Mountain Darkness

by Vanessa Vale

  His jaw clenched. “It’s not only my career on the line.”

  I frowned. “What are you talking about?”

  He shrugged. “The District Attorney’s going to want the killer behind bars just as much as I do. That falls to your shoulders.”

  “Meaning don’t fuck this up.” While the DA was in charge of the office and dealt with politics, like meetings with my father, I dealt with the actual cases, did the time in the courtroom. If things went south, it was on me.

  This meant I shouldn’t have fucked a prime suspect’s pussy while she sucked the lead detective’s dick. And planned to do some other variety of that later tonight.

  He lifted a hand in a stop gesture. “I didn’t say that.”

  I stood, set the paperweight back down.

  “You didn’t have to.” I was used to his passive aggressiveness.

  “You’ll be the DA within five years if I have my way,” he said to my back as I made my way to his office door. He had aspirations for me that had never matched my own. If he were mayor and his son DA, the power he’d have. Nash and Nash, like some kind of TV show.

  Whatever.

  “Your way?”

  He smiled, saccharine sweet. “Donnie, having power means you control lots of places in the government, not just one seat. Imagine what the Nash boys can do if we’re running Cutthroat.”

  I hadn’t cared all that much about his aspirations for me, until now. But this was the first time he’d practically admitted being heavy handed in my career. Had he pushed cases my way to build up my resume? Did he know things about the DA to get him tossed out of office?

  Fuck. I knew we weren’t close, but I’d never imagined being my father’s pawn.

  I hadn’t thought about it much at all. Until now. Until there were more important things. I’d been going along for the ride because I’d been able to put bad guys away. I’d been content with that, clearly not knowing what Pops had been up to. But there hadn’t been much to stand up for. To protect. Now there was Kit.

  I didn’t want to throw away three years of law school because my dad was power hungry, but I didn’t want any puppet strings either. I wanted to be the man Kit turned to. In the middle of the night, when she was sad. Happy. Horny. I needed her to be able to look me in the eye and be proud of me. And I needed to do the same with myself.

  I turned, looked at the man I once looked up to. Now, I didn’t like anything he stood for. “I want justice, Pops, not to be DA.”

  He looked at me as if he wondered if we shared the same DNA. “It’s the same thing.”

  It was like talking to a fence post. No matter how many times I said it, he wouldn’t understand. I’d gone into law for Mom, not for him. “It’s not the same thing at all.”

  KIT

  * * *

  “Look who the cat dragged in,” Dolly said, her usual smile on her face, a coffee pot in her hand as she walked by where I stood at the hostess stand. She didn’t stop to say more, but worked her way down the row of booths by the front windows offering refills. I’d rarely seen her out of the diner’s uniform of jeans and a T-shirt with a drawing of the building on the back and sturdy black shoes.

  Once done, she turned on her heel and worked her way back to me.

  “Give me some sugar,” she said and I hugged her. Hard. She was taller than me by a few inches and bony, although she was strong from lugging heavy trays of food about all day. She smelled like cooked onions and rose water. A familiar combination that had me blinking back tears. I’d missed her.

  Dolly’s Diner was one of the only places that was frequented by all of Cutthroat. Tourists and truckers passing through as well. Open twenty-four hours, everyone liked a greasy, late-night breakfast after hard drinking or an early morning business meeting. The rich liked good food in large portions as much as those on a budget. Her parents had started the place back in the sixties—and obviously named it after their only child—when the highway first opened. While they’d retired to Florida when I was a little girl, Dolly and her husband, Clyde, took over the running of it.

  “I heard you were back.” She walked around the lunch counter and put the coffee pot back on the warming plate. Reaching beneath, she pulled out a box of sugar packets and began tucking them into the plastic holders.

  “I’ve been working with Erin Mills.”

  “Heard that, too.” She shook her head. “I can’t believe what happened to her.”

  “I… I found her.”

  Her hands stilled and her shrewd eyes met mine. “Kit.”

