Page 382 of Cold Case, Warm Hearts

“Let’s figure it out. We can wait for the cops, and you can tell me everything in the meantime. We’ll work out what happened.”

Instead of responding to that, she looked around. “Do you have a security system? Maybe we can see what he’s doing outside.”

“We’d know if he was trying to get in.” He didn’t want to placate her. That wasn’t his intention. But getting through this together would help both of them.

He held out his hand. “Let’s go sit. Wait this out, and if the cops don’t show up in a few minutes we can face down whoever it is outside and go find them.”

She eyed his hand like it was a trap. “I could go out there right now. Figure out exactly who it is.”

“And leave me unprotected?”

Her gaze flicked up to his eyes. “Because you’re helpless?”

“I don’t like the idea of you going out there by yourself.” Before she could get mad at him, he said, “I know you’re an FBI agent. You’re trained. But my gun is at the apartment, so I can’t watch your back if you try to track down this guy.”

Eventually she relented. “Let’s go try the phone again.”

He thought she might not and was about to drop his hand. She slipped hers into it and they held onto each other. They’d tried doing it in that cabin. They’d both been terrified kids with no idea how to handle what was happening.

She’d pulled away eventually when things got too scary.

He didn’t blame her for that. Not when he was too busy blaming himself.

She squeezed his hand as though she knew a little of what he was thinking. Not for the first time, Jacob recognized the fact she understood him in a way no one else did. Or ever would.

In the office, she lifted the handset. He looked out the window.

“No dial tone means the line was cut. No signal means he’s got a jammer.”

“There’s no one outside on this side of the building.” He frowned. “But why leave and ditch the truck here?”

“Maybe it’s stolen, and he doesn’t need it anymore?” She glanced around. Her attention fell on the framed photo on the wall. The one he liked to look at when he was working. “Did you take that?”

“Do you want to talk about my photos, or do you want to figure out how we’re going to get to one of our cars if there’s someone outside waiting?”

“Give me a second.”

Jacob figured that was fair. “That’s my grandfather.”

Her eyes widened. “You found him?”

He nodded. “A couple of years after…” No point going there out loud. That would only give a voice to things that had power if they were spoken. “It spurned the first book. He introduced me to his people, and I got to tell his story.”

She studied the photograph he’d taken of an elderly Native American man. Bison was Cherokee, and he’d handed that blood down to Jacob.

“I said you had Native American in you.”

He found a smile. “You were right. Though it took time for my mom to admit who her father was. Didn’t exactly fit her narrative, according to my dad.”

Jacob hadn’t fit either of their ideas of what he should be.

They were happier in Florida, though no less dysfunctional from the sound of it. He just wasn’t between them to witness it—and find himself a target.

“But you got to know him?”

“And as many of his tribe who wanted to get to know me.” He’d absorbed it all and done his best to document the stories Grandpa told him. The unique experiences Jacob could never understand.

“The book is amazing.”

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