It’s a punch to the gut how much that hurts. The more that I want includes this—
all of this. All of him. The things that bother him, the things that sting. I want to crawl into his lap, grab his shoulders and shake it out of him.
I want him to look at me.
Reaching over, I rub my hand up and down his bicep. “What is it, Chase? You can tell me.”
He grips the steering wheel and pushes back, flexing his arm muscles, and I can tell he’s struggling.
“Please, honey. Tell me?”
“A guy on the force got killed today.” Finally, he glances over at me. His eyes are stormy. “Jason Eaker.”
“Oh, baby. I’m sorry.” I stroke his arm, wanting to comfort him the way he comforted me that first month when I got my period. I want to pull him into me and run my fingers through his hair, hug him to my chest and whisper that it will be okay.
But he’s not opening up to me that way. He’s barely here with me, barely looking at me. His body is stiff and he’s talking to me about facts while the rest of him is locked somewhere else, out of my reach. I want to get inside him, where his feelings are. Where his heart is.
“How did he die?” I ask, hoping that I can coax him into leaning on me.
He swallows. “It’s crazy really. Routine traffic stop.”
“A routine traffic stop?” My mouth suddenly goes dry. I’d expected that his fellow officer was killed while doing something dangerous like chasing after a bank robber or making a drug bust or bringing down a sex trafficker. “Jason Eaker was a traffic cop?”
“Yeah,” Chase says softly, not seeming to understand what I’m getting at. “I know him quite well.” He blinks then corrects himself. “I knew him well. Sarge said he had pulled someone over for a busted light, and while he was giving the ticket, a drunk driver came by, hit him, and took off.”
“Oh my God,” I whisper, but what I’m thinking is that could have been Chase. “Are you okay?” I want him to turn and let me hold him, but now, just as much, I want him to hold me. Because I’m not sure I’m okay.
He remains somber though, staring out the front window at his garage door. Focused on the details and not on the pain. “This loss is going to be hard on the force. It’s the second death we’ve had in the line of duty in the last couple of years. Jason was young too. He’s leaving behind a wife and two boys. I don’t even think the oldest is in school yet.”
“That’s awful.” My voice breaks and a tear slips down my cheek. That could have been Chase and that wife could have been me, and while he’s stoically handling the very real death of his friend, I’m barely holding on over the realization that cops’ jobs are dangerous. Barely holding on over the realization that Chase could die.
He hears the crack in my voice and turns toward me, alarmed. “Oh, kitten.” He wipes the tear off my face. “I didn’t mean to make you cry.”
“It’s a sad situation,” I sputter, embarrassed by my tears. “And I’m hormonal. It’s not your fault.”
“Even so, I’m used to this shit. It’s part of the job. I shouldn’t be dumping all of this on you.”
Except he’s not dumping anything on me. He’s barely sharing, and as much as I want him to tell me more, as much as I wish he’d tell me everything, I find myself pulling back now too. Back behind familiar walls where it’s safe and pain free.
“I should go,” he says, and I don’t argue.
All the things I wanted to say before his phone call are long gone, and as I drive away I’m no longer worrying about our end; I’m worrying about Chase’s end.
It’s a late lesson to learn, but now that I have I can’t stop focusing on it. He’s a cop. And cops die.
Chase is going to die.
* * *
I’m still thinking about it at work later. Still thinking about the dead officer.
I feel terrible for the family that lost a husband and father, and can’t stop thinking about how I’d feel if I were the officer’s widow. I can’t even begin to imagine how Chase is feeling.
A book comes to mind that I think he’ll like. Deaths and Entrances, a collection of Dylan Thomas poems. I decide to check it out for him, hoping he’ll find it comforting, even if he won’t let me be his comfort directly.
In the back room, I pull up Chase’s name in the database and scan the title out to him. Then, because I’m curious like that, I peruse the list of books he already has checked out.
What to Expect When You’re Expecting
Mayo Clinic Guide to a Healthy Pregnancy
The Expectant Father
The Healthy Pregnancy Book
The Pregnancy Countdown Book: Nine Months of Practical Tips, Useful Advice, and Uncensored Truths
and World War Z
At the sight of the last title, I bring my hand up to my mouth so my laugh isn’t too loud for the quiet library. A book about the zombie apocalypse seems out of place in the company of the other books he’s checked out. Books about babies and gestation and women’s bodies changing with the growth of life. Books he’s obviously checked out because of me. Because his child is living inside of me.
It startles me to feel the tear drop slowly down my cheek, but once I recognize it, it’s all I can do not to follow it with a dozen more. Thank God I’m not in the front because soon I’m crying pretty good.
I don’t want Chase to die.
I don’t want him to die and I don’t want to lose him and I want more and I don’t want things to end because I love him.
I’m in love with him.
I’m such a fool. Such a stupid, stupid fool. It’s been there all along but I couldn’t admit it. I didn’t want to admit it.
And it’s not because of the orgasms. Or his uniform. Or those sexy aviators he wears. Or his beard. Or because I’m filled with pregnancy hormones. It’s not because he cares about justice and body cameras and Captain America. Or the way he takes care of his nephews and has them tattooed on his body. It’s not how he handles Ryan or talks about his mother or how he moved in with Pop to look after him.
