Body Of Evidence

Outside, the breeze coming off the water chased away the afternoon heat. They followed the stone path, and Traynor pointed out the boat dock and the helipad. The safe house was prepared with a number of escape routes, as well as a safe room that could withstand just about any sort of attack.

“When did you join the Colby Agency?” She leaned against the steel railing that topped the seawall at the back of the property. The air was crisp and fresh, and she felt herself starting to relax.

“Six years ago.” He propped his arms on the railing and stared out at the water. “Before that I was a bounty hunter.”

Marissa smiled. No surprise there. She’d had him pegged as a rugged law enforcement type. “Where did you grow up?”

“Floresville, Texas,” he announced proudly. “Half an hour south of San Antonio. The family ranch is there. I have two brothers and a sister who run the family business, one of the biggest cattle operations in the state. My dad’s retired now, but he still gives his input.”

She gazed out over the water for a moment before searching his face. “You didn’t want to stay with the family business?”

He smiled, and the expression startled her. Lacon Traynor was an attractive man, but when he smiled it was a genuinely beautiful sight. She liked his smile. His eyes, too. He had those light brown, almost golden eyes. The blond hair and gold eyes were a vivid contrast to his tanned skin.

Her detailed analysis of his physical assets puzzled her. It didn’t seem appropriate to admire the man’s attributes after what had happened. Honestly, she couldn’t even remember the last time she’d paid attention to whether a man was attractive or not, much less noticed his smile or his eyes. Something inside her had shut off all those feelings after William threw her up against the wall a few times and then tossed her down the stairs. It really was a miracle she’d survived without truly devastating injuries.

But no matter that he had done that awful thing to her, she still never wished him dead.

Yet he was dead, and somehow even in death he’d found a way to punish her for being a better doctor than he could be...for working harder than he ever considered working. And for trying to do the right thing when he no longer cared.

She had a right to be happy, and William—alive or dead—had no right to try to take that happiness from her. Anger sparked deep inside her.

“I was far too cocky and too full of myself to be happy on the ranch. I needed adventure. For a long time—” his gaze drifted back to the water “—rounding up the bad guys and bringing them in was enough. But then a really bad one got out of jail after a two-year stint, and went back home and killed his ex-wife. I saw things differently after that. Doing the job no longer held the same appeal. I needed distance and a fresh start.”

“The ex-wife was someone you knew?” She had a terrible feeling the story didn’t end with a job going wrong. His words carried the weight of far more than mere facts or statistics. This was personal.

“She was my fiancée. We were getting married the next month. He killed her just to get back at me for hauling his sorry ass to San Antonio to stand trial the first time.”

“I’m so sorry.”

He nodded, stared down at his hands. “I was out of town when he was released, a week earlier than expected. I had a bail jumper to pick up in El Paso. The local cops took care of the bastard though. He made the mistake of trying to fight back when they cornered him, and they took him out.”

“So you moved away.” She didn’t blame him.

“I needed a change of scenery.”

“The winters are very different here,” she commented, easing the topic of conversation away from his painful past.

“You’re not kidding. But I wanted to work for the best. It was important to me to find work that allowed me to help people before the worst happened. The Colby Agency gave me that opportunity.” He sent her another smile, this one considerably dimmer than the first. “Most of the time anyway.”

“Sometimes there’s just no way to see what’s coming.” Not in a million years would she have suspected William of this behavior. She’d had no idea his fall from grace had taken him so far down.