She stroked his chest and kissed his shoulder.
‘It’s good to be alive. Great that you rescued me.’
‘Me and my trusty tyre iron.’
‘It was lucky Mary Jane brought it with her.’
He didn’t take his eyes from the screen. ‘Lucky for her that she didn’t kill him.’
He sounded grumpy, or at least unengaged, as though something was bugging him. She watched as her fingers made circles over his chest. In an effort to snap him out of it she played the sympathy card.
‘I don’t think I’ve ever been so cold in my life.’ She backed it up with an involuntary shiver.
Doherty still remained silent. Wooden. His attention remained fixed on the wall where the flat screen television was flickering with a soap that he always declared was absolute dross.
Honey thought about the interlude with John Rees. John had visited her in hospital. She’d been kept in purely for observation. John had sat awkwardly beside the bed because it wasn’t just the doctors doing the observing. Doherty was there too, grim-faced, arms folded across his chest and eyeing John as though daring him to gush with affection. She’d pointed out to him afterwards that John could not be arrested for visiting her in hospital.
The fact was, Doherty had not been amused about either John or the car accident. On the other hand she hadn’t been too happy either. Being relegated to second place in his affections behind a damaged car hadn’t exactly pumped up her ego.
There was no alternative but to tear his attention away from the television. Plan A. Confront the problem. Plan B … well, she’d work through plan B if plan A fell flat.
‘Right! Can I have your undivided attention, please!’
First, she threw back the bedclothes.
Secondly, she got between him and the TV, her knees to either side of his, thighs apart.
Bearing in mind the fact that she was wearing nothing but her favourite perfume, it came as something of a surprise that his gaze stayed fixed on her face. Not that he never looked at her face; it was just that at certain moments he was partial to scrutinising other bits of her body.
‘OK. I’m sorry about your car. I’m also sorry about flirting with John Rees. But you have to understand that you telling Ahmed that you loved your car more than anything else was a definite contributor to my flirting. I mean, Ahmed wouldn’t lie about a thing like that, now would he? He’s about to become a married man.’
Doherty stared at her, lips slightly apart. Funny, he was still looking into her eyes. He’d often told her that he loved her eyes, but they hadn’t necessarily been top of his list of admirable parts of her body.
‘You’re wrong.’
Now it was her turn to look surprised.
‘I am? Which part of that statement am I wrong about?’
‘Ahmed about to become a married man. His family have brought over half a dozen possible brides for him to meet. He hasn’t married any of them.’
Honey’s jaw dropped. ‘Really?’
‘He wants to be an actor.’
Honey decided she wasn’t really interested in Ahmed’s career prospects. First and foremost she wanted to know where she stood with the love of her life.
She sighed, her breasts rising and falling with purposeful intent. Doherty still looked wooden. Being downbeat wasn’t normally part of her makeup, but his manner was pushing her that way.
In the end she felt beaten. ‘Oh well. We all have our hopes and dreams. Where would we be without them, huh?’
Doherty chewed his lips as though he were thinking something through. Lashes fluttered over half-closed eyes.
Her hormones did acrobatics. Those little tell-tale signs convinced her that he was about to regain his former interest in the rest of her body.
She waited.
Nothing happened.
What was she reading wrong?
‘You’re deep in thought. Do you want call it a day?’
He shook his head.
‘Are you ill?’
He shook his head again. ‘Just nervous.’
She’d never known Doherty to be nervous. He was her big brave policeman; well not too big. Just right in fact.
‘Anything I can help you with?’
She felt like melting when he raised his eyelids. Those eyes. They took her back to the first time they’d met. Casper St John Gervais, chairman of the hotels association, had lumbered her with the job of Crime Liaison Officer. Bribed with the promise of business being put her way, she’d accepted the post. Nothing much would occur, she’d thought, but it had. An American tourist had gone missing from a downmarket guest house. They’d clashed at first, though not for long. But this. Was this the end?
‘Your boobs are good,’ he said suddenly. ‘Perhaps if I concentrate on them rather than your face I can say what I want to say.’
Honey straightened. ‘Like hypnosis?’
‘Could be,’ he said, dropping his gaze from her face to her breasts.
‘Do you want me to swing them? Like they do with a pendulum or a pocket watch?’
He shook his head, his eyes flickering out to her then back in to some very deep thoughts. ‘OK. Here goes. Honey. My car is all fixed which means we are all fixed. We’re back to where we were. The two of us against the world. OK?’
She nodded. ‘Seems OK to me.’’
The Honey Driver Mysteries
Accent Press Crime
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Blood and Broomsticks
A Honey Driver Mystery
Published by Accent Press Ltd – 2014
ISBN 9781909520363
Copyright © Jean G Goodhind 2014
The right of Jean G Goodhind to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
The story contained within this book is a work of fiction. Names and characters are the product of the author’s imagination and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, electrostatic, magnetic tape, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the written permission of the publishers: Accent Press Ltd, Ty Cynon House, Navigation Park, Abercynon, CF45 4SN
Printed and bound in the UK
Cover design by Joelle Brindley
Blood and Broomsticks Page 25
