Free Midnight Sacrifice by Melinda Leigh Page A

stubborn to let me.”
    And why was that?
    “What about you?” Danny asked. “How do you feel about the cops not catching Nathan?”
    “Pissed.” Jed’s jaw sawed back and forth. “If I run into him, I’m greeting him with a bullet to the head.”
    “Sounds reasonable to me.” Danny didn’t have much patience for killers either, insane or not. “If I see him first, I’ll give him the message.”
    “Appreciate that.” Jed grinned. He stooped down and gathered an armful of branches. Danny did the same. He followedthe hunter to the rear of the property. They piled the small debris behind the garage and made a couple more trips. Then Danny helped him drag the larger limbs to the rear of the yard. By the time they’d finished, his entire left arm was shaking.
    Jed leaned forward and placed his hands on his knees. His face had lost color and sagged with lack of air, pain, and disappointment. “I’ll have to come back tomorrow and cut them up. Just can’t seem to get back up to speed.” He wheezed and pressed a hand to his belly.
    Danny massaged his forearm. Fire shot from his fingertips to his elbow. “I’m done in, too.”
    Jed looked up. A wry smile crossed his face. “Not exactly prime specimens, are we?”
    “Nope.” Danny snorted. “We suck.”
    Jed barked out a laugh and straightened. “I need something to drink. Come on. Let’s see what Mandy has in the kitchen, and you can tell us what the detective had to say.”
    Danny hesitated. He’d come planning on confronting her, but now that he was here, guilt poked him like a sharp stick. “She doesn’t want to see me. She wants to forget the whole thing.”
    Jed shot him a hard look. Hard enough that Danny had no doubt there was some bad shit in Jed’s background. “Well, she needs to face facts. It did happen, and pretending it didn’t is stupid and dangerous.”
    OK then. Jed was a straight shooter, and Danny couldn’t help but like him. Even if he was jealous as hell that Jed had Mandy and he didn’t.
    Danny followed Jed to the back of the house, and Jed used his key to open the door marked P RIVATE . They walked into the dated but clean and spacious kitchen. Notebook and pen in hand, Mandy turned away from the open pantry. Her eyes locked onto him and filled with regret. Danny could imagine what it wouldbe like to be greeted by a smile on her beautiful face, and the fact that it would never happen was a big empty space in the center of his chest.
    He fought the urge to apologize and back out of the room. Jed was right. Ignoring the possibility that Nathan was still around could be deadly.
    “Hey, Mandy.” Jed went to the fridge He walked right past Mandy and did not stop to kiss her. Strange. That’s the first thing Danny would have done. In fact, he wanted to do it right now, and she wasn’t even his girlfriend. His gaze dropped to her lips. What would they taste like? Jed selected an orange sports drink and offered one to Danny.
    “Thanks.” Danny took it.
    Jed twisted off his cap. “Danny stopped by to tell us about his meeting with the state cop.”
    Mandy gave Jed a what-the-hell look, but behind the laser glare was a whole lot of scared she couldn’t conceal. So why was she so against digging the case up again? Danny had seen her courage. She had plenty to spare. Was she really unable to deal with the strain, or was there another reason she refused to acknowledge the possibility that Nathan was still a threat?
    Mandy said, “I told you both that I didn’t want to talk about it.”
    “You did,” Danny answered, “but I thought you still might like to know what Detective Rossi said. Do you?”
    “Not really,” she said.
    “Well, I sure as hell do.” Jed pointed to Mandy with the bottle. “You’re not the only one at risk here. Nathan gutted me like a brook trout. I won’t rest easy until he’s in the ground.”
    Mandy paled. She clutched her notebook to her chest for a few seconds. She focused on Danny, as if she was