Texas K-9 Unit Christmas. Shirlee McCoy

tough times. I plan to buy them each a gift,” Bea continued.

      “They’ll appreciate that. I’ll just call my grandmother and ask her to stay with Emma while you’re gone.”

      “I don’t need—” Emma began, but Lucas shook his head.

      “Why would you do something like that?” Bea huffed, her blue eyes flashing with indignation. “I can certainly take care of my own niece.”

      “You said you wanted to go shopping,” Lucas reminded her.

      Bea frowned, her gaze jumping to Emma. “Well, I certainly don’t want to go if you need me, Emma.”

      “I do.” Emma followed Lucas’s lead. That was so much easier than arguing with Bea.

      “In that case, we’ll go home. I’ll make some of my chicken noodle soup and get a package of frozen peas for that cheek.”

      “Thanks, Bea.”

      “You don’t have to thank me, dear. I love taking care of you.” Bea smiled beatifically as the elevator doors slid open.

      Emma stepped in behind her, pressing close to the wall as Lucas followed. He smelled like soap and sunshine, and he looked exactly as she thought a hero should.

      Which was a problem, because she didn’t need or want a hero in her life.

      He leaned toward her.

      “You can thank me later,” he whispered, his lips brushing her ear. Warmth shot through her, and her heart jumped. She wanted to lean her head against his shoulder the way she had when they were teenagers, but they weren’t teenagers anymore. They were nothing more than strangers who’d once been friends.

      “I’d rather do it now and get it over with,” she responded, bracing herself as she looked into his eyes. “Thank you, Lucas.”

      He chuckled and shook his head. “You’re welcome. Although I have to admit I was hoping you’d thank me with a meal. I hear you’re quite a chef.”

      “Who’d you hear that from?” she asked as he led them off the elevator and into the hospital lobby. Watery sunlight streamed through floor-to-ceiling windows, the parking lot beyond packed with cars and people. Nothing to be afraid of, but she felt a sharp zing of anxiety.

      “Your ex. Camden had a lot to say about the wonderful meals you made for his family every Sunday.” His hand settled on her lower back, his palm warm. Emma’s breath caught, her nerves suddenly alive with longing.

      She met his eyes, saw her surprise reflected in his gaze.

      He’d been married and widowed. She was pretty sure of that.

      Was he dating now?

      It was a question she wouldn’t ask, because the answer shouldn’t matter.

      “Camden?” Bea said as she shuffled out the automatic door, her walker tapping on the concrete sidewalk. “Is that the jerk who dropped you like a hot potato?”

      “He didn’t drop me, Bea. I broke things off with him. Remember?” she responded, trying not to notice the way Lucas was watching her.

      “Here’s our ride.” He gestured to a black four-door sedan parked in the loading zone. Not what she’d have expected from him. When they were kids, he’d loved old cars and trucks. The older, the better, according to Lucas. He’d spend hours taking apart old motors and putting them back together.

      She wanted to ask him how he’d ended up with such a modern and boring vehicle, but that was another question she didn’t need to know the answer to.

      He opened the front and back passenger doors, gesturing for Emma to climb in as he helped Bea get settled. “Go ahead and get in, Emma. The less time you spend out in the open, the happier I’ll be.”

      His words got her moving, and she slid into the passenger seat, slamming the door closed.

      Lucas wanted to hurry Emma’s great-aunt into the car, but there was no hurrying a woman in her eighties. Especially not one who was recovering from a broken hip. She held on to his arm as he helped lower her into the car he’d borrowed from his grandmother. His personal vehicle was an old Ford truck, and he hadn’t thought either woman in good enough condition to climb into it.

      He’d had no intention of letting Emma and Bea find their way home on their own. The evidence team was working to collect DNA from the ski mask he’d found, and they were looking through security camera footage from businesses near the bus stop where he and Henry had lost the scent trail. So far there was little to go on. No leads. No witnesses. Nothing but the nagging feeling that money wasn’t the only thing the perpetrator had been looking for.

      He glanced at Emma as he pulled away from the hospital.

      Aside from the bruise on her cheek and a smaller one on her jaw, she was colorless, her dark hair scraped back from her face and held in place by a pink rubber band.

      She looked scared.

      She should be.

      She’d been accosted and beaten. Only the fact that he’d shown up had kept worse from happening. The need to protect her mixed with the desperate fear that he wouldn’t be able to save her any more than he’d been able to save Sarah.

      His fist tightened on the steering wheel, and he glanced in the rearview mirror. Traffic was light, and the afternoon sun reflected off the cars and trucks that were behind him. No sign that they were being followed and no reason to believe anyone would bother. Unless there was something Emma wasn’t telling him.

      “You didn’t ask me what else Camden had to say,” he mentioned casually, wondering if there was more to the ex-boyfriend than she wanted him to know.

      “Because I don’t really care what he had to say. He’s not part of my life anymore,” she responded.

      Lucas had been a police officer for seven years, and he knew the truth when he heard it. She was telling the truth. At least, her version of the truth. It was possible Camden’s version of the truth was different. “He might like to be.”

      “I told you last night, Camden had nothing to do with what happened. He enjoys his job, his reputation and his money too much to risk it. Besides, he wasn’t sorry to see me go. He’s already dating someone else. As a matter of fact, he’ll probably get engaged to her on Christmas Eve and give her the ring he planned to give me.”

      The guy sounded like a real winner. Lucas kept the thought to himself. “You’ve been back in Sagebrush for how long?”

      “Two months.”

      “He had a pretty quick recovery time if he’s already planning to marry someone else.”

      “Exactly my point,” she said. “I wasn’t all that important in the grand scheme of his life. Certainly not important enough for him to follow me or send someone else after me.” She sounded unaffected, but her hands were fisted in her lap, her knuckles white.

      He lifted one, running his thumb over the deep grooves her nails had gouged into her palm.

      “He’s not worth it,” he said quietly. “You know that, right?”

      “Worth what?” she murmured, pulling her hand away and rubbing it against her thigh.

      “Any time or energy you might spend wishing that things had worked out.”

      “I don’t wish that. I just...”

      “What?”

      “Thought I was going to have the dream. The house and the white picket fence. The career. The kids. The husband who adored me.”

      “You still might have all those things.”

      “I’m nearly thirty.”

      “Ancient,” he joked, and she rewarded him with a smile.

      “You’re