He sucked in a deep breath and opened his eyes. “I was a tool. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it.”
No response.
“I know you’d never do that to me or to anyone else.”
No response.
He couldn’t even hear her breathing.
“I’ve never talked to any woman I was involved with about the AOS or that night. It’s not just you.”
That time a sharp inhale was his reply.
“Hell. I don’t mean it like that. You’re not just any woman.” He lifted his gaze to the sky. The stars were hidden by misty drizzling rainclouds. The back of his head banged against the door. A jagged laugh caught in his throat. He’d thought it’d just be a case of him putting on the contrite male act, but he knew now that wouldn’t be enough.
“That night…” He licked suddenly dry lips. “It was a lot like tonight. Misty rain, poor visibility, freezing fucking cold. The call came in just after one in the morning and the squad left headquarters twenty-five minutes later. There was nothing unusual about the initial emergency call—a reported domestic disturbance. But the constables first on the scene were threatened by a male with a rifle, so the Wellington AOS was deployed to take control of the situation.”
Cordon, contain, appeal; the AOS mode of operation. Initially everything had run smoothly with the evacuation of the surrounding houses and police setting up a safe perimeter around the property and the suburban street. Senior Constable Miller had made contact with the suspect, and information was trickling in.
“The suspect was Tristan Howard, a forty-two-year-old mechanic who’d lost his job two weeks earlier and had only moved into the second-floor apartment a month before that. A neighbor thought the woman’s name was Mandy, and she was Howard’s girlfriend, but none of the people interviewed knew anything about her.” He let out a soft, humorless snort. “They kept to themselves, was the general consensus.”
Not knowing your neighbor was a cardinal sin in Oban. One of the many differences between city and rural life.
He continued in a low monotone, describing the positions of his squad and the timeline of the negotiating standoff, which had lasted nearly three hours before they’d gotten a glimpse of the hostage.
“Howard dragged her to the window, using her and the frame as a shield, a hunting knife pressed to her throat so snipers couldn’t get a clear shot. He wouldn’t admit to being high on drugs or alcohol; in fact, he refused to engage with the negotiator at all. We didn’t really know what or who we were dealing with, but the woman was in a life-threatening situation. Something I could’ve prevented.”
His last words fell hollowly to the ground, slid under the door, and elicited a reaction. Clothing rustled.
“What do you mean?” she asked.
He shook his head, the weight bearing down on him making his movement slow and jerky. “When the woman started screaming inside the house—a kind of scream that can only mean physical pain—the OC ordered us to move. And when we move, we go in hard and fast. Jim and Andy took out the front door, Mike, Dale, and I, the back, with Mike and Dale ahead, all of us hollering at Howard to give it up. Something along the deck caught my eye before I followed them inside. I backtracked and saw the offender struggling out of a low window with his rifle. He saw me at the same time I saw him, and he swung the weapon up. There wasn’t time to hesitate or light enough to discern whether or not his finger was on the trigger. I was trained for it—using necessary force to protect innocents when there’s no other course of action. So I took the shot.”
He heard her sharp inhale. “I remember that case now.”
“Yeah, the media was all over that story. Fortunately only a small percentage of AOS callouts end so brutally.”
“What he did to that woman was brutal. You prevented him from hurting anyone else.”
Noah emptied his lungs on a long drawn-out breath. “Mike and Jim found her tied up in the hallway. Mike had been a paramedic before he joined the police force, and he knew right away she couldn’t be saved. Howard had severed her carotid artery and stabbed her three times with his hunting knife. She bled out in front of them. It wasn’t pretty. In the organized chaos that followed it wasn’t until the coroner arrived and the hallway was lit up like a stadium that I caught a glimpse of Mandy’s face.”
“You knew her?”
“No.” His gut clenched then went numb as old memories broke free and rose darkly to the surface. “Not exactly.”
