Just last month she'd called him on his weekend off to try to talk through a gang-related murder. He'd fallen asleep while they were on the phone, but she hadn't cared. She just needed to feel like someone was there to listen.
"Okay, fine, you caught me spacing out. But yes, I'm starving. Did you bring anything good today?" She pushed out of her seat to walk with him toward the break room.
"Nope. Peanut butter and jelly. The usual."
"Trade you for my lean cuisine." She batted her eyelashes up at him. "It's sesame chick-en."
"Good as that sounds, I'll have to pass." He crossed the room quickly and grabbed his lunch out of the fridge before settling at one of the round wooden tables in front of the half-stocked vending machines.
Jade was slower, carefully reading the instructions on the back of the box and following them to the letter despite the fact that she brought nearly the same thing every day.
"So, how did your interview go?" He asked between bites, and when she clicked the microwave door shut, she shot him a skeptical glance.
"I was going to ask you the same thing."
"Beat you to it." He swigged his iced tea and Jade leaned back against the soda machine. "I got a young woman. She was...less than helpful."
"Not so unusual."
"No, but once people feel like they're safe and can help, they tend to, you know, help."
"So what was it? Bad information?" He furrowed his brow, willing her not to answer with what he already knew she'd say.
"She was tight lipped, but she seemed like she actually did want to help. It was almost like..." Jade glanced at the microwave, then tapped her fingers against the ugly green countertop. "It was like someone threatened her."
And there it was. His own suspicions put on the table in front of him.
"Mine too." He rubbed his chin then said, "So, we've got a couple options. Maybe these ladies coincidentally acted odd on the same day in regard to the same crime."
"Which is about as likely as you getting and keeping a girlfriend." Jade cocked an eyebrow.
"What would I need a girlfriend for?" he shot back, then shook his head. "Beside the point. Anyway, so either they were living in bizarro world today or Scaglietti's guys tracked them down and told them not to talk."
"So what do we do? We can't risk their lives."
"No, we can't." Derrick took another bite of his sandwich and willed his mind to work harder. "If they knew these two were coming in, it's likely that they got everyone who witnessed it."
"How is that even possible? They'd have to have access to the security cameras and some serious face recognition software."
"Which they don't have because they short circuited the electric, including the security cameras before they set foot in the restaurant itself." Derrick sighed.
The microwave beeped and Jade slid into the seat opposite him. "It doesn't make sense."
"No. It doesn't. But if we think about this, we can probably figure it out. Okay, how else would they know who all the witnesses were."
"They could have threatened them at the time of the crime."
"The average person would know they couldn't keep their word like that. No, these ladies seemed like there was a very serious threat of follow through." Derrick sipped his iced tea again, but when he looked at Jade he found that her blue eyes had glassed over, her jaw slack.
He followed her gaze to find Zac Flynn entering the room.
"Hey guys." He smiled. "Hell of a case you've got going for this Scaglietti guy. They weren't kidding when they said it would take me all week. How long you been working on it?"
"Better part of two years," Derrick answered since Jade seemed so clearly incapable of doing so.
"Damn, that's a lot of work." Flynn shook his head, then crossed the room, opened the fridge, and grabbed a yogurt.
Strawberry.
It would be strawberry.
"Word around the unit is that you were some big shot in the Army," Flynn said.
"I did my part," Derrick said. "You Navy?"
Flynn nodded.
Called it.
"I hope we can try to work past our differences," Flynn offered a friendly smile and Derrick answered in kind, though the effort hurt his muscles.
Jade, meanwhile, seemed unable to determine whether she should stare down at her meal or follow along with the conversation—a condition only made evident by the way her gaze darted back and forth like she was watching a particularly sporting tennis match.
Flynn apparently didn't notice this, and asked her, "You guys get anything good from your witnesses?"
"Nah. Not yet. We might, though. With, you know, time. Effort." She stabbed her piece of sesame chicken and bit her bottom lip. Derrick's stomach twisted just watching her.
"She's being modest," he stepped in. "We haven't gotten to go over everything just yet."
"I'm sure," Flynn offered another of those too-casual smiles and nodded. "Well, I'll leave you guys to it."
Derrick nodded and then the other man turned on his heel and headed for the door. With every passing step, he watched as Jade's face turned from green to grey and finally to a deep, glowing red.
When the door had closed at last, she buried her face in her hands and Derrick asked, "What the hell is wrong with you?"
"I...Look, it's better if we don't talk about it."
Derrick wasn't about to let her off the hook so easy though. "You're a 28-year-old woman. You don't know how to talk to men?"
"I know how to talk to men. You've seen me talk to men."
"I thought I had, but I don't know what the hell that sorry display was."
"Me neither." She groaned. "Can't we just talk about the case?"
"I would, but this feels like that's suddenly way less interesting than it used to be." He grinned, though a part of him wasn't sure if he wanted to know what was going on or if he was just doing his best to ignore the growing ache in his stomach.
"Oh shut up." She curled her lip.
"Jade and Za-ac sitting in a tree—"
She tried to hush him and threw a napkin in his face, but he caught it before it hit him.
