Her Amish Protectors

For a moment, he didn’t see the still-full ballroom, the auctioneer, the spotters. He saw only her face, gently rounded rather than model beautiful. And he saw that flare in her eyes, and knew whatever she’d felt had been for him, not what he represented. Or, at least, not only what he represented.

He grimaced. Maybe he bore an unfortunate resemblance to some scumbag who’d beaten her. Mugged her. Stalked her. Or what if she’d had an ex who’d been a cop and violent?

Bad luck. What Ben would like to do was drop by the fabric store and persuade Ms. Nadia Markovic to take a break for a cup of coffee. But scaring women...that wasn’t a feeling he enjoyed. He’d keep his distance, at least for now.

He abruptly refocused on the stage, because Nadia had taken the microphone and was thanking everyone for coming and letting them know how much money had been raised. Over $100,000 just from the auction, plus an additional $20,000 from the sale hall open today, where many more quilts had been available as well as other textile arts. A drop in the bucket compared to the need, but a nice sum of money nonetheless.

“And, finally,” she said, “we all owe thanks to the artists who donated the work of thousands of hours, their skill and their vision, to help people whose lives were devastated by nature’s fury.”

The applause was long and heartfelt. Ben joined in, watching as Nadia made her way from the stage and through the crowd, stopping to exchange a few words here, a hug there. She was glowing. Nothing like the way she’d shut down at the sight of him.

Even so, he hung around until the end, thinking about how much money was stashed in that metal box behind the cashiers. He couldn’t shake the big-city mentality. Hard to picture anyone here trying to snatch it—but better safe than sorry.

He clenched his teeth. That had been one of his mother’s favorite sayings. She had, once upon a time, been firm in her belief she could keep her family safe by adequate precautions. Until the day she found out shit happens to everyone.

Keeping that in mind, he stepped outside and waited in the darkness beneath some ancient oak trees until he’d seen Nadia Markovic safely in her car and on her way.

* * *

THE FOURTH STAIR always creaked, and it always made her start. Which was silly. Older buildings made noises. Nadia had had an inspection done before she bought this one, and there wasn’t a thing wrong with the structure. Yet the creak made her think of clanking chains, moans and movement seen out of the corner of her eye.

Had the stair creaked before Mrs. Jefferson’s fatal fall? Nadia wrinkled her nose at her own gothic imagination. Only then she got to wondering if the police had noticed that one step creaked. Because nobody could sneak up those stairs—unless they knew to skip that step. Or the person hadn’t bothered, because he or she was expected, even welcome. Either way, it suggested the killer wasn’t a stranger.

She rolled her eyes as she set the money box on the dresser in her bedroom. If Mrs. Jefferson had the TV on, she wouldn’t have heard anyone coming. Or she could have been in the bathroom, or maybe she was going a little deaf. No one had said.

Or, oh, gee, she’d stumbled at the head of the stairs and fallen. There was a concept. A neighbor had said that the poor woman had suffered from osteoporosis. Tiny, she had become stooped with a growing hunch. She should have moved to an apartment or house where she didn’t have to deal with stairs.

And Nadia did not want to think about tragedy of any kind, not tonight. If she hadn’t encountered Ben Slater, she wouldn’t have felt nervous for a minute going upstairs in her own home.

While she was at it, she’d refrain from so much as thinking about him, too. She’d forget that odd moment of fear, or her surprising physical response to the man. Instead, she’d let herself enjoy satisfaction and even a teeny bit of triumph, because tonight they’d exceeded their original goal by a good margin. She could hardly wait to deposit the money in the bank tomorrow morning.

Normally, she didn’t like to have money lying around. She made regular deposits to limit how much cash she had on hand in the store. But whatever Chief Slater said, Byrum seemed to be a peaceful small town. She read the local paper, and most of the crimes mentioned in it were trivial or had to do with teenagers or the weekend crowd at bars.

Nadia had locked up as soon as she was inside, checking and rechecking both the building’s front and back doors as well as the one at the foot of the staircase leading to her apartment.

Worrying came naturally to her, and the tendency had worsened drastically after—Nope, not gonna think about that, either.