And it’s not the way he makes me feel alive and fun. Or how he makes me feel beautiful. Or how he cares about me having my baby. Or because he gave me a baby. Or even how he bothered to check out pregnancy books—from Central even, probably so his sister and I wouldn’t find out.
It’s not any one of those things. It’s all of those things. It’s all of Chase.
I’m not into men, but I’m so into Chase. I’m so in love with Chase.
And maybe, if I read the signs right, there’s a possibility that he might even be into me.
I’ve been scared to say it because I’d have to look at my life and decide if I could be brave enough to try to fit him in. But now I can’t ignore it any longer, and I have no choice but to look and see what we could be.
And it’s nothing.
Because even if Chase wants to make something work between us, even if he wants to be a couple and raise our child with me, even if he is the rare unicorn of a guy who doesn’t leave—and those are a lot of seemingly impossible ifs to overcome, but if he could, he’d still be a guy in a dangerous job. He’d still be a guy who has the very real potential of encountering a criminal or a drunk driver or an angry cop killer.
He could die.
And that would destroy me.
But the worst part is that I’m not the only one he’d leave behind, and that thought hurts more than I can bear. It’s one thing for me to single-handedly raise a child who has never known a father, but to try to make up for the loss of a parent is an entirely different thing.
I can’t stand the idea of my kid with that kind of wound.
I can’t imagine the hole that Chase’s absence would create if he orphaned a child while in the line of duty.
I can’t handle the thought of comforting that kind of heartache in someone else, let alone in myself.
So the words I said this morning have to stand. We can’t see each other after Saturday. We have to
be done. Done having sex. Done shopping for baby things together. Done dancing around emotions we don’t want to face.
Just done.
Seventeen
Chase
The civic fair at the library comes together perfectly, of course, because Livia Ward is perfect and amazing at her job and also this little city can step pretty lively when it wants to. The Corinth parking lot has been cleared of cars and is currently hosting fire trucks, ambulances, police cars and several stalls from local businesses and restaurants, handing out coupons and ice cream and balloon animals for the kids.
I was nervous about my presentation at the beginning of the fair, even though I’m generally pretty confident when it comes to these kinds of things, but usually if I’m giving a presentation, it’s at a meeting full of city employees and other cops. Not in front of real, honest to God civilians, and not in front of my sister and not in front of the woman who is pregnant with my child.
The woman I can’t get enough of, no matter how hard I try. The woman who is breaking down every single fucking wall I have.
Plus, it’s a high stakes issue for me, especially after Eaker’s death. I have to present my case for body cameras in a compelling enough light that I get five hundred signatures out of this fair. And while there are easily more than five hundred people here, a majority of them will definitely need to sign my petition if I am going to hit my target number.
Despite my nerves and the beautiful distraction in the form of Livia Ward in a pencil skirt, the presentation itself went fairly well, with me standing on a platform in the parking lot in my uniform, the newly leafy trees providing enough shade for me to use a projector screen to exhibit data points and hammer home the salient information. And at the very end, I pulled up a picture of Jason Eaker, smiling with his family outside his son’s preschool.
“This is Officer Jason Eaker. He was thirty-five, in the Army for six years before he went blue, and he has two children. I rode in his funeral escort yesterday.” A sound rippled through the people in the parking lot, a collective exhale of sadness at the mention of his death. I appreciated the sadness, the real and tangible expression of it, and yet sadness on its own wasn’t enough to change anything. “He was working a routine accident on 75th Street when he was struck and killed by a drunk driver. It was a hit and run, and because he was riding his police motorcycle that day, he didn’t have a dashboard camera to record the events. The hit and run driver still hasn’t been found—but maybe, if Jason had been wearing a body camera, we would have footage of the car. Maybe his family would have some closure.”
People were nodding by this point, and I continued. “This isn’t meant to supersede other reasons why getting body cameras is imperative. A police officer’s life is not worth more than a civilian’s. But I’m telling you about Jason to highlight the point that this upgrade benefits civilians and officers. And I hope you’ll keep that in mind as we circulate the petition around. Thank you.”
There was a healthy smattering of applause, a lot of people coming up to ask questions and talk afterward, and then my part was over. Now, all I can do is wait until the end of the fair to see how full the signature sheet is.
After I’m done talking to various citizens and media people, I feel a graze on my arm. It’s Livia, a smile on her face and the near-summer breeze playing with loose tendrils of her hair. I have a bit of post-presentation adrenaline and she’s so fucking beautiful and it’s been three days since I’ve had her shamelessly panting and bucking against me, and so I slide an arm around her to yank her in for a kiss.
To my surprise, she pushes me away, casting a nervous glance around. “Chase! Megan’s here!”
“I don’t care,” I growl, because I almost don’t. In fact, I actually don’t.
“I care,” she protests, still looking around. “And we said—remember, we said that last time was the last time.”
I give her a martyred look. “I need one more last time.”
She heaves a giant sigh, but a smile is pulling at her mouth. She looks like she’s about to answer—and I can tell it’s going to be an answer I’ll like very much—but then something in her face closes up.
