by Lainey Reese
“Sheesh.” Now she looked disgruntled. “What are you, the fitness police? Yes, sir, I’ll stretch.”
“Good,” he said with a smirk. Then he smacked her on the ass, because he couldn’t help himself. Her yelp was entirely satisfying.
Exasperation was just as charming on her as every other emotion he’d seen her express, and as Luke made his way out of the house and into his car, he felt something for a woman he hadn’t felt since he was sixteen years old. Hopeful.
Chapter 5
Tiffany Lewis was only twenty-two years old when she died. She was a cute and bubbly college girl who loved to dance. That’s what she had been doing the last time any of her friends had seen her alive. Dancing the night away in her pink camisole and stretchy jeans.
As the coroners got the okay from Rachel—the desk clerk who doubled as the police photographer when one was needed—to remove the body, they lifted her slight frame from the ditch. Covered in filth and blood, Tiffany was unrecognizable, the beautiful girl gone forever with only this butchered and empty shell left behind.
Sheriff Derek Anderson watched the proceedings with the weight of her death weighing on him like Sisyphus’s boulder. “Useless, meaningless waste of life,” he muttered to no one in particular, but his deputy answered anyway.
“Sure as hell is. What the fuck?”
Craig’s voice was choked with emotion. He was a good kid and had the makings to be one hell of a good cop with some time and seasoning. “That’s what we’re going to find out. And watch the language. Keep in mind you’re looked up to when you put on that uniform.”
“Yes, sir.” Craig was still young enough that the reprimand brought a flush to his cheeks, and he tried to hide it by adjusting his hat before following Derek back into the ditch.
“Now, let’s take a deeper look down here. I want you to bag any and every thing you see, even if you think it might not be relevant. Let’s just get it all to the lab and let them sort out whether or not it’s related,” he told Craig as the muddy ground oozed over the tops of their shoes.
“Do you think this is the same guy who did the last girl?” Craig asked as he crouched down to pick up and bag an empty box of cigarettes.
“Can’t say. But it sure as hell looks that way. Both young, pretty girls. Both out clubbing when they got attacked. And both stabbed multiple times. Too many coincidences for me.”
“That’s what I was thinking.” Craig nodded, bagging a beer can next.
“But we can’t make assumptions,” Derek cautioned as he too bagged the offal that littered the ditch. He never let himself forget Craig was green and in need of his guidance more than his other deputies. “This could be a copycat. Some guy who wanted to get rid of his girlfriend and the last murder gave him the perfect excuse and cover. We gotta look at each one individually no matter what our gut is telling us.” He looked at Craig until the younger man met his stare. “They deserve that from us. We can’t change what happened to them, but we can put whoever is responsible for this away. That’s all we can do, so we’re going to do our best by them. Right?”
“Right, sir.” Derek liked what he saw in the deputy’s face. He saw a kid ready to be a man, and more than that, he saw integrity and honor.
“Right, then,” he told him. They both set to work with renewed determination, and neither of them spoke again for a very long time.
Andie was in the orchard, riding the fence. She liked this job, because she got to ride the quad. As the barbed wire bit through her glove and drew blood for the twelfth time that day, she amended that she liked getting to ride the quad part of this chore, but the fence could eff-off as far as she was concerned.
“Son of a—” Andie snatched the leather off so she could assess the damage and was mildly horrified. Blisters, some bloody, some already busted and oozing covered her hand. There were the scrapes and tiny punctures from the barbs, and what was left of her manicure after yesterday’s endeavors was toast.
“You hurt yourself?”
Andie screeched like a banshee. She also jumped about three feet in the air and came down on uneven ground with all the grace of an elephant. If Luke hadn’t grabbed her, she would’ve landed face-first in the dirt for sure.
“God!” she exclaimed as she purposefully took a big step back from him. “I didn’t hear you come up. You scared the crap outta me.”
“Sorry ‘bout that,” he said, not looking the least bit sorry in her opinion.
