She let out the breath she didn’t realize she was holding. What was that kiss about? She’d been okay. They’d given in to their animal attraction. They’d had sex. Wall banging, crazy hot sex. But . . . sex. They’d bonded over their similar pasts, which meant she felt . . . safe with him. Accepted. Respected. And that was enough. She wasn’t going to be the Girl Who Wanted More.
So . . . what
was
that?
A kiss good-bye? Wait for me later? Thanks for the great lay?
What?
She discovered her second thing. In this new life, she wasn’t going to be content to consider, to endlessly ponder, or worry. Life left too many things unanswered. So when there was an answer to be had, well, dammit, she wanted to have it.
With two T-shirts on, one inside out, and one sock in her hand, she got off the bed and walked to the bathroom door. Okay, so maybe half-stalked, half-staggered was a better description. She didn’t want to be get-crazy-after-great-but-meaningless-sex girl, either. She just wanted a simple answer.
What did he expect?
She needed to know that, so she could decide if it was what she expected, too.
She took a calming breath as she lifted her hand to knock on the door.
See? So civil, so polite
. Not at all crazy-after-sex-girl.
Before she connected knuckles to wood, he opened the door, fully dressed in a fresh, crisp uniform. If he was surprised to find her standing there, half dressed, he didn’t show it. In fact, his gaze locked on hers, and she got as far as thinking
damn, you’re so beautiful,
before he yanked her into his arms and kissed her senseless.
“That’s what I really wanted to do,” he said gruffly. “When you moved away, turned your back. In case you were wondering.”
“I wasn’t—”
Wow, that was some kiss.
It took her a moment to recalibrate. Her toes were still curling.
“I didn’t turn my back on you. I was just—” She broke off because she wasn’t sure what she’d just. Not really. He’d gotten a call to go into work and she’d rolled away to leave him to it. Great sex, but just sex. Clean and simple. Except it wasn’t going to be either, apparently. That was fine. Obviously, no matter what she’d wanted to believe, just sex, clean and simple wasn’t really for her, either. Or she wouldn’t have stalked over to the bathroom door in the first place.
“I get it,” he said. “I was supposed to give you your space. I didn’t want to. So . . . I compromised. You frustrate the hell out of me, and I’m all done with being frustrated. So, this is what I wanted to do. Pretty much from the moment we stopped doing it. You?”
She was still reeling from the kiss and the declaration. Both of them had been—well, there was only one word to describe it.
Possessive.
And damn if she didn’t learn a third thing. She liked it. When it was him doing the possession anyway. “Me, yes. Uh, too. Me, too.”
“Good.” He kissed her again. He took his time, sliding his hand under her hair, tilting her mouth up to his, and backing her up against the wall before sinking into the kiss as if he had all day, even though he clearly didn’t. He kissed her until her knees were jelly and stars were twinkling in the periphery once more. And then he was gone.
She slid a little until she was sagging against the open doorframe of the bathroom, hand touching her mouth, lips so tender, feeling like he’d just touched her in places everything that had come before hadn’t come close to touching. She shifted her head and looked at the bed. The sexy sex bed made of sex—where she’d just enjoyed some of the very finest of its kind. And she smiled. “Well, one thing I’m not, is frustrated.”
She took a few moments to use his bathroom to clean up, hell, to brace herself against the sink until she could stand up, then tortured herself with images of what he looked like in his shower, all hot and steamy and naked and aroused, doing . . . what he’d said she made him want to do . . . which made her want to do . . . a lot of things. And none of them alone. Back in the bedroom, she had barely uncovered one boot and was digging for the other when she heard her cell phone chirp. Her cell phone never chirped. Who would be texting her? Who even had her number? Fergus, she supposed. Oh, and Owen. And Brodie. How had that even happened? She hadn’t even been in town that long.
She wanted to bask a bit more, okay a lot more, but new life or old, apparently one thing didn’t change. Life was determined to move along at its own pace, whether she was ready or not.
She finally unearthed her phone, but didn’t recognize the number associated with the text. She did, however, know who’d sent it.
About the prospectus, it read.
She sat cross-legged amidst the tangle of linens and comforter on the floor next to his bed, smiled, and typed: Yes?
It takes as long as it takes.
Her smile spread to a grin. Okay. Thank you.
There was a pause, then: Include tower and cottage.
