Well, maybe he wouldn’t say that.
Charlie would eat his own gun before saying ‘clitoris’.
He would have a stroke.
Could she blame him?
His only child, his precious daughter, was playing ‘hide the sausage’ with a guy who only wanted to get laid—one who came right out and suggested it too!
What was she thinking?
This felt all kinds of wrong.
He was getting the milk for free.
Moo.
Yeah, that was EXACTLY what Charlie would say, and for Chris’s sake, she prayed he wasn’t around when Charlie came to visit in a couple months.
Her Daddy would kick his sexy, geeky ass, and he wouldn't ask questions about it.
Yeah, she needed to save her dignity, and find a way to keep Chris from dying a cold, Southern sheriff death.
As she packed away his boxers and t-shirt, Elizabeth headed toward her shower.
She was going to have to head to work.
While Elizabeth was supposed to be off today, unfortunately, Gabe had called an emergency staff meeting. She had a feeling the shit was going to hit the fan.
She couldn’t imagine what it could be about.
Then again, with Chris away, she might have done something bad.
Who knew?
She normally sexually harassed him.
It was kinda their thing.
Maybe she’d turned that lechery onto someone else without even realizing it.
It wouldn't be the first or last time she was called to his office for something.
Turning on the water, she forced Chris from her mind. Elizabeth needed to come to grips with the truth.
She wasn’t girlfriend material.
And the man just wasn’t interested in her like that anymore. That train had left the station, and it left her behind.
But of course it did.
That was her shitty luck.
* * * E l i z a b e t h L a R u e * * *
He was exhausted.
The last few days had been a marathon of autopsies. While he stood elbow deep in the dead, he was having a hard time focusing on his job.
Why?
Elizabeth.
She was running through his mind, mostly naked. Okay, she was completely naked, riding his dick, and shouting his name the entire time, and it made for awkward moments when you were wearing scrubs in a room full of techs.
Scrubs did NOT hide a raging erection.
Not in the least.
Truth be told, Chris had suffered the last ten days away from her.
While he was getting his street cred as an ME, he really preferred being HER ME.
Working with Elizabeth was something that made him so damn happy. They knew each other’s style, they got the nuances without having to say a lot, and they had chemistry.
In and out of bed.
He was a man, so that was totally his favorite part.
Then again, he was horrible with the opposite sex. Maybe it was all in his mind.
Chris was smart, but when it came to women…yeah, that was not going on his resume.
Why?
He had asked a gorgeous woman to be his bed buddy and nothing more. What had he been thinking?
What was difficult about their relationship was the lack of one. That fateful day, where they decided to have sex, changed everything.
He’d been stupid, suggesting they stay friends with benefits while he knew damn well he wouldn’t be able to pull that off. He’d gone for what he thought she’d be okay with, and not what he really wanted.
Chris wanted her.
All the time.
He had her that one time, and immediately, he wanted so much more. Chris knew what they had was special, but he didn’t know how to go about telling her that.
Or if he should.
Did he blurt it out and risk her cutting off all sex and cuddling?
He really loved the sex, and there was something so damn awesome about being home after work, having a glass of wine, and cuddling through the news.
Until he forced himself to drag his ass back home.
Because he was an idiot.
A.
BIG.
IDIOT.
He’d gotten the hot, nubile girl in bed, and he’d opened his mouth after and said the stupidest shit.
Now he was stuck playing catch up to make it all right. This was NOT what he wanted.
Did he pretend he was okay with it as it was since he was at least getting her attention?
Or did he just come right out and tell her the truth?
Either way, Chris had no clue.
Out of desperation, he even asked Tony. That was how frantic he was. He was asking the ‘Bug Man’ for dating advice.
Yeah, how the hell could this go wrong?
Anyway, he told him to romance her until she was putty in his hands.
Would that work with a woman forged out of steel? Elizabeth was quite possibly the toughest woman he knew. She was badass to the core.
Could she go soft if he applied romance?
He didn’t even know, but at this point, what choice did he have? He’d already screwed it up with trying to rationalize being ‘friends with benefits’ to a woman he wanted to be with, in a relationship capacity.
So, he was winging it, dipping his toe in the water, as he tried to figure out what to say and do. He was smart, so Chris was hoping it would come to him.
Or there’d be a miracle.
He’d take one of those.
Hell!
He’d call his witch mother up and beg for a love spell at this point…or not. Yeah, he wasn’t letting crazy on their trail. As of yet, his mother was staying away, and that was a good thing.
For now, he needed to figure how to bring the big ‘D’ word up to Elizabeth.
Not dick.
Not do it.
DATE.
Chris, desperately, wanted to date her.
So, he was going to try.
He knew it was likely doomed from the start, but he wanted to give it a chance to take root. He was so worried that he was thinking about calling in the big guns.
Charlie.
