Profile Durango

He frowned and raked a hand through his gray hair. “We need to tighten up security around here. I can’t believe somebody managed to get inside after hours and do something like that.”

She nodded. “I’ve put in a request for some additional money for tighter security measures, but you know how that goes.”

He nodded sagely. “Red tape and budget cuts.”

“You’ve got it.”

“I’m heading out. Anything you need before I go?”

She smiled at him fondly. He was such a nice man. “No, thanks, I’ll be leaving here pretty soon myself.”

As Jerry left the office she glanced at her clock and instantly tension twisted in her stomach as she realized Tom would be arriving at any moment.

Last night it had been easy to retreat to the privacy of her bedroom. But tonight she would have to get through dinner and the hours before bedtime with him.

Maybe he would hide out in his bedroom tonight. She couldn’t get so lucky, she thought with a grimace.

At precisely six o’clock he arrived at her office door to take her home. “You ready?” he asked. He looked tired, the lines on his face deeper than usual.

Although she didn’t want to leave, wasn’t accustomed to going home so early, she didn’t argue the point. She merely nodded and got up from her desk. It took her only a minute to exchange her lab coat for her ski jacket, then they left the lab and headed for the elevators.

“Tomorrow afternoon I need to go take a look at a site where a woman was supposedly killed by a bear,” she said. She knew he probably wouldn’t be pleased by her need to be out and away from the lab, but her job involved other things besides test tubes and lab work. There was a certain amount of field work that was necessary.

“Just tell me where you need to go and I’ll get you there,” he replied. They rode the elevator down and when they reached the ground floor he grabbed her by the arm and held her tight against his body as they left the building.

Once they were in the car she turned to look at him and again noticed the weary lines on his face. “Bad day?” she asked.

“I met with Dylan Acevedo and Ben Parrish and we had a small memorial service for Julie.”

“I’m sorry, that must have been difficult.” As she thought of Julie her heart squeezed with pain. “I feel so responsible for what happened to her.”

He turned and raised an eyebrow in surprise. “Why should you feel responsible?”

She pulled her coat more tightly around her. “I guess because she was working on the Del Gardo case. She wanted to find him before he found me.”

“Callie, Julie wasn’t murdered because of you. She was murdered because she was doing her job. We all know the risks when we take on any assignment.” He dropped one hand from the steering wheel and rubbed it across his chest, and then frowned and returned his hand to the wheel.

“Julie would be angry with you if she knew you suffered a moment of guilt over her death,” he continued. “She died doing what she loved to do—chasing down leads to find bad guys. It wasn’t just what she did, it was who she was.”

Callie stared out the passenger window and thought about what he’d just said. Yes, that had been the problem three years ago. Being an FBI agent wasn’t just what Tom did, it was who he was. He wasn’t a husband or a father. He couldn’t be because he was already wed to the job and nothing and nobody was more important to him. A trace of familiar bitterness swept through her.

They were silent for the remainder of the drive to her house. When they arrived he escorted her inside where they hung their coats in the closet, then went to the kitchen where the savory scent of spaghetti sauce hung in the air. She knew that smell—Tom’s famous sauce—and her mouth began to water in anticipation.

“I took the liberty this afternoon to do a little grocery shopping and made a quick pot of sauce for dinner,” he said.

She wanted to be outraged that he’d taken such liberties, had been in her house during the afternoon while she’d been gone. She wanted it to feel like an invasion, a violation, but as he pulled the pot of sauce from the fridge and placed it on the stovetop, all she could muster was the sweet anticipation of a good meal.

“This will take about fifteen or twenty minutes,” he said. “I’ve got it all under control if you want to go change your clothes or freshen up or anything.”

“I think I will go change,” she said and left the kitchen. She didn’t want to remain and watch him prepare the meal. It was too reminiscent of the times they had shared together.

Most nights when they’d been in the safe house Tom had cooked while she’d sat at the table enjoying a glass of wine. He’d usually cook bare-chested, clad only in a pair of athletic shorts. And there had been times he’d put the meal on the back burner as they’d sated their appetite for each other.

She changed from her work clothes to a pair of navy blue sweatpants and a navy T-shirt, then went into the bathroom and stared at her reflection in the mirror.

The faint pink stain in her cheeks confirmed the rivulet of emotion that fluttered inside her. It felt like excitement, but that was ridiculous. It felt like anticipation, but she told herself there was nothing she was anticipating where Tom Ryan was concerned.

Sluicing cold water on her face, she focused on the work she’d left back at the lab. The crime scene photos from the bear attack continued to confuse her. There was no question that the wounds that Mary Windsong had suffered looked like those left from a bear attack, but there were pieces of the puzzle that just didn’t quite fit.

Maybe seeing the place where the attack had supposedly happened would clear up the inconsistencies and tell her definitively if it had been some unusual bear attack or a homicide.

When she left her bedroom she smelled the scent of wood smoke and heard the crackle of a fire. Tom had started a fire in the beehive stove and the flames flickered a warm glow on the pale pink adobe walls.

She heard the sound of him working in the kitchen and stood for a moment with her eyes closed, just listening. She hadn’t realized until this moment how lonely she’d been since coming to Kenner City.

Although she worked with a lot of wonderful people at the lab, she was their boss and rarely socialized with anyone. Whenever she was home alone the silence was what so often drove her back to work or into bed.

She gave herself a mental shake, irritated by the faint stir of need for something else, for something more than what she currently had in her life.

“I definitely inhaled enough smoke to addle my brains,” she muttered as she walked through the living room and into the kitchen.

“Just in time,” Tom said as he lifted a colander of spaghetti and dumped it into a waiting serving bowl. He motioned her toward the table.

“You know all this isn’t necessary. You don’t have to cook the meals,” she said, taking her seat. She kept her voice cool, trying to maintain an emotional distance from the domestic scene, from him.

He shrugged. “It was kind of a matter of survival. As I recall, and unless things have changed, you aren’t much of a cook.” He ladled the sauce over the noodles and set the bowl on the table.

“When I was growing up, Mom always preferred eating out and in Las Vegas it was almost cheaper to eat out than to cook at home. And things haven’t changed. I still don’t do much cooking. Most nights I’m working late and just grab something on the run.”

He added a tossed salad and a loaf of garlic bread, then joined her at the table. Immediately an awkward silence descended.

She didn’t want to talk to him, didn’t want to engage in the small talk that might somehow be construed as interest or a relationship. After all, she was used to silent meals.

What she wasn’t used to was the heady scent of him that filled the room, the brush of his hand against hers as they both reached for a piece of the garlic bread at the same time and the whisper of want that his mere presence evoked in her. How was it possible to want a man she hated?

“Is there somebody special in your life, Callie? Are you dating anyone?” he asked, finally breaking the tense silence that had stretched to endless proportions.

She knew she had two choices. She could either answer his question and indulge in dinnertime small talk or she could be a bitch. As she gazed at him she felt oddly vulnerable.

“I told you before that there was really no reason for us to exchange a bunch of personal information,” she said, her voice decidedly cool as she chose option number two.

His brown eyes flashed darkly. “Sorry, for a moment I forgot your rules. Don’t worry, it won’t happen again.”

A twinge of regret edged through her as she stared down at her plate. She knew she was only making things more difficult, but she was afraid to let down her defenses even a little bit where he was concerned.

There was no question that he was under her skin, but what she had to do was keep him out of her heart, because Tom Ryan had as much potential to destroy her as the man who wanted her dead.

TOM CHECKED the rearview mirror as he and Callie drove away from the lab. It was just after three in the afternoon, although it looked more like twilight than midafternoon.