by Linda Howard
Now I had to deal with Wyatt.
“Well, yeah,” I managed to gasp between voracious kisses. What, you expected me to lie?
“Then it’s a good thing I have enough to handle you.” He’d unsnapped my jeans and was peeling them down.
He did; oh, he did. He knew it, too, and proved it once again. At least he got me to the couch that time, instead of simply taking me down to the floor as he’d done on more than one occasion.
And then he lingered, stroking in and out, looking down at my body as he clasped my hips between his strong hands. “It makes a difference,” he said roughly. “No birth control. It makes a difference.”
It did. Not a physical difference, but a mental one. Since the brain is the most important erogenous zone…wow. Everything was heightened, intensified, and sex between us had already been pretty intense.
He lay heavily on me afterward, absently stroking my hip as he often did. Dazed, I became aware that he hadn’t undressed at all, though he’d managed to get me out of the bottom half of my clothes. His badge was still clipped to his belt, scraping really close to where I didn’t want to be scraped, thank you very much, and that big black automatic was uncomfortable against my inner left thigh.
I wriggled under him. “You’re still armed,” I complained.
“Yeah, but I unloaded.”
I pushed at his shoulders. “Badge—ouch!”
Pausing several times for kisses, he braced his hands on the cushion I was lying on and carefully pulled away from me. Logistically, this hadn’t been well planned, and now we had to deal with practicalities. You know what I mean. Thank God the couch was leather.
After we cleaned up we made supper together. Before, he would have eaten out, but since we’d been together I’d stocked his freezer with premade stuff that just had to be heated. That night we chose lasagna, and added a salad. Salad fixings were something else I’d added to his refrigerator. I was teaching him about girl food.
After supper, I bit the bullet. I’d been thinking and evading and thinking some more since Tuesday night, and I couldn’t put it off any longer. We were having sex without birth control, for heaven’s sake, and even though there was practically no chance I could get pregnant, still…
“The things you said,” I began as we loaded the dishwasher.
“I was horny. Men will say anything to get sex.”
I frowned at him. “Tuesday night. When you were mad.”
He straightened, giving me his full attention. “You’ve thought about it long enough, huh? Okay, let’s have it, so I can apologize again and get it over with.”
That wasn’t exactly the serious tone I’d wanted. My frown changed to a glare. “This isn’t something to apologize for, it’s something we need to face, straight up, and make a decision.”
He crossed his arms and waited.
I hoped my voice would hold up to the explanation. Giving it a rest that afternoon had returned me to that awful croak, which at least had sound to it. I blew out a breath and started.
“You said that I pull dumb-ass tricks, that I expect you to jump through hoops and get pissy with you when you don’t, and that I call you for everything that pops into my head and expect you to check it out. You also said I’m high maintenance. Duh. All of that other falls under that category. I’m high maintenance, I’ve always been high maintenance, and I’ll always be high maintenance. That won’t change. I won’t change.”
“I don’t want you to change,” he began, reaching for me, but I stepped out of reach and waved him to silence.
“Let me finish, because I don’t know how long my voice will hold out. I don’t consider my tricks dumb-ass, so that’s a difference of opinion there. I don’t think I expect you to jump through hoops, but I put you first and I expect you to put me first—within reason, of course, and that goes for both of us. If you’re at a murder scene, for instance, I wouldn’t expect you to come jump my car off if my battery goes dead. That’s what I have AAA for.
“And I don’t call you to check out every little thing. Honest. But I will definitely expect you to do things for me, like fix any parking tickets I happen to get, but I wouldn’t ask you to fix a speeding ticket or falsify a report or anything like that, so I think that’s reasonable. But in the end this is your decision, whether or not to go on with this marriage. If the high maintenance bothers you that much, if I’m already not worth the trouble to you, then you should get out now. We’ll probably stay together for a while, but we should call off the wedding—”
He put his hand over my mouth. His green eyes were glittering. “I don’t know whether to laugh, or…laugh.”
Laugh? My heart had been breaking, I’d finally gotten the courage to lay it all out for him, and he wanted to laugh?
Men can’t be the same species as women. They just can’t.
His other hand slid around my waist, pulling me against him. “Sometimes you make me so mad I could spit tenpenny nails, but since we’ve been together there hasn’t been a day I haven’t woken up smiling. Hell, yeah, you’re worth the trouble. The sex alone is worth the trouble, but when you throw in the entertainment value—”
Furiously I tried to pinch him, but he laughed and caught my hands, pulling them up to hold them against his chest. “I love you, Blair Mallory Soon-to-be-Bloodsworth. Everything about you, even the high maintenance—even the notes you write, which, by the way, have completely alleviated the resentment toward me from the older guys. I don’t know how that bastard Forester managed to steal that note without me noticing, but I’ll find out,” he muttered.
“I didn’t write it to be funny,” I snapped, or tried to snap. “I was making a point.”
“Oh, I got the point; we all did. You were mad as hell, at all of us, and after we knew why we had to admit you had the right. But I’d do it again, to keep you safe. I’d do anything to keep you safe. Now, how is it macho men are supposed to phrase this? Oh, yeah, I’d take a bullet for you. The wedding is still on. Does that answer your questions?”