I turn to see Megan—who, like all the Corinth employees, has been drafted to work the fair—walking up to us. Livia makes a noise that can only be described as a squeak of panic, and then squeaks something else about checking on the children’s section, and then hurries off before Megan reaches us.
Megan stares after her with narrowed eyes and then turns those narrowed eyes to me. “What did you do?”
I hold my hand over my heart. “I was a complete Boy Scout.” Except for the part where I told her I needed to fuck her again.
Megan isn’t buying it. “Uh-huh,” she says slowly. “Sure.”
I try to make an innocent expression, but it must not be successful because nothing about my sister’s face changes.
“Well,” she says, still looking as if her bullshit meter is (rightfully) beeping, “Phil has got the kids here to see the trucks and stuff. And I was wondering if you would mind taking them tonight after the fair winds down? Just for a few hours?”
“Of course,” I say, already wondering if I could rope Liv in with my plans. We could go get ice cream with the boys, maybe go see the latest Disney movie and irritate Megan because we’d kept them up too late. We could feed them popcorn and hot dogs and take them home and snuggle them on the couch. And the minute I picture spending an evening with the kids and Liv, I want it. Suddenly nothing seems more attractive than playing Family with her for a night.
“Excellent,” Megan pronounces. “Phil and I are going on a double date. His friend Daveed is in town, and—”
I don’t really absorb the rest of what she’s saying because I’m watching Liv as she approaches the double doors of the library, and she’s being intercepted by Phil and the boys and a guy so handsome he looks like a fucking GQ cover model. Dark black skin, high cheekbones, a smile so dimpled and toothy that it even makes my pulse race a little and I’m pretty much the definition of straight.
And Phil is introducing Mr. Gorgeous to Liv, and Liv is blushing because who fucking wouldn’t in front of this guy, and I am actually seeing red. Like scarlet bloodbursts of raw jealousy flowering behind my eyes. I want to hit something, scream into the air, grab Liv and carry her off like fucking Tarzan so everyone fucking knows she’s mine. Mine.
Mr. Gorgeous doesn’t stop at a smile either, he leans in and gives Liv a hug—like a real, I am a man who likes your body hug where their chests touch and his hands move gently on her shoulder blades and he drops a kiss on her cheek.
I practically bellow at this; I almost roar like an angry lion. And then I start towards them, nothing in my mind but getting between them, staking my claim. But by the time I’m halfway across the parking lot, Phil and the kids and Mr. Gorgeous are drifting over to the face-painting station, and Liv is walking back into the library. Megan is keeping pace with me, and I realize she’s talking.
“Sorry, what?” I say, trying to pull the frustration out of my tone because she doesn’t deserve my shitty mood, but also oh my God, watching Liv get hit on by that guy and enjoy it was like getting punched in the gut. Kicked right in the dick.
Megan lets out a noise that is both long-suffering and also I do not suffer fools gladly. “I was saying that Liv was talking to Daveed just then. He’s her date tonight.”
My legs make it two more steps before my mind absorbs the words. Then I stop. Like my feet are bolted to the asphalt.
“What did you say?”
I can tell immediately by Megan’s expression that she’s already explained this to me while I was in my jealousy coma. “Daveed’s in town, and I thought I might try to hook him up with Livia since she needs a good man to shake her out of her ‘no man’ funk, and since he’s a novelist and since she’s a librarian, I thought they’d be a good fit. Also he’s super fucking hot.”
I might actually snarl at her.
&nb
sp; She holds up her hands. “Whoa, tiger.”
“Livia is going on a date tonight with Mr. GQ Cover Model tonight.” I don’t say it like a question. I say it the way I say things to criminals and addicts and adult children who don’t check on their elderly parents. Bitingly matter-of-fact.
“Yes, she is.”
“She’s not fucking going on a date. Not with some other guy.”
“Don’t even start with me, Chase Kelly,” Megan says, grabbing my arm and making us stop. She steps in front of me so that I have to look at her. “You had your chance with her, and you blew it. And besides, you aren’t interested in anything more anyway, right? You give a girl the Kelly Trio and get the hell out. Why the fuck do you care what Livia does?”
Because she’s mine.
Because her baby’s mine.
But no, it isn’t even those things, or at least it’s more than them.
It’s because I love her.
The thought, with that one word like a flashlight swinging in the darkness of my mind, nearly takes me out at the knees.
I love her. I am in love with Livia Ward, sexy and careful and stubborn and fragile as she is, I am so fucking crazy in love with her. I want her and I love her and no one else gets to have her.
There’s something in Megan’s face right now that unsettles me. Because it’s almost like she’s not angrily demanding answers, but that she sees all of my conflict, all of my vulnerability, and the big brother in me is both irritated and a little nostalgically grateful for it.
I finally say, “It’s not important.” A lie, but I don’t have time to explain the truth to her, and Liv might kill me if I did anyway.
Megan folds her arms across her chest. “I care about that woman, Chase, so it is important to me. Tell me you’re not going to upset her. Tell me you’re not going to go in there and make things more complicated for her.”
“I can’t tell you that.”
Hot Cop Boxed Set Page 24
