Page 39 of Her Baby, Her Badge

“I’ve interrupted you,” Aileen said, and it wasn’t an apology. “I came to see how badly you’re hurt.”

“Not bad. Just this.” Grace motioned toward her arm and Dutton’s forehead. “We were lucky,” she added.

Aileen sighed again. “You were. You were damn lucky.” She turned to Dutton. “I’m about to lecture the sheriff. I’d ask you to step outside while I do that, but considering you’ve got a killer breathing down your neck, that’s probably not a smart idea. So you get to listen, too.”

Grace stood there, more than a little stunned. Her mother wasn’t prone to lectures, and in the time Grace had been sheriff, Aileen had never interfered in an investigation.

“You should be on desk duty, and you know it,” Aileen said to her. “It’s policy, and I know this because it’s a policy I wrote.”

“Policy isn’t strictly mandatory,” Grace said, but then she immediately waved off that comment rather than get into the interpretation of the department’s guidelines with her mother.

The policy spelled out that officers should be put on desk duty unless there was a critical operational reason for them not to be. A triple murder investigation was the very definition of a critical operational reason, but the truth was, there were other cops who could have filled in for Grace in the field.

But Grace had opted against that.

“As soon as the killer is caught, I’ll go on desk duty,” Grace said. That’d been her plan all along.

Clearly, that wasn’t enough for Aileen, though, and Grace knew Aileen wasn’t a former sheriff at the moment. She was Grace’s mother. And she was worried about her safety.

Aileen looked at Dutton. “I’m guessing you tried to talk her out of doing anything dangerous.” She sighed. “Of course, you did. I might not like you, Dutton, but you’re not an SOB. You’re trying to keep the baby and her safe, and it’s putting you at risk.”

“I’m at risk no matter what I do or don’t do,” Dutton was quick to say. “The killer named both Grace and me in that threatening note.”

It was a bad time for it, but Grace nearly smiled. Aileen had wanted to play the guilt card to get Grace to consider putting both Dutton and her “behind a desk” and out of reach of a killer. But backing off wasn’t going to fix this. Not for Dutton and her. Maybe not for her mother, either.

“The killer didn’t name you in the threat that was left at the last crime scene,” Grace said to Aileen. “But if the killer is Brian, you know you could be the main target. Heck, you could be a target even if it’s not him, since we aren’t sure of the killer’s motive. I’ll ask you again to consider protective custody.”

A muscle flickered in Aileen’s jaw. “No protective custody. Because if I’m truly the endgame target, then I want to makemyself available. Not so he or she can kill me,” she added when both Grace and Dutton opened their mouths to object. “But because I believe I’ll be able to stop it.”

Grace groaned, and she went closer, meeting her mother eye-to-eye. “I don’t want you in danger. But I understand that you are,” she acknowledged before Aileen could object. “It’s the same for Dutton and me. I want the killer caught, and that means we all need to take more precautions than we’re comfortable taking.”

“Like Dutton and you sharing the same air space,” Aileen muttered.

Grace pulled back her shoulders, waiting for her mother to snap out a reminder of how much she disapproved of Dutton and his family. That didn’t happen.

“Is the baby okay?” Aileen asked. “I figured you had some kind of tests and an ultrasound.”

“Both,” Grace verified, relaxing her stance just a little. She thought of what Dutton had seen on the ultrasound, though, and automatically placed her hand on her stomach. “It’s a boy,” she told her mother.

Aileen flexed her eyebrows. And then sighed. “A grandson,” she muttered, sounding almost happy about that. It didn’t last because her gaze volleyed between them again. “I don’t have to say that all this time you two are spending together will fire up the gossips. Yes, I know gossip doesn’t mean squat. Not usually. But in this case, it does.” She fixed her attention on Dutton. “I’ve heard this baby has cost you plenty of business.”

Grace turned to him, expecting him to deny it. But he didn’t. “How much business?” she asked.

“Some,” he admitted, but she suspectedsomewas minimizing it and that her mother’splentywas more accurate.

Even though she hadn’t huffed or done any of the cursing aloud, Dutton clearly picked up on what she was thinkingbecause he locked gazes with her. “I don’t need local business to keep my finances solid. If locals don’t buy the livestock, others will.”

Grace would have questioned him more about that, but there was another blasted knock at the door.

“Probably the doctor,” Dutton said and went to open it.

Again, it wasn’t the doctor, but rather Wilson Finney, and the county sheriff gave Dutton and Grace a look similar to the one Aileen had aimed at them moments earlier. Of course, now there was no lingering heat from the kiss in the room.

At least Grace hoped there wasn’t, anyway.

Wilson shifted his attention to Aileen, and she, too, earned a cool glance from him. Probably because he blamed her for not doing more to get him elected sheriff. He probably thought Aileen had shown Grace some favoritism over the years, but if she had, Grace certainly hadn’t been aware of it.

“I heard about what happened at the ranch,” Wilson said, aiming his comment at Dutton. “Is your father alright?”

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