"This is getting more interesting by the minute. You cooked dinner for Mad Dog? Ate with him last night? How was it?"
"It was … fine. He was good with Mitchell."
"I adore my godson, but right now I'd rather know how the man was with you. Did he behave himself? Make a pass?"
So much for not thinking about him. About it. Ann began to refill the bottles one by one, concentrating fiercely on the water levels as if her life depended on getting them equal.
"He kissed me, if that's what you mean," she blurted, both embarrassed and relieved to get it out.
"Oh, boy. That is definitely what I mean. Did you like it?"
Ann remembered Maddox's hands in her hair, warm and coaxing, and his mouth on her mouth, hot and hungry. The stubble on his upper lip. The smooth thrust of his tongue. His strong pulse pounding against her grip on his wrists, his solid body—not pressing, not overpowering—but close and urgent. Maddox kissed like he meant it. Like he wanted her.
Her insides squeezed together. It was a novel and disturbing feeling, being wanted.
"He surprised me. I don't know. I think so." She winced from the uncertainty in her own voice. She sounded like such a loser.
Val's eyes sparkled. "Well, tell him to kiss you again so you can find out."
"I couldn't do that."
"Sweetie, it's been a year since you left Rob. Maybe it's time to live a little."
"Not quite a year. The divorce isn't final for two more weeks. Technically, I'm a married woman."
"And Rob is a creep. You deserve the chance to find out that not all men are like him."
Ann grabbed a bunch of daisies from the refrigerator and began stripping leaves from the lower stems. "I can't take chances. I have to think about Mitchell."
"I thought you said Mad Dog was good with Mitchell."
"Val, listen to yourself. 'Mad Dog.' What kind of mother dates a man with a nickname like that? I might as well go out with somebody named Viper or Spike."
"You know that name's left over from his football days. It doesn't mean anything."
"Really?" Ann tossed the leaves into the garbage. "Then why have you been using it ever since he came back to town?"
They exchanged looks.
"He can be a little … intense," Val admitted.
Ann shivered with the remembered heat of Maddox's kiss. "Yes."
"But that doesn't mean he's dangerous."
"Obviously, you haven't been listening to the gossip at lunch."
"So, is it Mad Dog you're worried about?" Val asked shrewdly. "Or what people will say about you dating him?"
"Both, I guess." Ann stared at the pretty, bright flowers in the sink with their innocent and optimistic faces. She was a long way from innocent and years past optimistic. "I can't afford to ignore what people say. Not with the trial coming up. Rob still has lots of friends in this town, and I still have to live here."
Val sighed. "You're right. Of course, you're right. But I guess I'm so happy with Con, I want to see you happy, too."
Affection misted Ann's eyes. She wiped her hands on her apron and turned to hug her best friend since second grade. "I don't need 'happy,' honey. 'Safe' is good enough for me."
And Maddox Palmer definitely was not safe.
* * *
Chapter 6
«^»
"You want to play policeman in this town, you have to put on the uniform." The chief drew himself up behind his desk, every starched thread in place, every button gleaming.
Maddox, sprawled in one of the brown vinyl chairs, felt like he'd been called down to the principal's office. "I thought you wanted me on this case."
"I wanted you to look into facts that could exonerate Rob. Not swallow that woman's stories."
That woman. Annie. A vision of her cool green eyes, her pale face framed by baby fine hair, rose up to accuse him.
"And if the facts support her stories?" Maddox growled.
"Then we'll bring them to the D.A.'s attention. God knows they're eager enough to use the rest of her testimony."
"Which is?"
"Anything going to motive. That Rob and Val had a history. That he was upset with her for offering his wife a job. And that while he was working at the bank, he encouraged Ann to bring him the daily deposit bags from the restaurant."
"She mention anywhere along the line that Rob also beat the crap out of her?"
The chief stiffened. "Where did you hear that?"
"From Annie."
The chief looked uncomfortable. "She never came to me."
