by T L Osborn
People are disgusting.
“Where do you want me to start?” Matt asks.
“Video the scene.”
“You’re the boss.” I grin to myself as he walks away.
Boss. Yeah, I like that.
We spend the next few hours going through the crime scene, bagging the evidence, photographing every intimate detail. I really hope that there’s something here that will connect us with the assailant.
“Why was this missed last week?” Matt asks me, as he sorts the evidence.
“It wasn’t here last week and I know that because I checked it myself. None of this mess was here,” I say, rubbing my gloved hands together. “Someone in the local area knows something and they’re trying to throw us off the trail.”
Matt snorts. “They forget they’re dealing with you.”
I move an item of clothing out of the way and underneath it is a furry kitten. Unmoving. I gulp, saddened by the sight. It can’t be any more than six weeks old and it’s been tossed out like trash, yet there’re places to take kittens who aren’t wanted. Suddenly, it meows, causing me to jump.
“You okay, boss?” Matt asks, running over. “Whoa! A kitten?”
“Yeah, I think he’s just been dumped here.”
“You think he’s part of the crime?” Officer Barnes asks.
“Yeah, cat murderer caught at the scene of the crime.” Matt says with humour.
“I doubt it.” The kitten is frightened, its little body shaking. Slowly, I reach my hand out. It sniffs it before rubbing against me.
“What are you going to do with it?” Matt asks me.
Great, now it’s my responsibility?
I look at him. “I guess I’m going to have to take him to the vet.”
“Do we have time to do that?”
“We’ll make the time. For now you’re coming with me to the vet.”
Matt groans. “Aww, come on man, seriously?”
“Next time, don’t call shotgun,” I say, picking up the frightened little thing. I carry it gently to my car and wrap him up on the seat in my jacket, leaving the windows of the car down. I help the team dismantle the tent and we leave the scene. I make my way to a vet, I’m honestly hoping that someone hasn’t just dumped this poor kitten and there’s a child out there missing their pet. I look down at the little thing as it snuggles on my jacket. I’m normally a dog guy but this cat is cute and with my hours at work a cat would probably be a better pet than a dog. But I couldn’t let myself think of the kitten as mine. Surely he belonged to someone that misses him.
No, he’s not mine.
Chapter Five
Sasha
It’s Saturday and after the long week of staff meetings, planning my lessons for the term out, add to that setting up my classroom, all I want to do today is relax; maybe catch up on some reading. I will not be doing work of any kind. Instead I’ll sort the remainder of my things into our room and then I’m hoping Kyle will want to do something together: go out for lunch, a walk along the beach or even a movie. Just something. We’ve hardly spent any time together since I moved in though not totally either of our faults. We’re just busy working. Today is the perfect day to spend some time with him.
For the first week we lived together, I literally slept in the spare room until I put my foot down and told him enough was enough; that I wanted to be with him. Stretching out across the bed, I don’t find Kyle lying beside me like I expect him to be.
Where is he?
Listening for a few moments, I expect to hear the sounds of someone moving around upstairs but there’s silence. My heart leaps, he’s probably downstairs cooking breakfast for me as a surprise. Tossing the blankets off myself, I grab my robe and pull it on as I eagerly race down the stairs to greet him, only to find him dressed in a suit and picking up his briefcase.
Disappointment washes over me. I’m damn sure today is Saturday.
“Are you going to work?” I ask.
He sighs. “I told you the other day I had to work this weekend. You need to listen, Sasha.”
“I thought we could spend the day together.” Sadness fills my tone.
“Don’t be like this. You know my job is incredibly busy and demanding.”
“So is mine, but I still make the time for us.”
“I can’t. I’ll be home later.”
Without even so much as a goodbye kiss he exits the house, closing the door behind him. Once again I’m left alone. Well, I’m not going to let it spoil my day. I’ll just change my plans and do something for myself, though I really should sort the my stored boxes in the spare room. In truth, I can’t be bothered. I’ll head to the gym for a few hours, then read after that. Sounds like a great way to spend the afternoon.
Turning on the jug to make myself a cup of coffee, I log onto Amazon and begin searching for new authors to buy, discovering my favourite author, Eva R. Fields, has released a new book. I shriek with excitement and press ‘buy now’. It’s tempting to skip the gym completely and sit down to read, but I’m trying to keep healthy and weekends are the only chances I get to work out, especially when school starts back up. I make myself a coffee and by the time I’m finished drinking it, I have at least six new books to read.
I drag my butt back upstairs to gather all my gym gear. I always loathe going until I get there and then I get pumped to work out. I don’t think I’m bad looking, though I wish I could tone up a bit more, but weight wise I’m looking great. Perhaps in time I can convince Kyle to convert the room downstairs into a gym so we can work out at home and save money too. He’d go for that idea, especially when I mention saving money. He’s always on me about how much I spend, which really isn’t a lot. Okay—I spend more on books than I should, but they’re all on my Kindle and not taking up any space in the house.
I find my gear, toss it into the car and head out to the gym.
