The kind that made Kane acutely aware of the contours of his partner’s body, as well as of his own.
Slightly shaken, Kane blamed his reaction on his surroundings, on the stressful day he had just put in and just possibly on the fact he felt trapped in more ways than one. Those were all the components he felt justified in blaming for the very intense way his body had reacted to hers.
It wasn’t Cavanaugh he was reacting to, Kane silently and fiercely insisted. It was the circumstances, nothing more. In the absolute sense, she was an attractive woman.
And he wasn’t made out of wood.
Kane wound up polishing off the glass of beer she had ordered without even realizing that he had raised it to his lips.
Watching him, trying to distract herself from the very intense way her body had reacted to his, Kelly asked, “Another?”
Kane was on his guard immediately. “Another what?” he asked.
Kelly indicated the empty glass on the counter in front of him with her eyes. “Are you up for another glass of beer?”
“I haven’t even finished the one I have,” Kane protested.
“Yes, you have,” Kelly contradicted.
About to argue the point—what was her game, anyway?—Kane looked down at the counter and saw that his glass had been drained.
“Oh.”
It was official, he thought. The woman was making him so crazy, he was oblivious not just to his surroundings, but to everything he was doing, as well.
Pushing his glass closer to the bartender, he said, “Okay, why not? One more.” After that, he silently promised himself, he would go home—even if he had to take a cab.
The second the words were out of his mouth, Kelly raised her hand, waiting for the bartender to look her way again.
But when the man came over to where they were standing at the bar, it was Kane who put down a ten-dollar bill on the counter.
“Another round,” he told the man his partner had called Devin.
“None for me, Dev,” Kelly demurred, putting her hand over the mouth of her glass. “I’m driving.”
“Understood,” Devin told her, then he glanced at her partner.
But Kane was looking back at her. “One more won’t hurt,” he told her, adding, “Worse comes to worst, we share a cab.”
“Tempting,” Kelly allowed, even though, if she were being honest, it really wasn’t tempting to her in the slightest.
She drank beer to be social, not because she actually cared for its taste. When it came down to drinking because she liked the taste, she preferred the kind of drinks her brothers made fun of. The fruity tasting drinks that came with tiny umbrellas and a smattering of fruit floating on the surface.
“But I’ll have to pass,” she told her partner. “I don’t like leaving my car unattended in a parking lot overnight.”
After a moment, Kane nodded. “Yeah, I see your point.” Although crime was down considerably, it was far from wiped out. A car left unattended all night in a parking lot represented a great deal of temptation. “You’d think that the city’s finest could find a way to keep their own vehicles safe.”
His eyes were still holding hers.
Kelly was aware of what he was trying to do. Kane was trying to get her to back down—or maybe back off. She was not about to do either.
“I’m sure they’re working on it,” she said, standing her ground. “Get me a ginger ale, Dev,” she requested. “So I have something to hold in my hand.”
Ginger ale, she reasoned, was the same color as some of the beer that was flowing tonight. Given the dim lighting, she figured that would be a good substitute.
No doubt aware of what she was trying to do, Devin winked at her. “You got it, pretty lady.”
She grinned, then said good-naturedly, “You’re already getting a tip, Dev. Go chat up someone else.”
The bartender laughed. Dispensing the ginger ale into a mug, he placed it on the counter in front of her. “On the house,” he said, then turned toward Kane. “Be good to her,” Devin told him before he moved on to answer the call of another customer.
“What was that supposed to mean?” Kane asked her. Did the bartender think something was going on between him and Cavanaugh? Where the hell had he gotten that impression?
“Maybe Devin’s telling you not to strangle me,” she quipped just before taking a long sip from the mug the bartender had served to her.
“He didn’t seem that intuitive,” Kane responded. “Unless, of course, he’s spent time with you.”
Kelly looked at him over the rim of her ginger ale. “You are a regular laugh riot,” she told Kane. “If you ever decide to leave the force, you might consider a job as a stand-up comedian.”
“I don’t like crowds,” he reminded her.
“Don’t worry,” she told him cheerfully. “There won’t be any when you perform.”
He was about to retort, then decided to dial back his response. Instead, he inclined his head and said, “Touché.”
The next moment, a tall, dark-haired man with a genial smile made his way over to them and began to talk as if he had been standing at the bar with them from the beginning.
“This your new partner?” Brennan Cavanaugh asked his younger sister.
If she was surprised to see him, Kelly gave no indication. She nodded in response to his question. “Durant, this is one of my brothers, Brennan,” she said, introducing her partner to her brother, and then reversing the order. “Brennan, Kane Durant.”
Before Kane could say a word in response, Cavanaugh’s brother had taken hold of his hand and was pumping it heartily.
The moment the wide smile appeared, Kane saw the family resemblance.
“My sister driving you to drink already?” Brennan asked with a laugh.
