Hit 'N' Run (Under Suspicion #1) (8 page)

She didn’t look back. He had turned to peer over the fence and watch her walk away.
This was such a mistake
. Deflated, he stomped along the path down the end of her driveway. Back at his truck, he wrenched open the driver’s door, but didn’t get in. He lifted one foot up to the step—and still did not get in. He grabbed the steering wheel as he always did to hoist himself up on the seat, but still his right foot didn’t leave the cobbled stones of the driveway. He released the steering wheel, took his foot off the step, and slammed the door with a definitive bang and stood by his front bumper, hand meshed in his pockets.

“Get in,” he mumbled. He had to
leave
.
She drives you crazy
.
She’s always driven you crazy.
She’s got a kid. She’s complicated. She’s too intense. He continued to chant the mantra. It didn’t work.

Yes. But—then there was the initial smile when she first saw him. That unexpected, unrehearsed smile.
Those eyes?
The playfulness with the boy?
There’s no man.
He didn’t quite know how he knew, but his gut told him if the boy’s father wasn’t around, there was no man.
I’ve never seen her like that before
.
I'd like to see that again.

The decision made on impulse, he walked back up the driveway, along the path to the backyard, where he opened the gate without invitation and sauntered on back, praying for calm while his blood flooded his brain making him slightly lightheaded.

Lorna stood by the table, hat in one hand, bandana back around her hair, while she held the tumbler of lemonade against her throat, cooling her. Her head was tilted back enjoying the sensation. He stopped midstride as his body stiffened with lust, watching droplets of moisture course down the side of the glass onto her throat. Mitch imagined his tongue flicking those beads of water off her skin, tasting the salt as his hand slid through the softness of her hair. He would pull her close…

“Hello Mit-chell,” her son chirped from the kiddy pool, pulling him from his fantasy with guilt and causing Lorna to jump, lemonade splashing over the side, when she saw him standing at the edge of the deck.

“Hello Kris,” he replied, turning to face the boy and cover his own surprise. The images of what he wanted to do to Lorna continued to swim before his eyes. To avoid panting, he smiled in what he hoped offered an apology. Covering his carnal vision, he lifted his arm in illustration. “It looks like you could use some help with the fence.”

Taking the time to set the tumbler down on the table, she screwed her cap back in place, eyes never wavering from his. He watched a series of expressions cross the planes of her face as she weighed out her best course of action. With exaggerated patience, she said on a huff of air. “Listen, Mitchell, Mitch, Officer, whatever you call yourself these days. I am sure I appear a fright—single mother struggling with yard work and all—but I can assure you we are all fine here and in no need of assistance. We were fine yesterday, and we will be fine tomorrow. I appreciate your offer, but
really,
we don’t need the help.” She ended with her hand on her hip and her leg jutted out in her all-confidence stance.

“Hey Mama, not true.” Kris rolled over the ballooned edge of the pool to scramble to the deck and onto a chair in front of his snacks, water dripping from his toes. Between bites of banana, he pointed at his mother. “You said just before how nice it would be to have another set of arms.”

Innocent eyes were large in his face as he parroted back his mother’s words, swinging his legs back and forth, plucking some grapes from the bowl. Happy green eyes twinkled and he brushed his damp hair from his forehead. “You said, sometimes mamas can’t do it all.”

When her face fell in helpless recognition of her own words spouted at just the wrong moment, Mitch couldn’t help it: he laughed outright. “My God, it’s true—out of the mouths of babes.”

Casting a stern glare at her son before turning a cold stare on Mitch, she said with a forced smile. “Out of the mouths of babes or not, we’re fine and do not require your help.”

Mirroring her pose, he hopped up the last step and shot back. “Look, I can put my hands on my hips too.” The situation would create hilarity if he wasn’t trying so hard to make an impression. “But I’d rather roll up my sleeves and get the job done. Then
maybe
you can offer me dinner. After all, we are old buds from school.”

He relished her speechless expression as she opened and closed her mouth like a gaping fish groping for words likely inappropriate in front of her son. He was inordinately pleased to create such reactions in her.

“It’s lawnya tonight,” Kris chimed in, casting a merry glance between his mother and Mitch. “Nana made noodles for me.”

“Nana?” Mitch rolled up the sleeves of his cotton shirt and scooped the brush Kris had abandoned some time ago up off the grass close to his feet. Not waiting for further responses from Lorna, he picked off the larger pieces of grass before dipping it back in the paint can close to the fence.

