Tears ran down Katy’s pale face and dripped off her chin. “I don’t know. Maybe if I hadn’t gotten in the way, Jack would have caught the guy before any of this happened. I just don’t know.”
Jack. Where was his brother?
Ty turned a frantic gaze on the now silent crowd that had formed around the trio. Most lowered their eyes, afraid to make contact with the raw agony no doubt shining from his. Mitch stood to one side with Rebecca tucked into his chest sobbing. Grace had her arms around the young dishwasher and Annie Campbell.
Jack broke through the throng and came to a sliding halt.
His chest heaved and sweat ran freely down his flushed face. Ty took a running tally of his brother’s body, before releasing a sigh of relief. They might not see eye-to-eye most of the time, but they were family.
Jack’s somber gaze took in everything in an instant. Doc’s figure, Ty’s stiffening red hands, the crying women, and came to the correct conclusion, “He’s dead?”
Ty nodded, “Femoral artery. There was nothing I could do, he bled out.”
Jack rubbed a tired hand across the back of his neck. “The son-of-a-bitch opened fire as soon as he saw me. I chased him all over town, but he got away.” He glanced at Katy. “How’s she holding up? Their families were pretty close.”
Yeah, Ty grimaced. He remembered. “I have to talk to you.” He motioned to the crowd. “Private.”
Jack checked his watch. “It’s going to have to wait. I need to process the scene, get an APB out on the suspect, and question the witnesses.” He dug his phone out of his pocket. “Listen, why don’t you take her home and I’ll stop by later to get your statements. She needs to decompress, you both do.” Almost before he finished speaking, Jack had turned away with his phone to his ear calling in reinforcements.
Ty frowned after his brother, then moved to Katy’s side. “C’mon, I’m getting outta here.”
“What about our statements?” Katy swayed, and caught herself on his forearm.
“Jack said he’d drop by later. Let’s get you out of here before he changes his mind.”
As they moved past the body the ambulance arrived, followed by the coroner’s van and a couple of police cars. At least Jack would have some assistance now.
“Where do you think he is?” her voice quivered.
“In the next state, if he knows what’s good for him,” Ty said. He stretched over the side of the pick-up for a rag. “Get in, I’ll be right there.”
He rubbed his hands almost raw before tossing the rag into a nearby garbage can. He couldn’t wait to get home and wash the horror of the day’s events away. Preferably not alone, but he knew that was a pipedream. It wouldn’t be fair to use their past history together for sex anyway. And that wasn’t even counting the fact she was engaged and strictly out of bounds.
He opened the driver’s door and frowned. Katy sat huddled in the corner, her sunflower hair wilting, great green eyes bubbling over with tears, and shoulders shaking from shock. It pissed him off all over again to see the marks her would-be abductor had left on her creamy skin. If he ever caught up to the fucker, Ty would be happy to show him how a real man fights.
He stretched over the front seat and grabbed Tiger’s blanket from the back. “Here, wrap up before you catch a chill.” She looked small and lost covered up in the old gray army quilt. Now he had two stray females to look after. His life was getting complicated.
Ty started the truck and directed warm air her way before pulling away from the crime scene. He caught her gazing into the side mirror and sought to distract her attention.
“So what’s up between Mitch and Rebecca?”
Lame, Garrett.
He shot her a swift sideways glance. Sure enough, she was staring at him as if he’d lost his marbles.
“How the heck should I know? A good man dies today, and you want to talk about romance?” Katy’s voice shot up an octave, and she threw the blanket off in a fit of annoyance. “Are you serious?”
Ty slapped a palm on the steering wheel and then swore under his breath when he saw her jump nervously. “No, I’m not freaking serious.” His voice rang with frustrated anger. “What I am…” he gritted past clenched teeth, but the spooked look that entered her eyes told him clearer than any words to calm the hell down.
He blew out a long breath and started again, “What I am is pissed at myself for leaving the restaurant ahead of you in the first place. If I’d manned up and gotten my stupid libido under control, this never would have happened.”