  I pasted on a fake smile and leaned against the counter. “I’ve been staying with her, saving up some money for a place of my own.”

  “You’re the hardest worker I know,” she commented. “Still taking care of your momma?”

  I nodded. Nothing more to be said on that one. “I’m sorry I haven’t come to say hi.”

  I was ashamed of myself. I’d hoped to get beyond waitressing, making a career out of event planning. The job at the hotel in Billings was my start toward that, but it was definitely over now. Murder took care of that. But Dolly had been more of a mother than my own, and I should have at least stopped in to visit. I’d started working for her in tenth grade, first bussing tables then waitressing. I’d had the job until last year when I went to Billings. I hadn’t given her notice, but I had called her, let her know where I’d gone.

  Now I was eating humble pie and hoping she’d take me back. I’d always complained about the rich snobs in Cutthroat, but I realized, in this, I wasn’t any better.

  She looked over her shoulder at me, her dark eyebrow raised.

  Seeing the mess she was making of the sugar packets, I sighed. “Here, let me do that.” I stood beside her, grabbed the holders and rearranged the packets so they were tidy.

  “You never liked things out of place,” she commented.

  “I can’t imagine how the customers survived without me the past year,” I replied sarcastically.

  She chuckled. “We’ve muddled through as best we can. Especially since Melinda’s out on maternity leave and one of the new night waitresses—Sally Jennings, I think you babysat for her younger sister back in the day—isn’t the sharpest tool in the shed.”

  The bell that indicated an order was ready rang and Dolly went over to the pass-through window to grab the plates. She walked past me, the scent of greasy fries and burgers followed.

  I bit back a smile. Things around here didn’t change.

  The bell rang again and Dolly called to me. “Get that, will you?”

  I abandoned the sugar packets and went to the window. A cook I didn’t know looked surprised to see me picking up a ticket. “What table?” I asked him.

  “Twelve.”

  I nodded and stacked the plates up my left arm in a way that was second nature. “Got it.”

  Going to table twelve, I handed out the meals, ensured no one needed anything else and went back to the sugar packets. I needed something to keep my hands occupied, and Dolly would make a mess of them if she didn’t let me finish them.

  “I’m a disaster,” I admitted when she returned. “My friend was murdered. I no longer have a job. A place to live. I need money to cover my bills and my mom’s. Dolly, I’m a suspect in Erin’s murder.”

  She set her hand over mine, stilling it. “What?”

  I shrugged. “She was killed while I was sleeping just down the hall. I don’t have an alibi.”

  “The truth will come out. It’s awful about Erin. She was a handful, but she didn’t deserve to have an end like that.” She shuddered, then looked to me. “We could use someone who knows her way around the menu and can do more than basic math with her fingers,” she said as she came to stand beside me again.

  My hands stilled and I looked to her. “You’d take me back, after what I did?”

  “All you did was leave town with a broken heart.”

  She waved her hand as I stared at her, my mouth open.

  “You knew?”

/>   “I know heartbreak when I see it.” Her keen eyes looked me over. “And I know when that’s over.”

  I blushed and made sure my shirt was in place—as if Donovan or Nix had been around to tug it up to cop a feel. I couldn’t help it because, well, this was Dolly. She didn’t have ESP or anything, but she could read people better than they wanted. Like right now.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Mmmhmm,” she murmured.

  “What? Do I have a sign on me or something?” God, I hoped not because it would say Double Fucked. I had a hickey on my right boob, but I refused to lift my hand to my neck, worried there was on there I hadn’t seen. Total giveaway.

  “Worked out your issues with those men of yours? By the dark circles under your eyes, I’d say all night.”

  My mouth fell open. “Dolly!”

  “Well?”

  I leaned in and whispered, “You knew about… both of them?”

  “They used to watch you all the time.”

  I frowned. “What are you talking about?”

  She sputtered, shook her head. “They didn’t come in for my coffee. They came here for you. All the time,” she repeated. “Whose section did they always request?”

