Cop's Passion (14 page)

In fact, she
was half surprised that he hadn’t followed her but then again,
after yelling at him and being such a bitch, who could blame him?
Story of her freakin’ life.

A patrol car
came towards her and her heart leaped, but the two cops inside
didn’t glance at her, and neither of them was the big bear that
lived next door.

Driving into
the suburbs, she turned into a leafy street and finally into the
driveway of a fancy, two-story, brick house. The garden was
immaculate and bursting with flowers. Parking her car in the
driveway, Maddy walked to the front door and opened it. “Mum?”

“In here,
honey.”

Following her
mother’s voice down the long corridor, Maddy turned into the
lounge, only to groan inwardly when she saw Belinda sitting on the
sofa beside her mother. Matthew was sitting languidly in the
armchair opposite, a cup of hot coffee in one hand. His expensive
gold watch caught the sunlight that streamed in through the
window.

Mrs Lovett got
to her feet quickly. “Maddy, I’m so glad you came.”

“You invited
me, remember?” Maddy tucked the car keys into the pocket of her
dress and nodded at Matthew.

Matthew smiled
but his gaze was shrewd as he looked her up and down. “Maddy.”

Her brother’s
tone when he said her name wasn’t as warm as when Mike said it, but
she shook the fanciful thought away. “Day off, Matt?”

“Came to sort
some things out.”

“Ah. Ambush,
Mum?” She switched her gaze to Mrs Lovett.

“Don’t be
ridiculous, darling.” Mrs Lovett crossed the floor, her black
sandals sinking into the plush carpeting. “Belinda and Matthew came
around after I called you.”

“And after you
called them?”

“Don’t be
tiresome, Madeline.” Mrs Lovett gestured to Belinda. “The poor dear
has been a mess since you made her leave your house.”

Belinda’s eyes
were red from crying and she dabbed at the corners of her eyes with
a tissue. “Honestly Maddy, I didn’t mean to upset you.”

“She’s been
inconsolable,” Matthew added. “First you insult her friend, then
you embarrass her, and then you turn down a date she’d kindly
organised for you. Really, Maddy, why do you behave this way?”

Maddy’s eyes
narrowed.

“Matthew,” Mrs
Lovett said warningly.

“I’m tired,
Matt,” Maddy replied. “The last thing I need is your shit.”

“My shit?
Belinda does her best to help you and you repay her by embarrassing
her, and you say it’s
my
shit?” Matthew got to his feet.

More than used
to her older brother’s quick temper, Maddy matched it with her own.
“You weren’t the one told by her and her friend to lose weight to
get a rich husband.”

“She was trying
to help.”

“It was
insulting.”

Belinda started
to cry. “Maddy, you embarrassed me in front of Jeannie! I was only
helping.”

Maddy sighed.
“You never think, Belinda. How about you embarrassing me?”

“Jeannie was
trying to help you with your problem.”

“I don’t have a
problem.”

Belinda
sniffled and glanced at Matthew.

Matthew looked
Maddy up and down. “How much do you weigh now?”

“Matthew!” Mrs
Lovett protested.

“Screw you,
Matt,” Maddy retorted angrily. “What business is it of yours?”

“Why don’t you
take the help when it’s offered to you?” he returned. “You know you
could stand to lose quite a bit of weight. Maybe if you did, we
wouldn’t have to constantly be trying to fix you up with blind
dates.”

“I never asked
to be fixed up with blind dates!”

“It’s the only
way you’ve ever gotten a date, and the only way you’re likely to in
the future,” he shot back.

“Matthew!
Madeline! Stop this at once.” Horrified, Mrs Lovett took a step
nearer Maddy. “Honey, please. Just tell Belinda you’re sorry and
then we can get past this entire horrid mess and-”

“You want me to
apologise?” Maddy couldn’t believe her ears. “What about my
feelings, Mum? What about me?”

“Honey, Belinda
only tried to help.”

“What’s wrong
with me?” Maddy spread her arms wide. “Why does everyone want to
change me?”

“You want me to
start listing things?” Matthew said nastily. “How about making a
success of yourself to start with?”

“I’m a nurse,
I’m an asset to the community.”

He sneered.