Her voice came up behind him. “Mariam is my mother—umm, Kris’s grandmother. We live together.”

With nothing more than a nod of acknowledgement and an “mmm-hum,” he set to work.

Before long, her stiff countenance gave way to the rhythm of the job at hand. The contented jabbering from Kris once again frolicking in the pool and the kids music playing on the computer under the shade of an umbrella on the deck gave Mitch a real sense of peace he hadn’t realized he’d been missing not only in these last months away, but in his life in general. In her presence, in this cozy backyard, he felt at home, comfortable.
Uncanny

Laying her brush along the top of the can, Lorna checked her watch and told Kris it was cabana time, whereby the child happily wrapped himself in an over-large, brightly colored beach towel and went to settle in on the covered lounge chair. Mitch felt a pull deep within the cavity of his chest, watching Lorna mount the three stairs to the deck to make sure Kris was tucked and cozy. Before she could turn back and see him watching, Mitch lowered his eyes. He coughed to cover his spying after seeing her gently kiss the child’s forehead in so natural a gesture.

“Wow, he’s a good kid,” Mitch remarked when she came back to the fence.

“He has his moments.” But her lips widened with a smile, and he felt a familiar ease in her company. The same ease from all those years ago when she tutored him. Since their first meeting, she never made him feel stupid or inadequate. She simply went about the process of filling in the gaps of his understanding—or better put, misunderstanding—of what the profs taught and he missed, likely daydreaming about rugby or girls—not necessarily in that order.

“No, he’s definitely a good kid. I count my blessings.” She picked up her brush and walked back to the fence before casting him a sidelong glance and adding, as though it were afterthought, “Thank you for your help.”

“Do you need a Band-Aid?”

“What? I’m sorry, what?” Lorna’s eyes rounded, her brows shot up, confused. “A Band-Aid?”

“Yeah, for your wounded pride.”

“Ever the smart-ass.” Lorna flung paint droplets in his direction, laughing.

Oh, I could get used to that sound
. “I’d get you back, but I can’t. You’re already covered in paint. There’d be no telling the difference.” He chuckled like he hadn’t laughed in months. “Did you actually get any paint on the fence?”

“Oh, ha, ha.”

Finished with the last few pickets, he helped her clear the paint and tools away. “No, really.” He stopped outside the shed, sizing her up. “What did you do, bathe in the paint? You’re completely covered.”

Bending to store the paint under the bench, Lorna regarded him head to toe. “Unlike some, I like to immerse myself in my work.”

“I see. Here let me.” He took the cleaned tray and tools and stowed them up above the work area in the neat shed. “Bit of a neat freak, are you? I’m not surprised.”

“I like everything to have its place,” she replied, a note of weariness in her voice.

He couldn’t help baiting her. “So, you’re well aware it’s a problem then. Seeking help, are you?”

Lorna guffawed, and Mitch thought he had died and gone to heaven. “Been through a few therapists, but they dropped me when I catalogued their book displays,” she answered, biting her quivering bottom lip.

“Oh, you’re quick. I should have remembered.” He turned to leave the shed, satisfied everything was put away.

Lorna giggled. “It’s been a while and you’re getting older. The memory is the first to go.”

Is she flirting with me?

“Better than the alternative, I suppose.”

“The alternative?” She caught his eye as she slid the shed doors closed. Holding up a hand, palm faced forward, she laughed again, deep in her throat, and he ached to cover her lips with his. “Don’t tell me—I don’t want to know.”

“Oh, and that was the one thing I did want to tell you.”

Drawn to her, he stepped closer with a single-minded desire to act on his urge to take her in his arms to kiss those full lips. To rekindle that passionate flame from the spark he recognized in her eyes.

“Mitchell—”

“Lorna.” He cut in, his face inches from hers, his fingers fanning in contemplation. “Listen, I know you were born with a bit of a stick up your ass. I get it. You can’t help it. But we’re old school chums. Can you at least call me Mitch, so I don’t feel like I have to stand in the corner or something?”

“Listen, Mitch-
ell
,” she began again, taking a step back from him, and he knew she emphasized his name just to irritate him. “I happen to like your full name. Mitchell. And it
is
your name.”

He was taken aback by her frankness. “Oh, well, given you like it.” He leaned towards her, narrowing the gap. “I always assumed you said it that way to make fun of me. Make yourself sound like a teacher or something.”

“What? No, of course not.”