  I thought back. They used to come in frequently. And sit in my section. I’d thought, well, I hadn’t thought. I’d assumed it was one-sided.

  “But… it’s Nix and Donovan.” I blushed, thinking about them. Smart, handsome, ridiculously virile. I’d been… so unlike myself with both of them. Together. I wasn’t a prude or anything and wasn’t ashamed about wanting sex, but two men was definitely pushing my sexual boundaries. “I mean, two men. One’s the detective on Erin’s murder and the other will prosecute the case.”

  She pursed her lips. “That’s definitely a hot mess, but you’re innocent, so why not be with them?”

  “They could have anyone. I mean, you’ve seen them.”

  She fanned herself. “They aren’t hard on the eyes, that’s for sure. If I were thirty years younger. Why wouldn’t two men be interested in you?”

  I glanced down at the box of sugar packets, then reached in and grabbed a handful, set them on the counter. Without looking up, I stuffed them—neatly—into the containers. “I’m nothing special.”

  “Kittredge Lancaster, what happens when you talk about yourself like that?” she scolded in the mothering tone I’d known for a decade, and used frequently enough.

  “I have to clean out the grease trap,” I replied sullenly. I felt fifteen again dealing with catty high school girls who made me feel less than important.

  “And wouldn’t your time be better spent working the dinner shift?”

  I whipped my head about to meet her shrewd gaze. “Really?”

  “Really,” she countered, and I hugged her something fierce.

  9

  NIX

  * * *

  “Kit.”

  She spun around when I called her name. The back door of the diner slammed shut behind her, making her jump. The parking lot lights cast her face in sharp contrast, but I couldn’t miss the panic in her eyes.

  When I realized I was in shadow and she couldn’t see me, I stepped forward.

  She stumbled backwards, then froze when she recognized me.

  “Nix,” she replied, on a breathy exhale, her hand going to her chest. Her purse fell off her shoulder and she shoved it back up.

  “Shit, I’m sorry,” I said, stepping close, realizing I’d scared her.

  She whacked me on the chest. “Don’t do that!”

  Her body shook and I grabbed her into a hug. She was all soft and warm, and she was all but vibrating with adrenaline.

  “What kind of policeman are you, scaring the crap out of people?”

  “Why are you out here by yourself?”

  “My shift’s over. My car is right there.”

  I knew exactly where it was since I parked next to it.

  “Have someone walk you to it if it’s dark. Okay?”

  “Yes.” She tried to pull back and I let her. Only enough so she could look up at me. “What are you doing here?”

  “I couldn’t call you, so I was going to have you follow me to Donovan’s. He’s waiting for us.”

  “Oh,” she breathed. I could hear the sound of dishes clattering inside the diner. Her shift was done, but the place was open all night.

  “I told you later, didn’t I?” Ever since the questioning this morning, I’d wanted her. It had been torture letting Miranski grill her. I’d wanted to yank her out of the chair, hug the shit out of her and tell the other detective to fuck off.

  I liked Miranski. She was good at her job, which made my life easier. She could drink most guys under the table over happy hour and could ski the back bowls better than most locals on a good powder day. Being from Colorado, she wasn’t a local. She didn’t think Kit had anything to do with the murder any more than I did, but she knew nothing about Kit, hadn’t grown up with her like I had, so her questions weren’t just to mess with her.

  Keith Mills, on the other hand... The fucker had a thing for Kit, and not the good kind. Hell, I didn’t even want him to know her. But he did and he thought she was bad news. I had no idea if he really considered her guilty or found her a perfect person to vent his anger toward. Kit had taken it for years. Why not dish a little more shit on her plate?

  I’d calmed him down, a little. He was still out for blood, but I warned him from acting out and told him to let us do our jobs. I also gave him a piece of my mind for harassing Kit, although his hatred seemed to run deep. He’d left, but it wasn’t the last I’d see of him about the case.

  “How did you know I was working here?”

