Free Ever After (Love to the Rescue Book 3) by Rachel Lacey Page B

had vandalized her car, twice. They’d come onto her property during the night while she was asleep. But if the message was meant as a threat, who would have motive? Who wanted her to butt out?
    A question he needed to ask Olivia.
    Tomorrow. Because he was technically already off duty. He’d stopped by the office, as he always did, to catch up on paperwork before he went home.
    An hour and one small tree’s worth of paper later, he was finally on his way. It was almost five, and he’d been off the clock since three. In other words, an average day.
    But somehow, instead of taking Walnut Street toward his townhouse, he found himself driving down Peachtree Lane to ride by Olivia’s house. He’d always had a protective streak. It was part of what made him good at his job, and he needed to see that she was okay before he went home.
    She was in the driveway, in red shorts and a pink tank top, her hair tied back, scrubbing at the graffiti on her car. He cruised past before he could give in to the temptation to stop and help. She glanced up, and their eyes locked for a moment—he nodded.
    Then he turned the corner and headed for home.
    * * *
    Olivia sat on the floor in the bathroom, a tiny furball in her lap, feeling a bit like a superhero. She’d actually done it. She’d tamed the kitten. It hadn’t even been that hard. She’d just sat in here several times a day for the last five days, talking and coaxing, and now she had a baby cat in her lap—of her own free will.
    “You need a name,” Olivia told her.
    “Mew,” she answered, those blue eyes wide and solemn. The sound of her itty-bitty purr filled the small bathroom.
    “I was thinking Hallie, since I found you out at the Halverson plant. What do you think?”
    “Mew,” Hallie said.
    “All right then, Hallie. Don’t hate me for this.” She stood with the kitten in her arms. There was something dark and sticky in her white fur that the kitten apparently couldn’t clean up on her own. She needed a bath.
    Olivia ran warm water into the sink, lifted the stopper, and lowered the kitten into the sink. Hallie’s claws came out in full force as she fought to scramble to safety. But as she weighed all of a pound, it wasn’t hard to hold onto her. Olivia kept one hand across her chest as she worked shampoo over the kitten’s scrawny body. Hallie cried plaintively, scratching in vain at the sides of the sink, looking like the proverbial drowned rat with her hair wet and slicked against her body.
    Luckily, the gummy mess in her fur came out fairly easily in the bath. When Hallie was clean and soap-free, Olivia wrapped her in a warm towel and plied her with treats as a reward for surviving the ordeal.
    “What a good kitten,” Olivia soothed as she settled her back into her lap.
    Hallie gobbled the last of the cat treats, then set about licking her front paws.
    From her back pocket, Olivia’s cell phone chimed a happy tune. She shifted to the left to grab it without disturbing Hallie, then frowned at the unfamiliar number. “Hello?”
    “Olivia, hi. It’s Pete Sampson.”
    “Oh—” She sat up straighter against the bathroom wall. “Hi.”
    “Are you available this morning? I was hoping to swing by and ask you a few questions to follow up on your case.”
    Which case? she almost blurted. But she thought he meant her car and not her arrest. Hopefully anyway. “I’m not working until three today.”
    “Great. Could I stop by in a half hour or so?”
    “Uh, sure.”
    “Okay, see you then.”
    She stared at her phone, then at the kitten in her lap. “Looks like we have company coming, Miss Hallie. What do you say we get cleaned up for Deputy Hot Stuff?”
    Hallie settled her head on the towel and closed her eyes.
    “Okay, you take a nap, and I’ll get cleaned up.” Olivia set the kitten on the floor, still swaddled in the towel, and left the bathroom.
    In the kitchen, she found two hyper and nosy boxers, still peeved that she hadn’t allowed them down