Her Kind of Hero Read online

  I hadn’t seen the guy since the time he had dinner with me and Luke, and my only pictures of him were even older. But I knew someone who’d seen Mark more recently. I called Anthony and told him what my boss said. “Do you have any pictures I can borrow?”

  “I’ll be right over with what I’ve got.”

  “No, it can wait until you’re off work. Don’t you work mornings on Thursdays and Fridays?”

  He got a little huffy with me. “Vanessa, I really think your safety is a little more important than making sure all the labels on the canned peas are facing straight ahead.”

  In almost no time at all, he was in front of the main building. I ran outside to meet him. “You are so sweet. You must have broken every speed law in the state to get here so fast.”

  “I’d rather not take any chances.” He held out a few snapshots. “What made you change your mind about reporting him?”

  I wasn’t ready to take the pictures. Instead, I told him about the spam that wasn’t spam. Anthony looked worried. “Wow, Vanessa. That’s really disturbing.”

  “You think?”

  “How long have you been getting them?”

  “For at least a year.”

  He raised an eyebrow at me. “You didn’t read them closely enough to see if there was a message?”

  “I thought they were junk mail.” I was feeling a little sick again.

  He noticed and put his arm around me. I leaned against his shoulder for a second, taking comfort from his presence.

  “At least the songs were awesome.”

  I couldn’t help laughing. Anthony always had the strangest way of looking at things. “Yeah, they’re pretty good except for the creepy stalking Police song. I’ll never hear that one the same way again.”

  He patted me on the back. “Want to get ice cream?”

  I pulled away and smiled. “Twice in one week? I better not. It’s not even lunchtime yet. Besides, I’m going out tomorrow and I should save my calories.”

  “Hot date?”

  “No, just dinner. Well, it—” I stopped. It could be a hot date, but I didn’t want to talk about it. “Just dinner. But we’re getting too old for me to eat out more than a couple times a week, and it’s either watch what I eat or exercise. I’m way too lazy to exercise.”

  I was babbling, trying to change the subject, but it seemed to work. “Well, how about I buy you a Diet Coke instead?” said Anthony.

  “I could go for that.” We linked arms and headed off campus.

  “So, if you thought they were spam, what made you realize there was more to them? Did you finally read all the songs or something?”

  “Worse. One of them installed a keylogger on my machine. The antivirus program just caught it.”

  He stopped walking. “It all fits.”

  “What?”

  “Vanessa, don’t you remember? Mark and I met because we were both computer science majors. I was never really good at it, but he was terrific.”

  My jaw dropped. “Oh, no. I had totally forgotten that.”

  “That’s how I met you, remember? Through Mark, sort of. He got me to join choir our sophomore year because, um, well, he said there were a lot of girls in choir but not a lot of straight dudes. The odds were better for us to find chicks in choir rather than in comp sci.” Now he was the one babbling, trying to distract me. It wasn’t working.

  I couldn’t think of anything to say until we were back on campus with our sodas in hand. I was glad we hadn’t gotten any ice cream. My stomach felt like I’d eaten a ball of clay. “You’re right. It really does fit. I’ve got to get those pictures to security.”

  “Oh, right. Here.”

  The newest one was a few years old. “Did you take any pictures when you were hanging out with Mark last August?”

  “August?”

  “When you went up north for the convention.”

  “Oh, right. No, sorry. We just got together for some drinks, a little catching up. I didn’t think about taking my camera.” He looked apologetic. “Wish I had, now. But he hasn’t changed.”

  “Thanks, Anthony. I really appreciate this.” I smiled at him.

  He winked and did the finger gun thing at me. “You owe me one?”

  “I totally owe you one.”

  “How about dinner this weekend?” When I didn’t answer, he rushed onward. “I know you said you don’t want to eat out too much. I could just come over to your house and we could watch a movie or something. Or movies? Remember when a bunch of us watched all of the Star Trek movies back to back in one giant marathon?”

  I started laughing. “Oh, my God, I remember that. We were such dorks.”

  “Not you, Vanessa.”

  “Oh, I’m a dork.”

  “No, you were never that, you just liked dorky things. And you didn’t marry a dork.”

  “Stop using that word. I do not think it means—”

  “—what you think it means,” he finished. “Princess Bride.”

  “I’ve been watching it a lot lately.” I sighed.

  “I do know what it means, though, and Luke wasn’t like that,” Anthony said. “Your husband was exciting and fun to be around, full of ideas and never just a follower like a lot of the guys in our group. I figured that was how you wound up with him and not…other guys.”

