The Man Behind the Cop

by Janice Kay Johnson - His Best Friend's Baby

  “Me neither.” But, God help him, he wanted to do it again. Soon. With her. Bruce decided not to tell her that. Next time, he swore, he’d be so damn gentle, so considerate, she’d have to beg him to let go.

  Assuming there was a next time.

  “Can we have dinner tomorrow night?” he asked. “If something doesn’t intervene?”

  He was a homicide cop; “something” frequently did intervene.

  He saw the hesitation—leading up to refusal—on her face. Oh, yeah, he’d panicked her.

  “Just dinner,” he coaxed. “If we can have wild sex, surely we can talk over the dinner table.”

  A parade of emotions crossed her face. No, not a parade, more like the Kentucky Derby, every emotion jostling for space, stretched out at a flat run. He’d have really liked to get a good look at each if only they’d slow down.

  Finally, she sighed and dipped her head. “Yes. You’re right. Dinner. Say, six?”

  He agreed. She walked him to the door, offering no suggestion that he hang around, have a refill of that cup of coffee that had ended up spilled or—especially—spend the night. There, they eyed each other for a minute, their precise relationship uncomfortably ill defined. Thinking What the hell, Bruce stepped closer, tilted her chin up with one finger and kissed her.

  He kept it light, gentle and generally everything their lovemaking hadn’t been. The contact was still enough to stir something in him. She could become addictive, he thought, disquieted. The one comfort was that her mouth softened under his, and she appeared dazed when he lifted his head and, after clearing his throat, said, “Good night.”

  She’d backed inside and was locking up by the time he left the porch. Bruce got in to his car, started it, then sat there for a minute, trying to figure out whether this had been a really shitty day, or one of the best of his life.

  TOO MANY OF KARIN’S new clients came to her looking just like this woman. Unlike many, this one had avoided a hospital stay. Her nose was plastered, however, after being broken, and the still-puffy flesh around both her eyes had progressed from being merely blackened to a rainbow of sickly colors.

  Karin and she had already discussed her history with other men, and the escalating violence of this relationship.

  “Tell me,” Karin asked, “does Tyrone hurt you in bed, too?”

  Destiny Malone gave her a grin that was startlingly wicked, appearing on that battered face. “You kidding, girl? ’Course he does! But in a good way, you know?”

  Karin could count on one hand the times she’d blushed in a counseling session. She prayed the heat in her cheeks this time wasn’t visible.

  Oh, God, she thought in horror. Did I ask because I needed to know for her sake? Or for mine?

  Had she been trying to figure out whether sex like she’d had with Bruce only happened if the man was violent by nature?

  Maybe. But if the answer was yes and he was a brute—what did that say about her enthusiastic participation last night? Hadn’t she actually bitten him? Karin cringed.

  “He don’t beat me or anything like that. It’s just that he’s hot for me. He say he can’t get enough.” Destiny smiled again, with some secret satisfaction. “And a woman, she’s got to like that.”

  Yes. She did. Having a man desperate for her, rather than politely anticipating lovemaking, was an incredible aphrodisiac. Karin had had no idea.

  “What if you say no?” she asked. “Does Tyrone accept that?”

  Her carefully plucked brows rose in apparent surprise, momentarily widening her eyes. “’Course he does. You think I’d take him back if he raped me?”

  “Ah…He does hit you,” Karin reminded her.

  “Yeah, but…but…” She scowled. “That’s different.”

  “How?”

  “Well, ’cuz…” She shifted in the seat, crossing her legs, uncrossing them, finally bursting out, “He only hits me when I been asking for it.”

  “Do you believe you deserved this beating?”

  “I have this trouble, see.” Shame suffused her gaze before she lowered it. “I like to shop.”

  Karin blinked.

  Destiny, it developed, really liked to shop. She was pathologically driven to shop, and easily convinced herself that she needed that pair of shoes or that handbag or those jeans. She’d run up all her credit cards, then his. Sometimes she’d take things back, but mostly they went into her closet and often stayed there unworn. It was when she spent money they didn’t have that Tyrone lost his temper.