Her hands were fidgeting. She had returned to the nervous, awkward girl he’d first met, and he longed to make her easy with him—like she had been just moments before. He wanted to bathe in her laughter, surround himself with her scent, immerse in her warmth.

“That’s good.” He stepped purposefully in her direction, taking back the distance she created.

Mitch watched with some amusement as she took a deep breath and put a hand to her forehead in an exasperated gesture. “Mitchell, Mitch, listen. My, ah, Mariam will be home shortly. It will be a bit of a shock to her to see company for dinner when you weren’t expected. As much as I appreciate your help today, really, I’m sure you know how older women can be when you throw them off their schedules, so I would…”

“Hello dear, I’m home,” Mariam said in greeting, coming through the patio doors at first, not noticing Mitch as she moved straight for Kris. “Oh, isn’t he the cutest thing all curled up there.” She lifted her face towards Lorna when she noticed Mitch standing to her side. “Oh, hello there.”

Not missing a beat, Mitch walked towards the stately lady, holding out his hand. “I’m Mitch Morgan, an old school chum of Lorna’s. She’s invited me for dinner to thank me for helping her paint the fence.”

Mariam flashed a glance at Lorna. “Isn’t that marvelous,” she said warmly, accepting his outstretched hand in her cool, firm grip. She smiled warmly, her apple-doll face, all cheeks, with a dimpled chin. “Company. And an old school chum. We always have lots of food—too much really for three people,” she said with a wink. Glancing at her daughter, Mariam waved a hand, taking charge. “Lorna dear, I’m home now; I’ll keep an eye on Kris so you can run upstairs and freshen up, if you like.”

Chapter Eight

After a quick shower where she scrubbed her skin within an inch of its life to remove the brown stains splashed on her like freckles, Lorna decided to leave her hair loose over her shoulder for a change. Telling herself her menstruations had nothing to do with having a man over for supper, she slipped on a light-yellow cotton sundress with spaghetti straps. She felt very feminine and not just a little desirable. With just a touch of gloss on her lips, and a coat of mascara on her lashes, she made a face in the mirror, deluding herself as to why she was going to such trouble.

“You know why,” she mocked her reflection, raising her eyebrows. Laying her palms flat on the counter, she counted her breaths, calming her racing heart. She didn’t want to feel this attraction to Mitchell anymore. The strong pull of wanting him to pull her against his strong chest and make her feel safe and taken care of. But those kinds of feelings could only end in pain for her—again. She stood and smoothed the dress across her waist, over her hips, wanting him to want her and she being able to walk away. Needing him to need her like she needed him. Part of her ached to hurt him like he had hurt her all those years ago. And yet she yearned for his arms to wrap around her and tell her he would never leave and that he didn’t care what lay behind them; the only thing that mattered is what lay ahead.

“Enough stalling.”

Kris’s chirping while he played in the living room with his many figurines, reenacting one show or another, cloaked her descent down the stairs. She paused at the bottom, adult voices sailing to her from the kitchen on the slight breeze from the open patio doors.

Lorna peeked around the entrance.

“You’ve known Lorna for a long time?” Mariam questioned Mitch. Her hands worked in a blur whipping her homemade Caesar salad dressing in a deep bowl.

Pulling her head back, Lorna laid a hand lightly on the doorframe, not yet ready to make an appearance. Curious, she listened. “A long time ago…during our last year of university. We lost touch. Obviously.” There was a smile in his tone. “She was my tutor.”

“Oh.” Mariam hummed the word. “She used to do a lot of that to make some extra money. Did she help?”

A deep chuckle resonated up his vocal cords and Lorna felt the vibrations along her inner thighs. “Yes, as a matter of fact, she did.”

Happiness could be heard in Mariam’s voice. “Nice of you to keep in touch.”

“We didn’t actually. I only met up with her again when we ran into each other in Vancouver,” he said, laughing again. “Quite literally
ran
into each other.”

“So that was you? She didn’t say.”

“Still a closed book then,” Mitch said, sobering. “She never did give much away.”

“No,” Mariam agreed. “Keeps herself to herself, that one. Now my Natasha, there was a chatterbox. Always on the go. A real social butterfly.”

Lorna visualized Mariam’s mossy green eyes watering like dew on a meadow when she spoke of her daughter. Lorna had experienced this so many times over the last few years, she forever felt lost not knowing how she could ever make it better for Mariam.

