He turned away, pretending to hunt for a notebook, but really just needing the time to pull himself together. Surreptitiously he swiped at his eyes with the shirt he’d tossed on Daisy’s overstuffed armchair, then pulled the shirt over his head.

When he turned back, she was no longer staring at the board. She was staring at him, the “something else” in her eyes having shifted to . . . Need? Want? Old-fashioned lust? He wasn’t sure which it was, but he felt it too and was suddenly aware that the sweats he wore would conceal nothing. Do not push. Do not scare her away.

Swallowing hard, he sat on the other end of the sofa, pulling his notebook over his lap, her gaze becoming a little glazed as she followed his every little movement. Nervously he tapped his pen on the notebook, and the sound jerked her out of the trancelike stare.

But not a trancelike stare like the one at the airport. She was with him this time, he could tell. She’d been fully engaged, and rather than being pale and drawn, her cheeks were a shade of pink that tempted him to get up and put that glazed look back in her eyes.

But not now.

Her green eyes shot up to his, guilty at being caught looking. Rafe forced a wry smile. “You okay?”

She pushed her hair away from her face with an embarrassed chuckle. “Yeah.” Clearing her throat, she turned back to the board. “What exactly do you know so far?”

The sexual tension ratcheted down a fraction, enough that Rafe could actually draw a comfortable breath. Enough that he had to wonder what it would be like with her, if he’d actually burst into flames if she ever truly let him in. Because merely sitting on the same sofa had given him a painful hard-on.

That was completely inappropriate at the moment.

He manhandled his thoughts back into some semblance of coherence. “Well, Harry and his brother, Aubrey, were born in Santa Rosa. Harry is forty-seven and Aubrey would have been fifty-nine.”

“If he hadn’t gotten his just deserts the night he tried to rape Gideon,” she said matter-of-factly.

“Correct. Belinda Franklin, their mother, is now seventy-six. She lives in a nursing home in Santa Rosa.”

Mercy got up to inspect the photo of the care facility. “Looks like a nice place.”

“It is. It’s an expensive place.”

She turned, one brow lifted. “Who pays for it?”

He smiled at her. “Follow the money, right? I don’t know yet.”

“Does the FBI know where she is?”

“I’m sure they do. I haven’t asked. They’ll know I’m working on my own and they’ll tell me to stop.”

“Better to ask forgiveness than permission?” she asked.

“It’s a good motto for a reason,” he replied, and she laughed.

“I guess so.” She turned back to the photo. “Have you been to this nursing home?”

“Once. I posed as a family friend, but the staff was suspicious. She has dementia, and I don’t think she gets many visitors.”