“Shapely?”
He laughed. “Definitely.”
“Liar. I’m not shapely. I’m-” she thought a moment “-fit.”
“That’s it,” he said, his mouth lowering to hers. “I could watch you trek up and down mountains all day with that fit butt of yours.”
“Bastard,” she said with a laugh, their lips coming together before she could add anything else.
She opened her mouth to the kiss, giving a small gasp at the urgency with which he responded-all eagerness and heat. There was nothing tentative about him. He wasn’t tiptoeing around what he wanted.
He lifted her shirt and placed his palm, warm from the fire, on her stomach. “Stay with me tonight.”
“You can trust me not to go out a window on a bedsheet.”
“I’m not talking about staying in a guest room.”
“Owen…”
He eased his palm higher up her abdomen and smiled. “Yes, Abigail?”
“You’re direct, aren’t you?”
Without answering, he smoothed his palm over one breast, outlining the shape of it, curving his fingers around the nipple. “Lace,” he said. “Somehow I expected a lace bra, Detective.”
“Ah-ha. So you’ve been imagining what kind of bra I wear.”
“And you? Want to admit what you’ve been imagining about me?”
She smiled. “No.”
He slid her off his lap and got to his feet, tossing another log on the fire, then caught her by her hand and helped her up. The fresh chunk of wood caught fire with a crackle and a spark of heat. Owen didn’t let go of her hand. They walked together down a short hall to his bedroom, all dark woods and deep, earthy colors. The air was cooler there, away from the woodstove.
“It’s a beautiful spot,” Abigail said.
He lifted her into his arms and laid her on his bed, smoothing back her short curls. “Don’t think for a change. But if anything doesn’t feel right-”
“I won’t shoot you. I promise.”
He ignored her attempt at humor and kissed her forehead, her nose. “Just tell me.”
She touched her fingertips to his mouth. “I will. Thank you.”
They helped each other get undressed, her shirt going first, her lacy bra and underpants going last. Owen was very careful of her bandaged scratches, but she hardly noticed them at all, her entire body screaming out not with pain but desire, an ache that had nothing to do with getting attacked with a drywall saw.
“Owen,” Abigail said, letting her mind spin away from all that had brought her to Mt. Desert. “I like saying your name.”
She ran her hands up his back, skimming the ripple of scars, of hard muscle. She had nothing on him when it came to being fit. Every inch of him betrayed the work he did. He was tough, sexy, focused and absolutely relentless.
“Stop thinking,” he whispered, as if he’d been reading her mind.
“I’m not thinking. Not really. I’m feeling your scars.” Her fingertips caught the tip of his erection. “I guess that’s not a scar.”
“I hope to hell not.”
He took her nipple into his mouth, scraped his teeth erotically over it, then down her stomach, and lower. There were no more words after that. And, she thought, no going back. She moved under him, guiding him to her. He eased into her just a little, as if to give her a chance to change her mind, but she responded by taking him deep inside her.
That was all he required. She could feel his shudder of total abandon as he thrust into her. She threw her arms over her head and shut her eyes, sensations washing over her, emotion and physical need melting together, indistinguishable.
He didn’t slacken his pace, didn’t relent. She grabbed hold of his hips and drove him even deeper into her. She knew she was on the edge. She tried to hold back, but he urged her on, thrusting faster, harder, until she was spiraling into an orgasm that took over her entire body. She cried out, but still he didn’t stop, taking her higher, deeper, holding her there.
“Owen!”
She shattered and melted into the warm bed under her. She didn’t move. Couldn’t.
But he could, and did, still hard inside her, but moving more slowly now, as if to test her, tempt her, make her prove to him that she was spent.
Amazingly, her body responded. Desire coursed through her like a hot, oozing trickle that turned quickly to a flood, overwhelming everything in its path. She clutched his arms, digging her fingers into his muscles as he quickened his pace, his energy and stamina without limit.
For an instant, their eyes locked.
Then he smiled, shuddering with his own release, even as she pulled herself up against his chest and felt the heat there, tasted his sweat as her body convulsed yet again, this time with him.
They collapsed together, then fell onto their backs, breathing hard.
Bit by bit, the room came back into focus. The wood walls. The rich colors. Abigail could smell the fire in the other room and hear the sigh of the ocean, the rhythmic hoot of a nearby owl.
She’d just made love to Owen Garrison.
She hadn’t held back even a little. She sat up, aware of her nakedness. In the dim light, she could see spots reddened by his teeth and tongue, still sensitized. A touch-just a glance, probably-and she’d be fired up again, eager for more wild sex.
His eyes drifted from her breasts downward and back again with a frankness she found both comforting and unbelievably erotic. He made no effort to cover himself. She could see it wouldn’t be long before he was ready to take her again.
“You’re one good-looking bastard,” she told him.
He sat up. “Am I?”
“You know damn well you are. A good-looking dare-devil. And bloody rich, too.”
“And?”
“Oh, there should be more, should there? Glutton. Well, you’re also good at what you do, and committed to it, and-” All the fun went out of her tone, and she finished. “Rootless.”