  So, okay. There were two problems to deal with: Tyrone’s temper and Destiny’s compulsive shopping. Karin was hugely relieved to feel herself shifting into professional mode. She’d had absolutely no business relating anything a client told her to herself. Particularly when that something was as intimate as whether she had bruises after sex.

  As her day went on, she had trouble concentrating. She kept replaying last night’s scene, from the moment she’d sat on the sofa next to him and taken his hand, to that last kiss on the doorstep. Remembering, Karin found herself getting aroused. She was both disconcerted and embarrassed. This wasn’t like her! She’d always been the cool, calm, collected one, not so much a participant in life as an observer. She’d never really seen that as a negative; she liked maintaining a little distance.

  Uh-huh. Forgot to do that last night, didn’t you?

  The awful thing was, Destiny Malone was right. A woman did have to like the feeling of being wanted so desperately. Karin shivered at the memory of his face, taut with urgency.

  So, okay, maybe her previous experiences with sex had been a little too civilized. Maybe even tepid. Definitely lacking. But it gave her the creeps to think she’d been secretly craving that violent act.

  Or…was it a man like Detective Bruce Walker she’d been craving? And what did that say about her?

  Alone in her office at the end of the day, she squeezed her eyes shut and muttered, “Get a grip.”

  She just had time to make it home and change from a blazer and slacks to a more casual and comfortable pair of wide-legged pants and a V-necked, silk top before Bruce picked her up.

  “News?” she asked before she even had the door all the way open. The question seemed to restore their relationship to a former place, when Lenora was the reason they were speaking at all.

  She saw the answer on his face, but he shook his head anyway, lines furrowing his forehead.

  “Molly is back, which is a help, but we won’t be able to stay full-time on this. Upside is, the FBI is galvanized. Lots of good press if they find the kids, you know. The downside is, they’re being their usual jackasses.” His eyebrows rose. “Ready?”

  Once they were in the car, he said, “Oh, I meant to ask you about the upcoming self-defense workshop. Are we going on with it?”

  “I can’t decide,” she admitted. “I tend to think we should. If anything, what happened to Lenora highlights how much these women need the skills you’re teaching.”

  “Canceling on them might send the message that, see, it’s hopeless anyway,” he agreed. “We don’t want to do that.”

  They talked about the program a little more, including the question of whether another facility would be safer, but concluded that the moment when the women separated to go to cars was always the point of vulnerability.

  “This time Molly will be with me, and we’ll stick around until every woman’s safely on her way.”

  Karin nodded, wondering about his partner. In the course of her work, she’d met her share of women cops, but still found them…a puzzle, was perhaps one way to put it. Her end of the business, the healing, was more traditionally feminine. She couldn’t imagine stepping into the punitive role, or handling the physicality of it. The tendency was to believe that women who chose to go into law enforcement were mannish, but in her experience that wasn’t at all true. They were gutsy; maybe, like the men, they enjoyed the adrenaline rush their work brought. But Karin had met many who were soft-spoken, pretty, feminine, even petit
e.

  “What’s Molly like?” she asked.

  Bruce glanced from the road ahead at her. “Like?” he asked blankly, his tone one of typical masculine befuddlement.

  “Young? Old? Married? Does she have kids?” She waved both hands. “You know.”

  “Oh. Um…Not old. Twenty-nine, and worrying about turning thirty. Unmarried—one of the reasons she’s worried. She’s always asking what’s wrong with her.”

  “And you tell her…?” Karin probed.

  “Nothing’s wrong with her!” He shrugged in further bafflement. “She’s always seeing some guy. She’s the one who breaks it off.”

  “Hmm.”

  He shot her a grin. “Was that a therapist’s ‘hmm’? Or a mild expression of interest?”

  Until now, the conversation had felt…strained. Maybe just in her imagination, but she didn’t think so. She thought they’d both been pretending to hold a normal conversation. But all of a sudden her mood lightened. He didn’t smile often, this cop, and maybe that was why each time he did she found herself newly fascinated. She loved the way his eyes crinkled, so that sometimes they, rather than his mouth, seemed to be doing the smiling.

