concussion and hairline fracture.”
She figured Lionel had told him. “It could’ve been a lot worse. I was lucky that a good Samaritan stopped to help me.”
“Lucky? I don’t think so. This so-called Samaritan didn’t come fast enough.”
“He saved my life. And I never had a chance to thank him. He took off when the paramedics arrived.”
She didn’t expect him to understand, didn’t expect anything from Michael Slade but lies and a tendency to run away when the going got tough. Turning her back on him, she hiked up the stairs and crossed the upstairs landing to her grandpa’s bedroom.
In the doorway she stopped in her tracks and stared. Then she beamed a wide grin, delighted by what she saw. Lionel was out of bed. He was sitting in the easy chair by the bay window. Though the weakened left side of his body slumped, he looked like his old self. “Grandpa, how did you—”
“Mikey helped me get over here. You two want to tell me what the hell was going on outside?”
Her anger was completely disarmed. Having Michael pay a visit might be sheer agony for her, but his presence seemed to have had a positive effect on her grandpa. It had gotten him moving. “Grandpa, what is Michael doing here?”
“First things first,” Lionel said. “Who was that guy on the street?”
“Drew Bateman,” she said.
Lionel exchanged a meaningful glance with Michael. “I haven’t heard that name in a while.”
“He’s an ex-convict,” Annie said, “and he seems to blame you for keeping him in jail.”
“Well, he’s right about that. If it was up to me, I’d lock him up and throw away the key.”
“I didn’t recognize him.” And she surely would’ve remembered somebody so ugly. “Is he from Bridgeport?”
“He’s from Wayside, over on the coast.”
“Why does he blame you?”
“I helped get him convicted.”
That didn’t make sense. As municipal judge, her grandpa hadn’t dealt with felony crime. A serious criminal like Bateman wouldn’t have been arraigned in Lionel’s makeshift courtroom at the back of the police station. So how was he involved with a case that included aggravated assault on a cop? She drew the obvious conclusion. “You were a witness at his trial. You testified against him.”
“That’s right.” He held out his right hand toward her. “Come here, honey.”
She went to him and perched on the arm of his chair, gazing fondly at him. Though his cheeks were sunken and his body ravaged from the stroke, she still saw him as the strong kind man who’d taken her in and raised her after her parents were killed in a boating accident. She’d been only ten years old. If it hadn’t been for Lionel, Annie didn’t know what would have become of her. He’d been her solace and her inspiration. Everything she was she owed to him.
He gently patted her arm. “Did he scare you, Annie?”
“Grandpa, I’m a cop.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
She wouldn’t tell him about the flashback of rain and fear. Annie didn’t understand the sudden panic attack herself, and she surely didn’t want to worry her grandpa. “I’m all right.”
“Did he threaten you?”
“He did the opposite. He said he wouldn’t