by Jill Shalvis
She looked around Russell’s office, which held a tiny desk, two filing cabinets filled to overflowing, and enough room to stand.
Nowhere to sleep.
Knowing she’d stalled as long as she could, she got up to go and opened the top desk drawer to grab her paycheck. But Russell hadn’t written it, and one glance at the balance scrawled in his checkbook told her why. He was short again. He’d left her an envelope with half of what he owed her in cash, and a note that he’d get her the rest by the end of the week. Oh boy.
Things were going to be okay.
But she didn’t know how. She moved to the office window and looked out. She could see the pier from here. The Ferris wheel was turning. The trees lining the street were swaying. She knew if she opened the window, the breeze would be scented with an intoxicating combo of sea salt, pine trees, and hope.
She craved that. The fact was Lucky Harbor gave off a quiet serenity and strength, and she craved that too. She’d grown up in smoky, noisy, colorful lounges and bars. Mimi Winters had a long work history, from waitress to “dancer,” and then back to waitressing when it got too hard on her body. She might not have been all that good with money, but she was good with love. Some would argue too good, as she’d rarely met a man she didn’t fall for. But when there’d been trouble—and there had been trouble—Mimi had always come through for her girls, and together they’d handled whatever had come up.
Ali had gotten good at handling things, real good. This was just another of those times. Needing to connect to someone who loved her, she pulled out her cell phone and texted both her mom and sister with: Missing you, how’s things?
Harper replied right away. Got a hot date with Lenny. Remember Lenny? He’s hot as ever and running his dad’s plumbing business now.
Mimi’s response was just as fast. Ali-gator! Miss your pretty face! Gotta run, caught some OT to help cover rent. Oh and I’m taking an online business class that’s gonna change everything, you’ll see.
In Mimi’s world, there was always something that was going to change everything. And the thing was, Mimi honestly believed it. Optimism was one of her most endearing qualities, but it also left Ali as the only realistic one in the family. She looked in her envelope again and worked some fancy math before texting her mom back. Got some extra this month. I’ll send.
Mimi’s response was immediate: You’re an angel. What would I do without you?
Exactly what Ali worried about.
Luke woke up with a start, heart thundering in his chest, the vision of a drowned Isabel Reyes crystal clear in his head. Her hair had been floating behind her in a terrible parody of beauty, eyes open in permanent terror, skin so pale as to be translucent.
He’d been there when they’d pulled her body from the water, but he’d seen plenty of dead bodies before. It wasn’t the image haunting him now so much as the failure to save her.
It was pitch black in the room, but he didn’t need a light to remember where he was. In hell. He sat straight up. It was dark outside. He’d slept all day.
Scrubbing his hands over his face, he let his wits catch up with him. He would’ve rolled over and closed his eyes to take the rest of the sleep he still needed, but his stomach rumbled in protest. Damn. He reached for his phone and saw he had messages. No big surprise there.
His commander, wanting him to get his ass back to San Francisco in one week, not the three Luke had asked for, because “vacation time was for pussies”—not to mention that it left him dealing with the “media shitstorm” on his own. His mom, reminding him that sometimes things happened for a reason. His dad, telling him to work through it and stay strong. Last was Jack’s message, suggesting that Luke not read the news or turn on the TV.
So of course Luke went straight to the browser app on his phone and brought up the news. Yep, the media storm was still raging, with people blaming the DA and the entire SFPD.
And Luke, of course.
That was okay. Luke blamed Luke too.
He was starving. He slid off the bed and staggered up the creaky stairs and into the kitchen. He could drive into town, but he’d have to get dressed, and plus, he had no idea where he’d left his keys. He rarely did. Without turning on the light, he pulled open the refrigerator door.
He had no idea what he was expecting. He hadn’t yet stocked any food. He hadn’t thought that far ahead. Hadn’t thought of anything other than getting away to hear himself think.
Or better yet, not think.
But there was bottled water, milk, eggs, cheese, luncheon meats, apples, oranges, and—hitting the jackpot—beer. A plate on the middle shelf had a colorful note stuck right on the top of it, from Ali.
He’d nearly forgotten about her.
Curious, he pulled out the plate. An omelet. He’d have preferred pie, but this looked good.
Hell, who was he kidding? Anything he didn’t have to cook would have looked good to him. He nuked the plate, and then wolfed down the omelet where he stood. He was moving to the sink when he heard a whisper of a sound.
Footsteps.
Luke reached for his gun before remembering he was unarmed and in his boxers. Christ, he needed more sleep.
“Hands where I can see them, dick breath,” a female said, and then the overhead light was slapped on.
Turning slowly, Luke came face to face with Ali standing in the kitchen entryway with an umbrella in one hand—aimed in his direction like a sword—and the other hand still on the light switch.
Clearly, she’d been in bed sleeping. Her hair was wild, like an explosion in a mattress factory. Her eyes were huge in her pale face. She wore a thin, white wife-beater tank top and sweatpants that were so big they were slipping off.
She lowered the umbrella and hitched up the sweats. “I thought we had an intruder.”
