“Gideon…”
His name was a broken moan, but it wasn’t enough. Grabbing her face in his palm, he pulled her head around until she was looking up at him. She let go of the branch and gasped as it drove her more firmly down on him. Her hands gripped his forearm, nails biting into his skin.
“Tell me you love me,” he whispered against her cheek.
“I love you. Please…” She strained against him, but there was no leverage.
He lifted her up, slowly let her come back down.
The desperate hunger in her voice was like a drug, sending him into a fevered frenzy. “Say it again.”
“I love…” Her body arched back against his, locking. “Gideon … please!”
“Say it!” He caught her earlobe between his teeth and bit her.
This time she moaned it, and it reverberated down his spine as though she’d dragged a silken glove along his skin. He staggered forward a step, using his arms to cushion her as he leaned against the tree, and proceed to thrust against her, up into her wet, waiting depths. The need to come, the need to mark her, claim her … whatever it took to keep her was overwhelming.
He clenched his teeth, fighting back his orgasm as he felt hers moving in closer.
It wasn’t until she started to climax that he loosened the reins of his control.
After she whimpered his name one more time, he fisted his hand in her hair, slanted his mouth over hers. Just before the climax ripped out of him, he rasped, “I love you, Mac.”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Morning dawned gloomy and gray.
Moira lay on her side staring out Gideon’s window, the scent of coffee heavy in the air.
There were also lesser, but still important scents—like bacon. Eggs, maybe.
“Morning, sleepyhead.”
She closed her eyes and smiled. “How do you know I’m awake?”
“Sixth sense.”
As the bed gave under his weight, she rolled onto her back and looked up at him. “I should call home. They’ll worry.”
“I already did.” He sipped from a cup of coffee, staring down at her. “I assume by they, you mostly mean Ella Sue. So I sent her a text when we got in. Then I sent one to Brannon, mostly to wake him up and piss him off. Also sent one to Neve. I’m sure it woke her up, too, but she’ll be too giddy to be pissed.”
Moira rolled her eyes before focusing them on the coffee. “Here I was hoping that was for me.”
“Oh, it is. So is the tray I left on the dresser. You can have it when you sit up.”
Moira pursed her lips. “I’m sort of naked.”
“I sort of noticed.” He lowered his gaze to stare at her. “I’m waiting.”
“You’re still seventeen somewhere under that cop exterior, aren’t you?” She eased upright, keeping the sheet tucked up against her naked breasts.
“Aren’t all men?” Eyes on hers, he reached out, caught the sheet, and gave it a gentle tug.
But she resisted. Something was bothering her. Tell me you love me … He’d wanted her to say it almost every time he touched her. He’d waited until she was practically lost to sensation and need before he’d admitted it, though.
Maybe it was the most she deserved.
“Do you still love me?” She stared at him, feeling exposed. It had nothing to do with being naked under the sheet, either.
Gideon’s eyes fell away. Under the simple black cotton of his shirt, his shoulders rose and fell. “I’ve loved you since you were fifteen years old, Moira. Why do you think that’s gone and changed now?”
“Maybe a better question would be do you still want to love me.” She managed a small shrug, even a smile. “You don’t seem to want to look at me. We … hell. This is hard. We don’t talk like we used to. I can’t … I’m trying to fix things and it’s like I’m reaching across a chasm sometimes just to touch you.”
His gaze came to hers and in a voice that sounded painfully grim he said, “I love you, Moira. You know that.”
“But…?” Her throat tightened as he came toward her. There were things in his eyes, words he wasn’t going to speak just yet. She could see it.
“No buts. I love you. First, last, always. Everything else? Maybe that’s the ‘but.’” He caught her face in his hands and kissed her. “We’ve got a mess around us and we need to deal with it. You—all of you are in trouble and I can’t get distracted from that. Take the coffee. Eat.”
He brought the tray closer and left her alone in the bedroom.
He hadn’t even tried to talk her out of the sheet.