When I arrive, I make my way over to the treadmill; an hour or so on there, then I’ll go home and read. At least that’s what I decided on the way here, until I lay eyes on the man hanging from the bar above his head as he lifts his legs, giving me a fabulous view of his strong muscles. With each lift, I can see the strain of his torso against the soft fabric of his sweat soaked shirt. He’d be a beast in the sack with legs like those. I’m sure he could give a girl a good time for hours. Almost as if he can sense I’m staring, he flicks his gaze to mine and we lock eyes. I’m staring at Toby.
Today just keeps getting better. He just won’t leave me alone.
I can’t mask the way my body reacts: my pulse races, blood pressure sky rockets and heart beats uncontrollably, and my vagina has joined the band. I can’t work out with him here. I’ve got to get away.
Turning on my heels, I race over to the lockers where I stuff my bag and go to grab it only to turn and literally walk into Toby.
“You know we really should stop meeting like this; people might start talking.” He chuckles, folding his arms across his broad chest as he leans against the wall. Inhaling his scent, the cologne is the one he wore when we were together, and my favourite, but surely, he doesn’t still wear it. He used to tell me he wore it especially for me.
I wonder if he was just saying that to please me or did he wear it hoping he’d see me? I like the second much better.
I smile as I look up into his hazel coloured eyes. “What people? We’re two people who are old friends.”
He smirks. “We were more than friends, Sasha. Much more.”
Damn him and his sexy smirk. He’s saying all the things that make my body come alive, something Kyle hasn’t done in a very long time. Kyle. He’d swept me off my feet, showering me with gifts and affection from the moment we met until…well honestly, about the time he proposed to me. I know that things dwindle after the honeymoon period, or at least that’s what I’ve been told, but with Toby, he never stopped taking the time to shower me with affection, gifts and even notes of love. Even a year into our relationship. Now, standing before him, my heart and
head are fighting with one another and I don’t know which will win the battle.
“Do you want to have a coffee with me, you know, catch up?” I blurt out. I shouldn’t have suggested that.
He taps my engagement ring. “How would he feel about this?”
“Right now, I don’t give a crap how he feels about anything.” I should but I don’t. He’s the one who left me alone.
He raises his brows at me. “Trouble in paradise?”
“No, and even if there was, I don’t want to discuss it. Now, are we having coffee together or not?” I demand.
“Oh, little Miss Bossy aren’t you?” He chuckles. I point to the showers. “All right, I’m going. Meet me out front.” Making my own way to the ladies changing area and climbing beneath a shower. Going to coffee with my ex isn’t such a great idea. My head is telling me to call it off, make up some excuse, but my heart is telling me to go and talk to Toby. Hopefully I get some of the answers from fourteen years ago. I just don’t know which path is right.
Toby
I shouldn’t have approached her, I should have let her go. But when I saw those lust-filled bright blue eyes fixated on me, I couldn’t—not this time.
Damn it, I want to know why she stopped writing to me. Leaning against the outside of the building, my leg resting behind me, my gym bag slung over my shoulder, I wait for Sasha. I hadn’t expected her to ask me out to coffee, but damn, it was hot when she demanded that I join her. It’s not cheating if it’s two people meeting for a coffee, right? We’re just old friends catching up and she suggested it, not me.
“Ready to go?” her soft, sweet voice asks as she approaches me.
Glancing at her, I suddenly wish I hadn’t. With all the thoughts of her swirling in my head, her outfit causes my heart to race, breath to catch in my throat, pulse to quicken and my cock to throb hard. She’s wearing a thin cotton red top with plunging neck line, giving me a lovely view of her tits. They’ve grown since I last saw them, and damn it, I’m dying to see what she’s wearing beneath that top. Lowering my gaze, I see she’s wearing black pants and blue high heels. Maybe going for a coffee wasn’t such a great idea after all. I don’t think I’ll survive it.
“I know a great coffee place up the road. They serve the best double chocolate cupcakes with blue icing,” I suggest. I should know. Every time I’m there having a coffee, the cupcakes remind me of her.
We walk together and I’m inside my own head not saying much.
“Are you okay?” she asks.
“Me? Yeah, I’m okay. I’m just thinking about this kitten I rescued the other day when investigating something and it was in a box with rubbish. I’ve been waiting for the vet to call. It’s not my cat, but if it does belong to someone else, I’d like to see it returned,” I lie.
She raises an eyebrow at me as we stop outside the café and I can tell by her expression she can see straight through my lie, but what was I supposed to say the truth? Yeah, that’ll go down swimmingly. Opening the door to the café, I hope to distract her from my fib and show her the cupcakes.
“Oh wow! You weren’t kidding.” She smiles as her eyes widen.
“They’re really good too,” I say as we step forward.
“They look it. I think I want the one with the blue icing and the chocolate sprinkles on the top.”
“I’m surprised you haven’t seen the one with rainbow icing and the liquorice topping.” I point to where it is.
“Damn it. Now I can’t decide what I want,” she whines.
“I reckon you should choose the rainbow one,” I reply.
She nods slowly.
We are served moments later and she orders, then pays for mine as well, which I’m not expecting. We find some seats and place our number on the table to await our drinks. Pulling out a chair, I motion for her to sit first.
