by Meg Benjamin
His office phone rang just as he was picking up his briefcase. Damn Doralee! She hadn’t put the phone onto voice mail before she left. Hilton grabbed the receiver. “Pittman.”
“Mr. Mayor?”
The woman’s voice sounded vaguely familiar, that slightly exaggerated drawl like someone doing a bad Scarlett O’Hara imitation. “Ms. Hastings? Is that you?”
“Why yes. What a great memory for voices you have, sir.”
Hilton gritted his teeth. Margaret Hastings was one of the most irritating of Konigsburg’s shop owners. Doubly so because behind that simper was a mind like a steel trap and a vindictive streak that was even wider than Hilton’s. “I’m the only one here right now, so you might want to call back tomorrow morning, Ms. Hastings. I’m afraid I can’t do much without my staff.” Tomorrow at least he could foist her off on Doralee.
“But it’s you I need to speak to, Mr. Pittman. After all, you’re the ultimate authority to appeal to in Konigsburg.”
Hilton recognized soft soap when he heard it, but he wasn’t averse to being flattered, particularly after the day he’d had. “Well, I’ll help you if I can, Ms. Hastings. What seems to be the problem?”
“Corruption.” Her voice dropped a half-octave. “Police corruption. It may not seem like much now, but I thought it was my duty to bring it to your attention. Before we had another…situation like we had before with Chief Brody.”
Hilton closed his eyes. Margaret Hastings had once dated Ham Linklatter. If this was going to be a little post-breakup revenge, he wanted out now. “Now, Ms. Hastings, I’m sure all of our officers try their best. Perhaps you misunderstood the situation.”
“Oh, but it wasn’t an officer. It was the chief himself. And I didn’t misunderstand anything.”
Hilton lowered himself slowly into his desk chair, allowing himself a brief shit-eating grin. Thank you, Jesus! “The chief, you say? Well, of course that’s different. You go right ahead, Ms. Hasting, and tell me all about it.”
Chapter Seventeen
The Dew Drop was empty when Erik got there, after he’d changed out of his uniform. Just his luck—the one time he really wanted to listen to Wonder bitch about something, he wasn’t around to do it.
He slid onto a barstool and waited for Ingstrom to bring him his Dr. Pepper. For the first time in a couple of years, he felt like getting roaring drunk, but he didn’t want to give Linklatter any excuse to pick him up.
He stared down at the dark brown liquid in his glass and imagined it was bourbon. Ingstrom wouldn’t even blink if he ordered a shot of Maker’s Mark to go along with the Dr. Pepper.
A bright ball of rage burned just below his rib cage like a glowing ember. A shot of bourbon was all he needed to fan the flames, turn the ember into something hotter, something a lot more dangerous. He knew those flames. He knew what they could do, what they would consume.
Stop it, Erik, that hurts! No, Erik, don’t! Leave me alone, just leave me alone! The soundtrack of his childhood.
Erik closed his eyes, breathing slowly. He wished mightily that at least one of his brothers was around, just to reassure him that those times were over. Even if he wasn’t ready to tell them about what was going on. Although he knew he’d have to. Eventually. If he was going to screw up again, he wanted to give them some advance warning.
Not that it would be much of a surprise. It would simply convince them he was the same person he’d always been—the nightmare big brother. The bully who didn’t know enough to protect his own kin. The half-assed punk who’d blown every opportunity that had ever come his way. The loser.
And deep down, he knew that punk still lurked inside him somewhere. He’d done everything he could to make him go away. Maybe it hadn’t been enough.
Erik sighed. Obviously, he wasn’t in any shape to be sitting in a bar right then. He dropped a dollar bill on the counter and headed out the door.
He swung by the Coffee Corral on his way home to pick up one of Al’s burgers and some fries, and on the off chance that somebody from his family would be in the dining room. His lousy luck held. Nobody was around, and the food did nothing to calm the burning in his gut.
Back at the apartment, he shared the kitchen table with Arthur, who wasn’t interested in hearing about his troubles. Just as well. By then Erik was thoroughly sick of self-pity.