That feeling that something was wrong hadn’t gone away.
If anything, it had spread.
* * *
“Moira, I don’t have time to … look, I get that you say it’s important, but my fucking bookstore burned … what do you mean do I have insurance? What—no. Son of a bitch.”
Brannon lowered the phone back to the cradle and stood there staring at it.
Hannah came out of the bedroom, wearing a pair of cargos and a bra. The bra was a soft, icy shade of blue. Brannon had picked it out for her, along with a matching pair of panties. Seemed a shame she was going to cover it with her uniform. But he didn’t figure a paramedic needed to run around in a pair of pants and a bra.
She could cause heart attacks, especially lately. Her breasts were bigger now, fuller. He had entire fantasies spun around her breasts and now that she was pregnant … well. Brannon had no problem admitting he was something of a pig when it came to her body.
“Sounds like you and Moira are getting along lovely, just like always.” She paused by him to kiss his cheek.
Before he could turn his head and catch her to deepen the kiss, she was already moving away.
“It’s something to do with McKay Enterprises.” Irritated, he crossed his arms over his chest. “She can figure it out. That’s what she does. I think it had something to do with a buyer. Moira is talking to cops and all now.”
“Hey, stop the train.” Hannah held up her hands. “Just why is Moira talking to the cops?”
Brannon groaned and rubbed his temple. “There was a dead body.”
“What?”
“Well, I’m not entirely sure. She said she’d give me more information when I got to the house.” Broodingly, he stared at the floor. It looked like he’d have to if he wanted answers. “Hell, if it wasn’t for the body, she couldn’t even make me go. I don’t deal with buyers of any sort. That’s all business. Business makes my head hurt. Moira loves it. She doesn’t need my help on any of this.”
“She asked for your help, though.”
Opening his mouth, then closing it, he sighed and looked away.
Well, shit. Hannah had a point.
Moira didn’t ask for much, which meant when she did, he kind of felt like he had to help. He glanced across the street, his gaze lingering on the bookstore—or rather, the burnt out husk that had been the bookstore. “I’ll call you,” he said when Hannah came back into the room a few minutes later, all dressed and ready to go.
She was neat and tidy in her uniform, hair pulled into a ponytail, her belly a high, hard mound. He wanted to go to her and muss her all up, but he stayed where he was. “When it’s close to end of shift, I’ll call you. If I’m not home, I’ll have you come to me … or something.”
Hannah rolled her eyes.
“That’s not necessary,” she started to say.
He shook his head.
“It is.”
There was a fire at the bookstore he owned.
Moira had to talk to cops about a body.
Idly, he wondered if his baby sister had been having any kind of fun today.
* * *
Neve hitched up her shoulder when Ian started nuzzling her neck. “Stop it. I swear, I’m going to start checking to see if you’re popping blue pills or something—we just about broke our necks in the shower and you’re ready to go again?”
“Neve, I’m a man and you’re laying on the bed in
my shirt,” he pointed out. “That’s way better than any blue pill.”
She snorted, nudging him in the gut when he leaned in closer.
He sighed and settled down next to her, staring at the screen of her laptop. “You spend an awful lot of bloody time on that site.”
She slid him a look. “It’s interesting. Haven’t you ever wondered where you come from?”
“Of course.” He shrugged. “But not so much that I’d go blind on a genealogy site. Half those people are probably doing it wrong.”
“Probably.” Neve grinned. “But it’s still fun. And I’m not doing it wrong. We’ve got our family tree all the way back to Patrick’s great-grandparents tucked away in this big family bible. Madeleine’s, too. We’re about as Scottish as they come on his side.”
“Who would have guessed, with the name McKay.” Deadpan, he shook his head. “What ’bout her, Madeleine?”
“English. Through and through. Her mother’s family came over late seventeen hundreds. Madeleine’s mother went back when she was eighteen for a visit and met the guy she’d marry. They came back here and that’s all she wrote.”
“When did McKay come over? The Clearances chased a lot of people out, especially up in the Highlands.”
