Maggie's Guardian. Anna Adams

      “Wait.” Noah grabbed the heavy door again, his greater strength shoving the cold wood against her palm. “I know you can’t get into your office to access the files, but I want you to write down everything you remember about any client who’s complained at any time in the past year.”

      “I can’t, Noah. I’m their attorney.”

      “Don’t start that. I’m not official, and we’ll find a way to protect privilege if we have to, but I have to know what went wrong here. I’m especially interested in the guy who wanted you to be his own private attorney.”

      “I’ll just bet you are.” The words slipped out, echoing the last contentious days of their marriage.

      Noah curved his mouth and the seductive fullness of his lower lip rattled her even more than his pleasure in provoking her. He spun on his heel and sauntered down the steps, in charge again, damn him. She hadn’t learned his kind of control, and she was still mad as hell at him.

      She watched him walk away until she realized divorcing him hadn’t cured her addiction to the loose, sexy swing of his stride. Without another thought she slammed the door. And then cursed herself, waiting for Maggie’s shrill cry.

      Which came right on schedule.

      “Let me get her,” Joe said.

      Tessa wavered, already used to having sole responsibility for the baby. But she had to assure Joe and Eleanor they were still important to Maggie. She might be afraid of loving enough to get hurt again, but she’d make herself trust a little for Maggie’s sake.

      “She’s in my room.” She pointed up at the gallery. “That door. I’ll get a bottle in case she’s hungry.”

      “I’ll come with you, Joe.” Eleanor followed her husband to the stairs. “But, Tessa?”

      With her hand on the kitchen door, she looked back.

      “Are you sure you don’t want us to go to a hotel?” Eleanor asked.

      “You’re welcome here.” Maggie knew them, loved them and needed them. “Noah’s already taken the room closest to mine. You can have the one nearest the stairs, but I’ve been using it for storage. I’ll clear it out for you later.”

      As simple as that, she began to transform her haven for one into a family dwelling. Her safe days of owing nothing to anyone were over, but she’d held Maggie without screaming in agony because she couldn’t hold Keely. Maybe she was turning a corner. Maybe she’d learn to treasure her memories instead of avoiding them.

      Some of her memories anyway. The ones that featured Noah still spelled danger. He might be the one man who could find the real killer quickly, but afterward, he’d retire to his self-sufficient life. A hint of unease snaked down her spine, making her shiver.

      She didn’t want to need Noah again.

      “BAXTON, I HAVE TO TAKE the time.” Noah shifted in the cracked leather chair across from his angry commander. The other man glared at him from beneath bushy brows that looked more gray than Noah remembered. When had Baxton started to look his age?

      More to the point, when was the last time he’d noticed anything except his own work? For eighteen months he’d made himself numb while he’d functioned on the job. He used that same detachment to focus now.

      “You know Tessa’s innocent. I can’t let those village clowns nail her for something she’d never do.”

      “You’re divorced. You haven’t forgotten that in some drunken stupor?”

      Noah passed on responding to Baxton’s sneer. Taking a punch at his superior could end this negotiation badly, and if his boss had really thought he was coming to work drunk, he’d have been off the job months ago. “I haven’t forgotten the divorce.” He never forgot, but maybe if he did something right for Tessa, he’d learn to let her go.

      “How well do you know her after all this time? When did you last see her?”

      Noah wasn’t about to admit he’d sat pathetically outside her parents’ house on Thanksgiving, knowing the hour she’d walk up their steps to the door.

      “We haven’t seen each other since she left me—until last night.”

      Baxton rocked slowly back and forth in his chair as a clock ticked behind him. “How much time off do you want?”

      “I’m not sure.”

      The commander seemed to think it over, as if he had a choice.

      Noah reared out of his chair. “Look, Baxton, I’m not asking—I’m going to Maine to help my ex-wife. Fire me if you have to.”

      “Damn you, man, you know I can’t fire you. I’d be explaining until my successor was planning his retirement party. Go, but you’d better make this fast. Let’s go over your caseload.”

      “We’d better start with Della Eddings.”

      Della’s was a case they’d worked on together outside of office hours. Abused by her husband, she’d arrived in the squad room in the early hours of a rainy morning, begging them to save her and her two children. Frank Eddings remained just outside the reach of the stalker laws, but Baxton and Noah, both sick of cleaning up after killings, had gone out of their way to protect her.

      “My wife will thank me for spending double my usual time with Della,” Baxton said.

      “We’re keeping her alive.”

      “I won’t forget to check in with her.”

      Noah nodded. “I’ll let Della know she should try you first if anything happens.”

      They covered the rest of Noah’s cases, and he got up to leave. Baxton swung around in his chair as if a great idea had suddenly struck him. “If you manage to train one of those hicks well enough, send him back here instead of coming yourself. He’d have to be less trouble.”

      “Thanks.” Noah gripped the doorknob, just a little ashamed of the pain in the ass he must have been in the past year and a half.

      Baxton dropped his loose fist on the desk. “Don’t forget to fill out your paperwork. I don’t want to come up there after you to get it right.”

      “You’re a warm guy, Baxton.”

      “Damn straight.” Picking up a pencil, he prepared to move on to his next point of business. “You know you got no jurisdiction up there?”

      “I don’t need jurisdiction. I can dial 911 as well as anyone else.” Noah pulled the door shut and met the accusatory stares of the detectives working their cases from the office. A single thought on so many minds was easy to read.