Locked In Temptation

“They’re on their way. A couple who just moved to the area.”

He crossed his arms over his chest. His grandmother was so trusting. “What do you know about them?”

His grandmother smiled. “Nothing. That’s why I invited them to dinner.”

It would be a waste of his time to tell Granny Kay that wasn’t exactly how things worked. In his book it was best to get to know people before inviting them into your home.

Stonewall checked his watch. He had some time since he was packed already. Maybe he ought to hang around and meet these people himself. He knew his grandmother considered herself Dear Abby, Dr. Phil and T. D. Jakes all rolled into one. Others in the neighborhood saw her as the threesome as well, and always sought her advice on a lot of things.

“So, how was your date, Stonewall?”

He leaned back against the kitchen counter and raised a brow. “Who said I had a date?”

“Mellie. She was at church and asked had I heard from you to see how your date went.”

He needed to remind his sister to keep her mouth closed. The only reason he’d told her was that she’d invited him to a concert in town. He’d turned her down and, without thinking, told her he was planning his own date for that night.

“It was nice.”

“Any details you want to share?”

“Nope.”

Not a single one. He wouldn’t even tell her about the extra step he’d taken with the cake and using her recipe to pull it off. He’d asked her for the recipe and she’d given it to him, no questions asked, and he’d been glad for that.

“You’re leaving town?”

“Yes. Later today. I think I’ll just hang around and watch a game on television.”

“Yes, you do that.”

He wasn’t fooling his grandmother one bit. She knew what was keeping him there. He would check out this couple she had invited to dinner and then leave. As he grabbed the remote off the table and settled down on the sofa, thoughts of Joy again filled his mind. Mainly thoughts of how she’d looked when he’d made love to her. Beautiful.

“Do you want to join us for dinner, Stonewall?” his grandmother called out to ask.

“No, I’m good.” He chuckled to himself while thinking that thanks to Joy, he certainly felt good.

At that moment the front door opened, and automatically his hand went to his Glock. He wasn’t as trusting as his grandmother. He relaxed when he saw it was Mellie, and couldn’t help but smile. This was the younger sister he adored even if she did get on his last nerve at times. She liked being bossy. Some days he could ignore it. Some days he could not.

He knew he had a beautiful sister. All of his friends had made that fact known to him just in case he was too dense to realize. He hadn’t been too dense. But you didn’t mess with his sister. Amelia Ursula Courson could take care of herself.

At the age of eighteen she began entering a number of beauty pageants for the scholarships. It still bothered him sometimes that his grandmother had been forced to cash in their parents’ life insurance policies that should have been used for his and his sister’s college education to pay his legal fees.

Mellie had once been Miss Charlottesville and Miss Virginia. She’d even competed in Miss USA and had come in third. All the scholarships she’d earned had helped pay for medical school.

“I thought you left town today,” she said, leaning over to give him a peck on the cheek.

“I do leave today. I just dropped by to check on things before heading out.”

She dropped on the sofa beside him. “And how was your date?”

There was no need to tell her to mind her own business, because she wouldn’t. “It was nice.”

“You want to tell me about it?”

“No.”

Mellie laughed and he couldn’t help but smile. Then he asked her, “What do you know about this couple Granny Kay invited for dinner?”

“Nothing, which is why I decided to drop by.”

Stonewall nodded, feeling more at ease. He shouldn’t have been surprised that Mellie had this. “When will I get to meet her?” his sister asked.

He glanced over at her. “Who?”

“The woman you waited over six months to date.”

He frowned, wondering who’d told her that. Striker? Quasar? Who else had known?

“It was just a date, Mellie. Don’t make a big deal out of it.”

She smiled. “Okay. I won’t, but only if you don’t. If you do then I will. I love you, big brother.” After placing a wet, sloppy kiss on his cheek and deliberately making that annoying sound that came with it, she got up and went into the kitchen, where he could hear his grandmother moving around.

He wondered about what he’d told his sister—that his date with Joy hadn’t been a big deal. Instantly he knew he had lied. It had been a big deal, and he couldn’t wait for it to happen again.

CHAPTER NINE (#ua5663ba7-b3bf-5a18-b993-99eb60da434c)

JOY SAT AT her desk and stared at the documents she’d taken out of the folder, determined to go over everything again. It was a homicide that had happened during the time she’d been working the Erickson case. The detective originally assigned to the case had transferred to another city, and the unfinished investigation had been reassigned to her.

She had enough cases to work not to get hung up on just one, but there was something about this particular case that kept pulling at her. “There has to be something that’s been overlooked,” she muttered under her breath. Unfortunately, it would be headed to the cold case files if she didn’t get a break soon.

According to her boss, Police Chief Hal Harkins, it would be a waste of the taxpayers’ money to continue to pursue any case without strong leads, and there didn’t seem to be a single one for this particular homicide. All she had was a Jane Doe, white female, approximate age of twenty-three, found five months ago, frozen to death on the outskirts of town in a rural area known as Sofia Valley. It had been one of the coldest nights in Charlottesville, with temperatures dipping to a record low. The woman had been in her bare feet, wearing a thin dress and no undergarments. And according to the medical examiner, she’d given birth three months prior.

Who are you? Where did you come from? And more important, where is your baby?

The investigative team had ruled out the possibility that she’d been murdered elsewhere and then transported to the area. Although there was a chance she’d been alive and deliberately left there to freeze to death. The autopsy report didn’t indicate any trauma or sexual assault. However, there had been old bruises on her back. Could they be linked to some sort of domestic violence? Was there a husband or boyfriend somewhere who’d left her in the woods to die?