"K-i-s-s-i-n-g," He singsonged.
She rolled her eyes. "What's it going to take to get you to shut up about this?"
"Details." He spread his hands out in front of him. "Pretty simple. What makes the ball-busting detective I know and tolerate turn into a stumbling, fumbling—no offense—but total buffoon?"
"Little harsh." She glared.
He shrugged. "You gonna tell me or not?"
* * *
Jade wanted to dig herself a hole right there in the middle of the break room and bury herself in it. At least there she'd be free of this feeling like everyone could see her heart pounding out of her chest, her thoughts written out on her forehead.
"So, I know him. Sort of."
"I gathered as much." He nodded.
"We went to high school together."
"Did he get in your pants?" Derrick asked.
Heat rushed to her cheeks. "What? No. I wish."
"Ew." He grimaced.
"You're the one who asked. No, he was never with me. I barely ever got up the guts to talk to him."
"That is clear to all of us."
Jade frowned. "Do you want to hear this or not?"
"Fine, fine. You're right. Continue."
"The only time I got to talk to him was in debate club. He used to be able to argue like nobody you've ever seen. I'm telling you." She sighed and when Derrick raised his eyebrows, she tried to pull herself together again.
"Anyway," she went on, "everyone wanted to date him. He was sort of a big deal, but he had this...reputation."
"You like bad boys? Is that why you're a cop? Do you have some fantasy of pulling someone over and—"
"No, nothing like that. Now interrupt me again and I'll punish you."
Derrick closed his mouth and folded his hands on the table in front of him.
"He had a reputation for o
nly dating girls he couldn't have. He had, like, this thing about him. I think he liked the pressure of it, dating other guys’ girls. Anyway, I think that's why half the girls in the school wanted to date him. For the suspense of it."
"He only dated other men's women? Isn't that sort of...what a scumbag does?"
Jade shook her head. "It wasn't like that. You know how high school is. Besides, I'm sure he doesn't do that anymore."
"Okay, so if you're interested in this guy, why don't you just ask him out?" Derrick asked.
She paused. There was no easy way to explain it without sounding like an idiot or worse, a pathetic idiot. But then, this was Derrick and if anybody was going to understand, he would.
"Have you ever been around someone in your life where you just know they don't really see you that way?" She asked.
He considered her for a minute, then said, "I'm trying to be supportive, but to be honest I have to say no."
She shook her head. Not that she was surprised. She's seen the way women looked at Derrick—no, not looked. Ogled. Like he was a juicy, rippled piece of meat and they hadn't eaten in months. Of course, the women he tended to date also looked like they were used to not eating.
"Well, when you look like a normal person with more than 3 percent body fat, sometimes people put you in what's called the 'friend zone.'"
"No such thing as the friend zone. It's in your head." He tapped his temple with one finger, knowingly. Like he was some kind of Jedi master of hooking up. Which, thinking again of the line of girls she'd seen him with, might also have been the case.
Nevertheless, she rolled her eyes. Okay, how would she explain this to Johnny Depp? She tried again, "Well, regardless, sometimes people don't see me as a, you know..." She searched for the words, then mumbled "sexual being." As quickly and quietly as she could.
"People don't see you as a semblance beaming?" He raised his eyebrows.
"No, not that. They don't look at me and think, wow, I'd really love to give her a bit of the old...hokey pokey."
Derrick's eyebrows inched so high up on his forehead that they almost disappeared behind his shaggy black bangs. "It might have something to do with the fact that you call it that."
"Only in front of you. You don't count."
Derrick laughed. "Gee, thanks."
"You know what I mean." The heat in her cheeks scorched hotter and she pressed a hand to one to cool it down.
"I do." He took a drink and raked her over with something that looked curiously like appraisal.
"Well?" She asked when he stayed silent.
"Well, what? You want my input on why men don't see you as a sexual being?"
"You are a man."
"So I count as a man, but not really?"
"Exactly." She nodded.
Derrick sighed and threaded a hand through his hair before sitting back and studying her again. "I don't know. I've never looked at you like that, but I guess...You've got a nice rack."
"Thank you?" She wanted to cross her arms over her chest just hearing the words aloud, but she fought the urge.
"You're welcome. Your hair, too, is nice."
"Thanks."
"But it might be nicer if you did something to it. You wear it in that bun every day. It's...pretty when it's down." He said the word "pretty" awkwardly, like it was a slippery fish he was trying to catch with his bare hands.
"Okay, okay."
"Your clothes too, are..."
"What?" she almost snapped.
He frowned. "Do we have to do this?"
"I need to know."
"Okay, so you maybe could dress sexier. This is from an objective point of view, mind you."
She glanced down at her blouse and slacks and quirked her mouth to the side. "Like how sexier?"
"I've never seen your legs, for starters. Not that I want to. Those things are probably so white they'll blind you."
She bit her tongue, ashamed that he was pretty much on the nose with that one. "Okay. Right. So, tan and wear skirts."
"Or at least pants that don't have those 70's pleats down the middle."
"Wow. Harsh." She winced.
"You asked for the truth. You could probably get away with showing some cleavage, too."