Maddox shook out a cigarette and lit up. He'd never been able to do that in the principal's office. But he was a long way now from the nineteen-year-old truant who'd left town.
"And you never encouraged her to. Is that why you want to believe she's lying now? So you can live with yourself for standing by while Rob took his fists to her?"
"I'm not defending myself or my actions to you."
"Some things can't be defended."
The chiefs face flushed as red as the bricks on the county courthouse. "You know how tricky domestic situations are. If the woman involved won't file a complaint … but I run a clean department."
"Yeah? Then why are you so eager to get my investigation under your control?"
"For your sake, idiot. I want you to put a badge on again before you lose your head completely over that woman and do something we'll both regret."
"Like punch out Rob."
"Like get yourself fired for assaulting a civilian when you're already on suspension."
Well. The chief might actually give a rat's ass about him. Or about his career, at least.
"Thanks, Dad. I appreciate your concern."
"I'm concerned about upholding the law. I don't want to have to arrest my son in my town."
"So you're going to put me in uniform and let me make the arrests instead?" Maddox asked dryly.
The chief harrumphed.
It was a judgment call, and Maddox's faith in his own judgment had been badly shaken. He wanted action, damn it. He itched for the chance to wipe the blank look from Annie's eyes, to scrub away his self-disgust. But he was afraid of making another mistake.
He blew out a stream of smoke. "Let's say I do go to work for you. It beats moonlighting as a security guard. But what then?"
"Then I'll put you on the case. Officially, this time."
"What else?"
"Well, we're a small department. I can't spare any of my officers full-time on any one investigation."
"Which means what? You going to put me on rookie patrol?"
"I need somebody to start on swing patrol—three to midnight. But the schedule rotates. You'd do five-nines, just like everybody else."
Five days of nine-hour shifts and three days off duty. It was fair. Better than he'd expected. With the day-off rotation, he might even see a weekend.
Hell. He was thinking like this was a real job. Like he could ever work in Cutler, where everyone remembered every stupid thing he'd done in high school. Like he could work under the chief, who'd always figured him for a screw-up.
Like he had a choice.
Annie's flat acceptance still vibrated in his brain. Well, then, you can leave now. You got what you wanted.
He wasn't sure what he wanted. He only knew he couldn't leave Annie to face her detractors alone anymore now than he could when they were kids.
Anyway, it was only for a month.
He stabbed out his cigarette. "Where do I sign?"
* * *
The gym was hot and echoed with the slap of basketballs and the shouts of children. Ann stopped just inside the scarred double doors, hit by the smell of healthy young bodies and hot old ones, floor wax and sneakers and sweat.
She searched the knots of sliding, jumping children until she identified Mitchell's fair head and purple Spartans jersey. And then, with an old, reflexive fear, she looked for Rob.
He sat with the rest of the parents opposite the team's bench, his eyes nar
rowed on his son's play. His blond sideburns were dark with sweat. His mouth was compressed with annoyance. He looked like what he was, a former star athlete who played golf. She knew how hard he'd fought the deterioration of his physique, the collapse of his career. He still battled the loss of his standing in the community.
He did not see her.
Her shoulders sagged with relief. She'd come from weeding her garden, anxious not to miss Mitchell's first game. Her hair was stuck up with a plastic clip. Red clay shadowed her knees beneath the hem of her sensible shorts.
Rob hated her in shorts. Mrs. Robert Cross never wore them. She had never worn anything that could trigger her husband's uncertain temper. But Annie liked them. She liked the freedom and the coolness and the connection with the earth. She hadn't changed for Mitchell's game tonight. She was in too much of a hurry. And maybe she was too proud. But she was glad Rob didn't see her, all the same.
She slipped into the bleachers and sat down by the door. The referee's whistle blew. Ann didn't know much about basketball, but as the quarter wore on even she could see that Mitchell played poorly. He ran aimlessly, seeming almost relieved when his teammates neglected to pass him the ball.
