Austin was so taken with Sam’s performance, and he loved the poster of Atticus Colt I bought for his bedroom wall. He makes an excited gurgling sound, stamps his feet on the floor, and starts waving his hand in a clumsy but entirely endearing imitation of a magician.
Sam enters the room a bit hesitantly. I move out of the way, and he takes my place near Austin. “Hi, Austin,” he says, and takes a small step backward to avoid my son’s wildly waving hands. “I brought you something to help you practice your magic act.”
He shows Austin his palms, completely empty. Then he claps his hands together twice and when he opens them again, a pack of playing cards has magically appeared. Austin claps his own hands and lets out a shriek of happy surprise when the cards appear atop his open palms.
I discretely wipe tears from my eyes. My boy is so happy, and Sam is just amazing. Taking the time to interact with Austin instead of hurrying me out the door to avoid acknowledging that I have a child. Adifferentkind of child. I wonder if he knows what he’s in for. Then I wonder if I’m getting ahead of myself.
Sally is standing beside me. “Wow,” she says under her breath. “He’s incredible.”
“Totally,” I say quietly, not wanting to disturb the scene in front of us. Sam opens up the pack and fans the cards out in front of Austin, who taps one with a forefinger. Sam closes the fan, turns the deck over, and shows Austin the card he picked – right at the top of the pile. He hands the cards to Austin, who takes them almost reverently.
Eventually, Sam stands and comes over to us. “Thank you for watching Austin so that Arielle can come out with me,” he says and produces another rose from thin air for Sally. She blushes and giggles.
“No problem, Mr. Foster. You two have a good afternoon.”
Sam offers me his arm. “Shall we get going?”
Chapter 11
Tell Me
Tim
Tim pulled up to Arielle’s house on Saturday afternoon. It had been hours since he lost his temper with her, and he needed to apologize for his behavior. When he thought back to the way he had spoken to her, the things he had said, he was mortified. And remembering the look of abject fear on her face at his outburst made him cringe. He needed to set things right with her.
Just before he got out of the car, a black Mustang pulled to a stop outside Arielle’s house. Tim watched as a man got out and walked up to her door and then stepped inside. It made him uneasy. As far as he knew, Arielle had never invited strange men to her home. She hadn’t dated since Steve died; there was no reason she should have lied about that, and if she had a date, she surely would have asked Tim to watch Austin.
Tim suppressed the urge to storm into the house and demand to know what was going on. Even through the haze of his anger the night before, he had heard Arielle lock the door after he slammed it shut when he left her kitchen in a rage. The clicking of that lock had told him that he wasn’t welcome to just drop by anymore.
He kept watching now, and a few minutes later, Arielle opened the door and stepped outside. She looked beautiful in a simple sundress, and Tim’s groin twitched in reaction. The guy followed her out, and she took his arm as they walked to the Mustang.
He opened the passenger door and waited for Arielle to settle herself in the seat. There was something familiar about him. As he walked around the car to the driver’s side, Tim caught a glimpse of the guy’s face, and recognition dawned. He was the guy from the files Tim had gathered about Arielle’s new boss, Samuel Foster.
His sweet Arielle was going out with her boss! The fact just didn’t compute. Arielle said she’d never met Samuel Foster and that she would take Tim along when she did finally meet him. She knew Tim wanted to check him out to make sure that he was legit and that she was safe.
Tim hadn’t figured that he’d be competing for her affections. She always said that Steve was her true love. Kind, loving, gentle Steve. Which is who Tim had been trying to copy. He reasoned that if she loved those things about Steve, surely she’d love those things about him soon enough too. But if this bastard thought he was going to steal Arielle’s heart, he had another thing coming.
Tim started his car and headed for the station.
∞∞∞
“Hey, Detective,” said the female officer at the front desk. “Aren’t you supposed to be off duty?”
“Hi, Danielle. Detectives are hardly ever off duty,” Tim said as he entered the building.
“Do you have a lead on the murder case?” she asked enthusiastically. “Need any help?”
Danielle was a new recruit. She completed her basic training a few months before and had been a real eager beaver since joining the force. Apparently, she had plans to be a detective in under five years. Wouldn’t believe anyone who told her that it was unlikely to happen before she was thirty. But having her stick around a bit longer wasn’t a bad thing in Tim’s books. She was a fantastic lay – enthusiastic in that department as well.
Even though he was in love with Arielle, Tim was definitely no saint. He was prepared to play the long game in getting her to come around, but he sure as hell was not swearing off sex until that happened. Especially not when some nubile newbie was practically throwing herself at him.
“Not right now, but maybe a little later,” he said suggestively.
“You know where to find me when you need some help,” she said with a wink.
At his cubicle, Tim powered up the laptop on his desk, eager to get the search on Samuel Foster started. A rookie had run the name through the department’s search programs at Tim’s request but hadn’t uncovered much. Certainly not enough to keep Arielle from going on a date with the guy.
Tim entered ‘Samuel Foster’ into the first program and waited impatiently for the results. Nothing earth-shattering aside from a bit of a tricky childhood. No sign of a father and the mother had dropped off the scene when he was about nine. Records had him moving to a guardian round then, and after that, he didn’t make a blip on the radar.
