“We investigate every threat we receive. You can never be too careful, is my motto. But our investigations never turned up anything more than clients and their families blowing off steam.”

  “Do you keep these threats on file?” Mitch asked.

  “Yes. Each of us is instructed to keep such a file.”

  “Can we look at Mr. Bodig’s file?” Kat’s hard look said it wasn’t optional.

  “Now that you mention it, I don’t remember my assistant asking me what to do with that file when she cleaned out Nathan’s cubicle. Let me check with her.” He picked up the phone and dialed. “Margaret, did you find a threat file in Nathan’s belongings?” He listened, his finger resting on the side of his narrow face. “Okay, thank you.” He put down the phone. “She didn’t find one, but Nathan was a by-the-book kind of guy so I’m sure he kept a file.”

  “So where is it, then?” Kat asked, sounding as if she thought Weichert was lying.

  “That’s a good question.”

  “Could someone else in your office have taken it?” Mitch asked before Kat completely took over the interview.

  “Why would they want to do that?”

  “Maybe to cover up something.” Kat leaned closer and watched him intently.

  “Like what?” Weichert’s eyes narrowed. “We have nothing to hide here.”

  “We don’t think you do,” Mitch jumped in as he gave Kat a look, telling her to chill. “You’re sure there’s no one in the office that might have a grudge against Mr. Bodig?”

  “I’m positive, Detective.” He sighed. “This is a stressful job, and I work hard to foster teamwork. If someone had it in for Nathan I’d know about it.”

  “We’d still like the name and contact information for all of his coworkers. And the same information for his clients for the last ninety days.”

  Weichert’s back went up. “You know I can’t do that, Detective. All of our information is confidential, and I can’t just hand it over. But if you’d get a court order, I’d be happy to oblige.”

  Legally what the man had said was true, but officials in Weichert’s position often cooperated in investigations. Maybe Mitch could persuade him with a little push. “I have no problem getting that order, but if you make me do that, I’ll think you’re hiding something.” He turned to Kat. “What do we do when someone’s hiding things?”

  “We start digging. Maybe tail the person. Wait for the least little mistake to haul them in.” She smiled at Weichert. “You wouldn’t want us to do that would you, Mr. Weichert?”

  “That’s not fair.”

  “Neither is the fact that Nathan Bodig may have been murdered,” Mitch said. “Either you want to help us find the killer or you don’t.”

  “It’s not that I don’t want to help, but I’ll lose my job if I turn over confidential files.”

  “Tell you what, Weichert.” Mitch leaned forward. “At least give me the information on the clients right now, and I’ll get to work on that court order to show the higher-ups in case anyone asks.”

  “You’re not just trying to play me, are you?”

  “He’s a man of his word,” Kat added with respect and admiration in her eyes that made Mitch’s heart warm.

  Weichert seemed to mull it over, then turned to his keyboard and started clicking away. As Mitch shared a victory smile with Kat the printer whirred behind Weichert and started spitting out pages.

  “Here you go,” Weichert said tersely as he grabbed the pages. “Now if you don’t mind I have work to do.”

  Mitch rose, towering over the guy, who shrank back. “I’d also appreciate it if you’d ask around to see if anyone else might know what happened to Mr. Bodig’s threat file.”

  “I will.”

  “Call me if you find anything.” Mitch gave him his business card.

  “You won’t forget about the order?” Weichert’s confidence had all but evaporated.

  “I said I’d do it, Mr. Weichert, and that means I’ll do it.” Mitch waited for Kat to exit the room then he followed.

  In the hallway, she let out a long breath. “So exactly how are you planning to get that court order without any solid evidence to back it up?”

  “I’m hoping we’ll come up with something that I can use by the end of the day.” Mitch met her gaze.

  “And if we don’t?”

  “I didn’t actually promise to get one, just said I’d try to get one. And I will try.” They went through the lobby, and he held open the front door. “Nancy’s place to search Bodig’s things?”