Her heart thumped, part nerves, part excitement. Okay, mostly nerves. With shaky fingers, she typed: Okay. I’m glad. Thank you for trusting me.
That part was never in doubt.
She was still sitting there, grinning like a loon, when she heard an engine start up outside. She half crawled, half stumbled over to one of the alcoves, careful to keep her head ducked. She knelt in front of the window, looking through the clear part of the pane, down at the side driveway as his SUV slowly backed out and turned around. He paused as he turned, looked up. Their gazes met. She didn’t smile, neither did he. She didn’t wave. He didn’t nod. They just . . . looked. And there didn’t have to be anything else.
Then he drove off.
And she watched him until his taillights disappeared. “Alexandra MacFarland, what has just happened to you?” She shifted around and leaned back against the window. “Welcome to your life, part two,” she murmured.
Then she crawled out of the alcove . . . jumped on his bed, and danced.
Chapter 8
S
cowling, Logan entered the police station, the front of his uniform shirt soaked clear to the skin for the second time that day. It was forty-two degrees outside, for crying out loud.
“Again?” Sergeant Benson took in the state of his uniform, rightly guessing that Eleanor Darby had nailed him once more with her gun. Her high-powered, super-soaking water gun. “Sir, you do know that your gun has real bullets in it.”
“Yeah, well, I’m pretty sure you were right. Garlic and a stake, maybe.” He wasn’t laughing this time. “She took a sniper position from her bedroom window. That’s what she called it. Sniper position. Are we sure she’s lived in Blueberry all of her seventy-nine years? She wasn’t CIA? FBI?”
“Just be happy she’s not NRA.” Barb followed him into his office. “Chief, why don’t you go on home for the day? Except for Eleanor and that damn raccoon of hers, it’s been quiet.”
“Can you believe that?” Logan demanded, still working off his mad. He hung his jacket—which had still been damp from the earlier assault and was now soaked—on the back of the door, then plucked at the front of his sodden shirt. “Now she’s claiming it’s a pet and she’s shooting at Randy with that damn gun.”
“And you, sir. Twice.”
He leveled a look at Barb, but she didn’t so much as blink. One of the many reasons he’d never joined in the Thursday night poker game she’d started up a few years back with some of the officers and a few other locals. Alex, on the other hand, would probably fit right in.
“I just wish I knew what the hell has gotten into her,” he said. “Yesterday she was trying to mace the damn thing with furniture polish and oven cleaner. Do you think maybe it’s some kind of Alzheimer’s?”
“What I think is that she watches way too many cop shows. You should get Randy to trap that thing at night when she’s in bed—they’re nocturnal, right?—before it up and bites her. He can cart it over to the next county and release it. She’ll just think it wandered off.”
“And then she’ll find some new way to waste our time. Remember when she was convinced someone was sneaking into her house and rearranging her doll figurines? The woman needs a different hobby. Why can’t she knit or sew? Like other women her age. Something safe, noncombative, that doesn’t require firearms.”
“I knit. And I sew. Sir.”
Again, Logan leveled a look at her.
“Her family has all moved away,” Barb said. “Husband passed what has to be almost nine years ago now. Maybe she just needs something more in her life.”
“Well, she’s a little too late to enroll in sniper school and I don’t think a life of crime is a good alternative. I still say it might be time for her to have a little chat with her doctor. At the moment, though, we have to do something about this damn raccoon. Before you know it, she’ll have it on a leash walking it around the harbor, scaring folks half to death and starting a rabies scare.”
“I’ll call Randy and tell him to trap it tonight. Why don’t you go on home before you catch your death of cold? I can handle things here, call you if there’s a problem.”
“Make sure you tell Randy he has to wait until the damn thing isn’t on her property so she doesn’t get him for trespassing. I’m not too sure she’s not nocturnal, too. And I’ll stay on. I know we’re short-staffed with Nate being gone for his sister’s wedding.”
“Speaking of sisters, one of yours called today. I left the message on the desk.”
Logan lifted a quick glance her way, but she didn’t look particularly perturbed, which meant it wasn’t Fiona; nor did she look worried or concerned, which meant it wasn’t Hannah, either. He made a mental note to call Fi and get an update on Hannah. He was a little worried about her, too, and being the middle of the three girls, Fiona was the one who kept track of them all. “Kerry?” he guessed, referring to the youngest of his three siblings as he slid files around on his desk, looking for the phone slip. “Is everything okay? You should have texted me or had her call me on my cell.”