I didn’t know whether to pout, pinch, or punch. I settled for looking sulky. God, I was so relieved! He knew I wasn’t going to change, and he still wanted to marry me? Good enough.
“Clarify something for me, though.”
I looked up, questioning, and he took advantage, stealing a couple of kisses.
“Why would you want a parking ticket fixed but not a speeding ticket? A speeding ticket costs more, counts against your driver’s license, and makes your insurance premium go up.”
I couldn’t believe he didn’t see the difference. “A speeding ticket would be for something I did. But a parking ticket? Excuse me! Who owns city property? The taxpayers, that’s who. Am I the only person who thinks it doesn’t make sense for someone to be charged for parking on their own property, and then fined if they park too long? That’s un-American. That’s downright…downright fascist—”
He didn’t use his hand to shut me up, that time. He used his mouth.
Chapter
Twenty-nine
The weather turned chilly again overnight, and rain had started by morning. Normally I would be going to work early on Saturday, because it was a busy day, but when I talked to Lynn she said that JoAnn was working out great and she suggested offering the job full-time. I agreed, because otherwise these next three weeks would kill me.
Wyatt slept late, sprawled across the bed, and I entertained myself that morning by writing his list of transgressions. Like I would forget something that important? No way. I sat curled in his big chair with a throw over my feet and legs, perfectly content to laze away the morning. The rain seemed to do away with any sense of urgency. I love listening to rain anyway, and seldom get the chance to because I’m usually too busy. I felt safe and happy, cocooned with Wyatt, letting the detectives do the legwork in tracking down my stalker. They were on the right track with the rental cars, I just knew it.
I could talk. To my delight, I could actually talk. My voice was very raspy, but
at at least it worked. I never could have been one of those nuns who took vows of silence. Come to think of it, I couldn’t have been a nun, period.
I called Mom and talked to her. She had talked to Sally and was greatly relieved; Sally had already called Jazz and apologized, and they were supposed to meet this morning and talk in person. I wondered if maybe I should wait until tomorrow to take my fabric over, and Mom said yes. I got the picture, having gone through something of a reconciliation with Wyatt.
Then I called Siana and we chatted for a while. After hanging up with her, I took all of my new clothes upstairs and laid them out on the bed in the guest bedroom. I tried on all my new shoes again, walking in them to make certain they didn’t rub my toes. By then Wyatt was up; I heard him go downstairs for a cup of coffee, then he came back upstairs and leaned in the doorway while he drank it, watching me with a sleepy sort of half smile on his face.
My shoes perplexed him, for some reason. I’d bought what I considered the basics: athletic shoes for the gym—three pairs—plus high-heeled boots, plus some clogs, plus some black pumps, a pair of black flats, and, well, the list goes on.
“Just how many pairs of black shoes do you need?” he finally asked, staring at them lined up on the floor.
Okay, shoes aren’t a laughing matter. I gave him a cool stare. “One pair more than I have.”
“Then why didn’t you get them?”
“Because I would still need one pair more than I have.”
He said, “Hmmm,” and wisely let the subject drop.
Over breakfast I told him I thought the Sally/Jazz situation was resolved. He looked a little stunned. “How did you do that? You’ve been evading a stalker and getting burned out of your home. When did you have time?”
“I made time. Desperation is a great motivator.” I was a little stunned myself. He truly had no idea how desperate I’d been.
After breakfast I went back upstairs and puttered with my new clothes, cutting off tags, washing what needed to be washed before I wore it, pressing out stubborn wrinkles, then rearranging Wyatt’s closet and hanging my clothes in there. Except it wasn’t Wyatt’s closet now, it was our closet, which meant three-quarters of it was mine. That was okay for now, with my sparse wardrobe that was just for the fall months, but by the time I bought winter clothes, then spring clothes, then summer clothes—well, there would have to be more rearranging.
The dresser drawers had to be cleaned out and rearranged, too. And the bathroom vanity space. Again he leaned in the doorway and watched me while I emptied all the dresser drawers, piling all the stuff on the bed for now. He kept smiling a little as if the sight of me working my ass off while he just watched was somehow satisfying to him. Why his conscience didn’t kill him, I don’t know.
“What’s so funny?” I finally asked, a little irritably.
“Nothing’s funny.”
“You’re smiling.”
“Yeah.”
I put my hands on my hips and scowled at him. “So why are you smiling?”
“I’m watching you nest—in my house.” He gave me a heavy-lidded look as he sipped his coffee. “God knows I’ve tried long enough to get you here.”
“Two months,” I said, scoffing. “Big deal.”
“Seventy-four days to be exact, since Nicole Goodwin was shot and I thought it was you. Seventy-four long, frustrating days.”
Now I really scoffed. “There’s no way a man who’s had as much sex as you’ve had could be frustrated.”
“It wasn’t sex. Okay, so part of it was sex. It was still frustrating, for you to be living somewhere else.”
“Well, I’m here now. Enjoy. Life as you knew it is over.”