Tilly seemed to sense he needed time to gather his thoughts. But if he gathered them too much he wouldn’t speak them out loud. He’d never told anyone about the woman with red dreadlocks. Why he suddenly wanted to tell Tilly, he didn’t know. Maybe it was because he didn’t have to see her face, the way someone would confess their sins to a priest.
“That afternoon I was running late and I didn’t finish my shift on time. When I finally checked my phone, there were five increasingly pissed off messages from Hayley. I’d completely forgotten we were supposed to attend her brother’s birthday dinner and I’d be even later now that I had to go home and change into something suitable for a posh restaurant. As I left the station I noticed a woman with striking red-dyed dreadlocks sitting near one of the concrete pillars. Her cigarette was burned down almost to the filter and I observed her, while reading through another of Hayley’s messages, shooting quick, nervous glances at the station doors. It didn’t occur to me, even while I watched her watching me, that the woman wasn’t just jittery. She was genuinely scared.”
He chuffed out a humorless laugh. “Being jittery wasn’t unusual. Not many people look happy when they walk into a police station. I was late, and I knew there’d be drama about it, but I still walked over and asked if she was okay. She took another drag on her smoke then ground it out. She told me she was, but she wouldn’t meet my eyes. I was about to ask if I could help in any way, when Hayley called. I turned my back on the woman to talk—a forty-seconds-at-most conversation to try and calm Hayley down. When I turned back, the woman wasn’t there. Maybe she’d walked into the station, in which case she was the front desk’s problem. Maybe she’d just changed her mind. I dismissed her from my mind and went home. The next time I saw her she had a knife to her throat.”
Another rustle from behind the door, and suddenly it clicked open. A kiss of warmth from inside the house caressed his neck, and the delicious scent that was Tilly’s unique blend filled his nose. She kneeled behind him and wrapped her arms around his shoulders, pressing her mouth to his throat in the softest of kisses.
His heart slammed around his chest over and over. Could she feel the rapid bump of his pulse against her lips? He swallowed hard. “If I’d let Hayley’s call go to voice mail and just taken the time to talk to her…”
“You hold yourself accountable, but no one could predict the outcome of that tragic day,” she said. “Even if she’d come to the station to make a complaint against Howard, you can’t say with certainty things would’ve turned out differently.”
“My head agrees. But my heart…”
“Still hurts for Mandy.” She rubbed her palm over the spot in question. “Come inside now. It’s cold.” Backing up the statement with a shiver, her breasts pressed sweetly into his back.
If he followed her inside, he wouldn’t be able to keep his hands—or mouth—to himself. Better if he didn’t crawl out of the dark and take what he needed just so he could get another taste of her warmth and light.
As if sensing the turmoil churning inside him, she stood and, with surprising strength, gripped his wrist and tugged. Considering his willpower to resist her was at an all-time low, it didn’t take much effort for her to pull him to his feet.
He framed her face in his hands. “You deserve more than being a distraction for my brokenness.”
Her nose crinkled and she placed her hands over his. “You’re not broken, just a little dented and battle scarred. And am I really just a distraction?” Her gaze challenged him to push beyond his comfort zone a
nd admit the truth.
He brushed his mouth against hers, reveling in the way her pouty lower lip clung briefly to his. “No. You’re everything good and bright and real.” A kiss to the corner of her mouth, which curved upward. “I think you’re my unicorn.”
“Your what?” Confusion and laughter danced in her voice.
The sound of it peeled away some of the darkness threatening to overwhelm him and he gazed down at her beautiful smile. There wasn’t time for explanations, or, at least, he didn’t have the temperament to resist claiming her mouth for a space-and-time-bending kiss. Like trying to catch sunbeams, he sought solace in one deep, drugging kiss after another. The heat of her tongue dancing along his, the silky texture of her hair caught between his fingers, the feel of her breasts molding to his chest—he was becoming lost in this woman.
His woman.