“All true. Everything you say.” He sat up halfway and flicked his tongue over her nipple. “Every word.”
She gulped in a breath. “Owen…”
He flicked his tongue over her nipple again. “I think you’re the sexiest woman I’ve ever met.” He cupped his lips around the nipple, holding it in his mouth as his tongue did its work and she started to melt. He released it, saying, “I love your dark eyes,” then captured it again.
Barely able to sit up any longer, Abigail ran one hand up his back. “Never mind my eyes. I’m-”
“And your heart.” He let go of her nipple and sat up higher, so that his eyes were level with hers. “I love your heart. You’re not cynical. You’ve seen the worst that human nature can offer, and you still believe in the rest of us.”
She sank back onto the bed, taking him with her. “Don’t be too sure,” she whispered. “Just make love to me again. Now. If you can…”
“Oh, I can,” he whispered back, taking her hand and guiding it to him.
As she stroked him, she pressed him against her most sensitive flesh, slowly, the hard tip inflaming her. When he entered her this time, he didn’t move. He filled her up with him and held her close.
“I’m falling in love with you, Abigail,” he said. “I have been for a long time.”
This time, their lovemaking was slow and tender as they explored each other, giving as well as taking, a meeting of souls and not just of bodies. She could feel his release starting and moved in such a way to heighten it. He moaned, shuddering with each thrust.
She didn’t think she’d have another orgasm-didn’t care-but before she realized what was happening, it was upon her, rocking her to her core.
“Owen,” she said. “Owen, I…”
But she couldn’t get another word out. She was done, exhausted. Satiated. She rolled into him, aware only of his arms around her as she fell asleep.
Doyle kissed his sons good-night and lumbered downstairs as if he were a million years old. Will Browning in his last days at ninety-five had walked
with more of a spring in his step.
No one thought this thing with Mattie would end well.
He’d gone on self-destructive binges before, but luck and friends would walk him back from the brink. This time, luck meant not that he’d passed out before getting behind the wheel of a car but that Abigail Browning hadn’t caught him cutting her phone wires or pawing through her house. Armed or not, she’d have nailed his skinny ass.
Luck meant he hadn’t nicked her deeper with the drywall saw.
And friends.
Mattie might have other friends he could count on, but Doyle was through. The DUI over the winter had just about done him in. If Mattie had been bugging Abigail with the anonymous calls-if he’d attacked her-there was just no going back to any kind of tolerance between them. Any kind of friendship, no matter how ragged.
The stupid bastard was working an angle.
It was one thing to hurt himself. It was another thing altogether to hurt other people.
And yet when he sat down at his computer and opened up an e-mail to Katie, Doyle’s first words betrayed his anguish.
“I’m worried about Mattie.”
CHAPTER 24
Bob O’Reilly took one look at Abigail on her front doorstep and scowled. “Damn it, Browning.”
“What? Do I have dirt on my nose or something?”
But she knew what he meant. With the fog burning off, she’d put on shorts and a T-shirt, and he could see her scraped arm-she’d pulled off the gauze wrap-and the lower edge of her bandaged thigh.
“Looks like you need a refresher on how to fight off a man with a saw.”
“I did fight him off.”
It was eight o’clock in the morning, but she’d awakened early in Owen’s bed and beat a path back to her place for a hot shower, coffee and a get-a-grip session with herself. A good thing, because she wouldn’t have wanted O’Reilly showing up unannounced and not finding her there. Having him privy to her love life or lack thereof in Boston was bad enough-one of the unintended consequences of him living two floors above her.
Explaining Owen Garrison would have been impossible. Abigail wasn’t sure she understood what had happened last night herself. Whatever was going on between them wasn’t just a fling. She knew that much.
“What are you doing here?” she asked Bob. “Taking a break from city life? Is it too hot in Boston, or is there nothing for an experienced detective like yourself to do?”
“You know why I’m here.”
She did, indeed. She’d have headed north if he’d been the one attacked.
“Scoop would be here, but he’s working a case right now. He said I have his permission to smack you up the side of the head for him, too.”
“And you boys wonder why you have trouble with women.”
“I don’t have trouble with women. It’s relationships that kill me.”
“This is what I’m saying.”
He stood at the bottom of the steps. He wore jeans and a navy polo shirt, yet no one would mistake him for anything but a cop. “And you’re not a woman. You’re a detective.”
“Ha-ha.”
He walked up the steps, and she moved aside, letting him go in first. He made a face at the brightly-colored entry. “The blue’s a change.”
“Doesn’t it remind you of lupine?”
“Right. Yeah. First thing I thought of.”
She smiled. Bob was even worse with plants than she was. “Lupines aren’t native to Maine, actually. They’re a Japanese import. They’ve naturalized.”
“Been reading about lupines?”
“Ellis Cooper told me.”
“Ellis, the amateur landscape designer whose brother is about to sell his summer house out from under him.”
“He has a pink lupine in his garden that’s incredible.”
Bob moved into her front room; he’d obviously heard enough about lupines. “Your assailant was hiding in here?” He didn’t tone down his skepticism. “How the hell did you miss him?”