  I shook my head. “That wasn’t it at all. Luke was a big nerd, you know. He just didn’t care what people thought of him. He never apologized for being himself, or liking what he liked. That’s sexy. Being cool has nothing to do with sexy, or being desirable. The Mr. Excitement stuff was just a bonus, not what made me fall in love.”

  That idea was out of my mouth before it sunk into my brain. For a minute, I couldn’t think.

  Anthony looked at me for a moment, his face unreadable. He reached out and squeezed my arm. “I’m sorry he’s not here to help you with this stalker thing. But I’m here, and I’ll help you all I can.”

  “Thanks. It’s good to have you guys… I mean, you, as a friend,” I said.

  “Do you want me to go in with you?”

  “No, I’ve got it.”

  “But I want to.”

  “It’s only going to take me a second.”

  “Well, it’s a second I can spend right by your side.” He reached for my arm.

  I swatted his hand. “Dude. Relax. I just want to go in and get out, not make a production of it.”

  His face clouded up, but for once I was in no mood to placate him. I just glared. He glared back. “I was doing you a favor.”

  I realized he was right, which was irritating. But I tried to back down. “Yes. You were. You did. Sorry.”

  “Okay.” He started walking away.

  “Oh, damn it, Anthony. I’m sorry, okay? I’m on edge.”

  He turned and smiled. “I don’t blame you. Just remember I’m on your side. I’m your biggest fan…and your choir buddy.”

  I tried to smile back. “Better hurry up and get a new beater. You need to convey me to rehearsal in style, right?”

  He laughed, and I was relieved for some obscure reason. He gave me a quick, hard hug, and I returned it.

  He left me at the security office. I did what needed to be done and somehow managed to finish out the workday.

  When I left my office, Derek was waiting outside for me, holding a laptop case. The edge of a truly ancient laptop stuck out over the zipper. “Hey, Van.”

  I threw my arms around his neck and held on tight. “Hey, Der.”

  “This is a nice way to say hello. Are you okay?”

  “Never better.” I grinned at him. “What’s with the old laptop?”

  “I thought you could use this while the police have yours. It’s old, but it works.”

  “Aw! Thanks. Does it have any personal stuff on there that I shouldn’t read?” I waggled my eyebrows at him.

  “Not that you’ll be able to find. Want a lift home?” When I cheered, he took my hand and we headed for the parking lot.

  On
our way to my house, I told him about my conversation with Anthony. Without a word, he turned away from my street and toward the police station. He took me inside to update the detective in charge of my case.

  She wrote down the new information. When she was done, she looked at me. “We are very interested in talking to Mark, but I’m afraid you should know that we can’t find him anywhere in Northern Virginia. Or in Virginia at all, as a matter of fact. We checked tax records, and the last employer we’ve found for him in the state was a tech start-up that failed several years ago.”

  “Do you think he might be here?” I demanded. Derek squeezed my hand. I squeezed back, grateful that he was there.

  “No way to know,” she said. “But keep your eyes open for out-of-state vehicles parked near your house, or anyone following you. I assume you’re locking your doors, keeping exterior lights on, and all that good stuff? Right. Besides that, trust your instincts. If something seems wrong, it probably is, so call us. We’d rather respond to a false alarm than an emergency.”

  “What about the calls?” asked Derek.

  “It’s a cell phone in Mark’s name, but we’re still waiting on the provider to tell us which towers the calls came from. We’ll let you know as soon as we have something.”

  We thanked her and left. On our way to my house, Derek made light conversation about the university and some funny stories he’d read online. His instincts were good, because I didn’t want to talk about Mark at all.

  My mail was crammed into the old fashioned brass box nailed beside my front door. I pried it out and tossed the whole pile onto the kitchen counter. “Want anything to drink?”

  “No, thank you.” He started sorting the mail into neat categories.

  I patted his hand. “You can’t help yourself, can you?”

  “Nope. Here’s the recycling.”

  I took the junk mail out to the bin on the deck. When I came back inside, Derek was peering with suspicion at a cream-colored envelope. Several others sat beside it. I refused to look at them or him until I fished a bottle of hard cider out of the refrigerator. It had been that kind of day.

  “All right,” I said. “What are you looking at?”

  “Four envelopes with computer-generated address labels. Local postmarks, not all the same, stamped around lunchtime today. No return addresses. I think you should open these with gloves on, unless you want me to do it.”

  “No, I’ll shoot Old Yeller myself.” I took a swig from the bottle before I retrieved my dishwashing gloves and a butter knife.

  Derek’s instincts were right on. Each envelope contained a recent photograph of me. In two of the shots, I was coming out of the main admin building on campus where I worked. The third one was of me in the grocery store wearing cutoffs and a tank top. The last picture was of my back, walking through my own front door. That was the most disturbing one. The angle, and the fact that the left third of the picture was a green blur, suggested that the photographer had been hiding behind the big hydrangea bush on the corner. I held it up, trying to see what outfit I was wearing.