He backed her step by step into her house, kicking the door shut behind them. Somehow they made it into Tilly’s room, minus a few items of clothing discarded on the way. He wasn’t even certain they’d make it to her bed when he peeled off the last of her clothes to leave her standing in a red lace bra, matching panties, and those sexy knee-high boots.
“Detour,” he muttered, pinning her to the back of her bedroom door.
His lips and tongue took the most pleasurable detour over the bump of her collarbone to the swell of her breasts playing peekaboo beneath her bra. He cupped the underside of one breast, leveraging it slightly upward until he could close his mouth wetly over a lace-covered nipple. Tilly moaned, pushing herself hard against his palm as he teased and suckled the sensitive peak into a rigid little tip. He repeated the attention to her other breast, then continued his detour south. He flicked his tongue into her belly button—which made her giggle and squirm—then traversed down to gently clamp his lips over lace and needy woman. She cried out, grabbing a handful of his hair to keep him there.
As if anything other than removing him handcuffed from the room would keep him from exploring Tilly’s delicious body.
He drew down her panties, letting them pool around the ankles of her boots. Then he feasted with lips and tongue, and when she whimpered for more, his fingers. She came for him, pulsing and shuddering, only his hands clamped either side of her hips preventing her knees from buckling. That and her death grip in his hair. He smiled as she continued to spasm against the pressure of his circling tongue. What were a few less hairs when you could drive your woman out of her mind?
He gathered up her limp body and carried her to the bed. She made a half-hearted attempt to unzip a boot, but he stilled her hand with a grin. “Lose the bra, but leave the boots.”
She smiled up at him and flicked the front catch of her bra, releasing her incredible tits. “You’re the boss.”
Noah stripped off the rest of his clothes in double time then followed the direction of her pointed finger to find protection in her nightstand. He suited up and crawled onto the bed, sinking into her welcoming arms and even more welcoming body. Guiding himself between her legs, he parted her slick folds until he pushed inside her—just a little. Just enough to give them both a taste of how perfect they were when connected so intimately. She hooked her legs over his hips and crossed her ankles, using her heels against his butt to pull him deeper inside her.
Plunging into heaven, he felt her muscles squeeze around him. God, the sensation was incredible. Addictive. Powerful enough to metaphorically bring him to his knees.
He thrust again and her eyes widened, then hooded into sensual bliss as she stared up at him. He kissed her throat and the creamy soft skin just above her breasts. When she moaned, he took her mouth again in another blisteringly hot kiss.
Her fingers trailed up his triceps and cupped his shoulder blades, urging him with the rocking of her hips to move within her. He obliged but kept his rhythm slow, drawing out every ounce of pleasure at the delicious friction they created.
You’re not just creating a little feel-good friction, a little voice whispered from a dark corner of his brain. This is not screwing or humping or banging, where the only goal is to reach orgasm. You know what this is. But it’d been such a long time since he’d made love to a woman, he couldn’t be sure his dick wasn’t just messing with his brain.
Noah pulled out of her and guided Tilly onto her stomach, and then to her knees. He bowed over her, caressing her breasts and reentering her wet warmth at a deeper, snugger angle. She moaned low in her throat and pumped her hips back, greedily taking everything he offered. Moving from breasts to her parted thighs, he found her swollen center and stroked her until she bucked beneath him.
He stared down at the graceful sweep of her spine, her smooth skin and her hair spilling over her shoulders. In this position—like rutting animals—surely this wasn’t lovemaking? His gut clenched and once again he pulled out of her. She looked at him over her shoulder, and without saying a word, rose upright and gave his chest a push. He flipped onto his back and she straddled him.
Sex. Really great, really acrobatic sex, but just sex. They could work through the entire Karma Sutra, and it would still be just sex.
Tilly sank down onto him. Of their own accord, his hands settled on her hips, fingertips digging lightly into her soft flesh. She braced her palms on his chest and rocked up and back, using her internal muscles to sheath him so sweetly that his breathing hitched. He was helpless beneath her. She rode him, taking him deep within her until he couldn’t tell where he ended and she began, or who was making love to whom.