“Told her that, but she was in some big hurry. Didn’t sound like anything bad. In fact, she sounded pretty excited. Said it wasn’t something she wanted to say in a text or leave on voicemail.”
“Okay, well, that’s good.” When the comment was met with silence, he glanced up. “Isn’t it?”
“I’m sure it’s not my place to say.”
Logan rolled his eyes. All three of his sisters had gone out of state for college, and never really made their way back, but they all kept in touch with him, often through Barb. Fiona had been the last to leave permanently, and that had been . . . wow, seven, almost eight years ago. She’d been in New York City ever since and had just launched her own design business in the Village. Hannah was a lawyer and lived just outside DC in the historic town of Alexandria. Kerry . . . well . . . the baby of the family was also the family nomad. She’d taken off at seventeen, and other than the occasional pit stop between adventures, was the sibling he saw and heard from the least. A wandering gypsy, Fergus called her. But a happier gypsy he’d never met. “She’s still in Yosemite? Doing the guide thing?”
“Winter is coming, so I’m thinking probably not. I think they close most of the trails in the off-season. I’m not sure. She didn’t say.”
Logan gave up looking for the slip and dug out his phone instead. “Well, she must have said something.” When Barb hedged, he said, “Come on, spill.”
“You know she was seeing that park ranger for a time.”
“Kerry’s relationships usually last as long as her interest in whatever job she’s latched on to.” He looked at Barb. “Why, is something different this time?”
His desk sergeant merely lifted a shoulder. Then, when he narrowed his gaze, she said, “Well, you didn’t hear it from me, but, as you know, I’ve got two sons, both married, and three granddaughters, also all married. So I know when a girl sounds like she’s thinking about wedding bells.“
“Engaged? Kerry?” Logan started to laugh. “Oh, that poor guy. What’s his name? Steve something? Tom?” He noticed Barb wasn’t smiling. “Oh, come on, you know she’ll bail before they ever walk down the aisle.” When Barb continued to stare, his smiled faded. “What, are you saying she eloped? You think Kerry got married?”
Barb shook her head. “But I suspect she’ll want to be.”
His gut clenched. He gulped. “Pregnant?”
“You didn’t hear it from me.” She turned to leave the office.
“Hold on there! You said wedding bells. Where did you get a baby from wedding bells?”
She looked back. “Sometimes the baby comes before the I do’s. What else would get that girl down the aisle?”
Logan sank down in his chair. He stared at his phone. When had he lost control of his nice, steady, understandable life? When?
“I’d call Fiona first,” Barbara said.
“I was going to anyway,” he said absently, mind spinning. The baby of the McCrae family . . . having a baby? It didn’t compute. Kerry was a happy soul who always landed on her feet somewhere, but it was one thing for her to pack up and go anytime and anywhere the mood struck her. She’d long since proven she could handle herself. Not that he didn’t worry about her anyway, all the time. But that kind of life wasn’t any way to raise a child. Last he’d spoken to her, she certainly hadn’t sounded like she was planning on slowing down anytime soon, much less settling down. “What do you know about this Steve character? Is he going to stand by her? Do we want him to?”
“I could say something about it being a sad commentary that you need to ask me these things—”
“Barb, you know I only half listen when Kerry talks about her latest lust interest. They’re never serious. I do listen when she talks about whatever work she’s doing. It’s always struck me that she’s a lot more passionate about the jobs she takes on than the men she dates. So, do I need to run a check on this guy?” He was already turning the computer monitor toward him.
“Already did. That’s the top file there.”
Logan looked up. “He has a file? What the hell has he done?”
“Nothing. Straitlaced as they come. Hard worker from what I can tell. Been with the park service pretty much his entire adult life. Eagle Scout.”
Relief made him a little giddy and he laughed. “Kerry went for an Eagle Scout?”
Barb lifted an eyebrow. “My Evan is an Eagle Scout.”
Logan sobered. “Right. I didn’t mean—it was more a comment on Kerry than on—”
“Timothy Stevens. That’s his name. Top of the pile there. Why don’t you grab it and head home? I’m sure with the project report thing happening out at the house, you have a lot of things you need to get your hands on. So why not go ahead and take advantage of—” She broke off suddenly and stared at him. She seemed to be at a sudden loss for words, then just as suddenly snapped her mouth shut and turned to the door.