  “There’s something written on the back,” said Derek.

  I flipped it over. Printed in block letters with a felt-tipped marker, the message read I’LL BE WATCHING YOU.

  I dropped it like it was on fire, but I tried to laugh. “Just in case I missed the point of the song lyric emails, right?”

  Derek reached out with his fingernails and flipped the other three pictures over. Two of them featured lyrics from some of the other love-song emails, but the one of me in cutoffs bore the message TEASE.

  “More proof this is Mark. Great,” I said.

  “I don’t know,” said Derek, slowly. “After years of being subtle, suddenly he really wants you to know it’s him?”

  “But if I hadn’t talked to Anthony, I wouldn’t necessarily know he still thinks of me as a tease.”

  Derek opened the drawer next to the refrigerator and got out a box of freezer bags. I dropped each photo into its own bag to protect any fingerprints that Mark might have left behind.

  “You’ve got a point. Van, I need to get home—do you want to come with me?”

  I peeled off the yellow gloves and threw them on the counter. “I’m not going to let this creep make me change my life or run away from my house.”

  “He’s stepping things up. I think you should be more worried.”

  “I think I need to chill out and recharge a little.”

  He caught my tone and backed down. “How about if I just leave it as I’m worried about you.”

  “I can’t just keep running over to your house. Besides, he’s not really stepping things up, if you think about it. The photos are a step down from that smashed picture frame.”

  He came around to stand beside me. He stroked my hair back from my face. “Your logic is impeccable, but you’re still welcome to come home with me.”

  “Thanks.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  “You could stay here a little longer and distract me.” I moved against him and was gratified to feel his body respond.

  “I don’t think I could stop after you were distracted,” he managed to say.

  I stretched upward and kissed the side of his neck. “That is the idea, actually.”

  “Vanessa—”

  “I feel distracted already.”

  Our lips met. What I was really feeling was desperate, so our kiss took on that quality. I pushed hard enough to pin him against the counter. Or I would have pinned him, if he hadn’t been so solid and strong. He was pushing back, one hand roaming down my back and the other tangled in my hair. I got his shirt untucked and my hands on the bare skin of his stomach. The feel of his taut skin over rippling abs was fantastic. All the pent-up tension of the day was pouring out of me.

  “I want you so much,” I whispered.

  He groaned. “God, Van. I want you, too.”

  “Good.” I reached for his belt buckle.

  He took my arms. “Please, no.”

  “What?”

  “Van, I’m sorry. Believe me, there’s no one else I’ve wanted more than you, but I want our first time to be special.”

  “I promise it’ll be special.”

  “Sweet girl, listen to me.” I was struggling against his hands, but at his gentle command, I held still for a moment. He wrapped his arms around me in a tight embrace and rocked me back and forth until I relaxed against his broad chest. His heart was pounding as hard as mine was.

  “I’m listening. But this better be good.”

  “I don’t want to be worried about my animals. I don’t want to be thinking of anything but you. I want to focus on every inch of your body and bring out every shiver and moan you’ve got.”

  “Okay, that’s pretty good.”

  I felt him chuckle. “Oh, but I’m not done. I don’t want to rush a single moment. I want to have as much time as we need, and when we’re done, I want to fall asleep holding you, hearing you breathe, feeling your soft skin under my hand. I want to wake up in the morning to see your eyelashes curving against your cheek with a little smile on your face.”

  My legs felt weak, and I was lightheaded. His voice was deep and quiet, his words falling one by one in a rhythm that felt like making love. He was still talking.

  “Here’s the thing, Van. I don’t want you to be reacting to something external for our first night together. I want to start out with a date, a real date, where we talk and laugh and maybe drink some wine. I need to tell you some things that I’ve never told anyone, too. Once we’re completely open to each other, and relaxed, that’s when I want to take you to bed. Does that sound good?”

  I kissed him instead of answering. I put everything I was feeling into that kiss, but I tried not to grind against him. It was difficult but not quite impossible.

  He broke the kiss first and grinned at me, slightly out of breath. “Woman, just kissing you is better than anything I’ve ever felt in my life.”

  “You’re not
so bad yourself,” I said, still holding his shoulders.

  He kissed my forehead, and I let him go. He picked up the four plastic bags and the envelopes. “Would you like me to take these to the police station for you? It’s on my way, and I’d kind of like to make some copies and look some things up.”

  “Derek, dear man, that would be fantastic.” I sighed. “I don’t have the energy to deal with this garbage any more today. I just want to lock my doors and watch a movie.”