Instead, she removed her heels and sighed with relief. Most people hadn’t had to dress up at all, the event having been advertised as Missouri summer casual, but since she’d opened the evening and closed it, she’d felt obligated to wear a favorite silk dress with cap sleeves while hoping it wasn’t obvious her legs were bare.

She took a cool shower, brushed her teeth and went to bed wearing only panties and a cotton camisole. She threw even the top sheet aside. The small air-conditioning unit in the window helped, but she usually turned it off at some point during the night. It didn’t just hum, it rattled, which was really annoying.

Maybe that’s why Mrs. Jefferson didn’t hear someone coming up the stairs.

Nadia groaned, but even as exhausted as she was, it was bound to wake her up later. Replacing it was on her wish list.

So, as she often did, she basked in the scant flow of chilly air until her eyelids grew heavy, then forced herself to crawl out of bed and turn off the air conditioner. Tonight, not even a sultry ninety degrees would keep her awake.

* * *

THE SCREECH OF the alarm jolted Nadia to enough consciousness to slap the button to shut it off. Then she moaned and buried her face in the pillow. Why hadn’t she planned to close the shop today?

Dumb question. Saturday was her busiest day in a typical week, and she bet lots of people would stop by just to share the excitement generated by last night’s event. Plus, she needed to slip out before noon to deposit the money, since the bank’s Saturday hours were so limited.

“Ugh.” Her eyelids felt as if they were glued shut, or maybe weighted down with a thin coating of cement. She had crashed last night. Unfortunately, her body wasn’t ready to reboot.

Another cool, or even icy-cold, shower would help, she decided. She just had to get up and make it that far.

With a whimper, she rolled out of bed. It only took a minute to gather clothes. Heading for the bathroom, she tried to decide why her entire body ached. Yes, she’d worked hard yesterday doing setup, and she’d been on her feet for hours on end, but she wasn’t in that bad shape.

Nadia had gotten all the way into the bathroom before her brain stuttered. No, no. I just didn’t see because I wasn’t looking.

So she set the neat pile of clothes on the countertop, then very slowly turned around. Through the open bathroom door, she could see her dresser. She could even see her reflection in the beveled mirror above the antique chest of drawers.

She just didn’t see the money box.

CHAPTER TWO

HAVING SLEPT POORLY last night, Ben was not happy when his phone rang while he was in the bathroom trying to scrape off the whiskers he’d grown since he last shaved at approximately 6:00 p.m. yesterday. He glared at himself in the mirror and groped for the phone. Half his face still covered with foam, he snapped, “Yeah?”

“Um...Chief?”

Recognizing the voice, he sighed. “Sergeant. Sorry. What’s up?”

“Ah, just had a call I thought you’d want to know about. Since you said you were going to that event last night.”

Tension crawled up his spine. “The quilt auction.”

“Yeah. The lady who organized it says somebody stole the money. She’s next thing to hysterical.”

How in hell...? “I know where she lives. I’ll be there in fifteen minutes.”

Incredulity and worry spinning in his head, he finished shaving, got dressed and went out the door without his usual second cup of coffee. In front of her building, he parked directly behind a squad car.

After he rapped lightly on the door that had a closed sign and no one came, he went in. An astonishing array of colors filled the space. Rows and rows of fabric on bolts flowed naturally from one shade to another, while quilts hung on every wall. At the rear was a door leading into another space that had been a storeroom in the past, but he knew Ms. Markovic was offering classes now, so maybe she’d converted it. The store was a whole lot more appealing than it had been the last time he’d been here, after Mrs. Jefferson’s death.

To his right, a wide doorway opened to a hall that gave access to a restroom for customers, ending at a back door. He was all too familiar with the layout, including the oddly shaped closet beneath the staircase. Ben stopped long enough now to examine the lock on the apartment door.

Voices came from above as he mounted the stairs. One step still creaked, resulting in abrupt silence above. Sure enough, Officer Grumbach appeared at the head of the staircase.

“Chief.” He looked relieved.

Ben nodded a greeting and entered the apartment.