He’d told him to call him if there was ever an issue or his daughter was in over her head.
Maybe this situation wasn’t what he’d meant, but…Chris was struggling.
Then again, the man scared him stupid.
He was like Paul Bunyan in cowboy boots, and he carried a gun. That was something Chris didn’t want to tangle with on a bad day, let alone a good one. He might call him for advice if it were any other woman on the planet BUT his daughter.
Okay, he was on his own.
He could do this.
It would only take thinking…
Chris began plotting his romance, and immediately, he knew the way to her heart.
Baked goods.
Despite being tired, needing some downtime, and to stop thinking for eight hours, he wanted to woo Elizabeth the only way he knew how.
Sugar, hope, and a prayer.
So, he set it up.
When he arrived at her door, he unlocked it and shut off the alarm. He could hear the shower going upstairs, and while he wanted to go in and join her, that felt like something relationship-y.
He didn’t want to freak her out.
This had to be done carefully, calmly, and with kid gloves. Elizabeth was super smart, too, one of the sexiest things about her, so she would smell a setup coming a mile away.
Yeah, no shower.
So, instead, Chris carried his token up to her and stared at the door.
Then the cupcakes.
Then the door.
He was going to catch a woman, and that meant he needed to be sweet, cute, and do something a boyfriend would do for a woman he was crazy about.
The plan was hatched.
Leaving one cupcake on the floor, he prayed she wouldn’t step on it. Thankfully, it had a paper wrapper, or this plan would have been d
ead in the water.
Moving down the hall, he placed another.
Then after a few more feet, he left another.
And another.
There were six of them, and he left a trail of cupcakes to the kitchen where he placed the empty box, a mug, and started the coffee pot.
If this didn’t lure her down the stairs, nothing would. If anything, Elizabeth was predictable.
The smell of coffee, the delicious sugar of her favorite cupcakes from the bakery down the street—red velvet—and she would make an appearance.
He was not hunting a rascal-y rabbit, but a sexy showered Fed.
With the coffee done, and his heart throbbing in his chest, Chris tried to stay calm.
Only, it was so hard.
As he waited, he wanted to freak out.
Chris was notoriously bad when it came to talking to the ladies. Elizabeth was the only woman who ever understood him.
From the start, she got him.
That didn’t come along every day. He wanted to make sure he caught her while he could.
He owed her the best he could do.
She’d given him street cred when no one would give him the time of the day, and she’d been loyal, kind, and gentle—and those were things he craved in a partner.
He knew her, and she craved it too.
After she’d been hurt and damaged by ‘The Butcher’ case, he’d seen the truth.
She was just like every other woman but protecting herself with some armor.
It was around her heart.
Now they were on equal footing.
She’d helped him.
He’d helped her.
Now they needed to help each other.
He didn’t know what he could offer her in the way of the opposite sex, but he wanted to try. People were respecting her more, and he didn’t feel useful. Before, it was a given that she needed him.
Now, not so much.
It scared him that she’d wake up, one day, and see that he was holding her back.
She’d leave a friend, but she’d never leave a boyfriend.
Right?
Wasn’t that how the ladies worked?
What if she opted to drop him from her life?
When the water shut off, he stopped moving. He crossed his fingers even though it was silly. That wouldn’t define what they had or deliver to him what he wanted more than that next breath.
He heard the door open.
Then a giggle.
And another one.
It was a damn good sign.
When she appeared at the top of the stairs, she was balancing three cupcakes in her hands.
“Lookee here,” she drawled. “It’s the cupcake fairy, and he popped in to bring me something sweet,” she teased.
Oh, he’d love to give her anything she wanted. Only, she wanted nothing and that made it hard.
“Hey, darlin’,” she said, in her Southern drawl.
The second he heard it, Chris prayed she’d never lose it.
It was her.
His heart skipped as she moved closer. How the hell could it not?
She was wrapped in a towel and nothing else.
Suddenly, he wanted to lick the droplets of water from her neck as he unwrapped her.
“Well, I know the way to your heart,” he said, trying to figure out a way to ask her on a date and to make her see him as more than a baked goods pimp and a booty call.
That miracle would help right about now…
“You certainly do,” she said, scooping up the next three cupcakes and then placing them back in their pink box as it sat on the island in her kitchen.
“When did you get…?” She almost said home. “Back?” she corrected, hoping it didn’t sound too…possessive.
Elizabeth had to remind herself that he was NOT hers. He was HIS.
This was just coffee before work for her.
Wet.
In a towel.
While he had an erection—and didn’t do anything about it...
Yeah, just a typical day in her life.
“We landed an hour ago. I was going to go home, but I missed you.”
Yeah, she missed him too.
Elizabeth only wished he missed her for more reasons than just sex. Then she wished she didn’t want more. Then she wouldn’t be hurt when he found someone else.
