Deep Dark (29 page)

CHAPTER 33

Veronica had a nervous knot in her stomach as she pulled up to Jay's apartment. His black Tahoe was in the parking lot, and she took a deep breath. He was home. She was all out of excuses.

She grabbed the cookie tin off the seat beside her and strode up to his door before she could change her mind. She gave a sharp rap. The door opened after a few minutes, and he looked surprised to see her. He had on basketball shorts and a T-shirt that stretched tightly over his broad chest.

“Good, I caught you,” she said. “You're probably on your way to the gym, right?”

“Good guess.” He gave her a puzzled look for a moment before swinging the door back. “Come on in.”

She stepped out of the heat into the chilly dimness of his hallway. His first-floor unit backed up to a greenbelt, and she caught a glimpse of thick woods through his back windows. She turned and looked at him. “Here.” She thrust the cookie tin at him. “Chocolate chip.”

“You made me cookies?”

“They're okay. A little overdone, actually. I'm not really a baker.”

The corner of his mouth curved up. She stood there empty-handed, trying not to fidget as he opened the
lid and popped a cookie into his mouth. He offered her one.

“No, thanks.”

“These are great.” He glanced around. “You want to come in and sit down or—”

“No, really. I just stopped by.”

He walked deeper into the apartment and put the cookie tin on the counter separating the kitchen from the living room. His place was all single-guy stuff, from the oversized leather sofa to the giant television. A sliding glass door in back led to a patio where he had a black Weber grill.

He was looking at her face now, specifically the bruise at the side of her forehead. It had gone through a rainbow of colors throughout the week, and today was a sickly greenish brown.

“How are you doing?” he asked.

“Fine.” She cleared her throat. “That's actually why I came. Part of the reason. I wanted to thank you.”

His eyebrows tipped up. “For what?”

“For, you know, kicking my door in. Getting there in time.” She tried to sound casual, but the words came out glib, and he looked down at the floor, clearly uncomfortable.

“Yeah, wish we would've been there sooner.” His gaze met hers. “And how'd you know it was me who kicked your door in?”

“I measured the shoeprint. Thirteen and a half. Who else would it be?” She smiled and glanced away.

This was even more awkward than she'd imagined it would be as she'd spent her day off baking the damn cookies. She'd burned the first batch and had to go to the store for more ingredients.

She looked at him, determined to get this done. “The other thing is I owe you an apology. For the other day.”

His eyebrows tipped up again.

“For what I said to Jordan about us.”

He winced and looked away.

“I'm really sorry.”

He shook his head. “Forget it.”

She stepped closer. “No, I really am. I didn't want to go out in the first place because I didn't want anyone gossiping about me, and then I did it to you. I feel like a bitch.”

“You're not.” He laughed and looked over her shoulder. “Actually, I wouldn't have minded gossip, if it had been good.”

“I'm sorry. Really.”

He shook his head and blushed, clearly embarrassed. “Yeah, well, I'm sorry you were disappointed.”

“I wasn't.”

He gave her a baleful look.

“Not like that. I just meant . . . damn it, I'm making it worse, aren't I?”

“Can we just forget it?”

A scratching noise caught her attention, and she glanced around him to see a cat pawing at the door.

“Your cat wants in.”

He turned and sighed. “It's supposed to stay outside.”

“ ‘It'?”

“She. Whatever.”

The cat mewed and rubbed against the glass, and Jay walked over and let her in. She made a dash for a bowl in the kitchen.

Veronica looked at Jay. “That's the stray calico April Abrams was feeding.”

He sighed. “Maybe.”

“Not maybe. I tested all that damn cat fur. It's the missing cat from the crime scene.” She went around the counter into the kitchen and crouched down to pet her. The little thing was old and had a torn ear.

She glanced up at Jay. “What's her name?”

“Damned if I know. She doesn't have a chip or anything.”

“You took her to a shelter?”

“Yeah.”

“Why didn't you leave her?”

“I don't know. I was going to.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “But it was like Death Row in there. They're overrun with cats. Who'd want to adopt that skinny old thing?”

The cat purred and rubbed against Veronica's hand.

“I'm thinking of taking her to my sister's,” he said. “She lives in Brenham, and she could probably use a mouser around the barn.”

“A mouser? This little one?” Veronica lifted the cat up and snuggled her against her chest. “She'd get picked off by the first coyote.”

Jay gazed down at her and sighed. He'd already decided to keep the cat, she could see it in his face.

She put the cat down at his feet and stood up. He wasn't looking at the cat anymore but at her. And he had that look on his face again, the warm, interested look that had put a flutter in her stomach and made her want to go out with him.

“You're a good man, Jay.” She went up on her toes and kissed him. As she eased away, he pulled her back
in and kissed her again, harder. As he let her go, she felt a surge of attraction.

“Sorry.” His hands dropped.

“No, it's good.” She caught his hand and squeezed it.

And then she stepped back, because she was sending him mixed signals, and she needed to leave him alone until she got her head straight.

He gave her a puzzled smile, and she smiled back, and she felt a swell of relief because things felt right between them again. She was glad she'd come.

He cleared his throat. “I should get to the gym,” he said. “Thanks for the cookies.”

She followed him down the hall. “Thanks for kicking my door in,” she said.

“Anytime.”

•   •   •

“Your cop's here.”

Laney glanced over her shoulder to see Tarek standing in her cubicle. He wore a black T-shirt with his favorite slogan stamped across the front in tall white letters: “RTFM.” Read the fucking manual.

