Chapter Eleven
When Bree pulled up to the ranch, she found Tanner chopping wood. He’d chopped enough wood in the past three days to last all of Risk Peak through the winter.
Being on suspension obviously did not sit well with Captain Sexy Lips.
He’d explained that the sheriff didn’t actually think Tanner had committed the two murders, so that was good.
It was just a matter of staying out of the way while the other people in the department worked the case.
But he definitely did not like being kept in the dark about what was going on with the investigation.
For the past three days, the fact that she had no idea how to help him had eaten at her.
Just another glaring spotlight on her lack of interpersonal relationship skills.
Usually it was him helping her figure out how to sort through feelings.
But for the last three days, the shoe had been on the other foot.
Not a good fit.
Bree had tried her best to cheer him up or take his mind off his problems, but she didn’t really know how. Wasn’t sure what was best or appropriate.
Your mind works like a mainframe.
She could hear Michael Jeter’s—head of the organization that had helped her develop her computer skills to the point of genius, and who had also made her life a living hell—voice in her head.
But it was nothing short of the truth. She did think analytically, rationally and logically, just like a computer.
Not the way to help someone going through an emotional crisis.
Ironically, it had been her own emotions—feelings of inadequacy and incompetence—that had been blocking her mind from realizing the truth.
Tanner didn’t need her to help him emotionally. He needed the part of her brain that worked like a computer. He needed her to help figure out the real killer so he could get back to the job he loved. Emotion had nothing to do with that.
As soon as it had become clear to her, she’d asked the Andrewses for the rest of the day off, and tomorrow as well. She’d gone home and grabbed the computer she generally tried to avoid, the one she hadn’t touched since looking up details about owning a puppy last week.
It was time to work the problem. There was no one better at doing that than her.
Tanner turned from the wood he was chopping to look at her as she got out of the car. She tried not to swallow her tongue at the sight of him clad only in a cowboy hat and jeans—chest bare.
She was never going to get tired of looking at him.
It was more than just his strong chin and carved jaw that already had a hint of shadow to it even at this hour.
More than his broad, powerful shoulders that tapered into trim waist and hips.
It was more than those deep brown eyes that seemed to notice everything.
It was all of it. The whole package put together that made up Tanner as a whole.
He walked toward her. She liked the way he walked. Not graceful. Not aggressive, but...powerful.
“You’re home early,” he said. “It’s still midmorning.”
She finally tore her eyes away from his torso to look up at his face. “Yeah. I brought pie. It’s good at any time, even morning.”
He reached over and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “Pie is a very distant second to the reason I’m glad you’re here.”
Her eyes dropped back to his naked chest. She wanted to close the inches that separated them and lick it.
She wanted to get them back to the passionate kisses where he slammed her against the wall. That kiss had been leading somewhere she desperately wanted to go.
But there hadn’t been any kisses like that since he’d been suspended from the force.
The words were out of her mouth before she could stop them. “I want us to get back to the slamming against the wall, so I brought my computer.” She grimaced. That hadn’t come out the way she’d meant it to.
He chuckled. “You might have to throw in a little more information for me. I didn’t quite follow your brain that time.”
She decided to leave out the part about passionate kisses against the wall. Especially when she was a second and a half from licking his chest.
She took a breath. “You’re frustrated about being suspended from the force. I can’t help much with the emotional part, but I can help you with my computer and my mind.”
His eyes narrowed. “Whitaker is on the case. He has experience with this sort of thing. He’ll eventually get it figured out.”
She rolled her eyes. “The same guy who thought I killed Newkirk? It could take him weeks just to figure out how to get his head out of his ass. I’ll never get any more kisses if we’re depending on him.”
Tanner chuckled again and stepped closer. “I seem to recall kissing you this morning before you went to work.”
Oh gosh, why did his sweat smell so good? So clean and male and Tanner. “I want the other kisses,” she whispered. “Like the one before we went to your mom’s house.”
His brown eyes darkened, and his hand slid down to wrap around her waist, pulling her against him.
Every single part of her insides seemed to clench. Yes. This was what she wanted.
But before his lips touched hers, he seemed to withdraw back into himself. His fingers that had been grasping her waist with an almost bruising force a moment ago loosened.
He stepped back, rubbing his hand over his eyes. “Bree—”
She sighed. She’d become used to the distance between them. “I know. You’re upset about what’s happening, and doing romance with me is the last thing on your mind. That’s okay. I—”
His mouth was on hers and she was backed up against the car—just like she’d been against the wall—before she knew what was going on.
She gasped, and he took full advantage of it, thrusting deeply into her mouth with his tongue before withdrawing and coaxing hers to play.
She sank into the kiss, her mind going blank as his lips ravished hers.
When he finally backed away, all she could do was stare at him.
“Doing romance, and doing a hell of a lot more, is always on my mind when it comes to you,” he whispered. “Don’t ever think I don’t want to be around you any way I can get you, no matter what is going on with my job.”