But not before he’d seen the smile peeking around the corners of her mouth. “Sergeant?”
“So much paperwork. Better get back to it,” she said over her shoulder, bustling out. “I’ll call Deputy Dan and get him to come in early. Go home.”
Deputy Dan was actually Officer Daniel Baker, but even at twenty-five, he was so fresh-scrubbed, apple-cheeked, and peach-fuzz-faced, Barb had nicknamed him Deputy Dan his second day on the job and it had stuck.
Logan didn’t care about covering the rest of his shift; he wanted to know what that damn smile was about. Hell, he wanted to know a lot of things, starting with that was going on with his baby sister. But that’s not where his thoughts were lingering at the moment.
With everything else going on, it should have been easy to back burner what had happened at the house that morning. But quite the opposite was true. Almost in defiance of everything else going on, his thoughts had never strayed far from Alex. At the moment, he was thinking that if he went home, and she was there, getting to the bottom of the Kerry and Timothy story would, at best, not happen right away. In fact, just thinking about that made him shift in his seat as his body enthusiastically put in its vote on how it would like to spend the evening.
The thing was, now that he was back in town and back at work, he’d had a chance for the fog to lift a little, and wasn’t sure what he hoped would happen when he finally went home. Or what he hoped wouldn’t happen.
Suddenly, staying at the office took on another layer of appeal. “No need,” he called out. “I have a fresh shirt here. Eula didn’t get my pants wet this time.”
From her desk just outside his office door, Sergeant Benson murmured something that sounded an awful lot like, “No, but it looks like someone did,” but the radio squawked just then and a moment later he could hear her talking to Randy.
“No,” he muttered.
Not possible
. Barb was good at reading people and situations, but no way had she’d figured out . . . anything regarding how he’d spent a part of his morning. How could she have? He hadn’t said a word . . . and he seriously doubted Alex would have made a peep.
Her goal was to get the restoration job on Pelican Point, and being viewed as professional was key to that. The last thing she’d be doing was flaunting a personal relationship with him. In fact, her first instinct had been to roll away and grab her clothes.
So despite her enthusiastic response to his parting kiss, he wasn’t all that sure she was interested in a relationship with him. That annoyed him no end, which in turn worried him. He wasn’t sure he wanted one, either, so why in hell was he pissed off that she might not? God, he hated complicated emotional shit.
It was exactly why Logan went to great pains to keep his personal life just that. Personal. Private. It meant not having one at all in the Cove. Not that he had much of one anywhere, but he wasn’t the hermit Fergus made him out to be. Not exactly, anyway. And he wasn’t a monk, either. When he wanted to . . . socialize, he generally found it a lot wiser to do so when he needed to go away on business, either to the county offices in Machias, or the state capital in Augusta.
That brought up the whole thing about how, exactly, he wanted to handle what was happening with Alex in terms of the rest of the town. Once one person got wind that there was something more than a business agreement going on between them . . .
He massaged his forehead, then pinched the bridge of his nose as reality came crashing in. “Seriously, what happened to quiet, simple, and predictable? How did I coast along for ten, twelve years, only to lose it inside of forty-eight hours?”
Not wanting to know what was happening with Randy and the raccoon situation, and possibly better off not knowing what Barb thought she knew about Kerry or . . . anything else . . . he closed his office door and flipped the blinds in front of the glass pane that comprised the top half of the door. He opened the supply closet door in the corner of the small office and pulled down another dry-cleaned uniform shirt that was folded and pressed, sitting on the top shelf.
He’d have to go without a T-shirt, and the seams scratched like hell, but it was only a few hours. He quickly unbuttoned his wet uniform shirt, slipped the badge off the above-the-pocket panel, tossed the wet shirt on the chair, and put his badge on the fresh shirt. He’d just peeled off his wet T-shirt when his intercom buzzer went off.
“Chief?” Barb used the intercom only when she was trying to give him a chance to duck whoever was outside his office.
He could think of only one person who it could be and groaned.
Eleanor Darby
. He hoped like hell she didn’t have that damn critter with her. He stepped over to the blinds and peeked through.
Alex?
She looked . . . he didn’t know her well enough to know what her expression meant. She was chatting politely and calmly with Barb, smiling briefly, but there was something in her eyes. Tension, worry,
something
.
Without thinking, he immediately opened his office door. “Alex, what’s wrong?”