“Where did you come from?” she asked. Andie told herself she was not going to notice how handsome he was today in his rugged beat-up jeans and snug navy tee with a plaid button-up over it. He had a baseball cap on backward, and she decided it was not sexy on him, nor did it showcase his eyes. Nope, not a bit.
“I’m riding our fence just over there.” He pointed to a spot not far in the distance. “When I saw you fighting with this, I thought I’d come see if I can help.”
Fighting was a good word for it. When she decided to take this chore on, she had no idea it was such strenuous work.
“I’m fine.” Last thing she wanted to do was accept help from him again. Last night had completely thrown her for a loop. After the way he treated her before, his kindness last evening and now was confusing her and mixing up everything she thought she knew about him. “Thank you, but I’m fine. It’s harder than I thought it would be is all.” She picked up the wire after slipping her gloves back on. “I’ll get the hang of it… eventually.” Her joints throbbed from the strain, and her blistered skin ached. Andie wanted to cry, but no way in hell would she let him see her fall apart. Again.
He’d seen her cry too many times already. She cried when he ranted at her that night. And she cried when he carried her out of the graveyard. Then cried again as he massaged her butt, for Pete’s sake. He probably thought she was the biggest whiner on the planet.
“Thanks for checking on me. But you can go,” she grunted and couldn’t help the whimper that came out when yet another metal thorn pierced her skin. He didn’t leave. He just stood where he was, with his arms crossed, staring at her with a frown on his grumpy face. “Now.”
“Shit.” He crowded into her place and made quick, easy work out of what had been an unbeatable task for her. It made tears prick the backs of her eyes, and she hated him a little right then.
“You’re not cut out for this kind of work, city girl. You should sell and go back where you came from.” She didn’t know if he realized what he just said was the exact thing that would hurt her the most, but then again, he had a knack for that.
“Who the hell do you think you are?” Andie heard the frustrated anguish in her own voice and hated him a little bit more for bringing it out in her. “God! I didn’t ask for your opinion or your help. I know it’s hard work. And I got news for you, Mr. Big Shot High and Mighty. I can do this.” She wiped angrily at the tears of frustration that were escaping from her eyes without her permission. “It may take me a while to learn everything I need to learn, and if that means I have to hire more help until I do, then I will. But you—” She jabbed a finger into his chest so hard her aching joints throbbed. “—don’t get to tell me to go anywhere. You, you mean, cold-hearted asshole, don’t get to tell me anything.” Then she yanked her wire and the pliers he was holding out of his hands and threw herself back on her quad with all the furious, righteous indignation she felt.
As she started the engine and sped away as fast as she could with a satisfying roar, Andie wished she had the skill to peel out and cover the insufferable, condescending jackass with dirt. She didn’t though, so she settled instead for just being happy she didn’t fall off or run into a tree… because she’d done both today. More than once.
“Hey! Those are my pliers!” Aint this a bitch? Luke stood where she’d left him and rubbed absently at his chest where she’d jabbed her bony finger. He wasn’t a ladies’ man; this he knew very well. But he also wasn’t a moron. He had a mother, didn’t he? Luke had been raised to always treat every gir
l like she was his sister and every woman like she was a lady. So why was it, he wondered, that the one woman he was most attracted to managed to bring out the worst in him every time she was around? “Shit.”
Walking down her fence line, Luke easily spotted her attempts at repairs and cussed some more. Damn, fool, helpless city woman just had no business taking on these chores no matter what she thought. She wasn’t cut out for this. And he was going to be out here all day re-fixing her crappy attempts at repairs.
He didn’t question his determination to help her. He wasn’t the kind of guy to sit back and let her fall on her ass without pitching in. Even though he knew, if he let her take that fall, it would give him exactly what he wanted. With a frustrated kick at a dirt clot and another venomous curse, he marched to his own quad. Resigned, he went after his pliers.