“It wasn’t our fault Doc was shot, Ty. I feel as guilty as you do… guiltier even. But we weren’t the ones to pull the trigger.” Katy tucked the blanket up to her chin.
There was a strained silence after that for the time it took him to drive home. He turned the corner onto his street and pulled up to the house before chancing her another glance.
She was smiling. The little vixen.
He turned off the key and rested his arm across the top of the steering wheel. “What’s so funny?”
“Us.” She pulled a slim hand—the one with the eye-piercingly bright diamond—out from the folds of the blanket and smoothed a hank of hair behind her ear. “We always do this.” When he stared at her in puzzlement, she dropped her hand to her lap and fiddled with the woven edge of the material before continuing. “We try so hard to protect each other that we end up pushing us apart instead.”
Yeah, she was probably right, but that didn’t change anything. He needed to take care of her; it was hard-wired into his system. He had no choice. And before he started thinking about what that meant, he was going for a much-needed shower.
“Look, I’m not really up to a philosophical discussion. Let’s shelve this for now, okay?” He opened his door, climbed out, and went around to her side. Then waited until she jumped down before adding, “It’s not bad to care about each other, you know. Just because we couldn’t work things out between us, doesn’t mean the feelings shut off like a water tap. They don’t… didn’t, I mean.”
Then, before he could get himself into more trouble, Ty gathered her up into his arms and helped her into what once was to be their dream home.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
By the time Jack processed the scene, broke the tragic news to Doc Johnson’s widow and wrote up page-after-blinking-page of reports, he was tired, depressed, and ready for a beer or three. Unfortunately he still needed to drop by his brother’s house and pick up his daughter from her job at The Craft Shack.
That was another issue he had to deal with. Even though it was no doubt a one-off, never to happen again occurrence, Jack didn’t want his baby girl working at the shop after the break-in. They’d argued about it this morning, not that that was anything new. Ever since puberty hit, an alien seemed to have inhabited his daughter’s body. One with big teeth. Jack never knew when he might get his head snapped off. Before that, he’d thought dealing with criminals was stressful.
The phone rang just as he finished straightening his files into neat orderly rows on the corner of his walnut desk. It rang again, and again. He swore and glared daggers through the closed door of his office. What was the sense of having a secretary if she couldn’t even answer the phones?
He heaved a tension-releasing breath and picked up the receiver. “Chief Garrett’s office, how can I help you?”
“Daddy?”
Jack smiled and relaxed, leaning back in his chair, and relieved the monster occupying his daughter’s body seemed to be sleeping for the moment.
“Tina. I was just thinking about coming to pick you up. Did you and Annie,” his heart pinged with regret, “get everything put back together okay?”
He’d enjoyed his dates with Annie the past couple of months. They had fun together. But he wasn’t blind. Now that Jared Martin had returned to town, Jack could see the writing on the wall. The two of them had a past they needed to get sorted. And he had Tina.
“Almost. I told you she would need a hand. We’ve worked our b
utts off all day.” There was a small I-need-courage-so-I-can-ask pause, “Dad…”
Uh, oh here it comes. He could almost feel the monster’s flames already. “Just spit it out, it’s easier that way.”
“Daddy.” Tina puffed out an annoyed breath.
“I know you’re probably going to say no, but Ted asked me to go for dinner with him,” she said in a rush of syllables, as if hoping the going out on a date thing would slide right by him.
Not. In. A. Million. Freaking. Years.
She was going to be the death of him, he just knew it. The gray was popping into his receding hairline as she spoke. “Ted, who?” he asked in what he thought was a fairly reasonable tone of voice. Considering.
Tina sighed the sigh of beleaguered teens everywhere. “Seriously? You know Ted, Dad. His father owns Duke’s, Mr. Farley?” She said, using a virtual cattle prod on his obviously ancient mind.
Jack would’ve smiled if this wasn’t so serious. When did his little girl grow up? She was supposed to be playing with dolls and dress-up, not boys and make-up.
Shit.
