“There’s a first,” Ronan observed wryly.
Sierra ignored the remark. “But isn’t feeding that many people awfully expensive?”
He scrolled over to another article before answering her. “The family chips in to cover costs. Uncle Andrew would throw those gatherings anyway, but nobody wants him to go broke, so we all put some money in, or bring the groceries he needs to create those mind-blowing meals he whips up.”
Nodding her head, Sierra pulled out her messenger bag then fished out her wallet, taking several bills out. “So, how much is it?”
Ronan frowned at her. “Put that away, Carlyle. There’s no charge for you,” he informed her. “You’re not family.”
She couldn’t gauge his attitude from his tone of voice. “I don’t know if I’m being insulted or given a pass,” she told him. Following his lead, she looked back at her screen then switched to another story and scrolled down, looking for something that might be pertinent.
“Just accept it,” he instructed. “So, are you coming?”
“Sure. I need an address, though,” she told him. “I don’t know where the chief lives.”
He started to tell her then stopped. “Tell you what. You drove me in my less than steady state. Let me return the favor. I’ll pick you up at noon on Sunday for the party. Makes it easier, actually. When everyone shows up, parking is hell and, like I said, this promises to be a pull-all-the-stops-out party.”
His offer surprised her. And pleased her. “Okay, thanks.”
She quickly wrote down her address on a piece of paper and then leaned across her desk and handed it to Ronan.
He took it, not bothering to tell her that he already knew where she lived. She might get the wrong idea. At the very least, she’d ask him a dozen questions as to why he knew her address and he didn’t want to get into it with her. He didn’t like explaining himself, especially when he couldn’t even do it to himself. He just chalked it up to idle curiosity.
He could feel Sierra looking at him even after he tucked her address away in his pocket. Ordinarily, he could tune something like that out. But there was just something about this woman that didn’t allow him to do that.
“Something wrong?” he asked her.
“Are we bonding?”
“What? No. What makes you say that?” His voice went through three entirely different tones, one for each sentence, ending on a confused note.
“Well, we were just having a conversation—”
He’d just lost his place on the link he’d pulled up. Irritated, he told her, “Which you initiated.”
“But which you continued,” she pointed out. “And now you actually offered to pick me up for a party.” That wasn’t merely random bonding. That was being a friend, in her book.
“I explained why.”
“You explained it to assuage your own concerns,” she told him. “I have a different take on it, though.”
“I know I’m going to regret this,” Ronan said as a preface before asking, “Which is?”
“That we really are bonding,” she said happily. “You finally realized that it’s better to talk to me than to ignore me.”
He sighed audibly, passing a hand over his eyes. “I was right. I regret asking.”
Rather than be affronted, Sierra grinned. “Don’t worry. I won’t tell anyone.”
She had lost him. “Tell them what?”
“That you’re human. And nice. That under that crusty shell is—”
“Another crusty shell,” he pronounced with conviction.
She merely smiled at him. “Have it your way.”
He would have said she was patronizing him, except that he didn’t think she was capable of that. “I intend to. I—oh, hell, never mind. I’m not getting anywhere.”
Sierra cocked her head, looking at him and silently asking him a question. He put his own interpretation to it.
“With this,” he all but shouted, waving his hand at his computer screen. “I might as well just call it a night.” And with that, he powered down his computer, shutting off his monitor at the same time. He needed to get some air.
“See you at the ceremony tomorrow,” she called after Ronan cheerfully.
“Yeah, right,” he muttered, barely audible as he walked out.
He swore roundly under his breath as he jabbed his finger at the down button for the elevator. He had no idea what had come over him, or why he’d extended the invitation to her in the first place.
Yeah, you do, the voice in his head countered.
It had to do with the fact that Carlyle reminded him of Wendy. She’d been nice to him, going out of her way to do it. But those were precisely the reasons why he shouldn’t have anything to do with her beyond what was absolutely necessary because of work.
Because being around her—when he let his guard down—made him remember. And memories eventually brought pain. Pain that couldn’t be resolved because Wendy was never coming back.
She couldn’t.
If he knew what was good for him, he’d find a way to make Carlyle’s life a living hell until she asked to be transferred out of the department altogether or at least off the team.
But that was just the problem. He couldn’t get himself to make her life a living hell. The best he could do was behave as if he didn’t want her intruding into his life.
He was going to regret this, Ronan predicted. Just as he had earlier.
* * *
SIERRA ARRIVED AT the ceremony early to ensure that she got a seat. It was being held in the square behind city hall, which could hold a sizable crowd and was now filled with a sea of folding chairs. She had a feeling that even more people would show up for the new chief of police’s swearing-in ceremony than had attended the previous chief’s funeral.
Within half an hour, she saw that she was right.
Taking a seat on the end of a row near the middle of all the chairs, she was in a perfect position to observe all the members of the new chief’s family—and there were a great many of them—react to the fact that one of their own was being made chief of police.
