With a heavy exhale, he dug into the front pocket of his faded jeans, took out his keys, and handed them to her.
“If you’re staying, then you’re waiting right here while I check the place out. Don’t. Touch. Anything. If you hear anything—see anything—that doesn’t look right in any way, shape, or form, I want you to haul ass and call the cops.” He hesitated, as if thinking twice about what he just said and then ran a hand through his hair. “Actually, go ahead and make the call. We’re going to need them to document the scene. But don’t tell them I picked the lock, okay? I’d rather not leave here in cuffs.”
Before she could respond, he took off down the hall, surprisingly quiet considering his size and the amount of debris all over the floor.
Following his instructions, Dorcas called the police to report the break-in, giving them her name, Rita’s address, and a brief description of what the inside of the house looked like when they arrived. The dispatcher informed her that a unit was on the way and should arrive in less than ten minutes.
With the call out of the way, Dorcas scrolled through her list of contacts and dialed her sister. While she waited for the call to connect, she paced the living room, her athletic shoes making soft, squishy sounds in the soggy carpet. One ring. Two. Three. Her heart beat louder with each passing moment, and the panic intensified to the point she didn’t think she could stand it any longer. Then the call flipped to voicemail and she cursed under her breath.
“Rita, it’s Dorcas. Call me when you get this, okay? I don’t care how late it is. It’s important.”
She ended the call just as Nate emerged from the hallway, the screwdriver he’d used to break into the house still in his hand. Judging by his expression, he didn’t come bearing bad news, and the fear squeezing her heart like a vise relaxed a bit.
“It’s clear. From what I can tell, they came in through the sliding glass door in the master bedroom.” Tightly leashed tension rolled off him in waves as his eyes scanned the room before settling on her. “The rest of the house is just as trashed. Do you think you can tell if anything’s missing?”
“I don’t know but I can try.” Dorcas caught her bottom lip between her teeth as her gaze flicked over to Rita’s purse and the worst-case scenario played through her mind. “Do you think...could Rita be...”
Nate shook his head. “I don’t see any evidence to support that.”
Given the condition of the house, his answer struck her as ludicrous. She made a sweeping gesture to the destruction all around her. “Are you serious?”
“Of course.” He stepped closer and gripped her arm, and she tried to ignore the unexpected hum of awareness that rippled through her. He was a big man, at least six feet tall, with the long, lean build of a basketball player, muscular without being bulky. The green of his shirt brought out the color in his eyes, while his jeans hugged his body in a way she had no business noticing. “I’m not going to lie to you, Dorcas. This place is a wreck. But I don’t see any signs of a struggle, and I don’t see any blood. That leads me to believe this occurred independently of whatever’s going on with your sister.”
“Oh.” What he said made sense, but it didn’t do much to put her mind at ease. She suspected that wouldn’t happen until she knew her sister’s whereabouts—and more importantly, whether she was alive.
The thought of breaking that kind of news to her mother made Dorcas’s stomach churn. Ever since they were kids, Rita had been Mamá’s favorite, hands down. It would break her mother’s heart if something happened to her baby, and more likely than not, she’d blame Dorcas for not watching out for her younger sister.
A brisk knock at the front door had her nearly jumping out of her skin.
“That’s probably the police.” Nate stepped around her and walked to the foyer.
He opened the door to two of Orlando’s finest. Both men were tall and stocky, and appeared as though it had been a few years since they had to pass the fitness requirements. When the guy on the right took one look at Nate, surprise widened his eyes.
“Flint, what the hell are you doing here? I didn’t think you haunted this side of town.”
Nate tilted his head toward Dorcas. “I’m here with a friend who’s here for her sister.” He opened the door wider and stepped back to allow them room to enter. “Come on in; we’ll explain it all to you.”
Once he gave them a quick rundown of everything that happened—minus the breaking and entering—the officers secured the scene, took their statements, and dusted for prints at the suspected point of entry, the sliding glass door in the master bedroom. They also snapped a ton of pictures, documenting every square inch of the house.
“If you hear from your sister, have her contact us immediately,” Officer Herrera told Dorcas as he tucked his pen in his pocket. He reached into a different pocket for a business card and handed it to her. “If you need anything or think of anything we should know, give us a call.”
“I will. Thank you.”
Dorcas stood in the doorway and watched them leave, ignoring the neighbors who were outside in their yards, some pretending to work on their lawns, while others stared in a blatant attempt to piece together what was happening inside Rita’s house. Once the patrol car disappeared around the corner, she closed the door and turned to find Nate a few feet away, a strange expression on his face that she didn’t know how to interpret.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.” He motioned toward the hall. “I put a bar in the track of the sliding glass door. It’s not the best security, but it’ll do for the time being.”
“Thanks. I appreciate it.” She felt bad about dragging him into this. What was supposed to have been a quick assist with the lock had turned into a two-hour ordeal. It wasn’t as if they even knew each other all that well. They ran in some of the same circles and knew some of the same people, but most of what she knew about him came courtesy of his reputation as a player. Which didn’t surprise her—the man was smoking hot—but it was one of the reasons she’d turned him down when he’d asked her out a few months ago. Nice guy or not, she didn’t have time in her life for a guy who lived to hit it and quit it.
Heart heavy, she surveyed the ruined living room, trying to decide where to begin. Probably the aquarium. If she didn’t clean up the fish and water, the smell would only get worse. Odds were, the carpet would need to be replaced, but that was something for Rita to handle.
Dorcas looked back to Nate and felt the punch of attraction she always experienced whenever he was around. “You don’t have to stay. I’ve already taken enough of your time.”
The crease in his brow made it perfectly clear what he thought of her last statement. “Are you nuts? I’m not leaving you here by yourself. Besides, it would take you forever to clean all this on your own. How big was that aquarium?”
“Twenty-five gallons, I think.”
