Under Suspicion, With Child

“I’m not used to letting someone else handle the kitchen.”

“Then get used to having a little more help around here.” Jocelyne smiled at Leah to let her know her comment wasn’t meant to belittle Leah’s work. She’d been a godsend to her mother.

Once her mother was out of the dining area, Jocelyne turned to push the swinging door into the kitchen. At the same time, the door swung toward her, jamming her hand. Pain shot through her wrist and she jumped back. “Ouch!”

Rick Simpson strode into the dining room from the kitchen. “I’m sorry, did I hurt you?” He grabbed her hand and held it, studying her wrist for a brief second. His hands were cool and clammy like beached fish.

Jocelyne jerked her fingers out of his grasp. “I’m fine, you just surprised me. Most guests enter through the front door.” If her voice was sharp, count it up to the shards of pain shooting through her jammed fingers.

“So they do.” Simpson’s attention moved from her to the breakfast buffet set up against the wall of the large dining room. Without another word, he stepped around Jocelyne and lifted a plate so that he could be first in line when the food came out.

Jocelyne used her other hand to push the swinging door. “Jerk,” she muttered beneath her breath as she strode across the kitchen, shaking the kink out of her damaged hand.

“I hope you’re not referring to me.”

The voice behind her made her jump. “Don’t do that!” She faced the man who’d occupied much of her thoughts yesterday and most of last night in her dreams. If not for him, her nightmares would have been much worse, but that didn’t excuse him sneaking up on her.

He leaned against a counter, incredibly handsome in his police uniform.

“Guests enter through the front door, not the kitchen.” She marched to the oven and pulled out the tray of biscuits, ignoring the tingle of awareness she’d felt at his nearness.

“I’m not here to eat.” Andrei Lagios pushed away from the counter he leaned against and moved toward her, gliding like a jaguar toward his prey.

Had heat from the open oven caused the temperature to rise so dramatically in the room? Jocelyne stood in his path, her gaze fixed on his mesmerizing dark eyes. Not until heat seeped through the hot pad did she return to her senses. “Yow!” She looked for a place to set the hot tray but the countertops were full of the dishes to be carried to the dining room.

Andrei snatched an oven mitt from a hook on the wall and relieved Jocelyne of the laden cookie sheet. “Do you have a basket you want to put these in?”

“Uh, yes. Of course.” She scrambled for her wits and the basket her mother had set out. After laying a colorful cloth on the bottom and draping it over the side, she plucked each fluffy biscuit from the pan and dropped it into the basket, all the while gathering her thoughts. “Did you have further questions for me, or is this a social visit?”

“Questions.”

A small part of her that she had thought buried poked its disappointed head up. She squashed it down and dropped the last biscuit into the basket. “You can put the pan in the sink.”

While Andrei’s back was turned, Jocelyne took the opportunity to study the man who’d carried her most of the way back to town yesterday. Encased in a sexy blue-gray uniform shirt, his impossibly broad shoulders all but filled the air in the spacious kitchen. No wonder he could carry not only a woman, but a pregnant woman that far and not look the least worn out. He was a cop, he probably worked out on a regular basis. Jet-black hair was longer than what she’d consider regulation for a man in his profession, but then it made him look more dangerous, a rule breaker. And the eyes—

He chose that moment to face her and pin her with his ebony gaze. “I found out something interesting yesterday you might be able to help me with.”

“Me? I’ve been out of this town for close to ten years. I barely know anyone. How could I possibly help?” And she didn’t want to spend any more time than she had to with this man who made her feel strangely off balance.

Leah poked her head through the swinging door. “Better hurry with the food. The natives are restless.”

“You’re busy, let me help you get this food out before your customers start shouting.” He lifted a tray of scrambled eggs and the basket of biscuits and left the room through the swinging doors.

More intrigued than she cared to admit, Jocelyne grabbed the pancakes out of the warmer and the tray of condiments and followed. What had he found and why come to her?