Nadia sat in an easy chair, arms crossed and held tight to her body. Her mass of dark hair was loose and unbrushed. She wore a stretchy camisole with no bra beneath—he had to make a conscious effort not to let his gaze drop to those generous breasts—and what looked like thin sweatpants. Her face was pinched, even paler than last night. And her eyes fixed on him, unblinking.

He sat on the coffee table right in front of her. “Okay,” he said in a deliberately gentle voice, “tell me what happened.”

“I don’t know what happened!” she cried. “Like I’ve told him over and over.”

Hovering by the doorway, the young redheaded officer flushed.

“Let’s put it another way,” Ben said. “I saw you drive out of the parking lot last night.”

Her eyes widened. “You were still there?”

“I was. That was an awful lot of money you had.”

Her teeth chattered. “It never occurred to any of us that something like this could happen.”

“Now I wish I’d escorted you home, too,” he said.

Nadia shook her head. “I got home fine. I had the box. I thought of hiding it downstairs, but I decided to keep it close by instead. So I put it on the dresser in my bedroom.”

He went very still, not liking the implication.

Officer Grumbach cleared his throat. “When I checked, the back door was unlocked. And Ms. Markovic says the door at the foot of the stairs was unlocked this morning, too.”

“But I checked both last night!” Nadia’s voice rose. “I locked my apartment door and verified that I had. I did!”

Unable to help himself, Ben reached out and laid a hand over hers, now writhing in her lap. She froze, took a couple of deep breaths and continued in a quieter voice, “I worried a little, because I always do, but how could anyone get in?”

He frowned. “Are you a heavy sleeper?”

“Not usually, but I don’t think I’ve ever in my life been as tired as I was when I got home last night.”

“That’s understandable.” He took his hand back. “So you were locked up tight last night. The money box was sitting on your dresser when you fell asleep.”

“I had to have slept more deeply than usual. I never even got up to use the bathroom. I turned my air conditioner off because it’s so noisy, but for once it might not have bothered me. If not for my alarm, I wouldn’t have woken up when I did. I was still tired.”

He nodded his understanding. He gave passing thought to whether she could have been drugged, but her eyes were clear, she was unlikely to have been drinking anything during cleanup at the end of the evening, and he’d heard from more than one person that she’d been at the mansion from the beginning of setup early in the morning to the very end, at close to eleven. She had to have been dead on her feet.

Her teeth closed on her lower lip, the eyes that met his desperate. “Without the air conditioner, it was hot up here.”

An upstairs apartment like this would be, even though it was still early summer.

“All I had on was this—” she plucked at her camisole “—and panties. I didn’t even have a sheet over me.”

Horror to match hers filled him. No, she hadn’t been raped, but she’d been violated anyway.

“He—” her voice shook, and she swallowed “—he could have stood there and looked at me. And I never knew it.” She went back to trying to hug herself.

“Officer Grumbach, please go find Ms. Markovic a sweater or sweatshirt.”

He nodded and disappeared into her bedroom. She didn’t even seem to notice until Grumbach handed her a zip-front, hooded sweatshirt. After a moment, she put it on and hunched inside it.

“This morning?” he nudged.

She accepted the cue. “This morning, I got up, grabbed clothes and started into the bathroom. That’s when I realized the box was gone. I knew where I’d left it, but I ran around searching anyway. I don’t know what I was thinking. That I sleepwalked? Hallucinated last night? Anyway, I searched this whole damn place, then I ran down to my car to make sure I didn’t leave it on the seat. I parked in front last night,” she added.

“That was smart.” He nodded his approval. “Do you lock the car?” Not everyone in Henness County did. Law enforcement kept busy enough, but the crime rate per capita was substantially lower in what was usually a peaceful town and rural surroundings than it had been in urban Camden, New Jersey.

“I always do. And it was still locked, so I knew—” She gulped to a stop.

Ben straightened, careful not to let her see what he was thinking. Because there were two possibilities here, and the most obvious was that she was lying through her teeth. If so, she was one hell of a liar, but he didn’t know her well. Nobody in these parts did. The first thing he’d do when he got to the station was run a thorough search on Nadia Markovic’s background.