“That’s nothing
to be ashamed of, Matthew.” Mrs Lovett said sternly. “It’s good
enough until Maddy finds herself a husband-”

“Not if she
keeps eating the way she does,” he interjected scathingly.

“Mum.” Maddy
looked at her mother. “This is me. I’m a nurse. I have my own home.
That’s something to be proud of. What’s wrong with that?”

“Nothing,
honey,” Mrs Lovett replied soothingly. “But you can’t blame us for
wanting more for you.”

“Why can’t you
accept me the way I am?”

“Because you
could be so much more,” Belinda jumped up. “Jeannie says you’re
really pretty and if you’d only lose a bit of weight-”

“Belinda!” Mrs
Lovett said sharply.

Maddy pulled
the car keys from her pocket. “Well, this has been a pleasant
visit, Mum. Thanks for the ambush. Thanks for your support. All of
you.” Her gaze flickered briefly over her brother and
sister-in-laws faces. “Always a pleasure.” Swinging on her heel,
she walked out of the room.

“Oh, honey,
don’t be like that,” Mrs Lovett pleaded, hurrying after her.

The sound of
Matthew comforting Belinda sounded clearly to Maddy and she
wondered bitterly if anyone would ever comfort her like that, but
the answer was very clear - obviously not.

Ignoring her
mother, she left the house and got into her car. She glanced up as
she started it to see Mrs Lovett standing unhappily on the doorstep
of the house.

“We only want
what’s best for you,” Mrs Lovett called out.

“Yeah,” Maddy
said to herself, “As long as it’s what you all deem acceptable.”
She left the house without looking back.

Driving back
home wasn’t an option right then, not when she still had her
afternoon round to complete. The lunch-time visit to her mother’s
had turned into a fiasco, which she should have suspected.

The way her
brother, mother and sister-in-law had treated her was so different
to the way Mike was around her. At least he was kind, he wanted to
discuss things, and….Maddy cringed inwardly. And she’d treated him
exactly the same way her family treated her. She wouldn’t
listen.

Pulling over
into the car park of a supermarket, she stared unseeingly out of
the window. Okay, Mike hadn’t expected to sleep with her, hell, she
hadn’t expected him to want to, but neither had he shoved her away
in disgust after the…episode. No, the big bear had wanted to talk
about it, and when he’d been honest, yes, she’d been a total
bitch.

She had more of
her family inside her than she wanted, and she didn’t like it. No,
she decided, it was time she apologised to Mike and got things out
of the way, then they could go back to being just friends.

If only she
could forget the way he’d felt above her, all passionate and
hot-eyed, so hard and thick inside her, so… “So not going to happen
again,” she murmured.

Refusing to
even contemplate the small twinge of pain deep inside her at the
thought, she put the car into gear and headed to the next
patient.

By the time she
got home, she welcomed the warm shower. The late afternoon was
chilly, and she actually pulled on a long-sleeved thin shirt,
rather than the normal short-sleeved t-shirt she usually matched
with the flowing skirt that swirled around her knees.

Chaz ate a big
bowlful of kangaroo meat, while Maddy took a bowl of fresh meat and
some kitten biscuits to the kitten next door. She found it firmly
ensconced in Mike’s battered wicker chair on the back veranda, and
it meowed when it saw her.

Placing the
bowls on the veranda, Maddy saw an empty saucer beside the water
dish. It wasn’t the bowl she normally brought the kitten’s food in
and she realised that Mike must have fed it before he went to work.
A warm feeling went through her.

“You’re lucky
you lobbed up in his yard,” she told the kitten, who peeked up at
her before resuming eating. “Though I’m going to have to do
something about you real soon. But right now, I have some baking to
do before I start grovelling.”

Back on her
side of the duplex, she whipped up a large batch of chocolate chip
muffins, remembering that Mike had once mentioned he liked them.
She also cooked a batch of vanilla biscuits, and once everything
had cooled down she packed them into containers and sat down to
wait.

It was well
after dark when she heard the motorcycle pull in next door and she
waited until she’d figured ample time had passed for Mike to have
gone inside. Gathering up the containers and her courage, she said
to Chaz, “Wish me luck,” and left the house.

