Page 15 of The Night Ride
It shouldn’t matter, this need I had to be accepted, to be loved for who I was and not who someone else wanted me to be.But I had always been me because I didn’t know how to be anyone else.I didn’t like pretension or make believe.I’d always been too much for most people.And felt far too deeply when my heart was involved.
Was there a cosmic bullseye above my head?Because I didn’t want to see Aiden Miller.Not that the universe listened or cared, because he stood outside the front door of Sweet Dreams Bakery just the same.
It felt as I had been struck by a lightning bolt.Thank god I didn’t wear heels today.Although I never wear heels to work.They hurt too damn much when you spent all your time working on your feet.But I had never been more thankful I wore sensible shoes into work than I was in this moment.Because the moment my gaze landed on him, my legs turned to jelly.If I had worn heels, I’d break something when I walked.
In the five years since I had last seen him, he’d grown even hotter.The jerk.Why couldn’t he have gone bald or gotten fat or been horribly disfigured?Aiden’s six-foot frame had packed on even more muscle.His long-sleeved cotton shirt stretched across his pecs like a second skin, outlining every muscle of his broad shoulders and arms.He was the epitome of the perfect male specimen.Damn him.
His golden ginger crew cut was partially bleached from his time spent out in the sun.But it was the few days growth of stubble covering his strong, rectangular jaw on his ruggedly handsome face that twisted my belly and sent torrents of tingles twisting through me.There were crinkle lines around his eyes and mouth that weren’t present five years ago.Damn man was aging like a fine wine, getting even hotter with age.
Aiden Miller had always been the hottest man on the planet.If a woman wasn’t careful, he could damn near incinerate a woman’s panties with a single glance.But it was his steel-blue eyes that lasered through all my defenses.They had always seen past all my defenses and made my toes curl at the same time.
Damn him.
What was he doing here?
He was the last person on the planet I wanted to see today.My heart squeezed because he was a blatant reminder that my brother was gone.
I couldn’t touch that landmine of grief.If I did right now, I’d be inconsolable.And I had to focus on the latest crisis.
It seemed like every which way I turned, fate tossed another monkey wrench into my plans, until I didn’t even know which way was up anymore.
“Do you know those men?”Detective Theo Garrison nodded toward the bakery’s glass front door.
The detective seemed nice, with a steely resolve and patient demeanor.His eyes missed nothing, assessing me and the bakery as if he was cataloguing it all to remember later.He was older, late thirties maybe early forties.His partner, Curt Davis, was perhaps mid-fifties, balding, with a slight paunch around the middle.
After discovering the theft, I waited until my employees left and the bakery closed for the day before I contacted the police.
Which led to this moment, me with the police detectives discussing the next steps as they opened an investigation into the theft, with Aiden standing outside my door looking sexy as sin.
With a cursory glance behind Aiden, I realized for the first time he wasn’t alone.Wyatt and Lucas were with him.I knew all the guys my brother had served with during his tenure as a Navy SEAL.I’d sent his SEAL team care packages with baked goods since I was fifteen.
Ignoring the heat humming inside me at being near Aiden again, I directed my attention back toward the no nonsense detective, his dark hair threaded with silver and eyes the color of the summer sky.Detective Theo Harrison was fit and a good foot taller than my five-foot frame.“Yes.They served with my brother before he died.”
Understanding filled his blue gaze.“I’m sorry for your loss.What branch?”
“Navy SEALs.”I’d always been proud of my brother, for the effort he had put into becoming a SEAL.
The detective’s brows rose.“Is that right?I was Navy myself.”He glanced out the window again really looking at the men standing near the bakery door.A grin spread over his face.“I’ll be.That’s Chief Petty Officer Wyatt Cooper.”
“It is.He was my brother’s second in command of their SEAL team.”
“And who was your brother?”Detective Garrison seemed friendlier given the strange connection.
“Senior Chief Petty Officer Evan Ryder.”
“Get the fuck out of here.I hadn’t heard he passed.”Shadows passed over his face.“You have my heartfelt condolences.Your brother was a great soldier, very dedicated to his service.”
I plastered a smile on my face.“Thank you.About my case?”
“Yes, I think it would behoove you to have cameras installed both in front of the store near the registers and in the back near the safe where you keep the register tills.”
I didn’t want to think about what that would cost me.Except if I wanted to get to the bottom of theft, I didn’t have a choice.“I’ll see what I can do to get those installed.Is there anything your office can do in the meantime?”
“We’ll review the report from the forensic accountant.Dig into the lives of your employees.And then we will need to question each of your employees, but I want to get as much information on them first, then we will proceed with having them come to the station for questioning.However, once we start that process, it will alert the thief and might curtail their illicit activities for a time.It could make it more difficult to catch the person behind the missing funds.My suggestion would be to get cameras installed as soon as possible.Don’t tell your employees about them though for about a week.Because in our state, technically, you do need to inform people they are being recorded for it to be admissible into court evidence.However, if you do the install, and are able to catch them within a week, it would create enough of a gray area for prosecution to say you were about to inform your employees about the cameras when the individual was caught red-handed.Because typically, when there is definitive video evidence, during an interrogation, the assailant cracks under the pressure and confesses to the crime.At that point the video footage won’t be needed as evidence because we will have their written confession.When you get them installed, make sure they are positioned at the right angles to record all the activity happening at the register.And then hopefully, we can catch them red-handed.”
It all made sense.But that didn’t make it any easier knowing that one of the people on my payroll I trusted had stabbed me in the back.
“Okay.I will get that done this week.”I didn’t want to think about the hit to my credit card.It was a necessary evil though if I wanted the culprit caught.And I did.My small business couldn’t sustain having someone steal funds on a regular basis.
