by Style, Linda
He smiled. “Me, too. Slept like a baby.”
Then they just looked at each other. Finally he said, “You okay?”
She nodded. “I’m perfect.”
“I thought that I might’ve…that you might think I’d taken advan—”
Two fingers came up to quiet him midsentence. “I think you think too much.”
Surprised, he said, “Maybe you’re right. I’ve been told I need to just go with the flow.”
She snuggled into him, her skin like fire against his. “Well, then. Let’s go with the flow.”
***
“What took you so long?”
Macy shut her car door and glanced at Rico standing on the steps of the cutest little house she’d ever seen — and looking as anxious as she’d ever seen him. He stalked across the lawn to meet her in the driveway.
“I stopped at the hospital to see if there was any change.”
“Yeah, I checked, too. No ID yet. Was he still unconscious?”
She nodded. “Then I followed your directions to get here. They weren’t the clearest directions I’ve ever read. I had to read lots of signs.”
“You should’ve followed me.”
She shrugged. “Hey, I’m here.”
“True.” He opened the back door of her car and took out two suitcases.
Her nerves hummed. This was probably the stupidest thing she could do. But wasn’t she already emotionally involved? Even more reason why staying here was a bad idea.
Or maybe it was the best way for them to realize that good sex doesn’t make a relationship. That an affair is all it could ever be.
“What do you have in here?” He dragged her suitcases toward the door.
She followed alongside. “One has clothes and the other some work I have to do.”
“Lots of work, I’d say.” He stopped at the steps. “Well, this is it.”
“Your house is very pretty,” she said. “Like one of those cottages in an English storybook.”
He dropped her suitcases and reached for the knob, hesitating before he opened the door. “Just to warn you, the outside is not a good representation of what’s on the inside. I’m not much of a decorator.”
She figured that. Utilitarian would probably be his style. “Well, I’m not, either. I had someone else do my place. Saved me time and a lot of angst.”
“Okay.” He swung open the door. “Let’s move you in and then we can both get some work done.”
They walked directly into the living room. No foyer. He was right. The place was small, and she could almost see the whole layout from right there at the door. Dining room on the right, and in the back through an archway, what looked like a family room that connected to the kitchen. She put Hercules down to sniff it out.
“He can go out back if he needs to do his thing,” Rico said. “It’s fenced. In fact, there’s a doggy door that the previous owners put in. I’ll just take out the nails and he’ll be all set.”
“Ha!” She laughed. “The poor little guy won’t know what to do,” she joked as Rico walked her down a center hall, to the bedrooms she assumed.
“Three bedrooms.” He pointed them out. “Mine, my computer room and the guest room. One bath. And like I said, nothing fancy.”
They’d have to share a bathroom? She’d never shared a bathroom with anyone, but she found it oddly appealing. “I hate to put you out like this.”
He gave her a wicked look. “It was my idea. Remember?”
She did. And after last night, the idea was more exciting than it should be. “I remember.”
“I’ll let you get settled while I get the nails out of the doggy door.”
“Great. I have to go to the office this morning and then I’ve an appointment to keep.” She was going to see Cody. She’d told Rico they were testing the boy’s DNA and that she’d let him know when the results were available. But she really didn’t expect it to be good news for Rico’s case. “I’ll take Herc with me because I don’t think he’d like being alone in a strange place.”
“Be cautious, okay.”
“Definitely. But a person would be pretty stupid to try something with so many people around.”
“There are a lot of stupid people out there, so don’t take any unnecessary chances. I’ll be all over today, too, but you have my cell number if you need to reach me. And I’m going to stop at the grocery store on the way home.”
“Don’t do any special shopping for me,” she said, and the moment the words left her lips she realized how presumptuous that must’ve sounded.
“Maybe you want to come along? That way I won’t get anything you don’t like.”
Very funny. “I won’t be back until five or so.”
“Perfect. We’ll do it then.”
She was ready to do it right now. She felt as if he’d unleashed an insatiable lust inside of her. She’d never been as comfortable with someone as she was with Rico. He made her feel special, as if she mattered. And if she read the emotion she saw in his eyes correctly, he might be the one to get hurt if she let things go any further.
She couldn’t let that happen.
***
RICO’S FIRST STOP was the hospital to see if Macy’s attacker had regained consciousness so he could question the guy — if the other officers didn’t mind him horning in on their case. But the creep hadn’t come to yet, and the docs weren’t sure he would. “Got print results?” Rico asked the officer on guard. If the perp was in the system, they’d know right away.
“We’re working on it.”
But they didn’t seem to be in any hurry. Next he went to the House and sweet-talked Susan in Accounting to fill out the forms for Haven’s Gate’s financial records. He wouldn’t hear anything over the weekend, but it was a start. Back at his desk, he punched Dixon’s name into the database and, waiting for the information to process, went back to Chelsey Ray’s file. He was missing something. Every time he looked at the case he felt he was missing something. Gut feelings. And his gut was usually right.
When they’d interviewed the staff and residents at the shelter five years ago, the questions hadn’t been what he’d think to ask now. He had questions about the adoption process and record keeping. He wondered if the physical evidence collected at that time might be more useful now that they had better testing methods. Another avenue to check out.
