Cavanaugh's Surrender

It also made her realize how much she missed having a family of her own, people to talk to and use as sounding boards. People who cared how she felt and if she was getting enough sleep or running herself into the ground. After her mother had died, there’d been only Paula. And now even she was gone. That left only her, and it was true what they said. One is the loneliest number.

“Must be nice having more family than you know what to do with,” she commented, trying to sound offhanded.

He would have had to have been completely deaf to have missed the wistfulness in her voice. Although he wasn’t given to being touchy-feely and was rather careless at times about other people’s feelings, Logan upbraided himself now for not realizing that he was talking about family life to a woman who no longer had one.

He felt a genuine stab of guilt.

The next moment he heard himself trying to make amends. “Feel free to drop by on any morning or on Sunday,” he added. “The man goes all out then,” he repeated. When he saw her looking at him, obviously puzzled, he guessed at what was going through her mind. “Don’t worry, the chief won’t mind.”

“But you just said that he had family gatherings,” she pointed out. And right now, she was part of no one’s family.

“To the chief, anyone who’s part of the force is family.”

Okay, so maybe the handsome detective wasn’t just an empty vessel. He was being kind to her because she was alone. She got that. But she was no one’s charity case. Allowing a spasmodic smile to reach her lips, then go, she thanked him.

“I’ll keep that in mind.”

Logan knew a brush-off when he heard one, and ordinarily he’d just let it ride. But this woman was obviously someone special to his father, and initially he had been rather coarsely oblivious with her.

“No, really,” he emphasized. “I’m sure my father would like you to come, too. He seems to regard you as another daughter,” he said, trying to add weight to his invitation. He waited for that to sink in before saying anything more. Overkill was just as bad as neglecting to say anything at all.

At the mention of his father, Destiny allowed herself a small smile. Glancing over her shoulder to make sure the man was still in the other room, she said, “Your father’s a very nice man.”

“Well, we agree on that,” Logan told her.

And more than likely on very little else, Destiny added silently.

With a preoccupied nod, she began to leave the apartment. She’d let Sean do his work. If she felt there was anything to add, she still had the key to Paula’s apartment in her pocket. She could come back at a later date, when there was no one to get in her way.

Her hand on the doorknob, Logan’s question made her pause in midstep.

“You want someone to take you home?”

Was he treating her like a civilian? Or did he just assume that she’d locked down her hysteria and was just a tiny step away from having a complete meltdown?

Turning to face the younger Cavanaugh, she looked at him, not exactly certain just how to interpret what he’d just said.

“What?”

“Would you like an officer to take you home?” he asked her, tendering the offer with a smile. “I’d offer to take you home myself, but I seem to be a little tied up at the moment.”

He was serious. Either he was being too kind—or too cynical and doubting her actual feelings. She wasn’t sure which bothered her more.

“Why would you think that I’d need someone to take me home?” she asked.

Why did she take everything as a challenge to her authority? He was trying to be understanding. Obviously that was wasted on this woman. “Well, you did just have a big shock.”

“I’m not going home,” she told him. Not wanting to explain herself any more than she absolutely had to, Destiny walked out.

“Are you going to be all right?” Sean asked as she passed him.

Sean’s concern, at least, she didn’t have to wonder about. She knew it was genuine and smiled with gratitude.

“Yes,” she told him, not wanting the man to worry about her. He had enough to deal with these days. He didn’t need her to burden him. Besides, she wasn’t about to share her pain with him or with anyone. That was hers and hers alone to deal with.

And the way to deal with it was to keep busy.

She wasn’t going home right now, even though the hour grew late. Home was just a medium-size shell that she got to rattle around in, waiting for the beginning of her next workday.

And, since technically she wasn’t supposed to be working this case on the city’s dime, she had to do it on her own time. That meant going into the lab and the small cubbyhole that comprised her “office” during something other than her regular work hours.

As in now.

She took the elevator down to the ground floor. It went straight down without a stop. Getting off, she walked directly to the double outer doors and pushed them open. The night air was chilly and damp as it greeted her.

Destiny drew in a deep breath and then another, trying to make herself come around.

With renewed purpose and borrowed energy, she walked briskly from the entrance to the apartment building to the curb where she’d parked her car.

And then she stopped dead.

There was no way she was going anywhere. Some jerk had double-parked his car parallel to hers and was completely blocking her exit.

She was stuck.

Biting back a barrage of less than flattering words that leaped to her lips, Destiny peered into the offending vehicle, trying to see if she could ascertain what kind of village idiot belonged to the car.

That was when she saw the official markings. And the communications radio that was mounted beneath the dashboard.

A standard Crown Victoria, the white car was an unmarked police vehicle. And she had a really strong hunch she knew whom it belonged to.

Chapter 4

When he heard the elevator opening, Logan automatically looked in that direction. He was surprised to see Destiny getting off.

“Forget something?” he asked, raising his voice in order to be heard.

Canvassing the floor, he was clear down the hall from the elevator. So far, he’d had next to no luck getting anyone to answer, despite the hour.

The only door that had opened so far had been by a very grumpy older man in a stained T-shirt and rumpled trousers of an indeterminable color. Both items of clothing looked as if the man had slept in them for at least the past year.

The man also, when questioned, didn’t seem to speak any English. Whatever language he did speak, Logan was entirely unfamiliar with it. He was fluent in Spanish and knew a handful of other languages well enough to at least identify what they were. The old man was muttering at him in what he could only guess was an offshoot of some Slavic language, definitely not Russian in origin.

Thanking the man, Logan went to the next door. And the next.

So far, no one else had answered, but he’d canvassed only a quarter of the floor before his father’s chief assistant had stepped off the elevator again.

“No, I didn’t forget anything,” Destiny retorted, irritated because she wanted to be on her way already, “but I think you did.”