Forbidden (Southern Comfort) by O'Neill, Clark (free ebook reader txt) 📗

Josh, who understood the male psyche far better than Tate, weighed the pleasure of dining with the lovely woman against the pain of having his face ground into the dirt.  For despite the pleasant smile, Copeland’s eyes said join us and die.

Being fond of his life, and having no great desire to eat dirt, Josh wisely opted to bow out.  And gathering his sketchpad and laptop, excused himself from the room.

THE S&K Sandwich Shop was a throwback to simpler times, the wares advertised on a backlit plastic board in black removable letters.  The selection was pretty basic southern fare and the air so redolent of oil from the deep fryer that they decided to dine al fresco.  The patio was dwarfed by a large live oak whose graceful limbs cast welcome shade, and compared to the heat and grease of the restaurant’s interior, felt almost balmy by comparison.

Clay nodded toward a picnic table on the far side of the oak, brushing aside an errant piece of Spanish moss before offering Tate a seat.  As he unwrapped his sandwich from the wax paper casing, Tate eyed him across their trays.

“Do you think you’ll be able to help them find Casey?”

He took a bite of barbeque.  Tate knew there was a lot of stuff happening that he wasn’t at liberty to discuss, and he was clearly considering his response.

“Finding Casey, while obviously urgent, isn’t the reason they asked me to come in.  My role as a ‘profiler’ isn’t to locate missing persons or apprehend perpetrators, but to try and help the police understand the whys of the situation.  Why was Casey selected?  Why does the man who took her feel the need to do what he does?  And by understanding both the victim and the victimizer, they will have a better chance of locating their man by predicting his behavioral pattern and thereby preventing him from striking again.  I’m trying to help lead them to their man, which, in a perfect world, will also lead them to Casey.  But I want you to be prepared for the fact that they may not find her in time.”

Tate chewed on a piece of Texas toast while she considered Clay’s grim prediction.  He had to have an iron will to be able to separate the fact that a young girl’s life was at stake, and concentrate on the task of studying her abductor.  That cool professionalism, so different from the warm and engaging man she’d come to know, intrigued her on an entirely different level.  It took tremendous strength of character to do what he did, and she found her admiration deepening.

Whatever came – or didn’t come – out of her acquaintanceship with Clay Copeland, she’d walk away from this whole thing with a lot of respect for him as a person.

And she also remembered that just two nights ago he’d claimed to be a guy on vacation, trying to pretend like his real life didn’t exist.

And yet here he was, working.

Because he’d been nice enough to take her and Max to that carnival and got sucked into what he’d come to Charleston to avoid.

“I’m sorry,” she said suddenly, and he looked up at her, surprised.  “I just realized that if it weren’t for me, you wouldn’t be stuck working on your vacation.”

Clay ripped one of the paper towels off the roll in the middle of the table so that he could wipe barbeque sauce from his mouth.  “Don’t be ridiculous.  If it weren’t for you, it might have been hours before anyone knew Casey was missing, and the sheriff almost certainly wouldn’t have given her disappearance the high priority it has right now.  Doing your part to help that little girl last night, and to help ID Casey’s possible abductor today… that’s nothing for which you need to feel regret.  Trust me, when I signed on with the ISU, I realized that interruptions and inconveniences to the regularly scheduled program were part and parcel of the life.”

When he put it that way, Tate realized how insignificant a missed day of vacation was when compared with a young girl’s life.  But still, everyone was entitled to a break now and then, and there was something about Clay’s demeanor over the past couple of days that suggested the break was sorely needed.  She remembered how he’d shied away from Max that first day on the beach.

“I don’t mean to pry, and I know it’s none of my business, but…” Tate hesitated, wondering how to best phrase the question.  “Did something bad happen on one of your cases before you came here?”

“Something bad has happened on every one of my cases.  People generally don’t call me in when a guy sends his girlfriend flowers.”

Tate frowned at the flippant remark.  “That’s not what I meant.  It’s just that you seemed… I don’t know, a little gun shy when you first met Max. Like you’d had a bad experience or something.  At first I thought you simply didn’t like kids, but that’s obviously not the case.  You’re really, really great with Max.  He adores you.”

Clay took a sip of iced tea.  Cleared his throat.  “I, uh… Don’t know what to say to that.  Thank you.  Max makes it pretty easy to be, you know, great.”

Tate smiled, dredging a fry through ketchup.  “You know, you didn’t really answer the question.”

“No?”

She shook her head.

A bead of sweat rolled off Clay’s temple and he wiped it with the back of his hand.  “It’s really hot out here.  Do you want to finish our lunch at the station?”

“If it’s something you can’t or don’t want to talk about, I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable.”

“The heat’s making me uncomfortable.”

Her bland look had him sighing in acknowledgement.  “Okay.  You’re right.” He pushed his tray to the side and leaned back.  “A few weeks ago, I was in Kansas working a case.  The specifics aren’t important, but my profile helped lead the locals to the right man. The guy had