He tipped back in his chair, hands laced behind his head to wait for the computer to spit out information. Jordan came in and sat across from him. He looked preoccupied and a little disheveled, a strange phenomenon for the always pressed and perfect Jordan.
“You look like shit,” Rico teased. “What’s up?”
Jordan rubbed his eyes. “Nothing. Didn’t get much sleep, I guess.”
“Woman trouble?”
His partner raised an eyebrow. “I wish.”
Stupid question. Jordan never had woman trouble. The only trouble he had was too many.
“So, what then?”
“I approached my parents about finding my biological mother. They weren’t too happy about it.”
“Whoa. You’ve never mentioned that before.”
“I had a checkup the other day and the doctor was asking about hereditary diseases. It got me thinking.”
Rico sensed it was more than that. How could anyone not want to know something about the person who gave him life? He also knew how heartbreaking that search could be. “What if you found out something you didn’t like?”
Jordan frowned. “I could handle it. What I couldn’t handle is if it caused a lot of problems for my family, which apparently it would.” He shrugged. “I’m not pursuing it.”
“Okay.” Rico knew how important Jordan’s family was to him — even though they’d had their problems.
“You heard about last night?”
His partner’s gaze narrowed. “No, what?”
Rico told him everything that had happened after he left Macy’s.
“Man,” Jordan said, “I’m glad
she wasn’t hurt.” Then he smiled. “She’s a bad ass woman, eh?”
He pressed his lips together. “Seems so.” He shook his head and grinned. “Man, I never saw that one coming.” Then, getting serious again, he said. “But it was tramatic for her. So,—” he scrubbed a hand across his scruffy two-day growth of whiskers, “—now I have a houseguest for a few days.”
Jordan drew back, eyes wide. “Macy Capshaw’s at your place? That’s hard to imagine.”
Rico feigned hurt. “Hey, don’t dis my crib. It’s a palace.”
“Maybe — if you’d been raised by a wolves.”
Jordan was joking, but it made Rico think. What was in his head? Getting involved with Macy Capshaw was a no-win situation. “She’s safe. That’s the important thing. It’s nothing more than that.”
“Methinks the man protests too much.”
“Think what you want. Nothing is going to happen.” A street kid from New Jersey, the grandson of Italian immigrants, and the daughter of a famous Beverly Hills attorney, a woman who never wanted for anything in her whole life — no way was that happening, not for any length of time, anyway. No way would they ever find common ground.
No way but in bed. He smiled at the thought.
“That’s the problem,” Jordan said. “You think nothing can happen and it’s a self-fulfilling prophecy. You think too damned much.”
He’d been accused of that so many times before he was starting to wonder if there was some truth in it. “Yeah, well, it helps to think because I have cases to solve.”
Jordan raised his hands. “I’m cool.”
Turning, Rico went back to the computer and pulled up the information he’d punched in earlier. It was a futile search. There was nothing on Dr. Dixon.
What next? He punched in a different name. Maybe that would get some results.
***
THE SUN WARMED Macy’s face, the bright afternoon a reflection of her feelings as she watched Cody playing with Hercules at the park not far from the Appletons’ home. Despite her mixed emotions about staying at Rico’s, the move had dispelled some of her worries about her own safety and she could concentrate on other things. Like work.
Oddly though, she didn’t feel the urgency about work she usually did. She was content to sit and watch Cody enjoying himself. More relaxed than she’d been in ages.
Maybe it was because she felt safe. Right now, with everything going on in her life she needed that sense of security. Even if it was temporary.
“Yay!” Cody shouted. “I got a point.” Two boys had joined him and they were playing kick ball, with Hercules running interference. Watching them, she felt that things just might be coming together. Cody seemed to be adjusting at the Appletons’, and she was glad her earlier apprehensions had no foundation.
Just then, the ball bounced her way. She sprang to her feet and kicked it back and before she knew it, she was pulled into a game of kick ball.
By the time the other boys were called to leave, Macy was out of breath and crumpled in a heap on the grass. Hercules jumped into her lap and Cody tumbled down beside her, his brandy-colored hair tousled and hanging in his eyes. His cheeks were all pink from playing so hard, his clothes were dirty — and he was adorable. How could anyone leave a child like this to fend for himself? Any child.
“You’re not like other grown-ups,” Cody said, sounding very grown-up himself.
She gazed at him. “What do you mean?”
He shrugged. “You’re nice.”
“Well, I think you’re pretty nice, too. And so are the Appletons, don’t you think?”
“Yeah, but they’re not like you. They don’t care about me.”
Oh, my. She pulled him into a hug. “Of course they do, sweetie. You wouldn’t be there if they didn’t care.”
He didn’t answer, so she added, “You know what, I think they’re going to have dinner ready any time now, so we should probably head home.”
“Are you going to come back?”
She heard doubt in his voice. She couldn’t blame him. He’d been abandoned by his own parents, who’d never come forward, despite the rampant media coverage when he’d first been found. The authorities had no lead on any other relatives and though he’d been interviewed many times, Cody couldn’t remember any either. But she saw a sparkle of hope in his eyes when he looked at her and there was no way she’d do anything to take it away. “Of course I’m going to come back. You’re my best buddy.” She ruffled his hair.