"Go on, grab it! Get it! Get in there!" Rob shouted from the sidelines.
Another player dribbled down the court. Mitchell slapped at the ball, earning a whistle from the ref and a reprimand from his coach.
"Reaching," the referee announced, his shaved head gleaming under the fluorescent lights. "Red ball, on the side."
Mitchell's face tightened. Ann's chest tightened, too, but her sympathy would only embarrass him. She looked away, toward the doors.
A police officer entered from the recreation center lobby, his shoulders wide, his body broadened by whatever it was policemen wore beneath their shirts. His hat brim shadowed his face, but Ann recognized the set of his head and the slant of his shoulders as he sauntered through the doors.
It was Maddox, his lawless energy contained in a blue police uniform wilting with heat. Her heart two-stepped in her chest. She pressed her hands together in her lap.
He took one step toward the corner, so that the door was no longer at his back. His hooded gaze panned the room: the running teams, the yelling parents, the teens' pickup game—shirts and skins—on the other court. He saw Mitchell and smiled.
And then he turned his head and stared directly at Ann.
Something fluttered low in her stomach. Like fear, but she wasn't afraid, though her mouth was dry and her blood drummed in her ears.
She waited for him to come to her. He would come. The certainty was both thrilling and distressing. And he did walk over to the bleachers, with the same casual prowl that caught her eye and broke her heart in high school.
He nodded. "Annie."
She said the first words to come into her head. "You're in uniform."
His mouth relaxed. "I'm on duty."
"But I thought—you said you were on leave."
"From the Atlanta department, yeah." He angled his big body so he still had a view of the gym.
Ann blinked. On his dark sleeve, right above the stylized star on his shoulder, were the words Cutler Police Department. "You're working here?"
"For the next month."
Through the start of Rob's trial. Something shriveled inside her. "Well, that should make our next interrogation easier." She was proud that her voice did not shake.
Maddox kept his head turned toward the teens' game across the court, where play and tempers were heating up over a foul call. "I've read your statement. I don't need to interview you."
"I thought you already had."
"Not in an official capacity."
"And unofficially?"
He shrugged. "I wanted to know what's going on with you, Annie. Is that so bad?"
She wasn't sure. "It depends on your reasons, I guess."
She couldn't believe she was talking to him this way, challenging him, and the high metal ceiling hadn't fallen on her head and the aluminum bleachers hadn't opened and swallowed her up.
You want reasons? Rob had sneered, his handsome face swollen with bourbon and frustration. I'll give you reasons. Reasons not to question. Reasons to be afraid.
Maddox rubbed his jaw with the back of his hand, recalling her to the present. He had big hands, square and clean. "Maybe I'm just taking a friendly interest."
"Is that what we are?" she asked dryly. "Friends?"
He looked at her sideways, and his mouth curled in that slow, knowing grin that did funny things to her breathing. "We used to be friends, remember? When we were kids."
"You beat up Billy Ward for calling me 'Chicken Legs.'"
"And you used to save half your dessert to give me on the bus. Chocolate chip cookies."
Because his mother had died, and he didn't have cookies from home. She remembered. "It was a long time ago," she said.
"You're still feeding me."
"Once. I owed you for my car."
"So." He crossed his arms casually on his broad chest, watching the action in the gym. Mitchell was sitting out, head bent, skinny elbows on bony knees. On the other court, the backboard rattled, and a shirt shoved a skin. "What do I have to do to earn another invitation?" Maddox asked.
"Why would you want one?"
"Maybe I'm still hungry."
In her mind, on her mouth, she replayed his kiss, possessive, seeking, hot. I have pretty basic appetites. Her fingers curled in her lap.
"I'm sorry. I can't give you what you want. I can't be what you want"
"You are what I want, Annie," he said in a low, rough voice. You've always been what I want"
"Not always," she whispered, looking down at her hands. Remembering the river road.
