Page 32 of Sergeant's Christmas Siege

She frowned. “Once I accepted that I didn’t think you were responsible for the uptick in arson—though I do think you require significantly more local oversight—I had to ask myself who was.”

“Did you figure it out?”

“Yes, Templeton, I solve crime in my sleep. It’s uncanny. I have a dream and just like that”—she snapped her fingers—“criminals are apprehended and justice is restored to the land.”

“Your dreams are much more exciting than mine,” he said.

And then watched, to his astonished delight, as his trooper... burst into flame.

He saw the bright red flush roll over her, making her eyes glitter even as the faintest beads of perspiration gathered at her temples. And along her upper lip. And he couldn’t see the rest of her lean body, but he had absolutely no doubt she turned that same color everywhere.

Everywhere.

“Apparently much more exciting,” he murmured.

She scowled at him and jabbed at her window, letting a burst of cold air into the car. “I always get overheated while sitting still in winter.”

“Sure you do.”

She jabbed at the window again, closing it. With prejudice. “I’ve investigated a lot of questionable groups. Any one of them could have regrouped in some form or another and focused their attention back on me. I have to admit it’s not outside the realm of possibility.”

“But you think your own family is outside the realm of possibility?” Templeton asked.

“What’s your family like?” she retorted. “I notice you’re sitting here in a car with me in Juneau a week before Christmas. Not planning to head back home to sing all those Christmas carols around the family tree.”

“For all you know I could be flying out tomorrow.”

“Are you?”

“There’s nothing for me in the South,” Templeton said, easily enough.

“Does that mean that you don’t have any relatives? Or that you have a complicated relationship with them that you’d rather not go into detail about with a stranger?”

“You’re the one who had all those background files. I think you know perfectly well that my father is doing a life sentence in Mississippi. And no, Trooper, I’m not planning to go take part in a Parchman family Christmas event. If I’m feeling sentimental I’ll watchShawshank Redemptiona few more times, sing myself a Christmas carol, and call the whole thing merry enough.”

And to his surprise, Kate laughed.

Had he heard her laugh before? Not in the course of asking more questions or proving how little affected she was by finding herself surrounded by people she considered desperate commandos, but a real laugh?

It hit him the same way that unexpected blush had. It seemed to arrow its way inside him, then headed straightfor his sex—which was already a little too interested in how close they were sitting, here in this car with its fogged-up windows.

“I hope you don’t spend a lot of time trying to convince people how fine you are while your father is sitting in a prison cell,” she said when she finished laughing. “Here’s what I know about having a father rotting away in jail. It sucks. It doesn’t matter what I think about the man. It doesn’t matter that I’m proud of the fact that I’m the one who put him there and consider that chapter of my life closed. Those are things Ithink. What Ifeelwhen I think about the fact that a good chunk of my relatives and both of my parents are either still in jail or ex-cons is shame.”

Templeton felt his body shift, the way it did when he was ready for combat. He went still. Alert.

“You shouldn’t feel any shame for what they did,” he told her.

Her intent gaze slammed into his chest with the force of a bullet. “I appreciate that. But I think you know that I was talking about you.”

“Here’s the thing, Trooper. I’m shame-free. Shameless, in fact.”

“Of course you are.”

Templeton grinned widely and settled back against the seat. “You don’t have to believe me. But that doesn’t make it any less true.”

“Let me see if I’m remembering your file correctly,” she said, but she never shifted that steady gaze from his face. And once again, Templeton had the notion that there wasn’t a whole lot Kate Holiday forgot. “Your father went to jail when you were very young. Your mother moved you out of state. And when she died, she had so successfully broken all ties with any remaining family members that you were put into foster care. But you have no feelings about that.”

“You’re not the only person who’s come to terms with their childhood, Kate.”

---