Neve sighed. She’d read so much about the Jacobite rebellion and the Clearances—how the face of Scotland had forever been changed. “Most of the McKays did leave. Patrick’s father stayed, because his father had lost a leg, didn’t think he’d survive the journey and his mother wouldn’t leave without him. He met a girl, fell in love … had Patrick. But … well, hell. You know more about the history than I do. Life sucked there for a lot of people for a long time. Patrick was sixteen when he decided he wanted more and he left.”
She clicked on one of the little leaves, then made a face, deleting it. “Some of these stories people come up with.”
“What are these for?” Ian flicked at the leaf twitching on her screen.
“Hints.” She arched a brow. “Haven’t you seen those commercials?”
“I’m not much for commercials. I want the action.”
“I never noticed.” Rolling her eyes, she clicked on the icon and showed him. “Different things. Might be a story or a public record, that kind of thing. Who knows? I’ve found a couple of people who are probably legit distant cousins, but some of the stuff I’ve already known or it’s just crap. It’s probably more fun when you go in not knowing as much.”
“I should do me sometime.” Ian slid her a wicked grin. “Unless you’d rather. Do me, that is.”
“You are hopeless.” She shook her head and tapped the leaf connected to the icon with Moira’s picture just as the phone rang. Sighing, she closed her laptop without reading the information that had just popped up.
A few minutes later, she climbed over Ian’s sprawled body. “I’ve got to go to Moira’s. It’s about that house I was telling you about.”
Ian craned his head up and looked at her. “She find out who it was that fucked things up?”
“Yeah.” She pulled out a bra and put it on before she turned to face Ian. His gaze dipped to her breasts. “He’s dead.”
Pale eyes went as cold as winter frost as Ian’s gaze slanted up to lock on her face. “What the bloody fuck?”
“You heard me. He’s dead.”
Ian kicked his legs out of bed. “Well, it’s a good thing I’ve been taking Saturdays off. I think I’ll just ride along with ya, my beautiful Neve.”
* * *
“Well. Nobody told me there was a party today.”
Ella Sue stood in the doorway of the large living room. Although she had indeed retired, as they’d all expected, Ella Sue still spent almost as much time as McKay’s Ferry as she did at her own home.
She usually took Saturdays off, but Thanksgiving and Christmas were drawing close and that turned her into something of a fright—the decorating kind.
Cornucopias had been unpacked and lovingly placed while gourds and pumpkins were set with bunches of fall-colored flowers.
The Friday after Thanksgiving, Ella Sue would be back, like clockwork, and all the Christmas decorations would be up by evening. If she had her way, she’d draft all of the McKays into helping.
Moira wasn’t entirely certain she was ready to think about the holidays, not with dead people and burning buildings and threats seeming to haunt her every waking thought.
“It’s not a party.” Gideon flashed a bright smile at Ella Sue. “It’s a … discussion.”
“Discussions go better with food. What would ya’ll like?”
Moira glanced at Brannon, then her sister. This involved them, so it involved Ella Sue, too. “Ella Sue, you should be in here.”
Ella Sue came inside, her gaze sliding from one face to another. As she took her seat, Moira started to talk.
* * *
“I think…” Brannon said after a few moments of silence. He pushed back his chair and stood, keeping his hands braced on the table. “I think that you need to take a step back and look at this again.”
Moira stared at him.
The others were quiet.
“You think I need to step back and look at this again.” Moira started to tap her fingers on the arm of the chair. “How do you suggest I look at it? Should I reevaluate how I was attacked? Reexamine how the bookstore was burned? Review what all took place right before Gideon and I watched a man drink something that was apparently poisoned?”
“Exactly.” Brannon made an annoyed gesture with his hand. “Apparently is the key word here. They haven’t determined cause of death or whatever it is, have they? Look … we know we’ve got some nutjob there who’s trying to cause trouble—he tried to gut me, remember? But that doesn’t mean there’s a vendetta against the whole family.”