  I laughed. “I am a detective.” And she’d told me she was going to try and get her job back. I knew Dolly and Clyde and all those times I’d gone to the diner to talk with Kit, I’d seen the way they doted on her. I knew they’d give her the job back. I didn’t know she’d work tonight, but pulling into the lot and finding her car was easy enough.

  “You thought we weren’t going to connect with you.”

  She was quiet for a one heartbeat, then another.

  “Kit,” I said, drawing the word out.

  She sighed. “I just… it’s happening so fast. I wasn’t sure.”

  I grinned as I walked her backward until she was pressed into the cinder block wall. “Fast? It’s been happening for years.”

  I couldn’t help myself. I kissed her. And nudged my knee between her legs. Our height difference had her practically riding my thigh. My dick pressed into her belly.

  I wanted to flip her around and take her right here. Right now. But she deserved better than behind the diner. And no one saw Kit getting fucked but me and Donovan.

  With a growl, I stepped back, looked down at her. Fuck, she looked good. Her lips glistened in the lights. Her eyes were blurry and she was all soft and pliant against me. I could even feel the hard tips of her nipples against my chest.

  I wouldn’t fuck her here, but that didn’t mean I’d stop touching her. I stroked her hair back. “Where were you going?”

  Her eyes darted away and even in the harsh lights, I could see her blush. “Dolly offered me her couch.”

  I counted to ten, but it did nothing to ease my frustration with her. I wanted to shake some sense into her. I settled my hands on her slim shoulders, but didn’t shake. “Kit—”

  “It’s eleven at night. I hadn’t heard from you, so I thought—”

  “Whatever you were thinking is wrong. You’re ours now, Kit. If you didn’t get that after what we did last night, then Donovan and I aren’t doing it right.”

  The corner of her mouth tipped up. She didn’t believe we were in this all the way. I didn’t like that, that she doubted us, but it was a trust thing. While we’d been into her for so long, she’d thought we’d been off limits for over a year. I stifled a smile. Donovan and me, together. Yeah, no. So maybe it would take her a little longer to ge
t her head in the game, but we’d show her. Prove to her we meant every word. Every touch. Everything.

  “Let’s go.” I slung my arm around her shoulder and led her to her car.

  Thirty minutes later, we were in Donovan’s apartment and she was in my arms again. “Finally,” I murmured, kissing her neck. “Mmm, you smell like French fries.”

  She laughed pulled out of my hold.

  “Let me see,” Donovan said, grabbing her hand and spinning her around so she was in his arms. He kissed her, then nuzzled her neck. Sniffed.

  “I need a shower,” she replied.

  He stepped back, but kept her hand and led her toward his bathroom. “That can be arranged.”

  I followed. If she was going to be naked, wet and have soap bubbles all over her, I wasn’t going to miss out.

  There was no seductive strip tease, just Donovan helping her out of the diner T-shirt and her jeans. Still, I was instantly hard.

  “Oh shit.”

  Shyly, Kit turned to me. “Out of all the underwear in my drawer, you picked out this.” She didn’t sound too thrilled with the scraps of black lace and silk I’d selected when I packed her a bag the day before, but the way her nipples were hard beneath the flimsy fabric, I knew she wasn’t really upset. I’d been right, she looked hot as shit in sexy lingerie.

  Donovan grinned. “Nix is in charge of your bras and panties from now on.”

  Fuck, yes. I was all in when it came to finding sexy things for our girl to wear. Just for us.

  I couldn’t help but stroke a finger over the upper swell of her breast. The bra didn’t cover much and my dick liked that just fine. And lower, those panties… just a triangle with little strings covered that sweet pussy.

  “You look hot as shit in that. Now take it off,” I said, pulling my service revolver from my holster and sitting it on the vanity. Donovan’s apartment was in a new building downtown, modern and spacious. The bathroom, thank fuck, had a steam shower that easily fit three. No way could we fit together in my bathroom, let alone the clawfoot tub.

  She must have caught on to the way we were watching her hands undo the front clasp of her bra, because she slowed down. A turtle could undo the clasp faster. And the impish little twist of her lips…