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“Bob and I will be outside.” Peter nodded to the older man and tipped his head, then the two of them strode out.
Behind Gage’s back, Bob gave her two thumbs-ups.
Clare bit down on her molars.
“Everything okay?” Gage asked.
Great.She must’ve looked unhinged as well as exhausted. “I had a heart to heart with my mom last night. Then I talked to Katrina Mares, since I was in the hospital anyway. She agreed and was able to ID the man who held her.” She just hadn’t been able to pinpoint where she’d been. Aside from the fact it’d been a back room. Drywall and mud. No light fixture, just wires. Lights on stands blinding her.
Katrina had been beaten and tied to a chair and held for hours before she was left for dead in the park by Steven Phoenix.
Gage nodded. “I know your people believe Aaron Crenshaw is connected to this crime. I called the detectives, and he’s going to call Bob. A breakfast meeting with them so they can go over it all. Make some progress on the case.”
“Oh. Great.” She had to say, “Bob doesn’t usually get much more than basic politeness, and sometimes even that seems like a stretch.”
Gage started to speak but caught himself. “I’d like to get to know the man he is now. Not the guy everyone says he used to be.”
When he looked at her like that, it made her wish he would do the same with her.
Could she actually hope for that?
Clare wanted to believe.
THIRTY-ONE
“Let’s go outside.” Gage motioned to the front of the building. “It’s pretty ripe in here.”
Clare nodded. Her face was as pale as the walls, her black hair making her skin seem even lighter than normal. She had dark circles around her eyes.
He wondered if he was the one who put them there.
“Are you feeling okay?” he asked, then stopped her in the front room of the store. “One sec before we go out. I’m…” He held up his hand, trying to figure out how to say this. “I’m sorry.”
That was probably the simplest—and best.
Clare’s eyes widened.
“If you’re really so surprised that I would apologize to you, then I’ve got more to do to repair this relationship than I thought.” He winced. “Okay, so it’s not exactly a relationship but…”
“It’s not nothing,” she said, a guarded expression on her face. “Or just colleagues. Not with our history.”
He nodded. “Now that I’m supposed to be living what I said I believed, that Jesus took my sin, I’m supposed to apologize and ask for forgiveness.” He took a breath. “I shouldn’t have yelled at you last time I saw you. People were hurt. Dakota caused all that damage and put lives at risk. I was mad at him, and that spilled out into being mad at you, and I’m sorry.”
“Thank you.” She put her hand on his shoulder, leaned up, and touched her lips to his cheek.
Gage blushed. He ducked his head. “Can we talk about something later?”
“About us? Or the case?”
“Actually, neither.” He found himself saying, “But there’s no one else I want to talk about it with than you.”
Maybe she was a safe bet because she wasn’t part of his life all the time, or for the foreseeable future. They could part ways again, similarly to how they had before. She might get the contract with Benson PD for her company, then make sure she never had to work with him again.
Or he just wanted to tell her because she was the person who meant the most to him in his life that still lived, even if that was a long time ago. His mom was gone. His dad was who he wanted to talk to her about.
Who else did that leave?
He was going to tell Liam pretty soon, but for some reason he wanted to tell Clare first. She of all people would understand what it meant to him to finally know who his father was. They’d talked about their dads a lot at one point.
