Beau came out of his chair, braced his hands on top of the desk. “In case you don’t know, grief doesn’t have a time limit.”
His friend looked at him with a trace of pity. “Not if you don’t want it to.” Linc started for the door, turned back. “You don’t need to worry about the business. I can handle whatever comes up. You just need to focus on clearing your name.”
Beau sat back down in his chair. “You’re right.” A long sigh escaped. “Sorry about . . . you know. I’ve got a lot on my mind right now.”
“I know you do. Just remember, I’m here if you need me.”
As he always had been, since back when they were in school.
The phone on his desk rang. No matter what Linc said, there were things he needed to do. As for Cassidy, he intended to enjoy the time they had together. He wouldn’t let the past interfere. Tomorrow he would deal again with the murder.
Tomorrow—if he wasn’t on his way back to jail.
Chapter Eighteen
Cassidy pulled the Honda into a parallel parking space in front of Maximum Security and turned off the engine. All the way to the office, she’d been thinking about the woman in the photo on Beau’s desk.Sarah. She tried to tell herself the burning in the center of her chest wasn’t jealousy. Sarah was dead. Had died years ago. Surely she couldn’t be jealous of a dead woman.
But the bitter truth was, she didn’t want to share Beau with another woman, even if that woman was no longer living. Clearly, Beau had been in love with the beautiful, statuesque blonde. By his reaction, some part of him still was.
From the beginning, Cassidy had known Beau wasn’t a long-term kind of guy. Which had been fine with her. If her past relationships were any indication, she wasn’t a long-term kind of gal.
And yet, her feelings for Beau continued to grow, changing little by little into something far from superficial. She was involved with him on a deeply emotional level and the more she was around him, the worse it was going to get.
She wondered what Beau felt for her. Certainly not thepain-filled, heartbreaking, deeply abiding love he’d felt for Sarah.
Rubbing a fist against her chest as if it could make the burning go away, she climbed out of the car and headed into the office, which was simply furnished, with sturdy oak desks and pictures of Texas cattle ranches on the walls. A hooked rug on the floor in front of the brown leather sofa in the reception area gave it a homey feel the guys all liked.
The usual crew was there: PIs Jase Maddox, Dante Romero, Ford Weatherby, and Lissa Blayne. There were some part-time contractors who worked for the agency, but they weren’t in at the moment. The owner, Chase Garrett, sat in his office on the far end of the room, while a plump older woman, the widow of a cop who had died in the line of duty, manned the receptionist desk.
Connie Thurston did way more than run the office. Chase was the backbone, but Connie was the heart.
“Where you been hidin’, girl?” Connie called out in a voice tinged with her African American heritage and her Detroit upbringing. “That ex-boyfriend of yours, Richard What’s-his-name, stopped by three times in the last two days. Said to tell you he’s had time to think. Wants to talk things over.”
She barely paused. “If he comes in again, tell him I’m not interested.” They’d been finished as a couple weeks before they’d actually parted, and that had been several months back.
“Hey, Cass, honey,” Jase called out. “Wait up!” He was a big man, hard-bodied and handsome. Rising from his desk, he caught her in two long strides, reaching her just as she set her laptop down on her desk.
“What’s up?” she asked.
“Just wondering how it went with that scumball, Dooley Tate. He didn’t give you any trouble, did he?”
Jase looked down at her with a pair of steely blue eyesthat rivaled Beau’s, but she didn’t feel the slightest twinge of attraction. She had never dated any of the guys in the office. Not only were they dedicated bachelors, but it was her personal rule.
Since they liked and respected her, they hadn’t pushed for more than friendship. Instead, they’d taken on the role of protectors, which was a little irritating at times since she was fairly good at protecting herself.
“No trouble with Tate. Beau tangled with a bunch of bikers. He handled himself like a pro.”
“Beau Reese, right? Hotshot race-car driver?”
“Not anymore.”
“So what happened?”
“Beau took care of three of them. One of them came after me and I shot him in the foot. Aside from that it was fairly uneventful.”
Jase grinned. “The poor sonofabitch should have known better than to tangle with Hopalong Cassidy Jones.”
She rolled her eyes. “Very funny.”
