Jack's Christmas Mission

“Where you go, I go.”

“You are not going into the bathroom with me!”

“No, but I’ll be standing guard right outside. So just holler if you need me.”

“Wipe that smirk off your face, Mr. Parker. I hardly think I’ll be accosted in the bathroom. And I’m perfectly capable of doing anything I need to do in there without your assistance.”

With that said, she turned and stomped down the hallway, shoved open the door to her office and made a beeline straight to her private bathroom. Jack leaned against the doorjamb, crossed one ankle over the other and waited.

Usually an optimist, Jack didn’t understand why he couldn’t shake this pessimistic feeling he had that things with Miss Peggy Jo were bound to get worse. It was clear as the nose on his face that the woman was determined to dislike him. And even though she was well-known as a feminist, he didn’t think she hated all men. No, her feelings of animosity toward him were personal. But what could it be about him that rubbed her the wrong way? He wasn’t bad looking. He was fairly smart. And he had a likable personality. Most ladies found him downright irresistible.

Heck, maybe he reminded her of her ex-husband in some way. If that were the case, he’d just have to show Miss Peggy Jo that he wasn’t anything like Buck Forbes. He’d never struck a woman in his entire life, not even with provocation. Why, he’d rather cut off his right hand than to ever hit a member of the fair sex.

Jack noticed a shadow outside the office door. Just as he took a step forward, a perky young lady carrying a bouquet of red roses came prancing into the room.

“A delivery for Ms. Riley,” she said.

“Do you work here or are you delivering for the florist?” Jack asked, wondering if the station’s security people had allowed a delivery person to simply walk into Peggy Jo’s private office.

“I work for Humphrey’s Florist,” she replied.

Jack growled under his breath.

“Sir, is something wrong?”

“No. At least nothing that’s your fault.”

“Where shall I put these?”

“Set them on the desk.” He inclined his head toward the ornate cherry desk.

She hurriedly placed the arrangement on the desk, and when Jack reached for his wallet, she shook her head. “It’s already been taken care of by the person who sent them.”

The minute the woman left, Jack walked across the room, snatched the attached card from the flowers and opened the small envelope. But before he could look at the card, Peggy Jo emerged from the bathroom, took one look at the roses and cursed.

“Damn! Get those things out of here. Right now!” She glared at the gorgeous floral arrangement as if it were a grotesque two-headed snake.

“You want these roses tossed out?” he asked. “You don’t even know who they’re from.”

“I don’t care who sent them,” she said. “Anyone who knows me well enough to be sending me flowers would know better than to send me red roses.”

An alarm went off in Jack’s head. He glanced at the card he held in his hand. Hellfire! Peggy Jo’s sicko stalker had no doubt sent the flowers.

“What does it say?” she asked.

He hesitated, then lifted his gaze and looked her square in the eye. “‘Red roses for a dead lady.’”

Her mouth rounded in a soundless gasp. “They’re from him.”

“It would appear so.” Jack stuck the note in his pocket, then lifted the clear glass vase and dumped vase, flowers, water and all into the nearby wastebasket. “I’ll contact the florist and see if they have any idea who the sender was.”

“Do you think they’ll know?” Peggy Jo stood ramrod stiff as she gazed at the wastebasket.

“Probably not. Our stalker will be smart enough not to give himself away by letting himself be identified by the florist.”

Why the hell did she keep staring at the discarded flowers? It was as if they held her under some sort of demonic spell. What was the significance of red roses? And why did she hate the one flower that most women adored?

“Miss Peggy Jo?”

“What?” Still she continued to stare, as if hypnotized by the floral arrangement that she had told him to deep six.

“How about filling me in on the fascination you have for those dumped flowers?”

She snapped her head around and all but growled at him. “I’m not fascinated, I’m repulsed.”

“Why?”

“Why? How can you ask such a question. The person who is tormenting me sent those flowers, and you ask me why they repulse me.”

“You told me to get rid of the roses before you knew who they were from. Come on, level with me. Remember I’m the one guy you’re supposed to be able to trust.”

With her gaze boring a hole into him, she said, “My ex-husband used to send me red roses to apologize. Every time Buck beat the hell out of me, he sent me red roses the next day and a note saying ‘I’m sorry.’”

Chapter 3

J ack sat beside Peggy Jo as she drove along the busy downtown street in the late-afternoon rush-hour traffic. He hadn’t been surprised when she had rejected his offer to drive. Just another example of her I-gotta-be-in-charge-at-all-times attitude. He had turned in his rental car and explained to his client the necessity of him being with her at all times, and that most definitely included when she was en route to and from work. Her stalker knew where she worked and probably knew where she lived. It would be a simple matter for him—or her—to follow Peggy Jo, perhaps even to cause a minor accident in order to force Peggy Jo out of her car. There were so many clever ways for a stalker to make personal contact with his or her victim. Although everyone, including the client herself, believed her harasser to be male, Jack wasn’t ready to rule out the possibility that the culprit might be female. It would be easy enough for a woman to hire a man to make the phone calls for her.

Despite Peggy Jo’s adamant assurance that it was highly unlikely that her ex-husband was her stalker, Jack put Buck Forbes at the top of the list. When he’d suggested that Forbes should be considered as their number-one suspect, Peggy Jo had reminded him that she hadn’t seen or heard from her ex in thirteen years, so why would he suddenly begin harassing her? Put like that, it didn’t make much sense. But stranger things had been known to happen, so getting the police and the Dundee Agency to check out Buck Forbes was a top priority. Of course, the upcoming Thanksgiving holidays might slow things down a bit. That and the fact that the local police department had been less than cooperative.

The drive across the Market Street Bridge from the downtown business district to North Chattanooga took them across the Tennessee River. Sunset came early in late November, so the streetlights were already shining brightly, eliminating the darkness as Peggy Jo and Jack made their way toward home.

“So, how long have you lived here?” Jack asked.

“Here in Chattanooga or here at my present address?”

“Both.”

“I was born and raised here,” she replied. “But you must already know that. Surely your file of information on me states those mundane facts.”

“I’m trying to make conversation,” Jack said. “You know, just being friendly. Trying to break the ice.”

“This isn’t a date, Mr. Parker.” She cut her eyes in his direction for a brief glower, then returned her gaze to the road ahead. “There’s no need for idle chitchat.”

“Look, hon—Miss Peggy Jo, we’re going to be spending a lot of time together during the next few weeks or longer, so it might be nice for both of us if we tried to get along, if we made an effort to like each other.”

He felt rather than saw her tense. What was it with this gal? Had an abusive husband turned her off so completely that she couldn’t even be civil to a man? She was like a spooked filly who didn’t want any human hands on her.

“So, tell me about him,” Jack said.