“After the day we just put in, I thought he deserved to spend a little quality time at Malone’s,” Kelly informed her brother. “I’m only here because I’m his designated driver.”
There. That should take care of any speculation on Brennan’s part that this might be some sort of a date or something.
Her brothers were always trying to pair her off with someone, especially since Valri, their baby sister, was now officially engaged and off the market.
She wondered if they were doing the same thing to Moira, her other sister.
Brennan turned and eyed Kane in astonishment. “And you agreed to this arrangement? Having her drive you home?”
“She more or less agreed for me,” Kane replied. The only say he’d had in the matter had been uttering the word “Yes.”
“No” had not been an acceptable word to use at the time and clearly wouldn’t have computed even if he had said it. “Why?” Kane asked.
Brennan answered his question indirectly by turning to Kelly and asking her a question. “Has he seen you drive?”
“Not exactly,” she hedged. Only one block separated Malone’s from the police precinct. Brennan laughed as he clapped his hand on her new partner’s back, finally getting back to the man’s question.
“I’d say you were in for a treat, Durant, but I’d be lying. If you have a rosary, I’d suggest clutching it. It might afford you some measure of comfort.” Before turning to leave, he had one final suggestion. “Also, closing your eyes would probably help.”
“Brennan,” Kelly began, a warning note in her voice.
Obviously wanting to distract his sister from reading him the riot act, Brennan looked down at his watch. “It’s getting late. Gotta run. I promised someone dinner,” he told Kelly with a wink. Turning toward his sister’s partner, he told Kane, “Nice meeting you. Hope this isn’t the last time.”
With that, Brennan headed toward the front door and quickly disappeared into the crowd.
“He didn’t mean that,”
Kelly was quick to tell her partner.
He wasn’t all that sure he knew what she was referring to. “What, that it was nice meeting me?” Kane asked.
“No, that he hoped this wasn’t the last time he’d see you. And for the record,” she added, “I don’t drive nearly as badly as Brennan was trying to imply. He never got over being my big brother, which made him utterly overprotective.”
But Kane wasn’t about to be distracted from the topic he had honed in on. “Just how badly do you drive?”
“I don’t.” Realizing that he might misunderstand what she was telling him, Kelly tried to clarify her statement. “What I mean is that I don’t drive badly.” Then, for the sake of honesty, she felt obligated to admit, “But I do drive a little fast at times.”
Kane nodded. He had nothing against that. A little speed was a good thing.
* * *
“A little fast?” Kane questioned approximately forty-five minutes and three more beers later. They had finally left the tavern and Kelly was taking him home.
She had just narrowly squeaked through two yellow lights that both had been in the process of turning red. In addition, she had taken a right turn a tad too quickly, all but completing the hairpin turn on the passenger side’s two wheels.
Kane had been entertaining a slight buzz as they’d walked out of Malone’s. That buzz was now completely gone, evaporated in the heat of what he felt was very justifiable fear.
“If you ask me,” he said to her, his hands braced against the dashboard, his body rigid to keep from falling to the side. “Your brother didn’t begin to scratch the surface with his warning. You drive like a crazy woman,” he told her.
“That’s just the beer you’re feeling,” Kelly told him.
“No, that’s just reality I’m feeling,” Kane contradicted. “Pull over,” he instructed, intending to take the wheel. “Thanks to your driving, I am fully sober now and more than able to drive myself the rest of the way home.”
She spared him a quick look, then focused back on the road ahead. If she recalled correctly, there was a tricky maneuver just up ahead.
“Too bad,” she told him. “This is my car, so I get to drive. Just take a deep breath and you’ll be home in no time.”
Her words gave him no comfort. “Home as in my apartment, or as in the afterlife that priests and ministers all talk about and on occasion refer to as ‘home’?”
Kelly laughed as she shook her head. “As in your apartment,” she answered, refusing to be baited. “Did my brother really manage to get to you?” she asked, surprised. Kane didn’t seem like the type to be spooked easily.
“No, but your driving is,” he told her.
Again he braced his hands against the dashboard in an effort to try to steady himself as she took another corner quickly.
“For your information,” she informed him. “I haven’t had an accident yet.”
That was one statistic he intended to follow up on. “I guess that’s enough to get me to start believing in miracles,” he replied.
“And here’s another one,” she concluded with a grand gesture of her hand as she indicated the area outside his side of the vehicle. “You’re home.”
Surprised, Kane looked out the windshield. She was right.
Chapter 7
To his surprise, Kelly got out of her vehicle at the same time he stepped out on the passenger side.
“What are you doing?” he asked. He saw no reason for her not to drive off.
“I’m surveying the property,” she cracked. “What does it look like I’m doing?”
“You’re walking me to the door?” he asked incredulously. There was so much wrong with this picture he wasn’t sure where to start.
