“She’s got my ID,” Liam said, nodding toward Ellie.
Ellie quickly stood and handed the officer Liam’s wallet. “He’s telling the truth. His name is Liam Quinn and he’s a photographer. And—and I think I may have made a mistake.”
The short officer cuffed Liam and shoved him toward the door. “I’ll take him down to the car while you take her statement,” he said.
“’Bye!” Ellie called as Liam walked through the door. “It was nice meeting you.” She paused. “Officer, can you make sure you have a doctor look at the cut on his forehead? It could need stitches.”
“Ma’am, why don’t you have a seat and we’ll figure out what happened here?” the officer suggested.
“All right. But I want you to know that he was very polite and well behaved while he was here. And he told the truth. There was someone else in the apartment. I saw him run out. I thought they were partners. I didn’t realize he was trying to save me.”
“What his intentions were aren’t really clear, ma’am. I just need your side of the story.”
Ellie folded her hands on her lap and began to recount the events of that night from the moment she woke up. As she did, her mind kept returning to the instant her eyes had met Liam’s, to the powerful current that had passed between them. Had she simply imagined it or was the attraction mutual? As she spoke she tried to push the thought from her head.
For all she knew he was a burglar and he’d end up in prison for his crime. But in her heart she hoped it wasn’t true. She hoped that the story he’d told was real, that a handsome stranger had come to her rescue without thought to his own safety.
“Is Liam Quinn going to go to jail?” she asked.
“Do you want him to go to jail?” the officer countered.
“I really think he was telling the truth. If you think he’s telling the truth, then you should let him go.”
“Is anything missing?”
Ellie glanced around. “Liam said the guy was going through my desk when he came in. But there’s nothing of value there. My computer is still here and so is the television and the stereo equipment.”
“Well, if you find anything missing, call me and I’ll put it into the report.” The officer handed her a business card as he stood. “And you may want to get those locks checked. Burglars sometimes come back a second time.”
Ellie showed the policeman to the door, then closed it behind him, making sure to lock the dead bolt. Then she grabbed up the knife and sat on the sofa. She was afraid to go to bed now, afraid that whoever had broken in would come back. She scrambled off the sofa and picked up a chair from the dining alcove, then jammed it under the doorknob. But, given the choice, she didn’t want to depend upon locks and chairs and butcher knives to protect herself.
A lot of good her white knight was doing her now, locked up in a jail cell. “I should have left him tied up on the floor,” Ellie said. But somehow she suspected that he wouldn’t have stayed tied up for long. Liam Quinn would have convinced her to untie him—and then who knows what might have happened?
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