Her eyes met his, and he couldn’t look away. She was so beautiful, but that wasn’t the reason he couldn’t wrench his gaze from hers. Intense pleasure caused her eyes to glaze over and she bit down on that plump lower lip that he loved to nibble on.
This.
Her hips moved faster as he helped her along, slamming up into her.
Wasn’t.
Body bowing, nails raking his chest, Tilly cried out his name, her body gripping his as if it never intended to release him. He was good with that. And damn, but he couldn’t stop smiling as she continued to quake around him.
Just.
She sank onto him and he gathered her close, stroking her hair as she panted into his neck. Hard as an iron rod inside her still, he was content, against every male instinct, to just hold her.
Sex.
Tilly had other ideas. She rolled onto her side, giving him a flirtatious eyebrow wriggle and slapping a palm against her butt cheek.
“We’re not done yet. Spear me with your horn, unicorn boy.”
Laughter bubbled out of him. The sound was a little odd in a bedroom setting, but so right between the two of them.
You’re everything good and bright and real.
He buried himself inside her, tearing a groan of pleasure from his chest and making her gasp. He took her, and she took him. Over and over, until he poured himself into her and lost himself in everything that was good and bright and real.
Chapter 18
From Mary Duncan’s secret journal:
February 19th, 1972
No matter how many times you tell yourself that you’re over your first love, it isn’t until you run into them face-to-face, six years after they broke your heart, that you realize you’ve been lying to yourself. Today I walked into the medical center to find Jim and two of his three kids sitting in the waiting room. Murphy’s law; there was only one spare seat in the sitting room and it was next to Jim. I was tempted to turn and run away rather than make polite small talk, but I thrust my shoulders back, smiled politely, and took the seat beside him. I admit to a small amount of satisfaction knowing I looked polished and maybe even pretty, while Jim had baggy dark circles under his eyes and I’m pretty sure the baby in his arms had spit up on his shirt.
Actually, that was unkind. You see, while I tried not to think about him, every now and then I’d hear tidbits of news from Stewart Island. Gossip, really. For a while, I hated him with the same passion I’d loved him. He got his childhood sweetheart pr
egnant and married her. It certainly didn’t take him long to get over me, unlike the months it took me to get over him.
Though, tell the truth and shame the devil, I never really got over him.
Next thing I knew, Jim and his wife—a more suitable girl named Maata— had popped out Jim Junior, then two years later a baby girl, and two years after that Maata fell pregnant again. I hope you believe me, dear journal, when I tell you I derived no pleasure in hearing that Maata died two days after their son was delivered.
I had come to some sort of acceptance by this stage, knowing that Jim was no longer mine, and my heart hurt for him and his three motherless children. Of course, I intended my sympathy to only be shown from afar. I did the only thing I could think of to help him, and that was contacting Oban’s grocery store and setting up an anonymous donation of credit for him. A newborn’s need for formula, plus all the other baby paraphernalia, would put a strain on any family. Especially a man who now had to learn to be both mum and dad to this little baby.
So today I sat beside Jim and took up the role of a concerned but distant acquaintance. He didn’t see me at first because he was both jiggling the grizzling baby on his knee and trying to pretend interest in the toy his daughter was showing him. When he glanced up and saw me, his eyes widened, and then a huge smile crossed his face. It was the smile of both my sweetest dreams and my worst nightmares.
“Mary.” The pleasure in his voice was unmistakable. “I didn’t know you still lived in Invercargill. How have you been?”
“Just peachy,” I said, then realized that might sound a little sarcastic, so I cleared my throat and added my most sincere smile. “I’m now head secretary, and I really love my job.”
“Do you still live in town?”
I nodded, but he didn’t see the motion as the little boy grabbed his cheeks with two chubby hands and pulled his face toward him. “Um, yes. I’m sharing a house with some friends, saving up to put a deposit on my own house.”
Bending The Rules: Stewart Island Book 10 Page 22