Possibility two was that somebody had somehow unlocked two doors without leaving a scratch or making a lot of noise—because however sound her sleep, Ben was betting she’d have woken if she heard a strange sound right there in her apartment—and walked out with the money. And if that was the case...odds were good the thief had been a participant or volunteer at the auction. Who else would know who had the money?

What would have happened if she had awakened to see someone looming in her bedroom? Had the thief been prepared to kill if necessary?

A question he didn’t need to ask himself until he eliminated the possibility that she had either planned the entire event with the intention of profiting from it, or had succumbed to temptation at some point and decided to keep the money.

“Have you had anything to eat or drink yet this morning?” he asked abruptly.

Comprehension was a little slow coming. “No. No.” She shook her head. “I couldn’t eat.”

“You can,” he said firmly. “Let’s go in the kitchen, and I can at least pour you a cup of coffee.”

“Tea. I drink tea.”

“Tea it is.” He rose and held out a hand. Just like last night, she stared at his hand for a split second longer than would be usual before taking it. He boosted her to her feet. “Officer Grumbach, I think you can go back to patrol now.” On a twinge of memory, Ben glanced at her. “Unless you’d be more comfortable not being alone with me, Ms. Markovic.”

“What? Oh, no. That’s fine.” She summoned a weak smile for the young officer. “Thank you. I’m sorry I yelled at you.”

“You were understandably upset, ma’am.” Grumbach nodded and departed in what Ben suspected was more relief. He was a new hire, barely experienced enough to be out on his own. He’d done fine, though; Ben made a mental note to tell him so.

Nadia wanted to make her own tea, but he persuaded her to sit and let him do it. Waiting for the water to boil, he investigated her refrigerator and cupboards, finally settling on a croissant he heated in the microwave before splitting it open and slapping on raspberry jam from a local Amish woman. He recognized the label. He added extra sugar to the tea before setting the cup in front of her, then the croissant.

Under his stern gaze, she did eat and sipped at her English breakfast tea. Finally, she admitted to feeling better.

“Then let’s talk.” He pulled a small notebook from his pocket. He thought being recorded might stifle her. “Who knew you were taking the proceeds home?” he asked bluntly.

She blinked. “I can’t imagine...”

He cocked an eyebrow. “But the thief had to know.”

“Oh, dear God,” Nadia whispered. She stared into space for a minute. “Well, Katie-Ann Chupp, of course. Julie Baird, Karen Llewellyn, probably Rachel Schwartz.”

Two Amish, two Englischers. Even he’d come to divide his citizenry that way. From what he’d learned since moving to Byrum, it would be a cold day in hell before either of the warmhearted Amish women would so much as give a passing thought to stealing, never mind carrying out a heist like this. They’d have no need. If either woman’s family was struggling financially, all they’d have to do was ask for help, and it would pour forth. That’s how the Amish worked; they took care of each other. On the other hand, he knew both the other women, at least in passing, and felt reasonably sure neither made a likely suspect, either. Julie Baird’s husband was a doctor, Karen’s a representative for a farm equipment company. Still, he noted all four names.

Nadia reeled off a few more, then admitted that anyone helping with cleanup might have heard or guessed that she would be taking the money.

Yes, it would have been logical to suppose the event chair would deal with the evening’s take, which could widen the suspect pool considerably. But would somebody really break in to look for the cash box without being 100 percent certain Nadia had taken it home? Ben didn’t think so.

Of course, that somebody could have been lurking outside to see who carried the box out, and even though Ben had been watching for just that eventuality, landscaping around the historic mansion included a lot of dark bushes and trees.

“Did you see anyone around last evening who wasn’t involved with the auction?” he asked.

Her forehead crinkled. “I don’t think... Only Mr. Warren, wanting to be sure everything was going smoothly. He left after I promised to lock up and then return the keys sometime today, but I bet he went by after we were gone last night to make sure I had.”

Ben would bet the same. Lyle Warren, head of the historical society that maintained and showed the house, was anal to an extreme. He fussed.

“Anybody ask questions about the money?” Ben asked.

She stared at him. “Well...of course they did.”

“No, I was thinking about interest in how much cash you had versus checks or credit card slips.”

