by Eve Gaddy
“His name was Kirk. I dated him in college. Our senior year. He was great looking. The kind of guy girls were always falling over.” Like you, she thought, but she didn’t say it. “I thought I was so lucky to have him. I thought—oh, I was young and stupid. He told me he loved me and I believed him.” She gave a short, humorless laugh. “Seems he loved a lot of other women, too. While he was seeing me.”
“Jerk,” Will said.
“You can say that again. And that’s not all. I found him with another girl right before finals. One of many, I discovered later. He said he wasn’t sorry I’d found out, but he wished I’d waited until after finals.” She forced herself to meet Will’s gaze when she finished the story. “That was when he planned to dump me. He said he only dated me for my brains, that it sure as hell wasn’t because of my looks. It’s humiliating to realize you’ve been used as a study aide rather than a girlfriend.”
Will surprised her by smiling. “And you bought that? Honey, he handed you a line. He was just trying to save his ego by making you feel bad.”
“It worked. I believed him for a long time.”
“I think you still do sometimes,” Will said shrewdly. “I wish I could go back and punch him. Right in his lying mouth.”
She laughed. “He wasn’t much of a fighter. Too afraid to mess up his perfect face.”
“His face wouldn’t have been perfect when I got through with it.” She needed reassurance, Will thought, and he wanted to provide it. “Forget the twerp. I can think of much better things to do with our time.”
She smiled, but he sensed a certain reserve. He thought she believed him, but maybe she still harbored doubts. After that story, no wonder. Damn Amanda for putting that hurt look in Tessa’s eyes. He hated that he’d been the cause, even inadvertently.
Distraction, that’s what she needed. He drew his finger down her nose. “Your nose is a little sunburned. Did I ever tell you that turns me on?”
“Oh, right.” She shot him a look of disbelief. “I’m sure it’s amazingly sexy.”
“On you it is.” He kissed the tip of her nose, trailed his lips over her cheek. “And these little freckles, I like them, too.” Gazing deep into her eyes, he unfastened her blouse and spread it open. “But I like that you cover up this part,” he said, stroking a finger over her chest. “Your skin here is so pale, it gleams in the moonlight. Did you know?”
She choked out a whispered “No.”
“Smooth. Creamy.” Dropping his head, he strung kisses across her collarbone, then her chest, smiling against her skin when her breath hitched. “You taste like cream.” Above her bra, he tested the curve of her breast. “Sweet cream.”
“Are you . . .” She moaned when his mouth latched onto her nipple through the fabric of her bra. “Are you trying to seduce me?”
“Honey, I am seducing you.” He stripped her slowly, stopping to thoroughly kiss each portion of skin he uncovered. To stroke her, to watch his hands caress that fine, pale, magnolia-petal skin.
“You’re still dressed,” she said, her voice husky. “I want to touch you.”
“You will. Later. Right now—” his lips lowered to kiss her stomach, to trail farther down “—I’m touching you.” And touch her, he did. With his hands, with his mouth. Again and again, until she hovered a step away from the edge and he knew it wouldn’t take much to push her over. “Tessa, open your eyes.”
Those gorgeous blue eyes, hazy with passion, blinked open. He pressed his hand between her legs and slid a finger inside. Withdrew and did it again. And again, until she convulsed around him, crying out his name. Watching her climax shot whatever self-control he had.
He picked her up, carried her into his bedroom and placed her in the middle of his bed. In no time flat, he got rid of his clothes, wasted precious seconds fumbling with a condom, and then was beside her.
“Hurry, Will.” Her warm hands slipped over his chest, then went lower to caress him, to drive him even wilder with need.
She spread her legs and he entered her. He wanted to make it last, but knew there wasn’t a hope in hell he could. She locked her legs around his hips and he thrust harder, deeper, over and over, until he exploded inside her with a scalding release.
It was a long time before he moved. When he would have, she held on and murmured, “Don’t go yet. I like it.”