  She loosened up enough to laugh. “Habit, I’m afraid. Shake me if I start saying ‘Tell me how you feel about that.’”

  He grinned again, then said with satisfaction, and perhaps a little smugly, “A parking place! Damn, I’m good.”

  He had reason to be pleased; parking around the Pike Place Market was at a premium, and this spot was right in front of the open-air front. Artisans had their wares laid out on tables or blankets on the ground. Inside, under cover, shoppers could buy fresh-caught salmon or giant geoduck clams, local strawberries or armfuls of flowers.

  Seattle’s Pike Place Market was famous, having evolved from a simple farmer’s market into a tourist draw that still offered the fresh produce, seafood and baked goods that local shoppers sought. Multiple levels of an idiosyncratic wooden structure descended from the foot of Pike Street down a steep bluff to the Puget Sound waterfront below. Several high-end restaurants occupied space in the market, along with art galleries, importers, boutiques and specialty shops of all kinds. The market had spread to blocks around, too, making it a shopping mecca, with kitchen, furniture and gift stores, wine merchants and more galleries.

  “We’re early,” Bruce said. “Shall we wander?”

  Releasing her seat belt and reaching eagerly for the door handle, Karin agreed. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d come down here. It had been too long.

  Doing something so normal with Bruce eased the discomfiture she felt even more. She wrinkled her nose at the sight of fish fillets spread over beds of ice but admired tables heaped with produce, some local, like the strawberries, some like ears of early corn trucked over the mountains in the early morning from the sunnier eastern side of the state. She hovered over a table of beautiful handcrafted jewelry, finally buying a pair of earrings. When she turned back around, Bruce handed her a bouquet he’d bought from a nearby flower vendor. Karin inhaled the scent of deep pink roses mixed with the simpler blooms of daisies and sprays of tiny flowers she thought were yarrow.

  On impulse, she rose on her toes and kissed him lightly on the mouth. “Thank you. Nobody ever buys me flowers.”

  Eyes glinting, he said, “Maybe because it’s coals to Newcastle. You grow enough.”

  “Cutting them myself isn’t the same.”

  They had dinner at The Pink Door, a restaurant you almost had to be a local to find, and were lucky enough to be seated out on the trellis-enclosed deck as the sun was just setting. Inside, a trio played music that could have been performed in a Prohibition-era speakeasy. The rustic Italian menu used produce from the market.

  Karin and Bruce sipped wine, ate at a leisurely pace, listened to music and talked with surprising ease about movies, books, politics and their jobs. Darkness descended, and tiny lights strung on the trellis lent fairy magic to the night. They were still engrossed in their conversation when the musicians finally put away their instruments and they could hear again the muffled sounds of city traffic.

  She told Bruce about her childhood and coaxed stories from him about the tough neighborhood he’d grown up in and about his alienation from his own brothers, who had followed in their father’s footsteps.

  “Why were you different?” she asked.

  Bruce began. “I don’t know—” But he stopped. “No, that’s not true. Me, I hung out at this community center. Some cops volunteered there. One of them became my idol.” He shook his head, a wry smile on his mouth. “He was a great guy. He took me places, even to L.A. Lakers games. He had amazing seats. I couldn’t believe how lucky I was. His wife was a really nice woman. I remember the first time I went to their house for dinner, she complained—I think he’d forgotten to pick something up at the store on the way home—and I shrank, waiting for him to wallop her.”

  He seemed momentarily lost in the past, and finally, Karin prodded, “What did he do?”

  Bruce shook his head, his boyish astonishment still there. “He said I’m sorry and kissed her. She laughed and greeted me. The way she smiled at me, as if I was a real person, somebody she could hardly wait to get to know…” He cleared his throat. “I found out later that they couldn’t have kids. They did finally adopt, a little girl from Colombia.”

  Some of the tables out on the deck were now empty, and couples at the others spoke quietly. The sound of a ferry horn was somehow haunting at night.

  Very softly, so she didn’t disrupt the mood, Karin asked, “Have you stayed in touch with them?”