To a person, they beamed.
Even Ronan, whom she’d spotted early on, sitting with his immediate family, including his mother, looked proud and happier than she had ever seen him.
Seeing him that way made her happy in turn. She was glad to see that he could relax amid his own like this. It showed her a whole different side of him.
She caught herself paying more attention to Ronan than to the ceremony unfolding on the stage in front of the assembled audience. Paying attention to Ronan and smiling. And, at one point, running her finger along her lips and remembering what she was fairly certain Ronan had no memory of.
The moment the ceremony concluded, Sierra quickly slipped out. It was her main reason for taking a seat at the end of a row. She didn’t have to wait for the other occupants of the row to file out, which in turn meant she didn’t run the risk of having Ronan see her. This was his day, his and his family’s, to enjoy.
She thought about his smile a lot throughout the rest of the day.
* * *
HE MUST HAVE lost his mind.
It wasn’t the first time the thought had crossed Ronan’s mind. He’d already accused himself of that three times before he ever got into his car to drive to Carlyle’s house to pick her up for his uncle’s celebration.
If he could have come up with a plausible excuse that didn’t sound as if it had been conceived by an eight-year-old with no spark of creativity to his name, he would have called the detective and begged off.
But nothing came to mind and, besides, he supposed he did owe her. She could have left him to his own devices in Malone’s that night he’d wound up drinking too much and just gone home. Granted, it wasn’t as if he’d been stra
nded on a deserted island. Someone would have given him a ride home, or worse coming to worst, he could have hailed a cab.
But she hadn’t gone home. She’d played the Girl Scout and not only taken him home but then put on the hair shirt of an early, unsung Christian martyr and stayed with him to make sure he’d make it through the night without some sort of mishap.
Okay, that would have been a long shot, but she’d obviously believed it was possible, which was what ultimately counted in this scenario.
What kind of a person did that, anyway? he asked himself.
A nice person.
That was why he couldn’t just bail on her, much as his spirit to survive urged him to.
Besides, once he brought her to the celebration, there was no rule that said he had to stay with her. She wasn’t some shy, reclusive shrinking violet who needed to have her hand held. The woman was nothing if not upbeat and outgoing. She would be talking people’s ears off in a matter of seconds, taking no notice of the fact that he had stepped back and melded into the crowd.
It wouldn’t be too bad.
And on that supposedly encouraging note, Ronan squared his shoulders and reached over to ring her doorbell.
“Be right there,” he heard her call out from within the house.
“No rush,” he called back, resigning himself to a car ride filled with the woman rattling on and on.
Maybe he’d just put on the radio. As long as she didn’t opt to sing along, that would be a good way of keeping her quiet.
At least he hoped so.
The next second, thoughts of radios, quiet and doing penance while trapped in a car with her endless chatter filling the air vanished as Sierra opened her front door. Ronan found he had to struggle not to gape at her like some wet-behind-the-ears adolescent.
“Sierra?” he asked uncertainly, not even aware that he was using her first name, something he rarely did, even in the privacy of his own mind.
“Yes? Is something wrong?” she asked, looking down at the dress she was wearing to make sure she hadn’t accidentally gotten something on it.
The dress, with its hem some three inches above her knees, was blue-gray and very formfitting, highlighting curves that Ronan had no idea, until this moment, she actually possessed.
And she seemed different somehow. Softer, more feminine. And there was one more thing.
“Are you taller?” he asked her.
“No, but the heels are,” she told him with a grin. “I don’t usually wear heels that are this high,” she confided.
He looked down at the strappy, light blue sandals that were sexy in their own right.
“No. No, you don’t,” he agreed. But it wasn’t her higher heels that had shanghaied his attention. It was the way the dress she was wearing seemed to almost make love to her body with every step she took. The keyhole neckline with its flirtatious hint of cleavage had caused his mouth to grow dry.
What the hell was wrong with him? he sharply demanded. He was a grown man, not some teenage boy freshly escaped from a monastery.
“I can change my shoes if you’d like,” she offered.
He cleared his throat, wishing he could clear his mind just as easily. “No, that’s fine. Leave them on. We’d better get going,” he told her.
The sooner he got her to the celebration, the sooner he could just lose himself in the crowd. Out of sight, out of mind, he told himself.
“I’m ready,” she said. “Just let me get my purse and the present.”
“Present?” he repeated. “What present?”
“The one for the new chief of police,” she said with a smile. “It’s a big deal, being made chief and it must be extra special to him since his father was once the chief before he retired, right?”
Grabbing her purse and the gift she’d wrapped, topping it off with a silvery bow, she returned to the front door. One look at his expression explained why he’d asked his question.
“You didn’t get him one, did you?” she ventured.
“No,” he answered shortly. He hadn’t even thought of it. And it wasn’t that he didn’t like Shaw. There wasn’t a single person around who didn’t like Shaw. Giving gifts was just something he didn’t think about.