Nadia moaned, and he didn’t blame her. Once word got out, people would have to contact their credit card companies, maybe wait for new cards, put a stop on checks. Those among them with a strong conscience would then reimburse the auction committee, meaning the total sum wasn’t lost. But if the thief made use of credit card numbers or altered and cashed checks, everyone would be pissed, whether the credit card companies and banks took the loss or not.

Unfortunately, some inks were easy to “wash” from a check, allowing the thief to change the recipient’s name and even the amount the check was made out for. Depending on what info the auction cashiers had written down, checks could be an aid to identity theft, too.

And anyone who had not just a credit card number, but also the expiration date, name on the card and the code from the back was home free to spend up to the limit.

When she finally answered, he could tell her thoughts had gone a different direction.

“Nobody asked,” she said, her voice thin. “I think...most of them are so used to transactions with the Amish being primarily cash, nothing about the evening would surprise them. You know? But every time I opened the box, I was surprised. I mean, there were wads of money. So many of the sellers during the day were Amish, I bet three-fourths or more of that twenty thousand dollars was cash. And last night... I’ll have to find out, but even if it was only half...”

In other words, somebody might have gotten his or her hands on between sixty and seventy thousand dollars in cash. Even if the thief didn’t make use of the credit card numbers, the loss was substantial, even cataclysmic.

“Have you told anyone yet?”

She shuddered. “No.”

He decided to ease into the personal stuff. “Will you tell me why you moved here, Ms. Markovic?”

That had her staring. “What does that have to do with anything?”

Was she really that obtuse? He studied her face and couldn’t decide.

“I’m wondering whether you left behind somebody who dislikes you enough to want to do you a bad turn, and profit from it, too.”

“Oh. You mean an ex-husband or something?”

“A stalker, anyone who feels wronged by you.”

She started to shake her head again.

“Have you ever taken out a restraining order?”

“No. Never.”

“Were you married?”

“No.”

“Have you ever been in a relationship that ended badly?”

“No. Really.”

He rolled his shoulders. “That takes us back to my original question. Why did you move and why here? And where did you come from?”

“Colorado Springs. I grew up in Colorado, even stayed there for college.”

Big change, Ben mused, to leave a town of half a million residents at the foot of the Rockies for Byrum, with its flat terrain and 3,809 residents. He’d guess Colorado Springs to be politically liberal, too, while this part of Missouri was anything but. Of course, he was one to talk, coming from the urban jungle of Camden, New Jersey.

Nadia drew a deep breath. “I wanted—I needed—” The words seemed to be hitting a blockade.

Once again, he reached across the table and took her hand, which felt damn cold in his, considering the air temperature.

“I was running away,” she whispered.

* * *

SHE COULDN’T HAVE just said, I needed a change? But, no, the down-deep truth had slipped out. Nadia wanted to bury her face in her hands. Except one of hers was engulfed in his big, warm, comforting hand.

“From my family,” she added hastily. Like that helped. There was no getting out of this now, even if her past couldn’t possibly have anything to do with the money being stolen.

“I...had something traumatic happen. I couldn’t get past it. I thought making a change would help.”

The intensity in his dark eyes made it hard to look away. “You wanted a peaceful small town.”

“Yes.”

“Surely there are nice small towns in Colorado.”

His speculative tone unnerved her. Evading the question wouldn’t be smart. “I wanted to get farther away from home. Everyone I knew either babied me, or they kept thinking of fun things we could do. And I know they were trying to cheer me up, but...”

“If I do some research, would I find out what happened?”

Had he even noticed his thumb was circling in her palm, which was way more sensitive than she’d ever realized?

“Probably,” Nadia said. “But it really didn’t have anything to do with this. I mean, the money.”

He didn’t say anything, just watched her. Why had she opened her big mouth?

She bent her head and looked at the tabletop. “It was a domestic violence thing I got caught up in by chance.”

“Not your family.”

“No. And...I have to tell you, I really hate to talk about it.” Even trying to get out of talking about it caused the memories to rush over her, still shockingly vivid, colored in blood.

He saw more than he should, because his hand tightened. Or maybe it was because in his job he saw the horrifying aftermath of similar scenes. On a swelling of remembered bitterness, she wondered whether he would have made the same decisions those cops had.