As Luke pulled up behind an unfortunately familiar convertible, he told himself to remain calm as he cut his engine. As soon as he did, he heard Andie, still seated on her ATV, filling Jax in on their encounter. “And then I jumped on my quad and roared out of there so fast I almost fell off.”
“Roared?” Luke couldn’t help himself. Andie startled and had to grab onto the handlebars to keep her balance, while the only indication that Jax gave to even acknowledge his presence was to briefly flick his eyes in Luke’s direction. “You call that roaring? I could have jogged and caught up with you.” He pushed off his seat and marched toward the two of them. “And let me tell you something. This machine you are riding has a two-stroke engine. They are tricky to maintain and can gum up on you if you don’t run them full-throttle occasionally. Riding it the way you did is going to ruin the engine within a month. So, like your fencing, if you don’t know what the hell you’re doing, stay away and let somebody experienced do it.”
She had a mutinous look on her round face. Those lips that were so plump they reminded him of plums were pursed in a pout. And as hard as she tried to fight it—because he could see the struggle plainly—those jewel-bright eyes of hers again filled with tears.
“Shit.” He did it again. On the entire ride in from the field, he told himself he was going to be a gentleman, but he’d taken one look at her with Jax, heard her ranting about him, and all his good intentions went right out the window. “Look,” he said, desperately trying to think of something, anything he could say that could help. “I didn’t mean it like that. I know you can learn to do this eventually; it’s just that—”
“I thought I told you I didn’t want to hear your opinions on me or my abilities.” Her voice was husky from pent-up emotion, and it sounded achingly close to how she sounded when she was aroused, and the reminder of that night made him feel even worse.
“Andie, I’m sor—” He reached out, thinking if he could just hold her, then maybe the tears would stop. But she jerked back out of his reach so fast and violently that she jolted herself right off the seat and into the dirt.
“I think you should go, Luke.” Jax shoved past him and crouched to help Andie to her feet.
Luke moved before he thought. One second, he was standing with one arm hanging uselessly in the air where Andie had been moments before. Then, he saw Jax with his hands on her, and his vision went red. “Get your hands off her.” Luke grabbed the other man by the shoulders of his stupid, pansy-ass vest and yanked him three feet away to land on his ass before Jax knew what hit him.
“Hey!” Andie shoved up and hurried over to Jax even as he got to his feet. “What the hell is wrong with you, Luke?” she demanded in outrage.
“Don’t worry about it, Andie,” Jax said. He brushed her hands aside and righted his clothes as he shook his head at Luke with a resigned expression on his face. “This is about him and me. Things go way back between us.”
“Oh shut up, Jax.” Luke glared at him and briefly pictured punching his smug face. “There is nothing between us. I just don’t like watching you put your hands all over every woman who gets within ten feet of you.”
“No matter what it is, I don’t care.” Andie looked at him, and all Luke’s anger and frustration melted away at the expression on her face. She looked desolate. She looked heartbroken and fragile with her windblown hair and the beginnings of a sunburn kissing her cheeks. “Why did you follow me here, Luke?”
“My pliers.” Feeble, weak excuse. He knew the real reason he chased after her, but with Jax here, there was no way he was going to try to fix things now. “You took ‘em when you left.”
She eyed him solemnly for a moment, with her full bottom lip caught between her white, straight teeth. “M’kay.” As if she had come to some decision, she nodded before stepping around him and picking his tool up from where she dropped it.
“Here.” She wasn’t looking at him as she held the pliers out to him, and it unsettled Luke for some reason he couldn’t name.
Luke cursed and caught her wrist in his grip when he looked down to take the pliers from her. With her gloves off, he got a good look at the damage she’d done to her hands. “Oh, baby,” he soothed with compassion in his voice. “That must hurt like hell.”
“Don’t.” The tremor in her voice brought his gaze up to meet hers. “Just don’t. You blew your chance to be nice to me.”