“We do,” he said. “You.” To distract himself from the fact that she was very braless, he eyed her stance. She wasn’t new at protecting herself. “Dick breath?”
“Sorry, I was trying to sound tough.” She shoved a hand through that crazy hair, looking a little bit wild and a lot off her game, and yet, he thought, there she stood ready to defend his house.
The first person on his side in a good long time.
Firmly ignoring the odd feeling in his gut, he shook his head. “Bad idea, coming up on a pissed-off, hungry, exhausted cop like that.”
“I didn’t know it was you,” she said. “And you’re not a cop right now. You’re on leave.”
He could have told her he was always a cop. “What if I’d shot you?”
“Would have ruined my whole day,” she said in a tone that told him her day had been shitty. Then her gaze ran over him, and he knew the exact second she registered that all he wore was boxers because her breath caught audibly.
She was aware of him as a man. Ted might have dented her heart but he hadn’t broken it.
“Is that a gun in your shorts,” she asked softly. “Or are you just happy to see me?”
Chapter 5
Ali worked at not swallowing her tongue, as Luke—after a speculative, edgy look—turned and vanished down the hall without responding to her question.
Good Lord, the man wore nothing but boxers like no one else. She’d known he was good looking, but she hadn’t known he had acres of hard sinew that bunched and flexed with his every move.
And she had no idea what she’d been doing baiting him like that. She certainly hadn’t expected to feel scorched by heat just from looking at him. The man was drop-dead sexy, that was for sure.
Equally for sure was relief that he hadn’t responded to her. It’d been a rhetorical question anyway, one uttered only because her brain had clicked off at the realization that he was half naked. But before she could reboot, he was back, wearing low-slung Levi’s, shrugging into a shirt that he didn’t bother to button. He had that whole dangerous, brooding air going on, spilling testosterone and bad boy vibes all over the place.
It did something very unwelcome in the pit
of her belly. And lower. She cleared her throat. “I found two possible rentals today.”
He didn’t speak.
Good to know where she stood. Probably he was so thrilled and overjoyed that he couldn’t speak.
He went to the fridge.
“One’s on the outer edge of the county,” she said. “In the Highlands. The other’s a room from the guy who owns the hardwood store. Anderson something.”
“No,” he said.
“No?”
“The Highlands is a bad neighborhood. And you’re not renting a room from Anderson. Hell no.”
She stared at him, but he was head first in the fridge. “You still hungry?” she asked. “I can make you something.” She moved over there just as he turned to her. She tried to nudge him out of her way, her palms settling on his chest, absorbing the heated, hard strength of him.
He didn’t budge.
She pushed a little harder and this time he stepped back. “Thanks for the omelet,” he said.
“Want another?”
“Sure.”
She pulled out the eggs, cheese, broccoli, and a red pepper. Grabbing a pan, she turned on a burner. “Oh, I almost forgot. I have something for you.”
His gaze went hooded, and she felt herself blush. She wasn’t sure what he thought she might be offering, but given what she’d said about the gun in his boxers, it was probably far more than she’d meant to offer.
“There,” she said, gesturing with her chin to the envelope on the kitchen table. It was the cash equivalent of three nights’ worth of rent. Last night, tonight, and hopefully tomorrow night as well.
Optimism. Guess her mom wasn’t the only Winters with that particular trait after all. The fact was that she’d hoped to get into a place tomorrow, but he’d just shut down her two current options.
He didn’t make a move for the envelope, a fact Ali ignored as she began cutting up the pepper and grating cheese while he just stood there looking rumpled and sleepy and on edge. “Ironic, don’t you think?” she asked.
“That you’re more at home in my kitchen than I am?”
“The fact that we’re complete strangers, and yet we’ve already seen each other in our underwear.”
“Yeah.” He stole a piece of cheese and popped it into his mouth. “I noticed that you didn’t hand me a sweater like I did for you.”
She smiled. Her first of the day. Maybe of the week.
He actually smiled back, which had to count for something, especially since he had a pretty great smile. She flipped the omelet and then a moment later transferred it to a plate, placing a few small broccoli spears on top before handing it to him.
He stared down at the broccoli. “I don’t like broccoli.”
“Why not?”
“Because it’s green.”
“When was the last time you tried it?” she asked.
“I don’t like it,” he repeated, as if this answered her question.
“Eat around it.”
He stood there eyeing the offending vegetable like it was a bomb, and then his stomach grumbled loudly.
“Eat.”
Kicking out a chair, he sat. “Thanks,” he said around a mouthful. “I hate to cook.”
She smiled. “My mom always said I should know how to feed a man. She says most women assume a guy’s most critical body part is considerably lower than his stomach, but they’re wrong. She says it’s a man’s stomach that does his thinking for him, not—” She broke off and felt herself flush. “Anyway, cooking is how she caught all her boyfriends.”
“Was your dad one of those boyfriends?”
Ali’s dad lived in Tacoma, and last she’d heard, he was a bartender. By all accounts, he was an effortless charmer who meant well, but she knew him as the guy with all the unfulfilled promises. Long gone were the days where she’d wait by the phone for the call he’d promised, but the memories still made her ache a little bit. “He didn’t stick around. The first boyfriend who did was a dentist.” She let out an involuntary shudder. “He was a pincher.”
