This time Bogart didn’t hesitate, he sprang after her, easily catching up and circling her with excited barks as she made her way to the porch. The pair were through the door in an instant, and then it was shut behind them with a force that reverberated through the night.
“What the fuck?” James sat back on his haunches as the sounds of the truck tearing back through the forest became ever fainter, and let his thoughts sort themselves out. First things first.
He’d seen Bogart! Knew he was okay. That was a huge relief.
But now he had other complications to deal with. Something else was going on besides the dog-napping of his K-9 partner. Something he didn’t understand. But whatever the something was, he meant to get to the bottom of it.
One thing was certain. Regardless of the events of the night, the woman in the cabin was the prime suspect in the abduction of his K-9.
He should report what he’d discovered to the sheriff of this North Carolina county and ask for help. But after weeks of searching, he wanted the pleasure of confronting the suspect himself. That wasn’t exactly legal procedure. Any way he factored it, he was way the hell out of his jurisdiction.
James slid a hand down his face. By nature he was a by-the-book guy, professional, methodical, reasonable. But something had snapped when Bogart went missing. The job of finding him became a personal quest. And he was going to see it through. So then, how best to confront the woman holding his dog hostage?
Maybe the woman who had his dog had abducted him herself, or maybe she had had help. No way to judge that from here.
He had learned long ago that “female” did not equal “easy to best,” and certainly not “harmless.” Unlike the truck driver, he wasn’t going to give her the chance to get the better of him, or escape. He was going in full force and with overwhelming strength, to teach her a lesson she wouldn’t soon forget.
He was just going to wait for full light.
*
Shay Appleton jumped up when her dog, sprawled at her feet, suddenly lifted his head to listen. “What is it, Prince?” She stared into the shiny, alert gaze of her pet with an intensity equal to his. “Do you hear something?”
Prince made a soft nasally sound but his tail did an unperturbed thump on the floor.
Shay glanced at her front door. The bolts were still shoved into place. Was that enough?
For eight heavy heartbeats she stared at the doorknob of her rental cabin, burnished by years of use. It did not turn.
Shay exhaled audibly. Okay, so maybe nothing. Of course it was nothing. Prince wasn’t behaving the way he had last night when there had been a real problem.
Not until Prince lowered his head back to his paws did the warmth of spilled coffee permeate Shay’s awareness the way it had her jogging shorts.
“Oh damn!” She fumbled to right her mug and grabbed for napkins to catch the steaming liquid dripping over the edge of the kitchen table.
When she was done cleaning, she picked up her empty cup and stared into its depths. She hadn’t had enough sleep. And now she couldn’t even blame the caffeine she had yet to drink for her nerves.
Hypervigilance. Her condition even had a name. Her doctor assured her that this latest episode would pass. Many women felt unnerved after a nasty breakup. Especially if the ex-boyfriend continued to harass her with text messages and middle-of-the-night phone calls. She was told to ignore the calls and delete the messages unread. Within a few weeks most men moved on.
Unfortunately, that prognosis hadn’t made her less anxious for long. Though she had tossed away her disposable cell and bought another so that Eric could not reach her, she could not get rid of the feeling that she was being watched. Again her doctor assured her that only hypervigilance plagued her and it would subside with time.
That was a month ago.
Shay shook her head tightly. Not when it had become freakin’ obvious, after last night, that there was a very real reason for it to continue!
Eric Coates wasn’t most men. He had not sent angry messages or threats. He was more clever than that.
Eric had found her. Alone.
Who else would have been lurking in the woods watching this place? How had he found her?
Did it matter? He was out there, waiting.
Eric didn’t know about the cabin. No one in her present life knew about this place up on the state line. It had been her refuge since age fourteen, the one safe place in the broken world of her teenage years. That was a past she had run from, and was still running from. Even now, she’d do almost anything to protect herself from it.
Shay shook her head to dispel the band of fear threatening to tighten into a headache. She was an idiot to have left the city for an off-season cabin in the woods. She’d just provided him with the perfect place—
“No.” She raised both hands as if she could physically chase away the negative thoughts. “No!”
The shock of a wet nose poking her behind the knee jolted her.
She glanced down as Prince pushed his weight against her leg and stared up at her in question, alert to every nuance of her feelings. Her world righted.
She wasn’t alone. She had Prince.