It was bound to happen.
Christopher Leonard was a catch.
He was smart.
He was sexy.
He had a heart of gold—thus him looking like hell but still trying to stay awake. He always thought about her first.
Yeah, someone was going to get a good man, and she wished it could have been her.
“Was it a rough case?” she asked, pouring him a coffee and one for herself. “Want some breakfast sugar before you go to bed?” she asked, grabbing the cream from the refrigerator.
He watched her.
He wanted her.
He desperately wanted something, and it wasn’t coffee.
“Yeah, you know me and sugar. We are comfortable bedfellows.”
She laughed.
“I thought that was my job,” she teased. “Are you shacking up with sugar at night when you go home?”
God!
He wished he’d never suggested unattached sex. It only reminded him that she didn’t want to really be with him as a person.
Just a dick.
He left every night so he wouldn't overstay his welcome. Chris didn’t want her to kick him out.
It would break his heart and destroy the fantasy of him finally having her as his.
“Well, if you’re over the job, we can stop,” he stated, feeling irritated not at her, but at himself. The last thing he wanted was for her to do that, and then he’d have absolutely nothing left.
He was scared. This was typical ‘bad with people’ comments coming out of his mouth.
Elizabeth, shocked at his comment, sat down and stared at him.
“Uh, are you cranky?” she asked, getting that sick feeling in the pit of her stomach.
“Yes.”
She bit into her cupcake.
“I’m sorry if I made you upset. I’ll go get dressed.”
Chris felt bad.
She didn’t do anything, and he was about to take his stupidity out on her. It wasn’t her fault that he got lucky and landed a sexy woman, but only until some other man came by and took her away.
“It’s not at you, honey. Here, you have goose bumps,” he said, seeing them on her arms.
He pulled off his sweater and handed it to her.
Elizabeth pulled it on, and the scent of his cologne made her want to do stupid girl things.
Christ.
She was a sap.
They were just friends who had sex.
Nothing more.
NOTHING…
Shit.
Her heart fluttered when he pulled her wet hair out of the back of the sweater so she wouldn't be cold.
This was pretty bad.
“Thank you,” she said, as she finished pulling it down over her body. Elizabeth grabbed her coffee and took a sip.
“Want to talk about the job?” she asked, assuming that it had to be what had him testy.
Chris was never cranky.
Never.
Something had him stirred up, and if it wasn’t her, then it had to be the other thing in his life.
Work.
“I hated every second of it. I don’t like working with other agents. They don’t get me. You do.”
She took his hand in hers and squeezed it reassuringly in hers.
“Well, that’s because I know how to make you happy.”
Yeah, with meaningless sex.
“There were too many bodies for my liking. I like controlled chaos. This killer…yeah, he was a nut. What have you been doing?”
She held out her cupcake for him, and he took a bite of the cream cheese frosting.
What he wanted was to kiss her. H
e wanted to taste the frosting and her lips.
“The second you left, I was given a case. I had to work with a different ME and Doctor Michaels.”
He laughed.
Oh, he wasn’t the one who should be cranky. Chris knew how much that had to suck.
“Is she dead?”
“Nope. I managed to keep my cool the entire time. You would be proud. Although, it took a lot of time at the gym. I think I was there every night.”
Normally, she would have burned that irritation off with much more pleasurable ways.
Naked.
With him.
“Are you off today?” he asked hopefully, glancing at his Rolex.
“I’m supposed to be, but Gabe called a meeting so I have to head in.”
“What did you do?”
She laughed.
Yeah, it wasn’t just her paranoia that thought that. Her best friend went there too.
She was screwed.
Elizabeth had to have done something. Gabe didn’t call her in for medal ceremonies when she closed a case.
“I know, right? I thought that, too, but honestly, I swear to God that I’ve been on my best behavior. I worked a lot while you were gone. I really missed you.”
“Had to go ten days without sex, huh?” he asked, fishing for information. Chris wanted to ask if she was seeing anyone, but they’d made that stupid agreement that if they did find someone the other person would be happy.
Yeah, bullshit.
He would NOT be happy at all.
How the hell could he be?
Elizabeth was his, and his heart knew it.
She laughed. “Yeah, no sex for me. I’ve been too busy to even think about it,” she said, lying her ass off. “I handled two cases to your one. Who was your agent?” she asked.
Well, at least she wasn’t seeing anyone.
That gave Chris time to woo her.
Maybe.
“It was special Agent Miles Lane. He’s an asshole. He talks down to people like he was born with a silver spoon in his mouth,” he said, offering her a bite of his cupcake this time.
“That’s ironic because you have the whole set of silverware in yours.”
He grinned. “Yeah, yeah, we rich people are so privileged. We have the fancy jobs, the expensive digs…”
And he still didn’t have the one thing he wanted.
Dawn of Evil_FBI Flashback Page 3