  “I haven’t talked to them in a couple of years. I got an invitation to their daughter’s wedding last summer and sent a present, but I couldn’t get away. It would have been hard to go without…”

  “Visiting your parents?”

  He grunted agreement but didn’t elaborate. After a surprisingly peaceful silence, Bruce stretched. “I suppose we should get going. We both have early mornings ahead.”

  Back in the car, they weren’t three blocks from the Market before Karin realized she’d been kidding herself all night. All the talk about Mideast politics and art-house films hadn’t in the slightest reduced her awareness of his body. Every movement, every flex of his muscles, had her remembering him unclothed. He reached for the gearshift, and she saw his big, capable hand cupping her breast or gripping her hip. She knew the taste of his skin, the timbre of his voice when he was aroused, the rasp of his sandpapery jaw. And she wanted him again.

  He told a story about his days as a patrol officer in the Pioneer Square area; she asked a question or two. But it required a huge effort to sound…normal. A minute later, she could hardly remember what he’d said or why she had laughed politely.

  He gave up talking, and in the next blocks she felt as if the air in the car had become thick, difficult to breathe.

  A moment later, he pulled into her driveway. Turning off the engine, he said, “I’ll walk you to your door.”

  Moment of truth. She wanted him to. She didn’t want him to. She knew, of course, that he would kiss her, but not whether she’d risk asking him in.

  They got out, Karin cradling the bouquet. The slam of the car doors was as startlingly loud as a gunshot in the sleeping neighborhood. The two walked in silence up to her porch, and Bruce waited while she unlocked and faced him.

  After studying her face for a long moment, he smiled so ruefully she knew her panic must be blatant.

  Voice a rumble, he asked, “Was the evening so bad?”

  Karin laughed, if a little shakily. “No. Of course it wasn’t. I had a wonderful time.”

  “But you haven’t decided whether I’m man or beast.”

  Oh, dear. That was exactly it. Or…was it?

  “I think,” she admitted, “it’s more that I’m wondering what I am.”

  His gaze was all too perceptive. “I see.” He cleared his throat. “Here’s my suggestion. We slow it down a bit. I
kiss you good-night, then go home. Tomorrow I’ll call you, and we’ll talk about how our day is going, and maybe I’ll call again late in the evening, just because I’m going to want to. And then we’ll plan dinner again. Uh…if that works for you.”

  Filled with relief—because he wasn’t pushing her? Or was it because he hadn’t lost patience with her?—she nodded. “That works. Thank you.”

  He said something under his breath, which she couldn’t quite make out, and then his lips found hers. He kissed her so softly a wondering breath was trapped in her throat. Their mouths brushed, pressed, nibbled. The moment was indescribably sweet. He sucked gently on her lower lip, and that breath escaped in a long sigh.

  Bruce lifted his head and looked down at her. After a moment, he raised his hand, grazed his knuckle over her cheek, touched a fingertip to her mouth, then murmured, “Good night,” and left her still standing stunned on her doorstep.

  He was gone before she could whisper, “Stay.”

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  BRUCE LAY IN BED and frowned at the ceiling. So, okay; he’d managed to kiss Karin gently and with finesse. The kiss had lasted maybe one minute, tops. If it had gone on for one more minute, that finesse would have been history. He’d had to make his escape before he lost control. He wanted her with a clawing need different from anything he’d ever felt before, a need that still had him aroused an hour later.

  She got under his skin. If he could lose every remnant of control the way he did when they made love, what would happen if he lost his temper with her?

  Unfortunately, he knew. He’d grown up seeing what he could become. With the combination of genes and environment, what he would become.

  They’d had some great sex. If he had any sense at all, he would be satisfied with that and start running the other way, not woo her with dates. He’d decided long ago he wasn’t husband and father material, not unless he wanted to follow in his father’s footsteps. And, God—did he want to live day in and day out with this edgy feeling of obsession? He didn’t like that she was in the back of his mind all the time, that he constantly wondered what she was doing, what she’d think about this, what she’d say about that. And this restless, prickling, violent need for her—that would drive him insane.