Holding Out For A Hero. HelenKay Dimon

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      Deana fought to keep her world from tilting. If the dizziness shaking her from head to toe were any indication, that wasn’t going to be an easy task.

      “Oahu is not a big place,” she said, totally ignoring Josh’s question. “And we can’t really stay and talk to Eric because we have a meeting to get to.”

      Josh’s eyebrow lifted in question. “I don’t know about you, but my meeting is with Eric.”

      “Should I leave you two alone to straighten this out?” Eric asked.

      Josh shot the other man a warning glance. “Don’t even think of moving.”

      She struggled to understand what was happening. “Eric wasn’t the prosecutor on Ryan’s case, Josh.”

      “I know.”

      “Then what’s going on?” She asked because she needed a straight answer before the pounding in her head ratcheted up and drowned out everything else.

      Josh’s eyes narrowed “I’m conducting the investigation as promised.”

      “Think of another way to get it done,” Deana said.

      The air around Josh crackled with awareness. He acted as if she had overstepped. As if he was somehow above being questioned.

      Boy, did he have a surprise coming. The one thing Eric taught her was to not back down when you believed in something. He never intended to deliver that lesson, but she picked it up just fine when they were dating.

      “Not that this isn’t interesting, because it is, but I have work to do.” Eric signaled to Mary. “When is my next appointment?”

      “Hold it.” Josh held up a hand as if to emphasize his order. “Clearly there’s something I don’t know here. Someone care to fill me in on the problem?”

      “There’s not a problem,” Deana said.

      Eric turned his gaze to the floor, doing his damnedest to prove her a liar on that point. Typical. Never step up and take a hit to the reputation when you can let someone else do all the nasty work. That was Eric.

      He was tall and handsome in his perfectly pressed dark gray suit and short black hair. A driven, only child of parents who came to Hawaii straight from Japan. They poured everything into him, and Eric returned their hard work with a swift rise in the Office of the Prosecutor and a possible future as the Prosecuting Attorney of Oahu, if the voters saw fit. He was the same man she once believed was perfect for her…until he proved he absolutely wasn’t.

      Rather than bore Josh and the eavesdropping receptionist with the details, Deana went for the brief version. “Eric and I know each other.”

      “Yeah, I got that much,” Josh said.

      The receptionist snorted, then bowed her head and pretended to read something on her desk.

      Deana toyed with telling the other woman off but turned to Josh instead. “Is any of this really relevant?”

      Josh hesitated for a second. “I’m thinking it might be. This reaction isn’t a good thing. Might get in the way of the investigation, which is why I need details before I take one more step.”

      “Deana is right. We’ve known each other for years,” Eric said.

      Josh didn’t move. Didn’t look all that satisfied with the explanation, either. “Know each other as in biblically?”

      “What does that mean?” Deana asked.

      “Yes,” Eric said at the same time.

      Josh blew out a long and loud breath. “Okay, this is a problem.”

      “Why?” Deana asked. “And why meet with Eric anyway?”

      “As you know, I oversee the major felonies division. Josh and I go back a few years. Hello, by the way.” Eric held out his hand to Josh. “So, he called and asked if he could come in and talk about Ryan.”

      Josh returned the handshake. “And for some reason you forgot to fill me in on your personal connection to this matter.”

      “I don’t have one,” Eric said.

      Deana felt the words more than heard them. As if she needed a reminder of why this guy was an ex and not a current boyfriend.

      “Well, if this is the meeting, should we go to your office and get started?” she asked. As far as she was concerned, they’d shared enough private information with the office staff and the few attorneys who hovered nearby.

      “No need.” Eric handed Josh a thin envelope. “There’s not much I can tell you about this case. Whatever I have that can be disclosed is already public record.”

      “I see,” Josh said as he glared at Deana.

      “You want the basics?” Eric didn’t wait for a response. “Ryan killed his parents, Chace and Kalanie Armstrong, in order to get his hands on a sizable inheritance—”

      “That’s not true,” Deana insisted, more out of habit than anything else.

      Eric kept right on talking. “Like many rich kids before him—the Menendez brothers, Bart Whitaker, the Rafay kid, and hundreds, maybe thousands, of others—Ryan wanted quick cash fast. He made it happen the hard way and then set about to spend all the money he could get his hands on.”

      Deana longed to knock the smug expression right off Eric’s face. “We all know your public position on Ryan.”

      “That’s the only one there is, Deana.”

      “Eric, maybe we could schedule a meeting later.” Josh shot her a blank look. “Alone.”

      “If you want, but that’s honestly all I can give you.” Eric shrugged. “There was nothing all that unusual about the case. From a prosecutorial perspective, pretty easy.”

      Those three weeks of trial nearly killed Deana, and her ex-boyfriend—the man who watched her grieve and held her while she cried over her brother’s casket—viewed the entire scene as fun. “Happy you enjoyed yourself.”

      Eric frowned. “You know that’s not true.”

      “Sounds like it.”

      “This was not personal, Deana. My office just played the facts as they came. Out of respect for you, I stayed out of it. It seemed like the best choice for both of us.”

      For him, maybe. That’s what she could never make Eric understand. She wanted him in the case. She wanted him to fight for Ryan, to believe in his innocence. Instead, Eric protected his butt and his future political career and refused to help.

      “I guess that’s it then.” Josh wrapped his fingers around her elbow.

      The gesture, both intimate and a little threatening, confused her. “But I thought—”

      Josh steered her toward the glass doors and СКАЧАТЬ