She snapped her fingers. “You figured out my secret. I’m walking you to your apartment,” she confirmed. When he gave her a very skeptical look, she added, “I don’t mean to imply that I think you can’t hold your liquor. Let’s just say I’m satisfying my curiosity as to where you live.” She smiled up at him brightly as she fell into step beside him.
“It’s not some dark cave, if that’s what you’re thinking,” he told her.
With that he pointed toward the garden apartment located just beyond a central planter. The flowers in the planter seemed to be fighting a losing battle, she noted as they passed.
She laughed at his description. “Never even crossed my mind. No stairs?” she asked as he stopped before the door of a ground-floor apartment. She’d pictured him as someone who preferred being closer to the sky than to have someone living over him.
“I like being close to the ground,” Kane told her as he fished out his keys.
“Fear of heights?” she guessed.
When he answered her, she noticed that Kane neither denied nor confirmed her guess. Instead, he said, “It’s easier to hit the ground running this way.”
What he meant by that escaped her for the moment. She noticed that Kane tended to wax a little philosophical now that he had more than three beers in him. There were worse things, she decided.
Holding the key in his hand, Kane refrained from putting it into the lock. He supposed that a few parting words were in order.
“I’d invite you in—”
The next word he was about to say was but, however he didn’t get a chance to utter it because that was when Kelly said, “Okay,” and moved a bit closer to him, as if she was waiting for the door to be opened.
“But,” Kane continued with determination. “I’m not set up for company.”
He was the last person she would have thought felt uncomfortable about the appearance of his living quarters. “I’m not company,” she told him. “I’m your partner, remember?”
“I’m trying very hard not to,” he told her with a degree of honesty.
Kelly continued talking as if he hadn’t interjected anything. “That makes me like family,” she concluded, making her point.
His eyes were flat as Kane countered, “Not my family.”
Something in his voice caught her attention. But she couldn’t quite put her finger on what about it bothered her.
She watched his face as she asked, “Why? No girls in your family?” It was a guess at best.
Kane didn’t answer her.
He hadn’t been all that open with her tonight, but now it seemed as if a barrier had come down between them.
Hard.
“I’ll see you in the squad room tomorrow,” he said, turning away from her.
“Oh, you’ll see me before then,” Kelly informed her partner.
He’d just inserted the key into the lock and glanced at her over his shoulder. He kept his hand protectively over the doorknob.
“Why?” Kane challenged. If she was planning on meeting him for breakfast somewhere before their shift began, she was out of luck. This was as much fraternizing as he intended on doing for the rest of the year. Perhaps longer.
“Because I’ll be driving you in,” she said, trying to rouse his short-term memory. Kane had executed a perfect three-point turn to successfully parallel park, taking full advantage of the space closest to the six story precinct building. Right now, however, his vehicle left something to be desired.
Such as proximity.
“Your car’s parked in front of the precinct, remember?” Kelly prodded.
He frowned, which immediately told her that he hadn’t remembered. The next moment, he shrugged. “Don’t bother. I can call a cab.”
Kelly was quick to veto the idea. “There’s no need for you to spend the extra money. I take my responsibilities seriously.”
Since when was he a responsibility? Especially hers? Kane waved away her words.
“That’s okay—” he began.
“You turn me down and you’ll hurt my
feelings,” she said out of the blue.
For a second, he stared at her, trying to decide whether she was serious or just pulling his leg. He couldn’t tell.
“What feelings?” he challenged. “If there was one thing I learned about you today, it’s that you have the hide of a rhino.”
Even if she had the face of an angel.
Kane immediately pulled back mentally as he simultaneously upbraided himself. Where the hell had that thought come from?
He supposed it was a clear indication that he had had too much to drink after all.
It irritated him beyond all reason that she was right.
Kelly seemed to take no offense at his comment. “Ah, yes, but under the tough outer layer beats a soft heart,” she informed him. The corners of her mouth twitched a little as she did her best to keep her amusement from showing. “Okay, Durant, this is where we part company. See you in the morning.”
She thought she heard him grunt something in reply just before he disappeared behind the door. The man’s manners left something to be desired.
Kelly hurried back to her vehicle. She had barely pulled out of the spot when another car immediately swooped in, taking her place. There were few spots available at this time of night, she noted. Parking was at a premium. Not for the first time, she felt a wave of smug relief wash over her.
She’d made the right decision.
A little over a year ago she had given up apartment living and bought a small detached home. Among other things, this afforded her a driveway where she could always park her car. That in turn meant she no longer had to go searching for a parking spot at the most disadvantageous time of the evening.
Granted, a parking space had come with her previous apartment, but she’d lost count the number of times she’d come home, dead tired, only to find someone else had parked in her space. Like as not, the rental office would be closed for the night and she would have no recourse but to go trolling for an empty spot, not an easy feat at that time of night. Especially when all she really wanted to do was crawl into bed and get some well-deserved sleep.
How to Seduce a Cavanaugh Page 7