Hiding His Witness by C. J. Miller Page A

someone wondering where you are?”
    Carey slid to the floor, letting her back rest against the couch. She stretched her legs in front of her, her feet in reaching distance of Reilly. She should tell him in no uncertain terms she wasn’t going to talk about her life. He’d promised he wouldn’t press her about her past and she wasn’t naïve. They couldn’t share secrets. Their relationship needed boundaries. He was a detective, committed to working on the right side of the law, and she was the daughter of a crime lord. If she told him about her family and the things they had done, the crimes they’d committed, Reilly would look at her with disgust on his face. That was something she could live without. “You mean, is anyone looking for me besides two criminals?”
    Compassion softened his face. “You’re safe here, Carey. I’m going to take care of you.”
    Carey shifted. This was the reason she hadn’t gotten close to anyone in the last eleven months. It created too many complications, like trusting someone, relying on them to help, opening up to them. Carey worried constantly that sharing something could get her or someone else killed.
    Her father had trusted Mark with his life. Her father had bestowed his blessing on his only daughter to marry Mark, and then Mark had betrayed him.
    Not that her father was an innocent who’d been forced into the life he’d led. In the endless hours of solitude, Carey had tried to resolve the logical side of her brain that understood her father was involved in a violent lifestyle and the emotional side of her brain that loved her father and couldn’t imagine him doing harm to anyone.
    “I don’t want to talk about the case.” At his nod of agreement, she continued. “I’ve been alone for a long time. I’ve gotten used to it,” she said. A lie. She was numb to it at times, refusing to cry over her fate. But she wasn’t used to it.
    “How long have you been running?” Reilly asked.
    She didn’t want to give exact times. He was smart. He’d dig around until he could put the pieces together, missing persons who looked like her from a given time frame. “Longer than I thought possible. But now that I’m far away from that life, I realized, in one way or another, I’ve been alone most of my life.”
    Reilly inclined his head and remained quiet, his focus on her, encouraging her to continue. It felt good to talk to him, to talk to someone who wasn’t trying to get something from her or use her to get closer to her father or Mark.
    She could stick to the ancient past. Before Mark. That was safe. “My mother left us when I was two. She moved to Las Vegas to dance in a show on the strip. I definitely did not inherit her gracefulness. I took dance lessons once in high school and I bruised my partner’s feet.”
    “Everyone’s awkward as a teenager. I bet you’re much better now. I bet you dance beautifully.”
    Carey clamped her mouth over her rebuttal. Mark had taken her to dance lessons in a rare display of romantic interest, in preparation for their wedding. More times than not, he had stormed out of class in frustration because she couldn’t remember the steps, she didn’t move in the right direction and she counted off beat.
    Reilly reached for a remote sitting on the side table behind him. He pressed a few buttons and the speakers in the corners of the room piped soft holiday music. He came to his feet and extended his hand to her. “Dance with me. Please.”
    She frowned and shook her head, even as she found herself reaching for his hand. “A man who grew up in a house with music in the living room will put me to shame.”
    He pulled her upright, bringing her body close to his, his hips inches from her stomach. Every nerve ending in her body tingled in awareness.
    “It’s just you and me. No one will see.”
    Her heartbeat skipped, faltered.
    He tucked her into the circle of his arms, holding her around the waist and clasping her left hand in his,