"Even then," he said, instantly understanding her. "But you were fifteen years old. Too damn young for what I had in mind."
She wanted to believe him. It soothed an old hurt to believe he'd rejected her from kindness and not because he'd found her flat-chested, embarrassingly eager and dumb. She smiled sadly. "And now I'm too old."
"Twenty-eight. Three years younger than me."
"Too married, then."
Too damaged, she meant. Too much Rob's accomplice in the destruction of her own soul.
"Separated, you said. Almost divorced."
The marriage is over. She'd told him that.
She sighed. "It's not that simple. There's my record. The trial. Mitchell. You can't afford to be involved with me."
"Why don't you let me be the judge of that?"
"Because," she said painfully, "I can't afford to be involved with you."
He drew breath to answer. And then the pickup game on the far court exploded. Half-naked bodies tangled under the hoop. Shouted curse words shook the gym. A ten-year-old Spartans player froze with the ball in his hands, and the ref blew his whistle.
Before Ann could blink, Maddox was gone, his hard shoes clacking on the wooden floor.
"Break it up. Break it up. Knock it off!" The last was an authoritative roar.
He stood aside a second while the sweaty players sorted themselves out, encouraged one with a heavy hand on his shoulder and plucked another from the floor. A father on the bleachers stood. The woman beside him stopped him with a hand on his arm.
Mitchell huddled with his teammates on the bench, chin down and eyes watchful. His trained response to violence, Ann thought, with a catch at her heart.
She looked anxiously back at Maddox, dark and solid in the center of a pack of teens.
I heard he shat that boy, and the department fired him.
He could handle it. Of course he could handle it.
"Tell me what's going on," he said.
The teens, black and white, shirts and skins, all of them sweaty and angry, crowded around. Words flew, punctuated with curses and gestures.
"Stuffed you, man."
"Knocked me down."
"Street rules. Show me blood."
Maddox listened, never reaching f
or his notebook or his radio, his face impassive. "This isn't the street," he interrupted. "You've got kids playing here, parents. I'm calling a technical foul."
"All right!"
"But I never touched him!" a tall black youth protested.
Maddox squinted. "Your name Burrell?"
The kid thrust his jaw forward. "So?"
"I used to play with a Jimmy Burrell. Know him?"
The kid's attitude leaked out like air from a ball. "My uncle."
Maddox nodded. "Good player. One shot," he said to the boy he'd pulled off the floor.
"But—"
"Take it," Maddox advised in a hard voice. "And get back to your game before I call the center off limits for the next thirty days. You want to get stupid, go someplace else."
Ann held her breath. Grumbling, the teen took the ball from one of his friends and stood at the free-throw line. The others jostled into position along the lane. Set. Shoot. Swish. Maddox caught the ball one-handed and bounced it to the other team.
And that was it. It was over. The teens slid and thumped down court, Maddox nodded to the referee, and the boys' teams resumed play.
Ann sat frozen on her hard aluminum bench, caught between relief and a sense of anticlimax. She watched Maddox stroll back along the far side of the court, nod to a parent, exchange a word with Rob. Uneasiness lurched in her stomach, but neither man glanced her way.
As Maddox passed the Spartans bench, he said something to Mitchell that earned him a quick, grateful look from the boy. Thank you, Ann thought. Without fuss, without thought, he'd done the right thing, defused a tricky situation and offered comfort to her son. She sighed. She would never in a million years have that kind of competent assurance.
And then, as Maddox paced the painted line toward her, she saw that beneath his black-brimmed hat his face was nearly gray.
He met her eyes and smiled crookedly. "Punks."
"You handled them very well."
He shrugged, dismissing her compliment. "So, I don't shoot every kid who pushes the line."
There it was, she realized. There was a reason for that gray look around his mouth, the lines of strain around his eyes. That boy he killed was only fourteen. Did he think about that every time he answered a call or went out on patrol?
"I'm sorry," she said. "It must be hard for you."
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