“You like not being able to breathe?” But instead of leaving, he raised up to rest his weight on his arms on either side of her.
“I like having you inside me.” She rubbed her cheek against his arm.
“I like being here.” He kissed her mouth, slowly, lingeringly. “Tessa?” When she looked at him, he had the satisfaction of knowing he’d wiped any sign of doubt from those beautiful eyes. “There’s another reason why I wouldn’t have been with her. With anyone else.”
Smiling, she raised her hand to his cheek. “What’s that?”
“I’m in love with you.”
Her eyes widened, but she didn’t speak. She simply stared at him, then her mouth curved into a smile and she pulled his head down to hers. He made love to her again and neither spoke for a very long time.
WILL FELT GOOD. Better than good. More like fantastic. Lying in bed with Tessa gave him a contentment he’d been missing in his life. And it wasn’t just the sex, though that had been incredible. He’d finally fallen in love. He hadn’t expected it, hadn’t even known he’d missed it. But now he knew why every other one of his relationships had ended. He hadn’t loved any of those women. He’d liked them, enjoyed them, but he hadn’t loved them. Until Tessa.
Why had it happened now? Was he just ripe for falling in love, being back in the only place he’d ever called home? Seeing Jed and Emmy again had brought home to him how much he missed the family they’d been. A family he probably would never have again . . . unless he had one with Tessa.
And what did Tessa feel? She still hadn’t said a word about his confession, when he’d said he loved her. He knew she cared for him, because she’d never have gone to bed with him otherwise. But did she love him? If she did, she wasn’t saying.
Her fingers traced his chest, halting at one of his scars. “What’s this from?”
He glanced down to see which one she was talking about. “Gunshot wound. Courtesy of a drug dealer with bad aim.” He didn’t think she’d get off on his scars, the way some women did. He figured she was just curious.
“Do you get shot at often?”
He couldn’t help smiling at her look of horror. “Sometimes. Not so much now that I’m not busting drug dealers all the time.” Which was nice, actually. He’d gotten used to not being shot at.
She kissed his scar, which made him smile again, and resumed trailing her fingers over him. “And this?” she asked, tracing a long, thin line that ran down his side. “Did a drug dealer do this?”
It would be easier to let her think that, but he found he didn’t want to look into those deep blue eyes and lie. “No. That’s not a line-of-duty scar.” He sighed, thinking how best to tell her. “After I left Uncertain I lived on the street for a while. A couple of guys decided I looked like fair game, and when I didn’t persuade easy, they pulled a knife. Lucky for me, the cops showed up on another call and scared them off.” Just not before they left him with a permanent reminder of that night.
The cops had taken him to the hospital, of course, and he’d cut out as soon as they stitched him up and pumped him full of antibiotics. Even so, he knew now he’d been damn lucky not to get an infection. But he’d known where he would have ended up if he’d stayed. At seventeen, and given his background, he wouldn’t have been high on the list for another foster home. No, he’d have landed in the nearest juvenile hall. Or worse, a real jail.
Her eyes widened with distress. “You mean they . . . they were trying to force you to . . . Oh, God, Will, I’m sorry.
I’m sorry I asked about the scar.”
“Don’t be. It’s over and I was lucky. But it’s an ugly world out there. Or it can be.”
“Is that why you became a cop?”
“Partly. They were . . . they were the good guys, and they were decent to me.” He hooked his hand behind his head and leaned back against the headboard. “But mostly I did it because of Frannie.”
“Did she want you to be a policeman?”
“Not especially. She wanted me to make something of myself. And I owed her.”
“For taking you in.”
He shook his head, his gaze holding hers. “For saving my life.”
“Tell me,” she said softly.
He wanted to tell her, he realized. Wanted her to know him like few other people did. “I told you some of it, that day on the lake.”
“I remember. But there’s more, isn’t there?”