The crunch was, she was still his baby and he wanted her to be happy. But if he said the wrong thing, she’d think he was being mean. Which he absolutely wasn’t, at least not deliberately. And how long did he have to ride this roller coaster anyway?
He gave in to the inevitable. “Where are you and Ned going?”
Her laughter bubbled through the airwaves, warming his heart. “The Soda Shoppe I think, and it’s Ted, Daddy, as you very well know.” She paused, and then in a voice soft as down she blanketed his heart with tenderness, “I know this is hard for you. I promise not to be late. Love you, Dad.”
“Me too,” he answered, swallowing a lump the size of Manhattan Island, and reluctantly let her go.
Now what?
Jack had spent so many years picking Tina up and dropping her off, whether it be dance class, skating, or soccer, that now he wasn’t quite sure what to do with himself. Her mother had walked out on both of them when Tina was still a baby and it had been the two of them ever since. Sixteen, tumultuous, joyous years that he would never, ever regret.
Restless, Jack pushed back his chair, grabbed his hat from the peg, swung open the door, and swore. Instead of his usual diligent group of officers hard at work at their desks, they were all gathered in a tight knot around the front counter.
And his new secretary.
Jack still couldn’t believe he’d let Angie talk him into hiring her while she went on vacation. Angie Sorenson hadn’t taken a holiday since the day he’d taken office, so why she decided she needed to now, just when Tidal Falls seemed to be experiencing a crime spree, he didn’t know. And the replacement she’d picked out… needless to say, he’d be happy when his life got back to normal.
He cleared his throat. Loudly. All chatter stopped and the group turned as one.
Mike Randolph was the first to answer. “Sorry boss, she needed help with the file cabinet.” He blushed and moved his lanky butt back to his desk.
Norm Walters just shrugged his behemoth shoulders and strolled away smiling after handing the troublemaker his card.
Last to leave was Sid the squid, named for all the bullshit that spewed out of his mouth. He ignored Jack to lean over the counter and stage whisper the latest too-good-not-to-pass-on gossip. “Seriously, Miss, you should have seen him. The sheriff there wrestled that cougar to the ground all by hisself. The Hendersons say it was the craziest thing they ever seen.”
Jack grimaced. That wasn’t quite the way it happened. He’d been lucky to get a tranq into the mountain lion just as it jumped him. Thankfully the dart was fast-acting and took effect immediately, with the big cat literally falling from the sky to land at his feet.
“Okay, Squid, quit filling her ears with your blarney. Aren’t you supposed to be doing a tour of the highway about now?”
Sid grumbled and rubbed at his whiskered chin, before doffing his hat like a gentleman courting his lady. Then he shoved it on over his batwing ears and stomped out the door.
Left with no more barriers, Jack forced himself to politely acknowledge the replacement. Now that her admirers had left she pretended to look busy straightening files and posting sticky notes to every available surface she could find. Curiosity almost had him leaning over the counter to see what she’d written, but just then she picked up a stapler and he decided a little distance might be wise.
He’d have to have a talk with her about her dress code. This wasn’t the beauty section in a fancy department store. How did she plan to type with those inch long flamingo pink nails? And maybe she thought placing her honey-red hair up in a bun was professional, but all it did was bring about thoughts of the naughty secretary. It was… distracting.
Her white shirt, while business-like, highlighted perky breasts and creamy skin. His gaze followed the trail from the two undone buttons to her slender throat, stubborn chin with a hint of a cleft, pursed pink lips, and finally, golden brown eyes that knew just what they did to a man.
Angie was going to owe him big for this.
~~~*~~~
Katy was in trouble the moment Ty put his arms around her. Long buried feelings bubbled to the surface and threatened to run over, making an impossible situation that much worse. She wanted to believe what was happening between them was a residual of their past, but in her heart she was afraid it was more.
They had to sit down and have that talk soon. She needed to know he forgave her for leaving the way she did, even though if he cared he could have followed her, or at least called. And she needed to tell him what happened after she left.
“I can walk,” she said, even as her hands tightened their grip around his shoulders. Helpless to stop, her fingers found and teased the fine curls at the base of his neck.
