All I Want(19)

But Parker hadn’t gained his investigator skills by accident. He’d started as a teen trying to figure out how to get out of the life that had been set in stone long before he’d been born, and he’d only honed his ways of ferreting out the truth in the years since. He’d long ago learned the value of holding his silence, and sure enough his patience was rewarded.

“Okay, that’s not the only reason,” she finally said. “My current theory is that it’s because you’re sweet to my big, silly dog.” She paused. “And also maybe a little bit because you have nice eyes.” She closed hers.

He laughed. “I like where you’re going with this.”

“I’m not going anywhere.” She fanned her heated cheeks. “Except to the shower.” She popped open her eyes. “Alone.” She headed up the stairs.

Parker was trying really hard not to imagine her stripping out of her clothes when he heard the bathroom door yank back open.

“Hey,” she yelled down the stairs. “Why does this lock work?”

Oreo looked at Parker.

Parker put a finger to his lips, and Oreo seemed to grin at him.

The door slammed again.

And a brick fell out of the fireplace.

The next morning Parker found himself at the local gym being beat all to shit by Wyatt’s good friend AJ. Wyatt had recommended the guy for PT, and AJ was putting Parker through his paces when his cell buzzed.

Sharon.

“Sorry,” Parker gasped to AJ. “Gotta take this.” He moved aside for privacy. “Hola.”

“I told you to back off,” Sharon said.

Parker didn’t pretend to misunderstand. “Backing off isn’t a strong suit of mine.”

“How about being unemployed?” she asked. “Is that going to be a strong suit of yours?”

“He’s here, Sharon,” he said quietly. “Carver’s hiding out until the heat on him dies down.”

“Have you seen him?”

“No, but—”

“Parker—”

“We can nail him.”

“No,” she said flatly. “We can’t.”

“But—”

“Listen to me very carefully,” she said in her someone’s-gonna-die tone. “Don’t be stupid and jeopardize your career.”

“You think this is about my career?” he asked in disbelief.

She sighed. “No. But this is bigger than us. Okay? That’s all I can say. Now back the f*ck off and walk away so I don’t have to come out there and kick your ass myself.”

And then she hung up on him.

Parker stared at his phone.

“Problem?” AJ asked.

“No,” he said automatically. But yeah, there was a problem, a big one. Walk away? Kel had hinted that another agency was involved in this thing. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives? FBI? Homeland Security?

And why?

And even more importantly, how the hell was he supposed to ever walk away from this case?

Very late that night, Zoe sat on the couch in some serious pain—and shame. As a rule, she ate fairly healthily but all bets were off during times of stress. Proving the point, she’d just polished off an entire bag of pizza rolls by herself and was covered in crumbs and questioning her choices in life. Plus, she’d screwed up another batch of cookies, burning this bunch, so the place was a little smoky.

Oreo sat with her, taking up more than his fair share of the couch, snoring audibly.

She hadn’t turned on any lights. Not because she was trying to save money on her electric bill, although she could do with a little saving there. Earlier she’d attempted to change the lightbulb in the hallway and most of the downstairs had gone dark. Not all of it. She could, for instance, turn on a light in the living room, but she didn’t need a light in here. She needed one in the kitchen to clean up her mess.

And to forage for more food.

But try as she might to figure out the electrical problem, she couldn’t. It would have to get in line with all the other things that needed fixing.

In any case, the only glow came from the TV, where her Friends season ten marathon was coming to an end.

Until the lamp suddenly came on.

Gasping in surprise, she blinked up at Parker. “What are you doing?”

“Checking on the odd sounds of a woman sobbing at three in the morning,” he said.

Oh God. She hadn’t been sobbing. Had she?

Parker sniffed the air. “You burn something?”

“I think the oven’s defective.”

“Do you?” Parker asked.

She let out what she meant to be a laugh but sounded horrifyingly close to a sob. Dammit.

“Hey.” Parker came close. “What’s wrong?”

She swiped at a few residual tears. “Nothing.”

“Zoe,” he said softly, with far too much empathy.

“Just never mind! You won’t understand.”

“Try me,” he said.

She sighed. “Rachel got off the plane for Ross.”

Parker turned in a circle, casing the room. “Who’s Ross?”

She let out a choked laugh and wished for a tissue. She also wished that she weren’t in her beloved King’s College sweats that were so battered and threadbare she might not be one hundred percent decent. Oh hell, who was she kidding? She was scrubbed free of makeup and had her hair piled up on top of her head and she was wearing Shrek slippers. She wasn’t even close to decent. “Ross from Friends,” she said. “He and Rachel got back together and it was . . .”