Veiled Passages by Terri Reid Page A

be even more worried and that was the last thing he wanted to do.
    Smiling wryly, he pictured her in the little black dress and high heels she had worn on their abbreviated date. He could still smell her perfume in his car.  He closed his eyes for a moment and breathed it in. It was exotic. Like a hot night on a tropical island. Like warm sand and soft, foamy waves. She smelled just like…
    “Cookies?” Ian asked, as he slipped into the car next to Bradley.
    “What the hell?” Bradley shouted, alarmed by his appearance.
    “Good job, mate, watching the house and all,” Ian teased. “It’s a bit tricky when your eyes are closed, but, hey, I’m a professor, not an officer of the law.”
    “Shut up, Ian,” Bradley grumbled.
    Ian closed the door and settled into the seat, placing the bag of cookies on his lap and his large cup of soda in the cup rest.  He inhaled deeply and grinned. “Well, now, I can see why a man couldn’t concentrate with her perfume floating all around the car. Do you want me to run into the house and bring out some disinfectant?”
    Bradley turned and glared at Ian. “No thank you,” he said. “And why are you here in the first place?”
    “Ah, well, I knew you could use my help staying awake while you watched over the house,” he explained. “And since I knew I wouldna be getting any sleep myself, sitting around worrying, I decided to come and pay you a visit.”
    Bradley reached over and snatched a cookie. “Thanks, Ian,” he said.
     “So, how is she doing?” Ian asked.
    Shrugging, he glanced up at the bedroom window. “The light went off a few minutes ago,” he said. “I’m guessing Mike turned it off. He said he’d watch over her.”
    “Aye, she was quite worked up,” Ian said. “The look on her face as she stood in the front yard and waited for word is not one I’d like to see again.”
    Bradley pictured her panicked look as they hurried from the restaurant. “I am such a complete idiot.”
    Sitting back against the seat, Ian studied him for a moment. “So, what’s really the issue here?”
    “Nothing, really, it’s nothing,” Bradley replied, placing his hands on the steering wheel and looking out over the neighborhood.
    “You know, you don’t have to tell me,” Ian said, nonchalantly, as he picked up another cookie. “But at least do me the courtesy of not lying to my face.”
    Bradley sighed. “I was just thinking…I took her out on a date,” Bradley said, turning to Ian. “Okay? I took her out on a damn date and left her mother and my daughter home without protection. If anything had happened to them…”
    He broke off the sentence with a curse. “Is that enough for you?”
    “Yeah, that’s pretty good for starters,” Ian replied calmly. “Well, except for the couple of things you left out.”
    “What?” Bradley growled.
    “Well, okay, you left out that Mary called you because her mother suggested, no, insisted, that the two of you have a night out,” Ian said.
    “I could have said no,” Bradley countered.
    Ian chuckled softly. “Aye, like that would happen.”
    He leaned forward again. “And, you forgot the part where you took Mary to a restaurant less than two miles away from her house, drove in the police cruiser and left it near the front door in case you were needed.”
    “Which we were,” Bradley inserted.
    “Yes, you were,” Ian said. “But…”
    He put up his hand to stop Bradley’s next comment. “You also left Mike watching over the two of them.  And Mike alerted all of us and by the time you arrived here,” he continued. “The police had already taken care of things, Clarissa and Margaret were both safe and the bad guy had run away. And if the bloke had been stupid enough to continue down into the basement and break down the workroom door, he would have been a whole lot of dead. The way Margaret was wielding that ax; it would have made Robert the Bruce proud.”
    Bradley shoved against the steering wheel and turned