Latimer's Law. Mel Sterling

staff and the dispatchers would get in on the fun.

      No. If he took her in, and that was looking like a more remote if all the time, it wouldn’t be to any station where he was known, either currently or in the past.

      She spoke again. “Does it hurt when I press, or are you just stoic?”

      “It hurts a little, but I’ve had worse.”

      “Really? Hmm.” She wetted yet another cotton ball and dabbed some more. “This may leave a scar. I’m sorry about that.”

      The idea was ludicrous. Compared with the ugly raw meat that was the left side of his face, a half-inch nick in his scalp, easily concealed by hair, was nothing. He tried to hold in his laughter, and ended up shaking silently.

      Abigail drew back and stared at Cade. “What’s so funny?”

      “It might scar?” He thrust the left side of his face toward her and said, “Like I said, I’ve had worse.”

      She blushed, darkly, and it made her gray eyes sparkle. He couldn’t tell whether she was holding back tears or laughter. One knee was up on the bench to balance her, and Cade knew a sudden urge to cup her hips, stroke the long line of her thigh. What the hell, Latimer? Get a grip, and not on your suspect.

      “Oh. I...see what you mean.”

      “Yeah.”

      “Chemical burn? If you don’t mind me asking.”

      “That old standby...acid.”

      “Did something blow up in your face?”

      Yeah...a meth bust went bad. They’d made me and I never knew it. That little twerp and his goon of a buddy... The little twerp was smarter than I thought. I got cocky, and he got lucky, and then I got scarred.

      “You could say that.” He hoped his tone would discourage more questions, but Abigail just went back to dabbing at the wound as if acid burns were something completely normal.

      “It will bleed just a little more, I think. I’m going to put some of this ointment with anesthetic and antibiotics on it. It’ll be hard to bandage unless we shave the area.”

      “No shaving. Does it need stitches?”

      “I...don’t think so, but I’m going to try a couple of these butterfly bandages on it and see if those help close the gap.”

      He felt a slight sting as she applied the cream, then it numbed the area of the cut. It was as Abigail was leaning to reach the kit again for the butterfly bandages that her much-washed chambray shirt, minus a button at bra level, gaped open. Where the plackets separated he saw the purple and yellow of bruises, both fresh and fading, on the upper curves of her breasts, where they swelled from the cups of a practical white cotton bra.

      Bruises with a definite outline of the too-firm grip of a hand. She hadn’t done that to herself.

      Cop reflex took over. He gripped her upper arms and brought her upright again where he could review the evidence. She gasped and paled in pain.

      “Sit down,” he said roughly, rising. He hadn’t grabbed her that hard, which only meant she had more bruises elsewhere, as instinct and experience had told him she must. He slackened his grip, but only slightly.

      What happened next twisted his gut.

      “Please. Please don’t. Please. Please. I’ll do whatever you want, just please. Don’t.” The woman was begging, scrabbling backward, trying her damnedest to get away, and her voice was filled with the most pathetic dread Cade had ever heard. Cade released her upper arms since it was clear he was causing her pain, and let his hands slip down to her wrists, where he locked his fingers in a grip she would not be able to break easily, even though she had more leverage. She flailed and thrashed, continuing to beg for release, until he caught both wrists in one hand and got close enough to thread the fingers of his free hand into her ponytail and immobilize her. She froze, gazing up with terrified, tear-filled eyes and half-open mouth, breathing as though she’d sprinted a mile.

      “Stop. Abigail. Calm down. I don’t want anything from you but the truth. That’s all.”

      Her breath came in sobbing, hitching gasps, but she remained still. Holding her gaze, Cade dropped her ponytail and carefully, slowly, turned back the front of her shirt before he looked at the uncovered area he’d glimpsed.

      Oh, yes, finger bruises. Someone liked to squeeze her small, pretty breasts to the point of pain and beyond. He bet himself he’d find matching bruises in rings around her upper arms, too. God knew where else. Anywhere they could be easily hidden, no doubt. He knew how abusers worked. Their private, sadistic indulgences were just that, and there would be hell to pay when their victims couldn’t conceal the evidence any longer.

      Or in Abigail’s case, wouldn’t. This was why she’d stolen his truck. She was running, running like hell.

      She bent her head and her ponytail slithered forward over her chest, shielding herself from his gaze.

      “Let me see, Abigail. I won’t hurt you, but I need to know bruises are the worst of it.”

      “That...that crummy button!” The words came out in the most embarrassed, horrified tone Cade had ever heard a woman use.

      He couldn’t tell whether the trembling that shook her entire body was laughter, tears, fear, pain or all of the above. She swayed on her feet like an exhausted toddler, and he realized she might fall if she remained standing. He sank back onto the picnic table bench and drew her down with him. She drooped like a flower with a crushed stem, and it was the most natural thing in the world to put an arm around her. In all his thug-tracking days he’d never comforted a criminal like this. How many of them had wept and gazed at him with pitiful, wet eyes? How easily had he withstood those bids for sympathy and lenience? How many of them ended up in the back of the patrol car on the way to jail, where they belonged?

      But how quickly, in just moments, had Abigail McMurray and her gigantic problem become the thing he most needed to fix in the world. He felt her stiffness melting away like snow in the Florida sun, and shortly she was leaning against his chest, her hands creeping up to hang on to his shoulders as if he were the only solid thing left on the planet. He took his gun out of his waistband and set it on the ground out of her reach. No sense in being stupid, even if his gut and his crotch were trying so damned hard to overrule his brain.

      Now I have the truth.

      He had what he thought he wanted, yes. But knowing what had pushed Abigail to take his truck wasn’t enough. Now he wanted the man who had done the damage, wanted him fiercely, with a dark, chill fury that was more vendetta than justice. He shouldn’t feel this way—his law enforcement training should have kept him from the brink. He hardly knew Abigail, and the fact she’d stolen his truck didn’t make her domestic abuse issues his problem.

      But somehow they were.

      He felt her tears soaking his shirt, her sobs shaking her body, and stared over her head toward the tea-dark river where something had taken the lure on his fishing line and was merrily dragging his pole down the sandy bank into the water.

      Aw, hell. You know it’s bad when I choose a sobbing woman over the best reel I own. Goodbye, pole. Hello, trouble.