Around nine, after he’d had the time to watch a couple of witless TV shows and read the Austin American-Statesman, the doorbell for the outside door rang. He glanced out the window to the street and saw Morgan.
“What’s up?” Erik herded her in the door, feeling a quick rush of adrenaline. Maybe the day could be salvaged after all.
Morgan picked up a large pet crate from the doorstep. “We had a break in the labeling. I thought I’d come get Arthur.”
Correction. The day was just as sucky as it had seemed.
He followed her up the stairs, keeping back so that the pet crate wouldn’t connect with his nose. Arthur thumped down off the table as they walked in the door, regarding her with suspicious eyes.
“You don’t have to take him home.” He reached down to scratch Arthur’s ears. “He’s doing okay here.”
“Okay? He’s creating chaos. And enjoying it.”
He shrugged. “So?”
Morgan’s lips spread in a faint grin. “Besides, he’s already grown back some fuzz. I think it’s safe to bring him back home now.”
Erik regarded Arthur critically. A fine layer of yellow fluff coated his rear quarters. “That’s not much fuzz.”
“It’s enough. Anyway, I thought you’d be glad to get rid of him.” She opened the pet crate.
Arthur promptly scuttled under the couch.
“Oops.” Erik tried not to grin. Way to go, cat!
Morgan blew a curl off her forehead with an irritated breath. “Arthur, you’re not helping.”
“On the contrary,” Erik murmured, sliding an arm around her waist. “He’s helping me a lot.”
She raised her gaze to his, eyes narrowing. “Ciro and Esteban aren’t finished labeling the sangiovese yet. I should get back. They need me.” Her perfect teeth nibbled on her lower lip.
His breath caught in his throat, and he felt an ache deep in his groin. “They’re not the only ones. I could use a little help here myself.”
Morgan’s eyes widened. She placed her palms on his chest. “Keep talking.”
“I’ve got some mint chocolate chip ice cream.” He swallowed, feeling the warmth of her hands move through him, then reached down to gather her into his arms, pulling her taut against his body, feeling the fire in his belly slowly change from burning to heat.
Her mouth was a warm, wet delight. His hands dropped to her buttocks, feeling the tight muscles contract. Oh, yeah. Definitely the best way to go.
She pulled back for a moment, staring up with eyes the color of night. “You think I can be had for a dish of ice cream?”
“Nope.” Erik took a deep breath. “But I can.”
Morgan sat cross-legged on Erik’s bed, watching him eat ice cream. Lit by the dim bedroom lamp, his profile looked carved from stone, his nose and chin sharp and craggy. His hair, grown slightly longer than his usual military cut, brushed across his forehead in a dark wave. Naked he looked like something primal—the slabs of muscle on his chest covered with a thick pelt of dark hair that extended down his belly. She loved the feeling of his body against hers, the sense of both danger and protection in those broad shoulders, those long arms, those narrow, supple fingers.
Something was bothering him. She didn’t know how she knew, but she was sure. She’d never seen a man more skilled at keeping his emotions under wraps than Erik Toleffson. Even in bed, he held something in check. He was the most amazing lover she’d ever had, but she wasn’t sure she’d had him, really. And at the moment something was going on beneath that deceptively calm exterior.
She reached for the ice-cream carton and his spoon. “Did you go to the Dew Drop after work?”
He nodded. “For a little while.”
“Anybody there?”
“Nobody I wanted to talk to.”
“You didn’t stay?”
He shook his head, his lips moving into a dry smile. “I go for the people, not the atmosphere.”
Morgan took a breath, wondering if now was really the time to dig deeper. “Could I ask you a really nosy question?”
His smile became guarded. “Ask away.”
“Are you an alcoholic?”
He watched her for a moment, his eyes flat. Then he shrugged. “Not in the usual way, I guess.”
“What do you mean?”
“I’m not a binge drinker. I can stop and start. And I could go without drinking if I needed to—I did in Iraq.”
“But you’ve stopped drinking altogether now.”
He shrugged again. “I decided it was better for me not to. I went through AA, and the process worked for me.”