“That’s okay, don’t worry. I can add your name to the card. I didn’t seal the envelope,” she went on. “I just tucked the flap in so adding your name to the card will be easy.”
It was like being next to a whirlwind, he thought. “You don’t have to—” he began.
She put her own meaning to his protest. He was embarrassed at forgetting.
“No problem. I asked around and found out the new chief’s a big Dodgers fan. There’s this memorabilia store in the mall and I found a DVD with all the games from the last World Series that they won. I thought he’d get a kick out of it.”
Ronan got into his car and waited for her to get in on the passenger side. “You went to all that trouble getting him a gift?” he marveled, not knowing what to make of her.
“Sure. If you’re going to give someone a gift, it should be something you know they’ll like. Otherwise, why bother, right?”
“Yeah, right.” He spared her a look just before pulling out of her driveway and onto the winding road that would get him out of the development.
“You don’t even have to sign it,” she went on. “I can fake your signature on the card,” she offered, taking the card out and resting it on her purse after taking a pen out. “I’ve seen it often enough.”
“You dabble in forgery?”
“No, but your signature’s a squiggle. Not exactly a challenge. You really should work on that, you know,” she told him, adding his name beneath hers on the card. “Forgers love people whose signature is that easy to imitate.”
“And now you’re giving me penmanship lessons.” He shook his head, keeping his eyes on the road. “I’ll see if I can fit them in.”
Finished, she tucked the card back into the envelope. “Just a suggestion,” she told him.
Ronan blew out a breath and frowned. He was acting like a jerk and he knew it. But the woman was being just too nice and it was putting him on edge.
She was only trying to help, he argued. “And a good one,” he murmured.
He didn’t have to look at her to know she was grinning. But he stole a covert glance anyway.
Damn, but he hated being right.
And he wanted to be annoyed at her for so many reasons. But she had a smile that would have given the devil pause—and made him behave, at least for a little while.
Chapter Fourteen
Parking near the former chief’s house was just as Ronan had predicted. Tricky. He also expected the woman he’d brought with him to start pointing out spaces where he could try to ease his sedan into. But, to his surprise, Sierra remained quiet, as if she thought that saying anything might distract him from finding a parking space that would accommodate his car.
Maybe Carlyle wasn’t as bad as he thought she was. But then again, it wasn’t really her talkativeness that was the problem. He realized that now.
It was the fact that she reminded him of Wendy.
Cruising down the next block, he finally found a decent space that could accommodate something larger than a smart car or a motorcycle. Parking his vehicle, they got out.
And then Ronan looked back toward his uncle’s house. “Maybe I should have let you out in front of the house. It’s kind of a long walk.”
“That’s all right,” she told him. “I’m not afraid of a long walk.” To prove it, she began to walk toward the house.
Ronan looked down skeptically at her footwear. “I was thinking about those high heels.”
Sierra smiled. Typical male, she thought, amused. “I wasn’t. I can run in these things,” she told him. “Walking
is no problem.”
“When have you ever run in those things?” Ronan scoffed. It was obvious that he thought she was just making that up for some reason.
She never hesitated. “When I was undercover and had to run down a perp.”
He looked at Sierra in surprise. “You were undercover?”
“Uh-huh. In my pre-Homicide days,” she told him. “I guess you didn’t read my file all that closely, did you?” she teased.
Ronan became defensive. “What makes you think I read your file?”
She gave him a knowing look before answering, “Because you’re you and you like to know just what you’re getting into—although that wasn’t exactly worded well.” She realized her gaff once the words were out. “But you know what I mean.”
Denial crossed his mind, but that would be lying and lies had a habit of catching up to a person. If they were going to have any sort of a decent working relationship, it wasn’t a good idea to throw lying into the mix.
“I just skimmed your file,” he finally admitted.
“And here we are,” she declared, waving her hand at the house and wanting to spare Ronan any further awkwardness since she could see that the topic was obviously making him uncomfortable.
He’d focused completely on the idea of her being undercover—she was obviously more of a risk-taker than he’d thought—so much so that he hadn’t realized they’d reached his uncle’s house.
“Oh, yeah, so we are.” The second the words were out of his mouth, he upbraided himself for sounding so incredibly stilted.
“It’s a really nice-looking house,” Sierra said as they went up the walk. And then she noticed something that gave her pause. “Is the front door supposed to be open like that?” she asked. Ordinarily, in their line of work, an unlocked door usually meant that there was either someone waiting to get the drop on them on the other side of it or a dead body in the house. “Isn’t your uncle afraid that some stranger might walk in?”
“There’re probably over fifty cops in there right now,” Ronan told her. “I doubt if he’s worried about a home invasion. Anyone breaking in is going to be really, really sorry,” he commented then grew serious. “Uncle Andrew probably left the door open because he got tired of having to come and answer it. I told you, he invited the whole police department and then some to this celebration.”
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