“Yeah, there’s more. I was thirteen. Frannie was my last shot at foster care. If I’d gone back to the street then, or to juvie, I’d be dead. Or an addict and better off dead.”
She made a sound of denial.
“But thanks to Frannie, I didn’t. I had a smart mouth, and the guy at my previous foster home didn’t much care for it. When I came to Frannie she noticed I was hurting. Made me take my shirt off and called Joleen, her friend who was a nurse, to come over. Turns out I had a busted rib.”
“They just let him get away with that? With abusing the children in his care?”
Will shrugged. “I think they’re a lot tougher nowadays. Anyway, I’m sure he got his. Frannie lodged a complaint and they pulled his license.”
“She sounds like a wonderful woman.”
“Frannie was great. She swore no one would ever hurt me like that again.” All these years later, he could still see her, hear her promising him he was safe. “I didn’t believe her.” He smiled wryly. “I didn’t have much reason to trust the system. It had never been very good to me.”
“But Frannie was different.”
“Yeah, she was. She loved us. If she could have afforded it, she’d have adopted all three of us.”
“Did your foster brother and sister love her as much as you did?”
“Yeah.” He pulled his arm from behind his head to skim his hand over Tessa’s hair. “Emmy was with her almost from birth, and Jed came to her when he was about six.” He didn’t doubt that they had loved Frannie. Which was one more reason his suspicion about Jed hurt so badly.
“Then why—” She broke off abruptly.
He looked down at her and finished her sentence. “Why did I arrest Jed?”
“Well, yes. If he loved her, why would he have killed her?”
“I don’t think he would have. Purposely.”
She stared at him a moment. “But you’re afraid he did it accidentally.”
He hesitated, nodded. “What I think doesn’t matter, anyway. I have to uphold the law. The new evidence gave Fielder enough to ask for an arrest warrant.” Jed’s insistence that he had lost the ring days before that, so couldn’t have been wearing it, hadn’t mattered, either. It was still his ring, found at the murder site. “And everything since, every item of evidence except that glasses case, has only made things worse for Jed.”
Thank God for that glasses case, Will thought, remembering the session earlier that day with Jed and his lawyer. Just as he’d been afraid of, Jed’s account of why he’d had so much blood on him left a lot of room for doubt. After a hard time remembering initially, he’d admitted he recalled washing blood out of his T-shirt that night. But he swore he’d cut his arm on a nail while loading the boat. Which was just about impossible to prove nineteen years after the fact.
“But now you have a new lead,” Tessa said. “You can look for the owner of that case.”
“Assuming I can date it. But yeah, I can tell you one thing. Neither Frannie nor Jed would have owned something like that.” He frowned, wishing he could remember why that thing had seemed so familiar.
“Why aren’t you happier about it? If this might prove Jed innocent, you ought to be ecstatic.”
Wearily he scrubbed a hand over his face. “I don’t know if it’s enough. Or if it was put there later or during the same time period as Frannie’s murder. The evidence—damn it, the evidence is stacking up against Jed.” And Will was very much afraid it would continue to do so, no matter what he did.
He had a shot at proving Jed innocent, though, and he sure as hell intended to try.
Chapter Thirteen
TESSA WOKE in her own room, surrounded by Will. Still asleep, he had taken over her entire bed, sprawled out in blissful comfort. Which, she supposed, was why she had slept practically on top of him. Self-defense.
She needed some time to think, time alone after a night spent with him. Careful not to wake him, she eased out of bed and padded to the closet, grabbing her robe before going to the bathroom to take care of necessities. Late the evening before, they’d returned to her place to care for the animals. Will had stayed over, as he had every night since the first time they made love. It surprised her how quickly she’d become accustomed to his presence. She hadn’t lived with anyone else since college.
She wasn’t living with him, though. He stayed over because it was easier that way. Just as it was easier for him to keep a toothbrush and change of clothes at her place. But none of that meant he was actually living with her.