"Right. Okay. I can do that." She thought again of the frightful whiteness of her skin, even despite the Hawaiian heat her fair skin never managed to do anything but burn. But she could try again. For Zac.
"If this guy is into girls who are taken, though, it seems like your best bet is just to get a boyfriend and see what happens." Derrick snorted and took a bite of his sandwich.
"Yeah, where would I find some poor sucker to agree to date me so that I can get another guy to notice—" She stopped dead, suddenly noticing the impressive cut of Derrick's jaw, the flex of his muscles while he held his food. Derrick who was always there for her. Derrick who was her beautiful, platonic friend.
"What? You come up with someone?" Derrick laughed, "I don't think Freddricks will go for it if that's what you're thinking."
"No, not Freddricks." She met his gaze and tried to impart as much meaning as she could.
In an instant, he shoved away from the table and waved his hands frantically. "Nope. You got the wrong idea there, lady."
"Derrick, come on."
"You want me to pretend to be your boyfriend? Who hell would believe that you and I would be together?"
For an instant she was stung. Wow. He really thought he was that much better looking than her. Of course, he was, but there was no reason to call attention to it. Not when everyone in the world could tell just by looking at them.
"It wouldn't be for that long. People would think it was just a hiccup in your sanity."
"Right. No way." He tossed his food in the trash and walked away to lean against the cement brick wall.
"I'll do all your paperwork for a week. Come on, it wouldn't even affect your life."
"Except we'd have to disclose it to the whole department and it would be a whole thing—"
"Please, half the people in here have slept together a time or two. Nobody will bat an eye. I'll fill everything out, and I'll do all your paperwork for two weeks. This is all I've ever wanted."
Derrick considered her for a long moment, then sighed. "One month. And the filing, too."
"One month, no filing."
"All or nothing."
She glanced out the window to where Zac was sitting in his cubicle, all chestnut and perfect and handsome. Smiling at someone with the full force of his stunning white teeth.
"Fine. One month and the filing, too. You won't regret it."
"Oh, I beg to differ," Derrick said, then left her beaming in his wake.
Chapter 3
Three hours and as many witnesses later, Jade slumped over a stack of paperwork on her desk and cursed herself for ever agreeing to help Derrick. Or, really, ever convincing Derrick to help her. The second she'd gotten back from lunch, she'd found what looked like a month's worth of overdue warrants and court orders waiting for her—unsorted and lacking any kind of organization. As usual.
Weren't military guys supposed to be more regimented than this? Wasn't that sort of their claim to fame? Why did Derrick Archer have to be the exception to the rule? And why oh why did that also have to be her problem?
To make matters worse, she hadn't seen Zac for the rest of the afternoon, either. He was probably hiding from her, sure that she'd do something else awkward and uncomfortable in his presence. Based on her track record, she had to admit that was a pretty strong possibility.
Glancing around for any superiors, she opened Facebook in her browser and looked for Derrick's name. Naturally, it was there with a little green orb next to it—gotcha.
Typing furiously, she shot him a message:
Jade Lockhart: What the hell is with all this paperwork? Did you break your hands in the past month?
Derrick Archer: I'll admit I've let a few things slide.
Jade Lockhart: Slide? More like avalan
che.
Derrick Archer: Hey, it's not my fault if you didn't do your research before we made our deal.
Jade Lockhart: Technically we never shook on it, so...
Derrick Archer: Still all or nothing. Take it or leave it.
Sighing, Jade typed back.
Jade Lockhart: You're the worst, you know that?
Derrick Archer: On the contrary. I'm the best.
Jade rolled her eyes and leaned back in her chair to catch a glimpse of Derrick. He was sorting through some papers—though it was hard to believe he had even more paper than what he'd already stacked on her desk—his black hair flopping in front of his eyes.
That always struck her as odd. The way he kept his hair so long. Not that it looked bad—where most men might look like skater boy wannabes, Derrick looked like he'd just stepped off the set of some television set. No, it was more the fact that Derrick had been in the military for so long that made her wonder at it. Didn’t most men usually keep the neatly shorn buzzcuts of the previous lives after they left the service?
And didn't most men occasionally mention it?
She shook off the last thought. She'd learned a long time ago not to mention Derrick's years of service to him, no matter the situation. It simply wasn't worth the steely coldness that always colored his eyes when the subject arose.
A ping from her monitor brought her back to earth, and she focused again on her screen.
Derrick Archer: Don't forget to fill out the relationship disclosure agreement with HR. I won't have it said that I'm a rule breaker.
Jade Lockhart: Even though you're on Facebook?
Derrick Archer: You and me both.
Jade smiled and typed a quick reply before opening the human resources page and downloading the form she needed. It was simple enough. ID numbers and names, mostly. Still, a strange sort of swirling settled in her stomach as she reviewed the canned information and filled in her name beside Derrick's.
What would pretending to be Derrick's girlfriend even look like? And more to the point—had a guy like Derrick ever even been with someone long enough to call them his girlfriend? She didn't know. And what would dating in the office look like?
Sworn to Be His (The Archer Family Book 3) Page 2