“Because he wasn’t in here.” She walked past him into the back room and pointed to the short hall that led past the cellar door and into the kitchen. “He must have heard me coming and ducked in there.”
“Why not just run through the kitchen and out the front door?”
“Because I’d have heard him and followed him.”
“And he knew that,” Bob said with just a hint of a challenge.
“It’s a logical conclusion-”
“For someone who knows you’re a police officer.” He nodded in agreement. “Otherwise, you’d just get out of here and try not to be seen.”
“Another indicator it was Mattie Young.”
“No word on his whereabouts?”
Abigail shook her head. “You heard he was holed up in Ellis’s garden shed?”
“Yeah. Lou Beeler gave me a call late last night.”
“Lou? Why?”
Bob’s expression told her that he wasn’t buying any pretense of confusion on her part. He said, “No one wants to see you get hurt or spin out of control.”
“Thank you for your concern, but-”
“But nothing.” He pulled open her porch door, the cool morning breeze gusting into the small room. “Turning out to be a nice day. I left Boston at two o’clock this morning.”
“If you want to take a nap, you’re welcome to crash upstairs.”
“I don’t want to take a nap, Abigail.”
At least he was using her first name again. “Coffee?”
“I drank a gallon on the way up here.” Standing in the doorway, he looked back, scanning her half-gutted room. “You do all this work yourself?”
She nodded. “Wielding a sledgehammer is a great tension reliever. Helps focus the mind.”
“I’d have helped. Scoop, too.”
“I know.”
“Leave the rest for us. We can all come up one weekend-”
“Bob, I’m not going back to Boston until I figure out what’s going on up here.”
“Yeah.” He gave her a grudging smile. “It was worth a try.”
“At least let me make you breakfast,” she said.
But he was staring out at the water, tufts of fog yet to burn off, lobster boats making their way to the buoys that marked their dozens of pots. “It’s gorgeous here. I remember when I first stood right in this spot. The scenery literally takes your breath away.” Without turning, he went on, “I couldn’t help thinking what a damn shame it was for this beauty to be marred by the memories you have.”
“I have good memories, too. They’re not all bad.” She sat on the edge of a chair. “You’re not here just because a Maine state detective called you.”
Bob kept his gaze on the water. “You’ve got a few spots of fog that haven’t burned off yet. Kind of neat looking.”
“Bob.”
“The FBI stopped by to talk to Scoop and me about you.”
Abigail didn’t react. “Because of Grace Cooper’s background check?”
He turned to her with a half grin. “We didn’t get that far.”
“Scoop was in a bad mood?”
“That and your father called right while these G-men were sitting in my living room.”
Abigail sprang up. “My father called you?”
“We knew each other in the old days.”
“So?”
“Better he should call me about his daughter than about five thousand other people he could have called, don’t you think?”
She was only slightly mollified. “What did he want?”
“For me to come up here.”
“And here you are. Great, Bob. Just great.”
“He talked to me as a father, not-”
“Not as the FBI director? And you didn’t think of his position for one second, did you?”
O’Reilly shrugged off her irritation. “He asked me to put eyes on you and reassure him you were all right. If he came up here himself, it’d be a show. You know that.”
And if h
e’d called-which he probably had tried to-she wouldn’t have been there to answer the phone, but that was a point Abigail preferred to keep to herself.
“Some asshole comes after my kid with a saw,” Bob said, “I’d want to know she was all right, too. It’s natural. It’s got nothing to do with what’s going on up here or what you’re doing or not doing.”
“It’s got everything to do with what’s going on up here. He wants to make sure it’s not about him-that someone’s not using Chris’s death to play games with my head and get at his somehow.”
“That’d be a stretch.”
She shrugged. “Anything’s possible. Isn’t that what my father told you?”
“You and your dad aren’t as different as you think.” Bob paused, nodding at her waterfront. “Isn’t that your neighbor? Batman Garrison. Guy can move on those rocks, can’t he? He’s like a billy goat.”
“Owen’s here?”
O’Reilly must have heard something in her voice, because he turned to her. “Browning, are you blushing?”
“I never blush.” She walked to the door, but he didn’t move aside. “I should go down there and meet him. Maybe he has news.”
Bob didn’t budge. “He patch up your injuries for you?”
“What difference does that make? He’s trained in first aid.”
“So he did patch you up. I’ll be damned. Should I report this to your father?”
“You should mind your own damn business.”
Her half-faked irritation only further confirmed whatever he was thinking-and she had a fair idea of what it was. His grin broadened. “So it’s not just the weird shit happening that’s keeping you up here.”
“If you don’t mind, I’d like to go out to see what he wants.”
“Am I in your way, Detective?”
“Bob.”
“Don’t you want me to meet your neighbor? I’ve seen him a couple times when I’ve been up here, but he’s usually off to a disaster. We’ve never officially met.”
“You don’t need to meet now.”
“Abigail? Hell-are you sleeping with this guy?”
“Bob.”
“You get involved with Batman, and everything changes. You know that, right?”
He wasn’t letting her go to Owen without him. “You’re a pain in the neck, Bob. You know that, right?”
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