He gave a tiny smile, eyes cast down.
After she dropped Cody off and was driving back to Rico’s, all the good feelings she’d had about Cody’s stay at the foster home had dissolved. Nancy’s daily journal detailed Cody’s fights with the other kids, sulking in his room. Not talking. He’d started therapy and Macy had hoped it would help him get comfortable in his new surroundings. But according to Nancy, it wasn’t happening. If he didn’t shape up soon, the woman said she’d have to talk to the social worker about finding him another placement.
Macy tightened her grip on the wheel. That was the problem with the system. Everything was temporary. If they didn’t find Cody’s parents or a close relative, he’d probably be shifted from one foster home to another until he was eighteen. Just thinking about made her chest hurt.
So, not only was she getting too involved with Rico, she was doing the same with Cody. What was that about? Cody wasn’t the first child she’d worked with and he wouldn’t be the last.
Pulling into Rico’s driveway, she remembered they were going grocery shopping. She couldn’t pinpoint when she’d last done that. She usually just grabbed a bite on her way home.
The front door opened as she stepped from her car, and Rico poked his head outside. “Why don’t you pull into the garage? Your car won’t be at risk that way.”
She hadn’t thought about that. “Is this a bad neighborhood?”
“No, but why take a chance? Teenagers are the same everywhere.”
He hit a handheld remote and the garage door slid up. Ready to get back in her car, she stopped. “What about the groceries?”
“We’ll take my car. It’s bigger and we don’t have to worry about getting it dirty.” She set Hercules down in the grass and pulled the Mercedes inside. When she came out, Rico was holding the dog.
“I think he likes me.”
“He likes everybody. Do I have time to change? My pants are dirty from playing kick ball.”
“Kick ball? You?” He didn’t disguise his astonishment.
“Yeah, me!”
“Hmm. I never would’ve guessed.” He went to the front door, opened it and went inside.
“Me neither.” She didn’t bother to explain and he didn’t ask. Truth was, she’d been doing a lot of things since she met Rico that she never thought she’d do.
She changed into a pair of jeans and an hour and a half later, they were stalking the aisles at the supermarket. Macy couldn’t believe how much food Rico kept throwing in the cart, most of it for the barbecue tomorrow. Hot dogs, hamburgers and steak, so people would have a choice, he’d said. Beer, soda and wine. Beans and the makings for both potato salad and a pasta salad.
“So, who’s going to cook all this stuff?” She hoped he wasn’t going to depend on her for any of it. Not that she didn’t want to help, she simply didn’t have the experience.
“Me,” he said, as if it was the most normal thing in the world.
“You cook?”
“Anything you want,” he said, beaming. “Grab a few bags of chips over there.”
She did as he said and balanced them on top so they wouldn’t get crushed. “Remember the restaurant I mentioned? Well, we all had to do our share and most of us learned to cook at home, too, in case my parents couldn’t do it for some reason.” He sauntered down the aisle, checking each side.
“Sounds like an ideal childhood.”
“At the time I thought it sucked. We didn’t have much money and we were forced to learn the meaning of hard w
ork. I guess that was a good thing. Kept us out of trouble.” He nodded toward a shelf. “Pasta.”
She grabbed it and tossed it to him. “Growing up in a large family sounds wonderful.”
“Most of the time it was. But we fought like hell, too. You get territorial when you have someone snitching your stuff all the time.”
“Is that why you haven’t managed to get married? You don’t want to share?”
“Yep. I’m selfish.”
“Yeah, right. You’re the most unselfish man I know.”
“Thanks, but no one in my family will believe that.”
Rico navigated the overflowing cart to the checkout line and started chucking the food onto the conveyer belt. Macy reached to help him, wondering what it would be like to do this with someone on a regular basis. No, not just someone — with Rico.
Suddenly he tossed her a head of lettuce and she caught it on the fly. “Soccer, huh?”
She tossed the lettuce back, laughing. “Yes, soccer.”
He shook his head.
“What? I don’t look the type?”
“Excuse me, sir,” the clerk interrupted. “That’ll be $175.00.”
“Sorry,” Rico apologized and paid the girl.
On the way to the car, Rico said, “I think you’ll like my parents. They can be a little overbearing sometimes, but with them, what you see is what you get.”
She smiled, but her stomach churned. She was actually nervous about meeting his parents. How bizarre. He’d said he’d told them she was under protection, so it shouldn’t be any big deal that she was staying with him. And they did have separate bedrooms.
Right. If that’s all it was to her, she wouldn’t be having a problem. She liked Rico. She trusted him. He was honest, his integrity was beyond reproach and he was funny.
So there it was. She liked him and because she liked him, she was nervous about meeting his parents. It felt almost like being a teenager again.
“Okay, we’re outta here,” Rico said.
Back at the house, they carried in the groceries and set the bags on the dark blue ceramic countertop. The kitchen, small as it was, had a charm of its own. She could see that the original structure had been built in the 1920s because it had an Art Deco feel with rounded corners and arched alcoves.
