Forever Hers Walters, Ednah (best novels for teenagers .TXT) 📖

studied the man as though he was an escaped felon masquerading as a mailman. “Where is your truck?”

The man jabbed a thumb to indicate the other end of the house. “In the driveway behind the station wagon.”

“Show me some I.D.,” Eddie added.

Seriously? Amy nudged Eddie aside and signed for the package. It had the label of an online store. She ripped through the tape and opened the flaps as soon as she reached the kitchen.

“Ah, your surveillance system.”

Amy grinned. “Yeah, the fake mailman planned to blow us up with it.”

Eddie made a face. “Very funny.”

“You are. Once I have them up, Nolan won’t come near the house without us knowing.”

Eddie didn’t look convinced. “You still need to learn self-defense.”

“I know, but right now I want this baby up and running.” She removed one of the four wireless cameras and studied it, then reached for the instruction pamphlet. Although the online instructions had seemed easy, now that she had everything in front of her, she didn’t know where to start. She’d always been technically challenged. She glanced at the half-naked man beside her. “Are you good with electronics?”

Eddie chuckled. “Oh yeah. I’ll be right back. I have to change.”

Not on my account, she wanted to say, but that was a can of worms she wasn’t ready to open. By the time he came back, his gorgeous body covered up in jeans and a polo shirt, she’d removed everything from the box—four cameras that looked like heads of a one-eyed robot, four stands and installation screws, AC adapters, a CD and a USB receiver.

They spent the next hour pouring over instructions and putting the system together. They placed one camera on the table by the wall between the kitchen and the living room, facing the back door. They hid it between potted plants so it wasn’t obvious.

“No infra-red for night vision,” Eddie murmured.

The company had some with night vision, but the price was way out of her range. “The security lights turn on at night and since the patio wall is made of clear glass and has no curtains, the camera can still capture images.”

They placed the second camera outside the front door in a flower bed and used an outside socket to power it. Eddie suggested they bury the cable and camouflage the camera with rocks.

“By the time he notices it, it would be too late,” Amy said with glee.

They placed the third one in the garage and the fourth in Raelynn’s room facing her bed. Next they loaded the software on her desktop and attached the USB receiver. When they opened the menu and clicked on the quad view icon, the four screens split evenly on her desktop screen. One showed Raelynn sleeping peacefully. He zoomed in. Amy touched the screen as though to touch her daughter. She was so innocent.

Eddie shifted from quad viewing to single camera, changing the angles of the cameras for maximum feed. He showed her how to switch from full-time to timed recording when there was motion detected.

“You’re enjoying this,” Amy said.

A boyish grin curled his lips. “I like to mess around with electronics and machines. In middle school, my cousins and I formed a garage band and—”

She laughed. “You sang in a garage band?”

He snickered. “Hell no. Stu Granger did the singing; Chase was on the keyboard and Baron the guitar. I was the sound man,” he said proudly.

Stu Granger was a professional baseball player now. Go figure the Fitzgerald family would know him. “Sound man doesn’t sound glamorous,” she teased.

He cocked his brow. “Don’t knock it till you see what I can do with a mixer and a power amp. Any idiot can pound on an instrument and call it music. It takes skills and a good ear to make a band sound good, to turn the chaos into music. I even had to modify a few things here and there.”

Amy cupped her chin and studied him. He was so cute when he bragged. “Do you guys still play?”

He laughed. “Nah. Our band didn’t make it to high school. Now I focus on modifying motorcycles. One day I’d like to custom-make them.”

Something in his voice said this was important. “For fun or to sell?”

“To sell to people with discriminating tastes, but don’t have the time to do the modification by themselves. In fact, I just finished one for Lex.”

“Isn’t he the CEO of your family’s company?”

“Yes, but he likes to skip the boardroom meetings now and then, join me and…” Eddie looked at his watch and frowned. Then he gave her a self-effacing smile. “And I have to get going if I want to make my four o’clock meeting.”

Amy almost asked the identity of the person he was meeting. For the first time since he arrived here, they’d talked without arguing. “Will you be back for dinner?”

“No, I plan on meeting with Randal afterwards at that pub.”

“About that, I really think I should come with you.”

He cocked his brow. “Not a good idea.”

“Why?”

“This is police work, Amy. If things get complicated, I don’t want you caught in the midst of it.”

“I know Nolan, Eddie. He will be inside that restaurant, watching you. I can point him out.”

Eddie shook his head. “No, I’ll be fine.”

Stubborn man. Luckily, she knew how to deal with men like him.

CHAPTER 7

The police station looked abandoned. A couple of patrol cars, motorbikes, bicycles and Segway Personal Transporters dotted the parking lot. At his station in L.A., Eddie would be lucky to find a parking spot on a Saturday afternoon.

Inside was equally quiet and empty. An older woman manning the front desk sat up and grinned, an appreciative gleam in her eyes.

“Aren’t you a sight for sore eyes,” she said, standing up. “You must be that young man who called this morning. Fitzgerald.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Sally and the Ol’ Bear Briggs are waiting for yah,” the police woman said, chuckling. “This way, please.”

Eddie followed the woman past empty desks to an office. He hadn’t known he would