“Oh.” She stared down at the mint chocolate chip, trying to form her questions into something coherent.
“I’m what you call a mean drunk.” His lips twisted slightly. “Like that guy in the story, the one with two personalities.”
“Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde?”
He nodded. “That’s the one. Only when I drink, the ol’ Doc goes missing sometimes. I’d rather stay in control.”
Control. It was the right word, now that she thought about it. He’d need to be the one in control. Always. “What’s bothering you, Erik? Did something happen today?”
His gaze fastened on the spoon in her hand, but she had the feeling he wasn’t really looking at it. His lips thinned as he thought. Maybe as he decided whether to tell her what was going on. “I went to see Pittman,” he said finally. “Friesenhahn warned me he was after my butt, told me to go in and make nice with him to see if I could head him off.”
She tried to picture Erik making nice with anybody, least of all Hilton Pittman. She couldn’t see it. “What happened?”
“Friesenhahn’s right. He’s after me. But there’s no way I can head him off or settle with him. He’s going to keep digging through my life until he finds something he can use, and then he’s going to sink me.”
Morgan stared at him. He still wasn’t meeting her eyes. “He’s going to try to sink you.”
He took a breath, finally looking at her straight on. “No. He’ll do it. There’s enough stuff in my background to give him all the ammunition he needs. All he has to do is look, and he’ll find it.”
She swallowed, careful not to look away. “You mean the stuff you did when you were a teenager?”
Erik turned away again, staring out the window at the darkness. “More than that. I’m not a nice guy, Morgan. The rest of my family—my brothers, my father—they’re all nice guys. I’m not. I’ve made my living pushing people around. Most of them deserved it, but it wasn’t pretty. You do what you have to do, but it’s not…like people think it is. When you start dragging that stuff into the light, it gets messy.”
She stared at him for a moment, trying to see what was happening behind the blankness of his expression. “You’re a cop. It’s not like you work with a great class of people.”
His lips moved into a dry smile. “Still, most people don’t like to see what it takes to stop the bad guys sometimes. And I’ve always got Mr. Hyde looking over my shoulder. Waiting for an opening.”
Morgan shook her head. “I’ve never seen you lose control, Erik. Ever. I mean, I’ve seen Ham Linklatter have hissy fits more times than I’ve seen you get angry. What are you so afraid of?”
He turned back to her, running his fingers lightly along the side of her hip. “Mr. Hyde is a tricky son of a bitch. You think he’s gone—you think you’ve got him licked. And then all of a sudden he’s right there breathing down your neck.” He closed his eyes. “All through my childhood I just let him run. Whenever I felt like pounding somebody, I did. Ask my brothers—they’ll tell you I was the big brother from hell. What I mainly remember about it was being angry most of the time, and letting that anger run whenever it suited me. In the army I learned how to control it, but it never goes away. I mean, I could happily have pounded Pittman into the carpet this afternoon. Mr. Hyde was panting to go.”
She rested her hand on his. “But you didn’t. You walked away.”
He turned toward her, his eyes fathomless again. “This time I did. Tomorrow, who knows? It’s always there, Morgan. Mr. Hyde—he’s always there.”
Morgan moved her hand to his face, tracing his jaw with her fingers. “But so is Dr. Jekyll. Maybe you’re not a nice guy, but you’re a good man, Erik Toleffson. I believe that.”
His eyes closed as he turned to kiss her fingertips, lightly. “Thank you, Ms. Barrett.”
“For what?”
“For being somebody I can talk to.” Erik gave her one of his half-smiles, one corner of his mouth moving up.
“Anytime, Chief.” She leaned forward, brushing her lips against his. “Anytime at all.”
Erik wrapped his arms around her waist, pushing her back against the softness of the bed. She could feel the hardness of his arousal, nudging between her legs. Apparently, conversation was over for the night. And she didn’t mind a bit.
Erik managed to get to the office by eight thirty the next morning, but it was a struggle. On the other hand, thanks to Morgan, he no longer felt like using Linklatter for target practice.