Footfalls echoed across the stone floor. Mitch’s voice hushed. “I didn’t know Natasha all that well, but I certainly am sorry for your loss. I remember her being very vivacious.”

“She was that,” Mariam said in a bare whisper. “Thank you, dear. First my poor Brent from a massive heart attack, just after the girls graduated, then Tasha.” A shuddered sigh escaped the woman’s lips. “Just about four years now.”

“It’s tough. I understand. I lost my father a year ago—April.” Lorna heard the chair legs pull back from the table. “When they’re gone, you have so many regrets. I was away on a job when he passed. I can’t seem to let it go that I wasn’t here.”

Clanking metal against ceramic let Lorna know Mariam had resumed her mixing. “I’m sure he wouldn’t want you to have regrets.”

“No, he wouldn’t.”

“You were close?”

“Yes,” he replied and Lorna longed to see his face as her palms pressed against the wall. She had an urge to run her hand along his cheek to ease the burden of his pain.

“You know they say the mourning gets better with time.” A slight clatter indicated the ceramic bowl had been laid on the counter just as bottles clinking let her know Mariam had opened the fridge. “Now I don’t know who
they
are, but I think they’re full of shit.”

A guffaw followed a cough. “I knew I liked you from the moment I laid eyes on you.” Mitch laughed, and Lorna closed her eyes, visualizing his deep dimples and the lines that looked so becoming fanning over his tanned skin. “I like the way you talk.”

The splish of a cap twisted off the top of a beer made Lorna’s mouth water.

“Takes one to know one.” The bottles clicked before silence descended.

“But we’ll always have a piece of Tasha.” Mariam continued, seeming by the sound of her voice to return to her post by the sink in dinner preparation. “She left us Kris, and he’s so much like her. Every day is a blessing.”

“Hey Mama, what you doin’?” Kris’s words caused her to stand up straight and made her realize how long she had been eavesdropping. “You look purdy in your lallow dress.”

Pulse beating loudly in her ears, she bent down to scoop the boy into her arms. “Thank you, my darlin’.” She kissed the top of his head. “You smell so good, like fresh outdoors.”

“Like the sunshine. Like your lallow dress,” he said, regarding her with adoring green eyes. “I touch your hair?”

Kris always loved to run his fingers through her hair. “I not mess it,” he said with such innocence his words melted her heart.

Lorna bent low to accommodate his reach. After he ran his chubby fist through her hair, she kissed him, smiling into the top of his head. “You do smell like sunshine.”

Lorna stood from her squatted position only to see Mitch staring at her in the most peculiar way from the archway to the kitchen.
Shit, does he know I was spying?

***

“Kris dear, Nana already put the sauce on the noodles; you don’t need to add more ketchup,” Mariam said to the small boy who seemed to wear more of the food on his face than he was getting into his stomach. She reached her napkin to wipe the red from his cheeks.

The child grinned at his grandmother.
He knows what he’s about
, Mitch tried not to smile.

“It’s good Nana, mmm-umm.” Red sauce formed a blurred circle from his nose to the bottom of his chin. His small tongue shot out to lick his lips. “Yummy. Want some ketchup, Mit-chell?”

The kid was so adorable he could see why the two women doted on the youngster. A foreigner to home life, Mitch hadn’t been around ‘normal kids,’ let alone any kids in such a long time, but he had been absorbed easily into this group. Kris had put him under a spell of adoration. “Sure, why not,” he agreed, allowing the child to pour ketchup over his noodles.

Both women at the table raised their eyebrows. Lorna shook her head almost imperceptibly.

“It’s fine,” he said, holding her gaze, enjoying the gentle warmth of her light brown eyes. “I like ketchup.” Which he did—on French fries. Lasagna? Maybe not so much.

“Mmm-umm, me too.” Kris took another large bite of his noodles smeared in the bright-red goo. “You really a policeman?”

“Yes, I am,” he said, mirroring the child’s movements, putting a heaping helping of lasagna on his fork and smearing it with ketchup.
Here goes nothing. Let’s hope I can keep it down.
“What are you going to be when you grow up?”

“An Avenger!”

Mitch almost choked on his food, taking a large gulp from his water glass. “An Avenger, eh? Just like Tony Stark?”

Kris jumped up from the table to place his hands firmly on his hips. “Maybe Captain America. I a superhero!”

Mitch started to laugh before catching the set jaw line in the young boy’s face suggesting his being a superhero was no laughing matter. Seeing the child’s grandmother and Lorna barely holding it together, he understood they knew better than to laugh at the boy’s ambitions.