“Actually…” Gideon put his phone down and flicked it, set it to spinning like a top. “I just had a message from the cops over in Louisiana. Coroner found poison.”
His eyes slid to Moira’s. “It was in the scotch,” he said quietly. “There was also poison in a box of candied nuts—some specialty deal, too. Can’t be bought in your typical Walmart or down at the Pig.”
Moira’s head started to spin and she thought she might be sick, right there on the pretty, pale green carpet. “Okay … okay. I”—she shoved upright and took a step, then another one—“I need air.”
Gideon was there when she started to sway. “You need to sit,” he said softly. But he steadied her as she stood there, her fingers kneading his biceps restlessly. As he held her, he looked over at the only male McKay, his eyes grim. “She had a glass of that scotch sitting in front of her, Bran. She didn’t drink any, but if she had?”
Brannon’s lids flickered and he turned away. He said something under his breath, something low and ugly.
Moira didn’t need to hear it to understand the meaning.
“It’s about us,” she said, easing away from Gideon. She looked at her brother, then at Neve. “Kevin admitted as much. Now, granted … I can’t say I’d put much stock in what he had to say, but I’m not seeing much reason for him to lie.”
“Deflect attention from himself.” Ian had been quiet up until now, and when people looked at him, he shrugged. “Hey, I’ve read a book or two. It could be the case.”
“There were cameras—several of them, and the feed was intermittently coming on until somebody started trying to track it, so there is at least one other individual likely tied into this.” Gideon managed a faint smile. “The county boys are keeping me apprised of what’s going on. I’ve … advised them that whatever happened to his man might be connected to some matters we’ve got going on here, so we’re sharing information. I’m not going to totally rule out the possibility that he was looking to deflect attention—I’ve read a few of those books, too. But the thing is … he was being recorded. It looks like we were as well. The techs found them during the search. They’re activated by motion and sound, but can be deactivated remotely. The sheriff ended up calli
ng in for assistance from the state once the scotch came back showing up traces of a rather complicated poison.”
“Complicated how?” Brannon demanded.
“Complicated as in there’s not just one poison—the small county hospital actually has access to a medical examiner who spent about twenty years working up in Baltimore until he decided to come home due to family illness—needless to say, he has some serious expertise under his belt and he got to work on Towers’ case as soon as he found out there was something with meat to it.” Gideon shrugged. “So far, he believes GHB was used, in conjunction with at least one other compound—possibly a heavy dose of digitalis.”
“Foxglove,” Ella Sue said quietly.
Brannon paused by Ella Sue and rubbed her thin shoulder. “For those of us who don’t know everything?” he asked, focusing his eyes on Gideon.
“Too bad Hannah isn’t here.” Gideon gave him a thin smile. “She could break it down in laymen’s terms. Digitalis is a cardiac medicine—slows down the heart, makes it pump more efficiently.”
Ella Sue covered Brannon’s hand with hers. “Digitalis is also what the flowers are called—the scientific mumbo jumbo.” She smiled a little. “It was used in natural remedies for centuries.”
“So somebody dosed this guy with something that will slow down his heart and they roofied him.” Neve sat on the edge of the couch, staring at nothing in particular.
“Basically.”
Moira tried to push away the remaining vestiges of nausea and focused on everything else Gideon had said. Kevin was gone. He’d done something terrible and stupid and he’d been sad and pathetic. But in the end, it was like he’d been discarded, like he’d been nothing. Now all she could feel was some vague sort of pity for him—and a lot of rage at the nebulous coward behind all of this.
Cameras. She seized onto that and locked gazes with Gideon. “You said there was a signal—they tried to trace it. Can they?”
A smile tugged up the corners of his mouth. “I love a smart woman.” He shrugged. “I’ve no idea. The geek speak is a little out of my league, but the state’s got some amazing electronics and computer people on hand. It’s going to be a question of who is better—them or the man behind those cameras.”
The Right Kind of Trouble Page 19