Nando had left a pile of printouts about illegal dumping in his mailbox before taking his day off. Erik figured he’d read through them at some point if things ever slowed down enough in the office to allow him some reading time.
Peavey had picked up a teenage graffiti artist who’d marked up the middle school basketball court. Helen passed on a handful of permits for his signature. Linklatter, wonder of wonders, found a stolen car on Milam. True, the car was parked, and there was no sign of the thief. But it was still the most actual police work he’d ever seen Linklatter do.
Erik himself fielded calls from TCEQ and Powell, who had information from his ranch hands about mysterious trucks in the back country. All in all, a busy morning.
A few minutes after noon, he got a call from Pittman’s secretary, Doralee. “Chief, I thought you’d like to know you’re on the agenda for the city council meeting next week.” She sounded like she was keeping her voice low on purpose.
“On the agenda?” He frowned. “I didn’t ask to be on the agenda.”
“No sir,” Doralee muttered. “You’re not on as a speaker. I mean you’re an agenda item. He asked me to put your name on.”
Erik didn’t need to ask who “he” was. Pittman. Busy man, our mayor. “Thanks, Doralee. I appreciate it.”
“No problem. You might want to talk to Horace Rankin, Chief.”
He sat staring at the phone after Doralee hung up. He had a very good idea why Pittman had put his name on the agenda. He’d found the smoking gun he’d been looking for—Erik was even fairly sure he knew what it was. And of course Pittman would make it work. He was going to be fired.
Friesenhahn would not be pleased.
Nando was sitting in the tasting room at Cedar Creek watching Kit when Morgan got there a little after noon. She assumed it was his day off, given that he was out of uniform. Hard to believe he’d spend the day watching Kit pour wine. Of course, “watching Kit” was the operative phrase there.
Right now she was pouring a glass of red for a tourist dressed in jeans and a bright green Konigsburg T-shirt. The tourist’s eyes seemed fastened on Kit’s breasts, and he was grinning. Nando looked like he was considering how satisfying it would be to push the tourist’s nose through the back of his head.
Morgan placed the plastic pet crate next to the office and opened the wire mesh door. After a moment, Arthur emerged, giving her a dark look. He really hadn’t wanted to leave Erik’s apartment. It had taken both of them to capture him in a towel and then pour him into the carrier. He’d spent the entire drive back to Cedar Creek complai
ning loudly.
After a moment, he stalked across the room, sauntering by Nando’s foot, sending Skeeter and Fred skittering to the far corners. Wimps. Right now, Arthur didn’t look like much of a threat. His hind quarters were covered with a fine yellow down, extending up his tail to the puff of hair at the top. Morgan couldn’t believe any self-respecting dog would be frightened of a cat who looked like that.
She ducked into her apartment to get a bag of dry cat food. Arthur gave his bowl a sniff, then moved to his traditional spot on the doormat.
“Afternoon.” Nando shifted on the barstool as she approached, draping a paper napkin across his lap. Not much in the way of camouflage.
“Hi. So what do you think? Doesn’t Arthur look a lot better?”
Nando blinked at her. “He looked worse before?”
“Well, he’s had a few days of pampering. Erik’s been keeping him until he regrew some fur. Chief Toleffson, I mean. He was keeping Arthur. I brought him back this morning, but he has to stay inside until he grows back a little more fuzz.” Morgan felt her face flush pink. Geez, could she be any more obvious?
Nando grinned. “Hard to picture Toleffson pampering anything.”
“He did an excellent job. He really took care of him. Arthur looks like he’s gained another five pounds.” God, now she sounded like the world’s prissiest Sunday school teacher.
She glanced up. Nando had gone back to watching Kit. Oh well, she’d probably be doing the same thing if Erik were standing behind that bar.
Erik waited until late afternoon to head for Cedar Creek. He hadn’t done anything about Pittman and his plans yet—he didn’t know what he could do, if it came to that. Talking to Horace Rankin might help, but he didn’t want to go to the animal clinic to do it, where he’d be seen by half the town as well as his baby brother. He wasn’t ready to involve the family in this. Hell, he might never be ready for that, although he needed to let them know what was happening.