  “You read my mind,” she answered and they stepped into the cool morning with the sun trying to break free.

  They made their way to the car and Mitch settled in for the task of navigating traffic. He loved living in Portland, but he could live without the heavy traffic.

  “You think Weichert was hiding something?” Kat asked when he turned into Nancy’s neighborhood.

  “Not really, do you?”

  “No. He seemed like a straight shooter until we asked for the records.” She seemed confident in her opinion. “He wouldn’t be the first official who followed rules and made us get a court order.”

  “It is odd that Bodig’s threat file is missing, though.”

  “Let’s hope we find it at Nancy’s.”

  He clicked on a blinker and turned onto Nancy’s street. “If she had the file, wouldn’t she have given it to you when you started looking into his death?”

  “If it’s there, I doubt she even knew she had it. She was just like her parents. She could never bring herself to go through his stuff. I was supposed to go through it, but I was tied up on another case. Maybe if I’d gotten to it sooner—” Kat bit her lip and looked away.

  “Hey,” he said as he pulled into Nancy’s driveway. “I thought you were over blaming yourself for all of this.”

  “I’m trying, but after I made my condolence call to Nancy’s parents last night it all came back. I keep thinking if I’d just done something different Nancy would still be alive.” The confident woman of a few moments ago vanished.

  He rested his hand on hers. “Don’t go there, Kat, okay? Remember what you told me, God has a plan here.”

  “You don’t really believe that.”

  “But you do. And I’m trying to.”

  She smiled. “I’m happy to hear that.”

  “I thought you might be.” He squeezed her hand.

  The sun slipped free of morning clouds, the warmth shining through the windshield as if it’d come out just to encourage her to cheer up. Mitch made a quick visual assessment of the area. Other than an official seal on the door, you’d never know a murder had taken place in this sleepy neighborhood.

  “Looks clear,” he said as his phone rang. “That’s Tommy’s ring tone. Hopefully he has some news for us,” Mitch said but Kat had already climbed out and started up the walk.

  He grabbed the phone and by the time he got out, she was on the stairs leading to the porch. That was Kat. Always in a hurry. But she’d have to wait for him to break the seal Tommy had placed on the door.

  He punched talk. “What’s up, Tommy?”

  Crack.

  A bullet whizzed past Mitch and splintered the front door. Kat whirled around, her eyes wide.

  “Get down!” he yelled as he drew his weapon, took cover behind the car door and searched for the shooter in one swift move. He swept his gaze right, left, front, back. Saw no one. He turned back to Kat and it was as if everything in front of him changed to slow motion. She pivoted and dived slowly toward the porch, taking him back to another time. Another place. Lori, with a bullet in her chest, blood spurting, dropping to the ground, her eyes open. Staring vacant.

  “What’s going on?” Tommy’s voice came from his phone.

  “We have a shooter. Send backup.”

  Crack.

  Another bullet.

  Kat, still trying to take cover, jerked, then landed on the porch with a loud thud.

  She’d been hit.

  Mitch’s heart skipped a beat. He wanted to race up the walk and throw himself over her, but he couldn’t help her if he was shot, too.

  Another bullet whizzed over her head and into the door.

  She lay there unmoving. Not even a flinch. She was hit all right, and despite everything he’d been trained to do, he couldn’t just sit here. He made his way to the front of his car, then to the garage. He waited a few seconds. No more gunfire. He bolted to his feet and charged up the walkway where he spotted blood pooling under her.

  “Kat,” he yelled and charged faster. He scooped her up in his arms, then dove behind shrubbery blocking the shooter’s view of the porch. He landed on his shoulder to shield her from the impact then rolled to cover her body.

  “Ouch,” she said, and his heart soared. She was alive.

  He lay there, waiting to hear another gunshot over the thudding of his heart or maybe the pounding of footsteps as the shooter came to finish them off. He tightened the arm hooked around her waist and lifted his head from where he’d buried it in her hair. “Where are you hit?”