Laughing, he went to get more coffee. The phone rang while he was downstairs and he answered, only to come upstairs a few minutes later to get his badge and weapon. “I have to go in,” he said. That wasn’t unusual, and it didn’t have anything to do with me or he’d have told me. This was more about the police department being understaffed than anything else, which was pretty much a chronic situation. “You know the drill. Don’t let anyone in.”
“How about if I see someone carrying a gas can and sneaking around the foundation?”
“Do you know how to shoot a pistol?” he asked, and he wasn’t kidding.
“Nope.” I was regretful, but I figured that was something I shouldn’t fudge.
“By the time I’m finished with you next week, you will,” he said.
Great. Something else to take up in my spare time, assuming I had any. I should have kept my mouth shut. On the other hand, knowing how to use a pistol would be cool.
He kissed me and was out the door. Absently I listened to the rumbling sound of the garage door as it opened, and a moment later closed again, then I returned to my sorting and arranging.
Some of the stuff that had been in the dresser could clearly go somewhere else, like the baseball glove (?!), the shoeshine kit, a stack of books from the police academy, and a shoe box full of photos. As soon as I opened the shoe box and saw the contents, I forgot about the other stuff and sat cross-legged on the floor by the bed, looking through them.
Men don’t care much for photographs, which is why these were dumped into a box and forgotten about. Some of them, obviously, his mother had given him: school pictures of both him and his sister, Lisa, at various ages. Six-year-old Wyatt made my heart melt. He’d looked so innocent and fresh, nothing at all like the hard-as-nails man I loved, except for those glittering eyes. By the time he’d been sixteen, though, he was already getting that cool, piercing expression. There were pictures of him in his football uniforms, both high school and college, and then other pictures of him as a pro, and the difference was obvious. By then, football hadn’t been a game anymore, it was a job, and a hard one at that.
There was one picture of Wyatt with his dad, who had been dead for quite some time. Wyatt looked about ten, and he still had that innocent look. His dad must have died soon after the picture was taken, because Roberta had told me Wyatt was just ten when it happened. That was when his innocence had begun to go; all of the pictures taken after that showed an awareness that life wasn’t always safe and happy.
Then I found the picture of him and his wife.
I saw the writing first, because the picture was upside down. I picked it up. In a pretty feminine handwriting was the inscription: Wyatt and me, Liam and Kellian Greeson, Sandy Patrick and his latest bimbo.
I turned the picture over, looking at Wyatt’s face. He was laughing into the camera, his arm draped carelessly over the shoulder of a very pretty redhead.
A pang of very natural jealousy shot through me. I didn’t want to see him with any other woman, especially one he’d been married to. Why couldn’t she have been someone either plain or hard-looking, someone obviously unsuited to him, instead of being so pretty and—
—my stalker.
I stared at the photograph, not believing my eyes. The photograph was easily fifteen years old and she looked so young, not much more than a teenager, though I knew she’d been just a couple of years younger than Wyatt. The hair was very different, of course: 1980s big hair, carried forward into the nineties. Too much makeup, not that I was judgmental or anything. And those long, long eyelashes that made her look as if she were wearing artificial ones.
There wasn’t any doubt.
I reached for the bedroom phone.
No dial tone.
I waited, because sometimes it takes a few seconds for a cordless unit to get a dial tone. Nothing happened.
Now, there have been more than a few times when I’ve been unable to get a dial tone and it’s no big deal, but when a homicidal stalker is after me and there’s no dial tone, yeah, I automatically assume the worst. My God, she was here! Somehow she’d cut the phone lines, which can’t be easy.
That’s when I noticed how still and quiet the house was. There was no background hum of the heating unit, electrical lights, refrigerator. Nothing.
I loo
ked at the digital alarm clock. Its face was blank.
The power was off. I hadn’t noticed because the bedroom had enough windows to let in sufficient light to see, even on a rainy day, plus I’d been engrossed in the pictures.
The power had been on when Wyatt left, because I’d heard the garage door. He hadn’t been gone more than fifteen minutes, so it couldn’t have been off long. What did that prove? Anything? That she waited until he was out of the house before she came in? How could she even know where he lived? We’d been very careful, no one had followed us here.
But she knew where he worked. Knowing that, all she had to do was wait there and follow him home, probably even before she started following me. Following him would have led her to me.
Silently I got to my feet and retrieved my cell phone from where I’d tossed it on the bed. I’d taken it upstairs with me because so many people call my cell if they want to reach me. The lack of electricity wouldn’t affect my cell phone, unless it was an area-wide problem that took out the cell towers, too, but if it was an area-wide problem then I didn’t have anything to worry about. It was the localized-to-this-house scenario that scared the crap out of me.
I was shaking as I punched in Wyatt’s cell number, my hair lifting from my scalp. No doubt about it, I was spooked. As quietly as I could, I crept into the bathroom and closed the door, to muffle the sound of my voice.
“What’s up?” he said in my ear.
“It’s Megan,” I blurted. “It’s Megan. I was looking through your old pictures, and…it’s her.”
“Megan?” he repeated, sounding astounded. “That doesn’t make—”