Assumed Identity(25)

“Hell.” Jake knocked the chair backward as he stood up abruptly, sending the shirt he hadn’t yet put on tumbling to the floor. He wadded the newspaper in his fists and tossed it across the apartment. He could damn well be sure the local cops would be keeping an eye out for him now. And he worked in a cop bar! Great place to blend in and eavesdrop on official business, giving him a heads up on any investigation that might lead back to him. Bad place to be if KCPD had an actual suspect description that matched his face.

“You’re ruining my life, Robin Carter.” He stalked across the apartment to the fire escape window and pushed it open so he could sit on the ledge and breathe in several lungfuls of the storm-scrubbed morning air.

He didn’t want to move on. He’d learned how to be good at leaving. He could move quickly and silently and be gone before anyone knew it.

But he liked Kansas City. He didn’t know if he’d grown up a city boy or a country bumpkin, but he liked the mix of urban amenities and small-town sensibilities he’d found here. He could lose himself in a big city crowd or take a bus and be out in the wide-open countryside in thirty minutes. He couldn’t remember if he was a Southerner or a Midwesterner or even an American, but he felt at home here. As at home as a man with no connections could be, at any rate.

And what about those Carter girls? Jake looked down at the newsprint stains on his rough, nicked-up hands. These were hands that were used for fighting, heavy lifting, killing. And yet he could still feel the silky strength of Robin Carter’s wet, wavy hair tangled in his fingers. He could still remember how warm and fragile tiny Emma had felt sleeping in his hands and snuggling against his chest. The sensations had been as vivid and unfamiliar as they’d been strangely addictive.

Probably because he had no woman in his life. He had no family he remembered. He was starved for human contact. But he’d made a point of denying himself those things so there’d be no attachments if he had to leave, no regrets if something happened to a lover he cared about because of who he used to be. His face and personality made it easy to keep people away.

But that whole gotta-save-the-innocents hang-up of his had gotten him into trouble last night. Robin and Emma Carter were a family, in and of themselves. There was no man to protect them, no husband or boyfriend or daddy they’d called on for help. They’d needed him. Him. A pretty woman with that much sass and a beautiful baby should have someone taking care of them. They shouldn’t be alone to fight against would-be rapists or whatever that mess had been about last night.

Showing up once he could write off as self-preservation—he didn’t need any more guilt and what-ifs in his life. If he knew something was wrong, and he could do something about it, he needed to do it.

But showing up twice? Yeah, he’d been suspicious of the guy watching Robin’s shop. Maybe it had been this Gabriel Knight; maybe that’s how he’d gotten this story. But what had Jake been thinking? Hiding in the rain, waiting to catch her alone. Had he really just needed to see that she got safely home for the night? Or had he been hoping for something more? Had he really thought she’d let him kiss her? Thanks for the rescue, now pay up?

Jake closed his eyes and leaned back against the windowsill. He evaluated his options. Leave town before the Ghost Rescuer became any more of a buzz word. Leave a decent job with a fair boss who didn’t ask questions. Leave the woman and baby who’d gotten under his skin and into his head in just a few short hours.

Or did he stay and trust that his covert skills could keep him out of any more newspapers? Stay and blend back into the shadows so he wouldn’t show up as someone suspicious on KCPD’s radar? Stay and pretend he wasn’t worried about the single mom and daughter combo who’d been thrust into a world of violence with no one to protect them?

Could he remain in K.C. and not have a thing to do with Robin and Emma Carter?

None of those questions got answered. He might not remember his name, but he remembered the training that had kept him alive. Jake shifted his thoughts firmly to the present. There were eyes on him. Right now. He could feel someone was watching him, perched on the window ledge five stories above the street.

Without changing his body posture Jake opened his eyes and scanned the windows across the street. Unlived in or empty because the occupants had gone to work. He dropped his gaze to the street below to check out parked cars and moving traffic. Alleys? Clear. Rooftops? Clear.

And then he spotted the man in the trilby hat, leaning against the newsstand at the corner. He held a newspaper up as if he was reading it. The brim of the hat obscured his face, but it tipped up at least twice, indicating the man was looking up. At Jake.