“O-okay.”
They both stood there for many moments, breathing unsteadily.
“But I know how much your job means to you,” she finally said. “And Risk Peak needs you back. So I want to help. Please let me help.”
“What did you have in mind?”
She slid over and opened the car door, grabbing her laptop.
“You know I have a computer, right?” he asked. “You don’t have to bring yours.”
She shrugged. “This one is...better.”
He shook his head, a half smile pulling at the corner of his mouth. “I’m not even going to ask.”
“Probably a good idea.”
He led her inside, and she sat down at the kitchen table, staring at her laptop.
Tanner stayed next to her as she breathed through her anxiety. Opening it up was tough. Her history with computers in a serious way—beyond researching puppy facts—was tied to being physically and emotionally tortured. She had to remind herself that the computer itself couldn’t hurt her in any way.
“You okay?” he asked.
“I used it a few months ago when I helped bring down the Organization. This should be quite a bit easier than that.”
He crouched down next to her so they were eye to eye. “You had to do that in order to save the world. You don’t have to do this. I’ll be just fine, you know. Whitaker will eventually crack who really killed those two guys.”
“No, I’m okay. I want to do this. The computer can’t hurt me. Jeter can’t hurt me anymore, either.”
He reached over and kissed her knee. “That’s the damn truth.”
He straightened, and she opened the laptop, allowing it to boot. The first few keystrokes into her search were the most difficult, but then her brain let go of its fear and she dived in.
This was what she was most gifted at in the world.
Gaining access to the Colorado state system to find out more information about Peter Anders and Joshua Newkirk didn’t take her long at all.
“I’m going to shower while you work. It’s probably better if I don’t know too much about what’s going on here.”
Her fingers continued to fly over the keyboard. “I’m not breaking any laws.” Yet. “Have you been cutting wood since I left this morning?”
“No. Ironically, I had to go into the main sheriff’s office earlier for a couple hours. I had an appointment I couldn’t get out of.” He paused. “With the police department psychiatrist.”
Now her fingers stilled on the keys. “Oh. Because of being on suspension?”
“No. Something else. Something that happened a few years ago. Something you and I should probably talk about.”
That didn’t sound promising. She looked over at him. “Right now?”
“No. It’s not something easily explained.”
She nodded. “A complicated past is something I understand. So whenever you’re ready.”
He kissed the top of her head. “Thank you.”
He walked off toward the shower, and Bree found herself staring at the screen without really seeing it. Mrs. Dempsey had been right. Tanner had demons—ones big enough to need required appointments with a psychiatrist years later.
Not that she thought less of him for seeing a psychiatrist. She was very aware she’d be much more emotionally well-adjusted if she’d been able to talk to someone about what she’d gone through.
It just...stung a little that she’d been living under the same roof as Tanner for almost a week—seeing him nearly daily for over a month—and he’d never mentioned an event traumatic enough to need psychiatric care.
What did it say that he hadn’t felt like he could even mention that to her? Especially after everything she’d told him about her past.
Bree forced the thought aside. It would have to wait.
She needed to focus on the mission in front of her now: discovering whatever she could about Anders and Newkirk.
She started with all the legal ways she knew of gaining information and searching public records.
Then slid into slightly more morally gray area, but still not technically illegal.
Both Anders and Newkirk had lived colorful and violent lives. Both had had run-ins with the law before they’d gotten arrested for the specific crimes they’d actually gone to jail for. But they didn’t seem to have run in the same circles or have known the same people.
Both had spent time in prison, although they hadn’t served at the same place at the same time. Both had gotten out of prison earlier than they should have, although Bree couldn’t find out why without definitely crossing into the illegal-hacking area.
It was easy to see why Tanner was a suspect. As arresting officer, he definitely was the most obvious link between the two dead men.
It took Bree another two hours of searching—a pretty damn long time given her skills—before she finally found someone else in common. And even then it wasn’t easy to spot.
Both Anders and Newkirk had been a cell mate of a Darin Carrico. Newkirk for six months. Anders for less than a week.
It was a weak tie, at best. But it was all Bree could find unless Tanner wanted her to really jump into illegal territory. She doubted he would be comfortable with morally gray, much less morally pitch-black.
Besides shoving a sandwich in front of her at lunch, Tanner had stayed out of her way. He knew what she was like when she was working—he’d seen her in action a few months ago. How focused she stayed. He hadn’t bothered her.
She was filtering through sites and databases at a rapid clip and wanted to make sure not to miss anything.
But as it became more and more evident she wasn’t going to find much of anything online, she admitted that some relationships and associations didn’t show up in a computer.
Even ghosting through the men’s social media accounts hadn’t turned up anything to link the two of them.
Sometimes there just wasn’t a visible electronic trail, even for two people who knew each other.
And if she couldn’t find anything except a weak tie to an old cell mate, she could damn well imagine nobody at the Grand County Sheriff’s Department was going to find much.
She sighed. This did not mean good news for Tanner.