  “He just grazed my arm,” she said as if she’d just fallen down and skinned her knee not taken a bullet in the arm.

  He rolled off her, and she looked at him, her face inches from his. “You might’ve warned me you were going to go all he-man on me again.” She frowned at him.

  Relief flooded through his chest. He wanted to pull her to him and hold her, but settled for smoothing her hair out of her face and looking at her.

  “What?” she asked.

  “You shouldn’t have just laid there in the line of fire, Kat.”

  “I knew I couldn’t take cover faster than he could fire. I hoped he’d think I was down so he’d stop firing. In case you didn’t notice it seemed to work.” She gave a little smile. “What about you? Are you hit?”

  “No.”

  “God came through again.” She gave a tremulous smile.

  He smiled back at her and cupped the side of her face. She was right, of course. God had kept them both alive. But that didn’t take away the feeling in the pit of his stomach. He’d only felt this helpless once. With Lori on the day she died. And he never wanted to feel it again. “Promise me you’ll stay by my side from now on. When I go, you go. When I stop, you stop.”

  He saw a brief flicker of fear in her eyes. So she was scared, but putting on a good show. This time he didn’t resist but drew her into his arms. She smelled fresh and sweet and he hated that she’d been hit. Hated the rise of all of the doubts brought on by lingering guilt over Lori’s death.

  “Promise me, Kat,” he whispered into her hair, his plea so urgent it scared him.

  “I’ll stay by your side.”

  He heard her words, felt the sincerity in them, but how could he relax when a killer still stalked her?

  SEVEN

  Kat sat on the back of the ambulance, her arm aching far worse than she’d let on to Mitch. Sweet, caring Mitch. Strong Mitch, holding her against that solid wall of his chest again. Stroking her back and making her feel safe.

  What was she going to do about that man? She wanted to dislike him. To not respect him. But the more time she spent with him, the more she saw he was just what Tommy said last night. A good guy. A good guy who just happened to look amazing. Behind the handsome face and toned body that her medic kept checking out, was a man she could fall hopelessly in love with if she weren’t careful.

  She sighed and dropped her chin to her chest to loosen cramping muscles in her neck.

  What am I going to do here, Lord? You saved us both. Kept us from harm. But it feels like You’re just pushing me into more trouble by keeping Mitch near me. You know I can’t handle a relationship. I need Your help, Father. Don’t let me do something I’ll regret.

  “Hey, partner.” Tommy’s voice brought her head up. He squatted in front of her and took her hands. “I hear you’re refusing to go to the hospital.”

  “I’ll go, just not in the ambulance.”

  “That’s what I figured you’d say so Mitch is going to drive you while I go through Bodig’s files.”

  “No! Please. You can take me.”

  “I can’t.”

  “Why on earth not?” She felt anger taking over.

  “Because Mitch is letting this get to him, and he needs to be with you to get over it.”

  She watched Tommy like a hawk trying to gage his sincerity. His eyes were clear, honest and transparent, but that didn’t mean anything. “Is this just a ploy to get me in the car with him or are you serious about helping Mitch?”

  He scrunched his eyes. “Mitch may not have told you, but he lost a partner in a situation very much like this one.”

  “He mentioned it.”

  “So you can imagine how this has upset him. He’s over there acting like it doesn’t bother him, but it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see he’s stressed.”

  She looked at Mitch standing near the house talking on the phone with his hand clamped on the back of his neck. His posture was rigid and his jaw tight. She remembered when he’d said he worried about this exact thing happening and not being able to stop it. Of course he was talking about someone he cared about then. Not her. So Tommy was way off base here.

  She moved her focus back to Tommy. “I don’t get how taking me to the hospital is going to help with that.”

  “On the ride over, you can convince him that this wasn’t his fault, and he’ll get a chance to see that you really are okay.”

  Was Tommy really being honest with her, or was he just trying to play matchmaker?

  “So this is really about Mitch and not you meddling in our lives?”