Her morning routine seemed mindless by now, even though established only a few months before. In urgent need of caffeine, she went into the kitchen. Goofy stood whimpering at the back door, so she let him out into the yard first. Then she turned on the coffeemaker, and while she waited, set out a bowl of kibble for Pepe, scratching him behind the ears when he came sauntering in.
Midway through the cycle, she siphoned off a cup of coffee and took it out to the front porch with her, content to sit on the swing and slowly awaken. Across the way was the lake, in all its eerie early-morning glory. A fine mist hung over the stands of tall cypress, trailing fingers of fog down to the water and sprinkling fairy dust across the gray Spanish moss that dripped over the trees. She smiled at her whimsical thoughts, for until she came to Caddo Lake she’d never known she had that streak in her.
The water was still, breaking into ripples only when an occasional water bird or a johnboat slipped quietly by. The air swelled with the tang of pine and warm dew, overlaid by the scent of wild dill and sweet honeysuckle.
Sipping coffee, she thought about the night before. As unlikely as it seemed, Will claimed to be in love with her. Even stranger, she believed him, or at least, believed he thought he loved her. But what did she feel about him? Unconsciously, she rubbed a hand over her heart.
Dazzled. No other word described it half as well. He simply dazzled her. His looks—hellraiser looks as Ellen called them—were a part of that, but only a small part. She liked how he made her feel. Wanted. Needed. And even pretty. She liked how he made her laugh, then turned around and shared painful moments as well. And she admired how he did his job, regardless of the personal cost, because he believed in it, believed in what being a lawman meant.
He was a nice man, an admirable man. But she’d known nice, admirable men before and had never been in danger of losing her heart to any of them. She’d thought herself immune, thought she’d be too afraid to ever allow a man that close again. Yet somehow Will had battered down those walls without her even being aware of it.
Oh, Lord, maybe she was already in love with him.
She hadn’t intended to fall in love. What she and Will shared had never been destined to be permanent. They had no future together. Soon her work would be finished, and she would leave. And her next stop would likely be several thousand miles away. Will’s life, his career, was here in Texas. And hers . . . wasn’t.
It could
be. Unbidden, the traitorous voice whispered in her mind.
She glanced at the doorway and saw Will, leaning against the door frame sipping from a steaming mug, wearing a pair of jeans and nothing else. Her mouth went dry as her gaze wandered over the broad expanse of bare chest, tanned, golden skin, past the faded denim covering powerful thighs, to his bare feet. Stubble shaded his jaw, making it look even stronger than normal. It appeared as if he’d raked his fingers through his blond hair, pushing it back from his face, though a shock of it rebelled and fell over his forehead. He looked dangerous, a little disreputable, and utterly tempting. And then he smiled and her heart tumbled.
“You seem awfully serious for so early on a Sunday morning,” he said. “Deep thoughts?”
Unsure if she wanted to talk about those thoughts, she returned the smile and shook her head. “No, not really. I’m still half-asleep.” She tucked her feet up beneath her and Will crossed the porch to sit beside her. The swing creaked with his weight, moving forward a little before settling.
“This used to be Jed’s favorite time of day,” he said, cupping his hands around the mug and lifting it to his mouth. “Frannie liked it, too. Sometimes I’d wake up and they’d be sitting on the porch swing, just like we are now, doing nothing in the early-morning light.” He smiled. “Emmy never could understand how they could sit there and not say a word.”
“I’ve met Emmy, but we’ve never talked much. What’s she like?”
“Loyal. True blue.” His gaze met hers and he sighed ruefully. “She doesn’t understand why I can’t believe in Jed’s innocence as wholeheartedly as she does.”
“Why can’t you?”
He stared at her a minute, as if struck by a thought.
When he didn’t speak, Tessa continued. “You obviously care about him. You don’t want to believe he’s guilty, yet a part of you does. I know there’s evidence, but what does your heart tell you?”