ANDREI STOOD BACK WHILE Jocelyne arranged the food on the buffet, placing serving spoons and spatulas within easy reach. He admired her smooth efficiency and easy smile for the guests, finding himself envious of her attention.

The customers waited patiently in line until she’d finished. Andrei, with less patience than the hungry patrons, stood by the kitchen door, arms crossed over his chest, his toe tapping the wood flooring of the elegant old house. He’d been here for breakfast on one or two occasions, but he wasn’t here about food. He was here on business. Although the scent of bacon and pancakes were making his mouth water.

Finally, Jocelyne stood back and announced, “Help yourselves.” With that she grabbed her hot pads and hurried toward the kitchen, leaving the pretty blond worker to fill glasses.

Andrei held the door for her and as soon as it closed behind them, he dug in his pocket and pulled out a piece of paper. “Are you familiar with a plant called henbane?”

Jocelyne reached for the color picture of an ordinary-looking plant. “A little. I know that it’s dangerous. A person can die if given a lethal quantity. The pagans used it in Medieval Europe as a painkiller and sometimes as a poison….” She glanced up at him. “Why do you ask?”

“Do you know of anyone who might have access to it?”

Her brows drew together and her teeth chewed on her bottom lip. “It’s not something you can find easily in the States—” Jocelyne froze, her eyes widened and she shook her head. “No way. She wouldn’t.”

“Who wouldn’t what?”

She spun on her heels and flew toward a door at the opposite end of the kitchen, flinging it wide to reveal the entrance to a lower level beneath the house. Before he could stop her, she was racing down the steps into the darkness.

For a split second, panic seized Andrei’s chest and he rushed for the doorway, staring down into pitch black. A light flickered below and Jocelyne’s silhouette appeared.

“Wait.” He took the steps two at a time, catching the bottom step with the edge of his heel, stumbling before he could right himself.

The innkeeper’s red-haired daughter was nowhere in sight, but her footsteps echoed against the damp walls.

In the back corner of the sprawling subterranean room were long tables stretched out beneath fluorescent lights. Jocelyne hurried along the rows of greenery flourishing in the underground greenhouse.

Was she on to something? Had she found his source of the drug used on the four victims of the Seaside Strangler? Andrei hurried to catch up to her.

When she stopped before one plant, her face turned an alarming shade of white. “This is it…” Her voice came out in a whisper and she handed him the sheet of paper, pointing to the plant that was the exact replica of the picture he’d pulled from the Internet. “This is henbane.”

“Well, Ms. Baker. Seems we have a problem.”

“Oh, Mom, why do you have such a dangerous plant?” The self-assured and self-proclaimed independent woman, who’d had Andrei scratching his head since he’d met her, turned a sickly pale green and sank toward the floor in a dead faint.

Chapter Four

Strong, warm arms held her against a solid wall of muscles. Seems she’d been here before. Jocelyne opened her eyes and stared up into dark brown eyes, hooded in the shadows of the overhead lights. “Did I do it again?”

“Uh-huh.” He pushed a strand of her hair away from her face. “You’re not such a good advertisement for a holistic healer.”

“Shut up.” She pushed away from him and attempted to stand. Her knees refused to hold her weight and she fell back into Andrei’s lap. Despite the coolness of the basement’s musty interior, her cheeks heated. “My blood sugar must be low.” Only a healthy breakfast and maybe some dry toast would make her better.

He set her to the side on the cool stone flooring and rose to his feet, extending a hand to her. “How many months along are you?”

In one swift tug, he had her up on her feet.

The rush of air in her face and blood to her legs made her stagger and fall against his chest. “What business is it of yours?”

“A man kinda likes to know a few details when the woman with him faints into his arms. Twice.”

Jocelyne pushed away from him and smoothed a hand over the baby growing inside. “Six months. I’m six months along.”

“And the father?”