  “Okay, fine. Maybe I’m meddling a little.” He shifted and leaned closer. “But this is the first time I’ve ever seen you let your guard down around any guy, and I’m not going to stand around and watch you let it pass by without doing something about it.”

  She studied him again. Her partner. Former partner. Mr. Macho. Squatting there and giving her advice on her love life. It suddenly hit her as hilarious and she started laughing. She saw Mitch’s eyebrow raise in question, then his eyes cloud with concern. He probably thought she was going into shock and losing it. She was losing it all right, but not from shock.

  “What?” Tommy asked, clearly baffled by her behavior.

  She shook her head. “You. The man who has never had a relationship longer than a month giving me advice.”

  He smiled, an adorable grin that women had a hard time ignoring. “I do all right with the ladies.”

  “I know you do, but trust me, that does not qualify you to give relationship advice.” She stood, felt a little lightheaded and wobbled. Tommy shot out an arm to steady her, and Mitch came rushing over.

  She took a step back and planted a hand on the side of the ambulance. She appreciated Tommy’s and Mitch’s concern, but she didn’t appreciate their continued coddling in front of the other law enforcement personnel swarming the scene.

  Intent on giving him a warning look she peered up at Mitch, but the warm concern was alive and glowing in his eyes and she felt all of her reserve melt away in the heat. She was so in over her head here. She’d just been shot by a killer and right now this look Mitch had trained on her felt far more dangerous than the man threatening her life.

  * * *

  In the hospital waiting room, Mitch laid his head back against the cushioned chair, closed his eyes and replayed their ride to the E.R. Something had changed between them on the ride over here. Or at least something changed with Kat. She was more cheerful and positive. Making sure he knew she was fine and treating him as if she felt like he needed cheering up. Who knows, maybe Tommy said something in their little discussion to make her change.

  Not that it mattered. Mitch had just guaranteed her mood was about to crash. He’d done the unthinkable. The minute the medics arrived and took over Kat’s care, he’d ignored wishes that she’d made completely and totally known to him, and he’d phoned her family. Now he had to figure out how to tell her that Cole—once he got over yelling at Mitch for not involving him sooner—had agreed to meet them at her house and work alongside Mitch to keep her safe.

  He could already see her reaction. She’d fist her petite hands, plant them on her hips, maybe jut her jaw out like she did sometimes and let him have it verbally. That he wouldn’t mind so much as she’d get over it. But he also knew there’d be a healthy measure of disappointment and pain of betrayal in her eyes for going behind her back.

  The worst part was that he understood her reason for keeping her family out of this. Distance protected people. He lived by that motto and let it control him and keep him from getting too close. Still, despite the need to protect himself, he cared. No matter how much he fought it, he cared. About Angie, Tommy and now Kat. More than he wanted to admit.

  Just like his mom always hoped he would. She’d begged him to let go of his worry and live again. Quoting the Bible to him, and reminding him that worrying can’t add a single hour to his life. So give it up, she’d said. He’d tried and succeeded for a while, but then she’d died, bringing all of his worries to fruition, and he’d chalked up that piece of advice as meaningless. But he was starting to think he’d been wrong. At least Kat was making him reconsider his stance.

  A hand touched the shoulder he’d slid across the porch on, and a searing pain shot down his arm. He knew it had to be Kat, but he didn’t want her to know how bad his shoulder hurt so he took a few deep breaths to keep the pain at bay before opening his eyes.

  “Trying to catch a quick nap?” She smiled down on him and no matter his recent thoughts, no matter his dread at telling her what he’d done, he smiled back, taking a few moments just to enjoy her good mood before he dropped his bomb.

  “Everything okay?” he finally asked.

  She lifted her arm with a cut-off shirtsleeve and a bandage circling her bicep. “I’m good to go.”

  “Then let’s get out of here.” He got up and led the way to the door. She tried to slip into her jacket and fumbled. He grabbed the back and helped her shrug into it. Then, instead of walking away as he should do, he freed her hair and let it settle over her shoulders, the silky strands curling around his fingers.