“A pincher?” Luke asked.
“Yeah.” She opened and closed her first finger and thumb together a few times to demonstrate. “Whenever we annoyed him, he’d pinch. Always where the bruise wouldn’t show too. Hurt like hell.”
Luke didn’t show much in expression or body language, and he had a way of staying very still. But his eyes had gone hard, pissed off on behalf of a young girl he’d never known.
“Your mom let him touch you?” he asked.
“Oh, we didn’t tell her,” Ali said. “She liked him so much, it would have killed her. But one day we were shopping and she saw a bruise on my sister in the dressing room.”
“I hope she kicked his ass,” Luke said.
“She took a baseball bat to him.” Her smile faded because Mimi had cried for a week when he’d moved out. “She didn’t bring another guy home for a long time after that.”
“Good.” Hooking his bare foot in a chair, he pushed it toward her. “Sit with me.”
She put the pan in the sink and sat, shaking her head when he offered her a bite.
“So you learned to cook so you could catch a man?” he asked.
“No. I learned to cook because I like to eat,” she said, “not because I want a string of boyfriends. Because I don’t.” Not until she figured out how to pick them anyway. She watched Luke work his way carefully around the broccoli. “Broccoli has almost as much calcium as milk,” she told him, amused. “It gives you strong bones.”
His gaze slid to hers, and she felt her face heat again. He had strong bones. And as they both knew, a few minutes ago, he’d had one particularly strong boner to boot. But mercifully he let the comment go.
Setting down his fork, he opened the envelope she’d left on the table, staring in surprise at the cash she’d carefully counted out. “What’s this?” he asked.
“What I owe you for a few nights’ stay. I prorated what I was paying monthly. I hope that’s okay.”
He was quiet for a full sixty seconds, and when he spoke, his voice was low. “I got the impression you were hard up for money.”
“Not that hard up.”
He looked at her for a long moment, then set the envelope back on the table and pushed it toward her with one finger.
She slid it back. “I pay my debts.”
“How much does it leave you?” he asked.
She felt a small smile curve her lips. “Worried I won’t have enough to find another place?”
“Hell yes.”
She laughed softly. “Don’t be. I’m not your responsibility.” She wasn’t anyone’s responsibility and hadn’t been in a long time.
He went back to eating. When a tiny piece of broccoli found its way on his fork, he gave it a look, but shoved it in his mouth.
She waited, but he just shrugged.
“Don’t overwhelm me with praise or anything,” she said dryly.
He flashed a quick grin. “It’s good,” he said. “Really good. You’re holding up your end of the bargain.” His smile faded. “But I’m not taking your money, Ali.”
Bossy alpha. She got up and loaded the few dishes into the dishwasher, trying to pay no attention to the silent man behind her. Hard to do when he rose and put his dish in for her.
A neat, bossy alpha.
“You should go back to bed,” she said softly. “You look beat.”
He gave her a long look, which she decided was best not to decipher, before walking away, leaving her alone with her thoughts.
Ali didn’t sleep well and got up before dawn. With several hours before she had to be at the shop, she quietly made her way to the garage. She pulled on an apron that said Florists Do It with Style. Retrieving fresh clay from her storage bin, she worked it for a few minutes, trying to lose herself.
From the other side of the garage door, she heard a car pull up, but it didn’t really register until the doorbell sounded. Startled at the early hour and pissed that another reporter migh
t have found Luke, she wiped her hands on her apron and left the garage, moving quickly through the house to the living room. Prepared to kick some ass, she opened the front door, shocked to find two police officers standing there, flanking Teddy.
“Are you Ali Winters?” one of the cops asked.
“Yes, yes, it’s her,” Teddy said impatiently.
“Is something wrong?” Her heart dropped. “My mom? My sister, Harper? Are they okay?”
“This isn’t about your damn family,” Teddy said in disbelief. “It’s about the fact that you stole that money to fuck me over. You’re that pissed at me, that you had to try to ruin me?”
Ali shook her head in confusion. “What?”
“Ma’am,” one of the cops said, “we need to bring you down to the station to ask you some questions.”
Her heart stuttered to a stop just as someone came up behind her. Luke. She could feel the warm strength of him at her back.
“What’s the problem here?” he asked calmly.
“Who the hell are you?” Teddy demanded.
Luke ignored him and waited for the officers to speak.
“We have a situation in regards to a theft that occurred at the town offices over the weekend,” the first cop said. “A briefcase of money went missing from Ted Marshall’s office.”
Ali felt the horror fill her—they thought she’d stolen the money?
“It didn’t go missing,” Teddy said. “She stole it to get back at me for breaking up with her.”
“Hey,” Ali said, “I broke up with you!”
The officer went on as if neither of them had spoken. “The missing cash was from Friday night’s town auction. According to several eyewitnesses, you were the last one in his office.”
“Twice,” Teddy said. “You were let into the office first by Gus on Saturday and then again by Aubrey on Sunday. Christ, Ali, how could you do this to me? I thought we were friends, at least.”