“Since this coffee date was your idea how about you start the conversation,” I suggest.
She plays with the end of her hair as her eyes scan the room.
Is she nervous to be sitting with me or scared we’re going to get caught by her fiancé?
Our drinks are brought over and I slide hers towards her.
Picking hers up, she takes a sip, closing her eyes as she drinks the liquid. In this moment I almost wish she was mine again; so beautiful with naturally red lips. Then I’m reminded very brutally that she isn’t, by the big, shiny rock on her left ring finger though it doesn’t seem like it’s her taste at all. She always told me she wanted a coloured stone with diamonds on either side. This ring is a plain circle shape and the diamond rather large, almost too large for her petite fingers. It’s as if he’s trying to make a statement.
As I glance lower, I see something I didn’t notice earlier. The bracelet I gave her for her birthday the night I asked her to be my girlfriend and kissed her for the first time. I also see she’s added to it over the years, but my charms are still there nonetheless.
“You still wear it?” I remark as I reach across the table to touch her wrist.
“Of course I do. I love it and always have. As you can see, I’ve added to it too. After I finished high school, I got my degree and secured a teaching job, and I travelled during the school holidays to other countries. I loved the USA and hope to return some day. Kyle however, thinks travelling is a waste of money.”
Kyle? Must be the name of her fiancé.
“I don’t think so. I’d love to travel further abroad; all I’ve done is work and pay the mortgage. The only place I’ve travelled to is Australia and even then it was to accompany Aria on her first overseas trip. I didn’t want her and Steph going alone. Call me over-protective but I had to know she’d be safe. I know Jake would’ve gone with them but he was overseas with the army at the time.”
“She’s lucky to have you as her brother. I did a lot of my travelling by myself. It would’ve been nice to have some company to share it with. How is Aria these days?” she asks, picking up her drink.
“Good, she got married last October.”
“What about you, anyone special in your life?” she asks though I can read it in her face that she really doesn’t want me to answer it.
“No, not at the moment and there hasn’t been for a long time.” Just as these words fall from my lips, Felicity the woman I had been casually seeing walks over to our table.
“Toby, fancy seeing you here,” she remarks with complete disregard for Sasha.
“Mmm…yeah, fancy that. I don’t mean to be rude, Felicity, but I’m with a friend right now, so can we talk another time?” I ask, trying to give her the brush off.
“Call me, baby.” She blows me a kiss and walks away to grab her coffee and leaves the café.
“So no one serious huh? She looked pretty serious,” Sasha says.
“She wasn’t; just a casual fling, nothing more. She became shall we say…clingy. In truth, there has been no one serious since you in my life. Sash, I missed you every day when you left, and looked forward to your letters every week.”
“Me too. I loved getting your letters, so when you stopped writing I was crushed.”
She thinks I stopped writing first?
I shake my head. “No, you’ve got that wrong. I didn’t stop writing first. You did.”
“I did not. I wrote to you every single week, telling you how much I loved you, how much I missed you and wanted to be back with you. I got nothing back, not one single letter. I assumed you’d found someone else to warm your bed at night and it crushed me.”
“Oh yeah? If you loved me so much why was your promise ring sent back? I knew our love was over then.” The moment those words come out of my mouth I regret them.
Her eyes glaze over with tears and I know I pushed her too far. “You jerk. I loved you with all my heart. I thought I’d lost that ring, or that I’d accidentally thrown it into the bin. It shattered me when I couldn’t find it. From that day forward, I never took my bracelet off. I refused to lose it like I did the ring. Now I learn it was sent back t
o you? Well, I didn’t send it back. We made promises Toby and I never broke them. But you promised to love me forever and like the silly little girl I was, I believed you.”
“I did love you. I only gave up because I thought you’d sent it back.”
“Yeah, well, looks like you didn’t love me quite as much as you said.” She points to Felicity.
“She’s got nothing on you.”
She scoffs. “I don’t believe you. You’ve turned into a jerk.” She bends, grabbing her bag. “Maybe having a coffee with you wasn’t such a good idea.”
“Sash, wait, don’t go.”
“No, Tobias, you don’t get to call me Sash anymore. But I’ll tell you this; I still wear this bracelet because there is still a place for you in my heart even after all these years. No guy has ever matched up to you, not even my fiancé. You were my everything. Now, I’m not so sure.”
With that, she exits the café and as she walks past, I see her wipe away stray tears.
Damn it! This wasn’t how this was supposed to go.
Leaning back in my chair, I start to think things over. If she didn’t send the ring back, who did? And where were her letters going, because I didn’t get them, and I know mine were all sent back. I still have them.
Either way, I’ve just fucked up any chance I had of keeping her in my life.
I’m such an idiot.
Chapter Six
Sasha
Today is the first day of school for the first term of the year. I’m excited to meet all of my students, but nervous too. Since it’s a new school, everyone will be new to me. I’d spent much of yesterday trying to get Toby out of my head which proved easier said than done. I’m still mad as hell at him for what he said and yet, my heart didn’t get the memo.