Laney tried to shake off the daze.

“My what?”

“Your detective guy,” Tarek said. “He's down in the lobby.”

Laney got up and glanced at her phone. She didn't think she'd missed a call, but then again, maybe she had. She'd been coding feverishly all afternoon, immune to all distractions, even thoughts of Reed. Now a buzz of anticipation filled her as she rode the elevator down to the lobby.

He'd been called to a crime scene at 3:20
A.M
., and Laney had woken up alone with a dull ache in her chest. Reed had spent every night at her house for three weeks, and it amazed her how quickly she'd gotten used to his warmth in her bed and his truck in her driveway and his razor on the side of her bathroom sink.

When she stepped off the elevator, he was standing beside the reception desk.

“Hey, I was about to call up there.” He held up a cardboard coffee cup. “Extra-large no-whip latte. I figured you skipped lunch.”

She took it. “Thanks.” She glanced around the lobby. “You want to go outside or—”

“Come on.” He pushed through the glass doors and led her around the side of the building to a tree-shaded spot with a picnic table. But instead of heading for the table, he took her hand and pulled her close to the building.

“What—”

He cut her off with a kiss, easing her back against the concrete and tipping her head back the way he did. He took her mouth with his until she was pliant and dizzy and she didn't even care where they were, she just wanted to be with him.

He stepped back and looked down at her. “Missed you this morning.”

“How was it?”

“Okay.”

Which meant bad, she was learning.

She walked over and set her coffee on the picnic table. He hadn't bought any for himself, so he'd probably been mainlining it all day.

“I wanted to get back over before you left for work,”
he said. “But I had to swing by my house, get a shirt, put my trash cans out on the curb. Place is starting to look abandoned.”

She leaned back against the picnic table and looked up at him, trying to read his expression. Was this his way of telling her something?

A warm breeze wafted up, stirring the limbs of the pecan tree above them.

“We could sleep at your house sometime,” she said. “We don't always have to stay at my place.”

“I don't mind.” He swept the lock of pink hair from her eyes. “You've just been through something. I know you feel safe at your place. With your security system. And your ferocious guard cat.”

He smiled, but she knew he was serious. He was trying to be supportive. He was trying to help her through the traumas, past and present, that she never liked to talk about. He'd been so patient with her, watching her with those long, steady looks and waiting for her to open up to him. And she was, gradually giving him pieces of herself. But she worried it wasn't enough. Every time they made love, the raw intimacy of it blew her away. He demanded everything, every fiber of her being, and then some. And she'd lie next to him, sated and blissed out and stunned that she could feel so close to someone.

“Hey.” He slipped his hand around her waist. “You're giving me that look.”

He bent his head down and kissed her again, long and deep, while the warm breeze swept over her skin. He stepped back and let her go.

“I did have a purpose in coming here, believe it or not,” he said. “I wanted to ask you out to dinner tonight. Someplace good.”

“Hmm. How about Bangkok Palace?”

“I was thinking Adrienne's.”

She drew back. “Adrienne's is
nice
. And expensive.”

He smiled and shook his head. “I'm trying to take you on a date here. Every time I ask you to dinner, you storm out on me, or one of us gets called into work, or we end up at a crime scene. You're making it damn hard to court you, Laney.”

“You're courting me,” she stated, and felt a tingle in her stomach.

“That's what people do at the start of a serious relationship.”

The ache was in her chest again. She pressed her hand to it as she looked at him, searching his eyes. “Is this a serious relationship?”

“Don't you think?”

“I don't know,” she said. “I've never been in love before.”

He smiled slightly and took her hand. “Hurts, doesn't it?”

She nodded.

He pulled her against him, and her heart was racing. Then he kissed the top of her head. “I'll pick you up at eight.”

She swallowed. “Eight's good.”

“If anyone asks you to work late, tell them to go to hell.”

He walked her back to the entrance, then gave her a quick kiss good-bye. Her gaze followed him down the sidewalk toward the parking lot.

Laney stepped inside the cool dimness of the building. She walked across the lobby feeling slightly dizzy
again. She stopped beside a cluster of people waiting for an elevator and stared down at her feet.

Reed Novak was courting her. He wanted to take her to Adrienne's tonight. What the hell was she going to wear?

“Coming, Laney?”

She glanced up to see Dmitry staring at her from inside the elevator. It was filled with her coworkers, young guys in T-shirts and cargo shorts and flip-flops, all bent over their cell phones playing games and texting—all except for Dmitry, who was watching her expectantly.

“On or off?”

She stepped on and turned around to face the doors as they eased shut.
I've never been in love before.

God, what had she done?

She shot her arm out, and the doors sprang open. She rushed across the lobby to the windows and spotted Reed at the edge of the parking lot. Her heart lurched. She hurried outside as he reached his truck and pulled open the door.

“Reed!”

He turned around. He shielded his eyes from the sun with his hand, watching her as she caught up to him. When she reached him, her cheeks were flushed and her pulse was pounding. He rested his arm on the door and gazed down at her, and she couldn't read the look in his eyes.

She took a deep breath to summon her courage. “You never responded to what I said.”

He looked at her a moment. “The love thing.”

“Yes.” Her heart actually hurt now, like he had it gripped in his fist.

He stepped closer, his gaze intent on hers. “I didn't want to freak you out.”

“You won't freak me out. Just tell me the truth.”