Embarrassment washed over her. She’d really thought he was going to kiss her. Had she misread his signals? The glances, held a heartbeat longer than with just any other colleague, the quick drop of his gaze to her lips? And the electric current of attraction she’d experienced when their fingers touched, was it even possible that something so potent on her part was one-sided?
“Bella!” His shout made her stand straight and cleared her mind of what she knew were inescapable personal rabbit holes. “Come here.”
“Coming.” She made for the back door, which he must have opened with the key.
He stood under the pale glow of the moon as it filtered through her pergola on the back patio. A quick glance at her large cushioned swing, myriad planters filled with cacti and other succulents, and her different garden sculptures showed nothing amiss.
“What is it?”
“Over here.” He led them with the phone light to her air-conditioning unit. “Have you had maintenance or repair on your AC recently?”
“No.”
“What about this crack to your foundation?” A long, jagged line ran from the stucco under her bathroom window and disappeared below the ground.
“It’s from the earthquake.”
“That’s right—it didn’t hit us in Phoenix as it did here. And the epicenter was close to the Colton Oil industrial area, am I correct?”
“Yes.” Annoyance mingled with fear. Would Holden just get to the point?
“Any reason these footprints should be here?” He spotlighted several sets of large prints in the sandy earth around the unit’s concrete-slab platform. Her gut heaved and she wanted to blame it on being tired but she knew fear when it hit her.
“Those have to be recent or they’d be gone already.” Nothing stayed the same in the desert, not for long and not during a time that included enough breeze at night to blow away the fine sand. “Why would someone come here, though, to an air-conditioning unit?”
Holden snapped several photos of the prints, a few with his feet in the shot for sizing perspective. “I don’t know. Unless—” He shone the light up to the three-foot-tall unit, and revealed that there was a good amount of dust atop the grate where the fan blew out hot air from the house.
“He climbed on top to look into that window.” She finished his speculation and looked up to the high windows that lined her master bathroom. “Even if someone could get up that high without a ladder, no one could fit through those windows.” They weren’t more than six inches tall, tops, though very long to allow maximum light in.
Holden pulled latex gloves from his jeans’ pockets and she laughed.
“You’ve got to be kidding me.”
“No joke intended. Just part of my job.” He pushed hard on the top of the AC unit before hauling himself up. She watched from the ground as he felt along the edges of the windows as far as he could reach. His movement stilled as his fingers rested on the same spot he had paused the first time he visually examined the frame.
“What is it?” Shivers raced down her spine and she crossed her arms in front of her, looked around them at the surrounding garden and wild property that backed up against her neighbors on either side, and acres of empty desert to the rear of the house. It had been her safe haven ever since she’d saved enough for the down payment to purchase the house a few years ago. She’d never felt vulnerable or at risk here.
Until tonight.
Holden tugged on something, then fisted his palm and jumped to the ground, far away from the footprints. “I need to look at this inside, in proper lighting, but I’d say someone is very interested in catching glimpses of you in your shower.” He opened his hand to reveal a tiny box with a lens.
“I’m going to be sick.” She said it before thinking. “I mean, not really, but the thought of this—I can’t do this right now.”
His firm, gloved hand grasped her forearm. “Hang on, Bella. It’s okay. You’re not alone—I’m here. And the good news is that your stalker is nowhere near here right now, most likely. If they wanted to watch you in person there wouldn’t be a camera and I’d have found them inside or lurking on the property. I’m going to call Spencer and have him and his K-9 inspect the area for scent, but we should be good to go for tonight.”
“Meaning?”
“We’ll be able to spend the night here, and then head to the pageant in the morning. It’s already past eleven, and I need to be at the school a full hour before the contestants arrive at eight.”
“I don’t even know if I’m a contestant yet.” She’d forgotten to check her inbox; the pageant director, Mimi, had told them they’d find out whether they qualified by nine o’clock tonight. A quick dive into her emails on her phone revealed a message. Her hands shook.
“Well?” Holden stood patiently next to her, as if whether she got into the pageant was important to him, too. Of course, she figured she’d be the best kind of bait for the serial killer, if there was one and if he’d now focused his sights on Ms. Mustang Valley.
She clicked the message open, skimmed the preliminary niceties, and let out a whoop. Relief and a sense of euphoria she did not expect washed over her, easing some of the tension that finding out about the camera had incurred.
“I take it you’re in?” His enthusiastic tone was as surprising as her reaction.
“I am. And you’re correct, I report at eight o’clock.”