The chill was
in the air and she shivered, glad she’d kept on the long-sleeved
blouse. The breeze swirled the skirt around her knees as she
climbed the steps onto Mike’s veranda. Taking a deep breath, she
knocked on the door and then stood back clasping the containers in
both hands. She actually felt her hands shake a little and her
heart bumped unevenly behind her breast. What if he just shut the
door in her face? Not that she’d blame him. She certainly would
have if she’d been in his shoes.

At first she
thought no one was going to answer, but then she heard the deep
rumble of his voice approaching, the light snapped on, and the door
swung open to show Mike with a phone to his ear.

He looked down
at her, his face wearing that familiar scowl. Recognising her, he
paused before saying into the phone, “Gotta go, Tim, I’ve got a
visitor.”

“Oh, no,” Maddy
protested immediately. “I can come back-”

“See you, Tim.”
Mike clicked the phone off without removing his steady regard of
her, his pale blue eyes revealing nothing of his thoughts.
“Maddy.”

The way he said
her name, so full of meaning yet with hidden depths. He could make
her shiver with heat or dread, she suddenly realised, depending on
his tone when he said her name. He made her heart thump, and the
memory of him above her…

Uh-oh. Her
nerves scattered and she shoved the containers towards him
hurriedly, babbling as she did so, “I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to
yell at you, well I did but I shouldn’t have and-”

“Maddy.” The
deep, calm tone cut through her babbling, and she looked up at him
silently.

In the light of
both the veranda and the hallway behind him, he looked big and
intimidating. Still dressed in his cop’s uniform, he was the
epitome of a composed, authoritative man, and one criminals didn’t
mess with if they knew what was good for them. He could scare the
crap out of anyone when he was angry.

And he’d taken
the time to feed a little kitten before he’d left for work that
morning.

It was that
knowledge that steadied her, and she took a deep breath and met his
gaze, lifting her chin a little. “Mike.”

He raised one
brow inquiringly.

The breeze blew
around her legs, swirling her skirts and sending a shiver through
her.

“It’s getting
cold.” He stood aside. “Come in.”

“Oh no, I just
came over to -”

He simply
reached out, placed a hand on her back and drew her past him into
the shelter of the hallway. Shutting the door behind her, he said,
“Go into the kitchen.”

“I only came
to-” But he was already behind her, his presence filling the very
hallway, and Maddy found herself moving down the hall even as she
continued to protest. So with a sigh, she stopped talking and
simply obeyed, walking into the kitchen and turning to face him
once she reached the kitchen bench.

Coming to a
stop not far from her, his expression was unreadable as he studied
her. That gaze was unnerving, especially when he didn’t say
anything and she hadn’t a clue as to what he was thinking.

There was only
one thing to do. “Okay,” she said. “Here I am again, grovelling and
presenting peace offerings.” She held out the containers.

Mike’s gaze
dropped to them.

“Chocolate chip
muffins,” she said. “And some biccies.”

“Peace
offerings.”

“I yelled at
you. I was…” She hesitated, then cleared her throat. “A little
nasty. I’m sorry.” She jostled the containers. “Peace
offering?”

For several
seconds she thought he was going to reject her, and she felt her
cheeks flush in embarrassment and, yes, she had to admit it to
herself, the idea of his rejection hurt.

Mike stepped
forward to pluck the containers from her hands and place them on
the kitchen bench before he turned again to face her. Placing one
big hand flat on the bench, he leaned on his arm, his muscles
bunching as they took his weight. His other hand was braced on his
hip.

He was not
happy. In fact, he looked so angry that Maddy felt her insides
quake, something that didn’t often happen.

“Maddy.” He
almost growled her name and his eyes were hard. “What the hell is
wrong with you?”

Oh no, he was
going to reject her peace offering. She swallowed.

“I repeat, what
the hell is wrong with you, Maddy?”

“Nothing is
wrong with me. I simply came over here to-”

“You need a
damn good spanking.”

Dumb-founded,
her mouth fell open.

“Yeah.” Leaning
down towards her, his expression was furious, which was downright
bloody scary. “I ought to give you that spanking if you don’t even
know what you did wrong.”

She was still
gaping at him. “But I didn’t do anything, Mike, I-”

“You came over
here-”

“To apologise,
damn it!” Temper as quick as ever, she jammed her hands on her
hips. “I came to apologise and-”