His breathing increased, and his arms squeezed a warning. “Quit that, or I’m not going to be responsible for what comes next.”
Undaunted and enjoying her momentary sense of power, Katy set her lips against Ty’s carotid artery, and licked. The vein against her mouth jumped in reaction. A second later they were through the door and the tables had turned. He dropped her to her feet, slammed the door shut, and pinned her to its wooden frame like a prize butterfly.
His blue eyes glinted at her from out of the shadows, the heat in their mesmerizing depths unmistakable. His hands were manacles that held her wrists to the wood. A muscled thigh pressed between her legs, holding her on her toes. A feral smile twisted his lips.
“If you play with fire,” he murmured. “Expect to get burned.” His mouth moved to within a hairsbreadth of hers. “My turn,” he said huskily, before changing her world forever.
Her fingers curled at the first feather-light touch of his quicksilver lips. They were everywhere at once, setting off fiery little explosions in their wake. He roved at will, from the lobe of her ear and along the line of her jaw, to the tip of her nose and each eyelid in turn. No spot left untouched, except that which craved him the most. Her mouth.
His leg set up a forward and back motion, rocking her core until she wanted to scream in frustration.
“Ty,” she moaned, thrashing against the door. Desperate now to break free so she could touch him and have his hands on her body. “Ty, kiss me.”
She felt his smile against her cheek. “Now that’s against the rules.” But he did lower their arms so he could bring her hand to his lips. Nudging gently, he opened her fingers one by one, and sucked them into his mouth, keeping rhythm with his leg.
It was too much. It wasn’t near enough.
Katy yanked her hands free and grabbed his head, pulling it down to her eager lips. “Didn’t you teach me rules are meant to be broken?”
She was awash in sensation. Their past and what was happening now, in this moment, swirled inside her chest like a tidal pool, threatening to drag her under. His oh-so-talented tongue danced with hers to a tune only the two of them could hear. The taste was better than the richest chocolate
bar, and just as decadent.
His hands roved over her hips and waist and moved much too slowly toward her aching breasts. Katy’s heart stopped, waiting for the first touch. And when it happened; it was like a jolt from a defibrillator, life-changing. Every nerve strained closer, tuned to his every move. So focused, that she gave a shriek of surprise when he suddenly bent forward and lifted her over his shoulder. Then he turned, hand splayed across her butt, and strode down the hall.
A draft of cool air across her back where her shirt had lifted gave Katy a clue to where he was taking her; the hot tub.
“Aren’t you a little old for this Neanderthal stuff?” she asked, hands braced on his back, just before he pitched her into the water.
Katy came up sputtering, her hair hanging in bedraggled clumps across her face. She brushed them back impatiently and glared at her tormentor.
“What the hell was that for?”
Contrary to the smirk she expected to see on his face, Ty stood at the edge of the pool and stared down at her with profound regret. “You tempt me more than any woman I’ve ever known, but I’ve realized I have a little pride after all.
“I’m not here to play second fiddle while your fiancé is out of town.” He cursed and turned away, “I’m going for a shower. There are towels on the shelf. You can clean up and rest in the first room down the hall. I’ll see you later.”
He strode away without a backward glance, which Katy was grateful for because there was no way to hide the tears streaming down her cheeks.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Katy didn’t expect to get any rest after the events of the afternoon, so she was surprised to awaken to a dim room. The muted lighting outside the window and her empty tummy told her it had to be near dinnertime. She lay for a moment longer to get her bearings, then threw back the light cover on the bed. Cool air brushed against skin and reminded her of the cataclysmic events of the day.
Ty had kissed her like there was no tomorrow. As if they were the only two people on earth. But they weren’t. And she had a commitment to Jeff. He’d been right to stop when he had, not that she’d appreciated his method at the time. Whether or not they ever had a second chance together, Katy hated what she knew she had to do, but there was no choice. She couldn’t go through with marrying Jeff feeling the way she did for Ty.
Twilight's Encore Page 9
