Read Online Mind Reader by Vicki Hinze - Free Book Online

shed roof pretty often. Anyway, I looked out my living room win dow, and I saw Decker outside. He was getting something out of the trunk of his car.”
    Parker leaned forward, over the table. “What was it?”
    “Well, it didn’t make sense then, and it don’t now. Decker don’t have a wife or kids, just Linda—his sister who lives in town—but he was getting a lavender bicycle out of that trunk.”
    Caron’s stomach sank to her knees. Tuesday was the day she’d first imaged the little girl being abducted—off a lav ender bike.
    Parker poured hot coffee over the cold in his cup and reached for a second roll. “Could the bike belong to one of Linda’s kids?”
    “Shoot, Linda don’t have any children, boy. She wouldn’t ruin her figure. Married herself a highfalutin man from downtown.” Ina dropped her voice to a conspirato rial whisper. “They say he’s richer than that Trump fellow, but I can’t say that for sure. Don’t see him much. Linda comes around every Tuesday, though, regular as clockwork and dressed up fancy.”
    “Was Linda there this past Tuesday?” Caron gave Parker an I-told-you-so glare that clearly annoyed him.
    “Sure was,” Ina said. “I was out working in my flower bed, getting it ready for planting, when she drove up. Smiled and talked real friendly, like usual. But when she left, she sure wasn’t smiling. She was fighting mad, and yelling at Decker that he must have lost his mind.”
    “About what?” Parker asked. “Do you know?”
    “No, I didn’t hear it. But Lily Mae—she lives on the other side of Decker—says she bets it’s got something to do with Linda’s husband. Lily Mae’s seldom wrong about things like that. She’s got this friend, Mary Beth, who works down at the diner near the man’s office. We drop by for lunch sometimes, and from what I’ve overheard, he’d make a fine snake-oil salesman.” She winked and dipped her chin to confirm what she’d said. “Slick tongue.”
    Caron passed the woman a second card. “Here’s my phone number, Ina. If you think of anything else, or see anything odd, will you call?”
    “Sure will. As long as you don’t tell Decker. I don’t need any more trouble with him. Last time we had a run-in, he stomped my irises. Ain’t much of a man who stomps a woman’s irises, if you ask me.”
    Caron agreed.
    Parker smiled, and when Ina escorted them out, then shut the door, he said, “I think Ina Erickson can hold her own.”
    Caron would’ve answered. But she couldn’t get her voice to work. She’d never seen Parker relaxed and at ease. His smile touched his eyes, and the accusing gray glints had softened to soft gray glimmers.
    “Caron?”
    His amused tone had her snapping to; he was holding the door open. She avoided his eyes and slid into the car, flatly refusing to accept what was happening. She couldn’t be at tracted to him. Not to Parker Simms. The man was insulting and rude—and he didn’t even think there was a case!
    He folded himself into the car, and the smell of his co logne and rain mingled with the scent of leather. Her throat felt thick. Parker Simms was guilty on all counts. But he was also the first man in a long time who had her hor mones humming louder than a swarm of droning bees.
    She didn’t care for the feeling; actually, she hated it. But only a fool would deny it. And only a fool would fail to accept that under the circumstances being at tracted to Parker Simms was stupid and crazy.
    Knowing that, she must have misjudged her reactions to him. Checking to make sure, she gave him another look. The flutters came back to her stomach, and that little tin gle of anticipation danced along her nerves. He smiled, and her hormones zipped into overdrive. There was no mis take; she was attracted.
    And stupid and crazy.
     

 
    Chapter 3
     
    Caron shivered.
    Sitting in her parked Chevy about three houses down from Decker’s, she pulled her raincoat closer around her and looked up at the streetlight.