“Come on and sit back down at the table,” Lorna instructed. “Finish your meal.”

“Yes, Mama.”

Supper was cleared, and Mariam shooed he and Lorna along as she took Kris by the hand. “You two go now and catch up,” she said, shooting a meaningful gaze at Lorna Mitch clearly understood. He lowered his chin, hiding his own smile of satisfaction. “I’m going to give this young man a bath.”

“I Super Kris!”

“Yes, indeed you are,” Mitch heard the older woman say as he and Lorna moved out to the wide front porch where a swing sat off to the side, sheltered by a thick hedge of lilac bushes.

Off in the distance, the sky was a painting mixed with pinks and oranges as the sun prepared to settle for the night. Standing close to the railing, Mitch regarded Lorna. The play of uncertainty across her features made him ache to cup her cheek and ease her worry. He remembered this vulnerable side so well—like yesterday when she tripped over the library carpet. Like then, his heart twisted, wanting her to feel comfortable. He took her stiff hand to lead her towards the swing.

She resisted slightly, and he tugged just a bit. “Come on,” he said, coaxing. “We’ll catch up.”

She sat down heavily with a sigh on the other side of the swing. “Listen, Mitch…”

The distance between them was too far. Overcome with impatience, he decided he had waited long enough. All day. Then through supper. Yesterday after pulling her over. The last five years, in fact. His lips cut her off. He couldn’t help it. Not one bit. As soon as she sat down, luscious curves enhanced by the girl-next-door shift of a yellow dress, he became determined to taste her lips. Drawn to her like a moth to the flame, he had to know if her body still responded to his as he remembered. He needed to know—once and for all—that he did not imagine the connection they had before.

Pulling back to scrutinize her features, try to read her, he wrapped his hand around the base of her neck enjoying the silk of her hair as it slipped over his fingers when he pulled her face back towards him. Without waiting for an invitation, his lips sliced across hers, so full and soft against his own. He tilted his head as his mouth moved over hers, his tongue running along the edge, tasting the citrus of her lip gloss. “Yumm.” he purred before lifting his head again, only slightly, to see her eyes flutter.

Encouraged, he continued.

He was rewarded when her lips parted, yielding to him, and he didn’t need a written invitation before his tongue took command. His other palm slid down the span of her back to settle just above the curve her hip, urging her towards him. His lower body hardened in response to her proximity when her arms came up to twine around his neck. With dueling tongues, their lips meshed. His breathing became laboured, as though he were running a marathon. Moving his mouth along her jawline to her earlobe, he gently nipping and tugging his way down the length of her neck to settle at her pulse point.

“Ahh,” she breathed, and he vibrated with longing. She was like putty, all melted longing, and he had a need to take her right there on the swing. “Mitch.”

Smiling into the soft part of her neck, he said, “Is this what it takes for you to say my name correctly?”

Her body stiffened, her head coming up, and Mitch moved his lips quickly to reclaim hers. The kiss deepened and he demanded more. To his surprise, she didn’t fight against the building passion. Instead, she enhanced the fire, returning his kiss, moving her hands to either side of his face, pulling him closer, her own fever adding fuel, blazing a trail across his cheek to his neck.

One of her hands came down between them to unbutton his cotton shirt, sliding her hand inside across his taut nipple.

“Lorna. I want you so badly,” he said, his own hand coming to rest on the outside of her dress. Her breasts seemed to strain against the thin barrier of the fabric.

Mitch was only vaguely aware of splashing and singing sailing down on them from the open window until Lorna stiffened in his arms, pushing away from him. Sitting up straight, she adjusted her dress and ran a shaky hand through her hair. “What am I doing? W-we doing? I can’t do this. Not here. Not now. Not ever. Not with you.”

Not with me?
“What?”

She pushed him back farther from her, creating distance. He registered the void, a deep hole. Something precious had been taken from him. Her hand twitched and she smoothed her hair into place. Her eyes, previously unfocused, turned to him with a penetrating stare, burning with golden flecks. “You have to go, Mitch. It’s getting late.”

Trying to recapture the moment, he said. “It’s not a school day tomorrow, Mom. Can’t we stay up a little later?” He leaned forward, reaching for her to draw her back in, but she resisted, palms outstretched. She pulled away, widening the gulf.

“I can’t. Not with you.”

There it was again. “Why not with me? What’s the problem with me? Why was there always a problem with me?”