Luke knew she was right, but that didn’t change the fact that he felt like he’d just taken a kick to the gut. He lifted his hands in surrender and stepped two paces back before turning to put his pliers in the toolbox on the back of his ATV. One of the hardest things he’d ever done in his life was to get on his own quad and drive away while Jax wrapped his arms around Andie and held her.
“I’m glad you were here, but did I forget something? I don’t remember us having a meeting set up until next week.” Andie sniffled and pulled back from Jax’s comforting embrace. He looked handsome today, she noted, with the late afternoon sun showcasing his face deliciously.
“Well, my last two appointments cancelled, and I thought I might come out and see if I could maybe pitch in.”
“That’s so nice of you, Jax. Really.” Could the man get any more perfect? “But,” she hedged and gave him a skeptical look, “dressed like that?” Andie looked him over from head to foot. He was wearing jeans, sure, but they were designer and probably cost more than her whole wardrobe. “Look at you. You look like a GQ ad, not a farmhand.”
He smirked at her. “Wait here.” Then he walked to his car and reached into the open back seat. First thing Jax pulled out was a pair of beat-up Chucks with holes in the toes and then a wad of rolled up T-shirt and denim that looked much more work-friendly than what he was currently wearing.
“I would have changed at the office,” he told her, walking back to where she stood, “but there was the off chance you would wanna finish up early yourself and might be open to dinner with me instead.”
If he had told her he was a shapeshifting alien from Jupiter, she would have been less surprised. He’d been nothing but professional on their previous meetings, and although she had her share of fantasies about him, she hadn’t had a clue he might be interested in return.
“So I came prepared for either option.”
Andie really wanted to see the sexy attorney dressed down, but the siren’s call of an early end to her disastrous workday was too sweet to resist.
“You know what?” She smiled up at him. “Put those back. You won’t be needing them after all.” She was rewarded for her decision by his dazzling and quick smile then, before she could guess his intent, he gave her a quick, smacking kiss. Then he turned and jogged back to his car.
Andie felt her tummy flutter. He was seriously hot. She pressed a hand to still the butterflies that were clamoring around in her stomach then started for the house. “Come on in. I’m going to hop in the shower. Would you like a glass of iced tea or something while you wait?”
“I know where everything is,” he told her, climbing the steps and holding the screen open so she could pass through ahead of him. “You go ahead and get cleaned up. I’ll take care of things here.”
“Great.” She headed in but stopped just as she reached the second floor. “Wait, Jax?” she called, leaning over and peering toward the kitchen. “Where are we going? How should I dress?”
Jax sauntered into view, not from the direction of the kitchen but from the front door, and he looked up at her with that sexy squint at the corners of his eyes again. “Well, there are only two places to eat in town and neither one of them are fancy. Both good food, just not the suit-and-tie kind of places. Plus, I was thinking you’re most likely sore and exhausted, so if it’s all the same to you, I was going to cook. Unless you’d rather go out?”
Andie was flummoxed. She told herself that’s why she said what she did next. “You look like that and you can cook?” When the only response she got from Jax was raised eyebrows and a laugh, she felt her cheeks erupt in flames. “Sorry. But dude.” Might as well throw the baby out with the bath water. “Look at you.”
Jax pursed his lips and licked them, slowly, before answering her. Then had to answer her again when she failed to register his first response, because she couldn’t stop fixating on his mouth. “Yeah. I cook. Go shower and I’ll prove it to you.”
His look was challenging and intense and made Andie want to wrap around him like a vine. She refrained, however, mostly because she was woefully aware of her own stench at the moment. She settled for answering with a smartass remark about Hell’s Kitchen then took her smelly self to the shower.
“Oh my God. Will you marry me?” Dinner was a feast. A delicious, decadent feast. And Andie was pretty sure that if heaven had a flavor, it would taste like this.
“Sure,” Jax said, stuffing a forkful of angel hair pasta in his mouth. “I’ll book the church for next Sunday.”
