The Life She Wants (15 page)

Here was Riley, thirty-five and alone. No interested man. No partner. Sitting in a damn parking lot at night, crying because her friend had let her go sixteen years without forgiving her for that one little... Okay, that one major mistake.

She had a sudden vision of herself making meat loaf for charity, taking in old ugly dogs and watching movies alone for the rest of her life. Whimpering because Emma would never again be her friend. And it was her own fault.

She dug around in her purse until she found a business card. She flipped it over and found the cell number. She texted:

Are you completely out of melons already?

What came back was:

??

She texted:

I'm going to have some dinner at the Chinese Palace. Have you eaten? Riley.

When four minutes had passed, four of the longest minutes she'd ever endured, during which she could feel extreme embarrassment about texting him, she was ready to go into the grocery and get a salad. Then her phone pinged with a text.

On Wayside and Bayshore?

That's it.

Ten minutes or less.

I'll get a table.

* * *

Riley kept telling herself it was an experiment, just to see if she had any game left after all these years. She'd had the most uncomfortable feeling in her chest when she realized that not only had Adam managed to brave a relationship, but Emma had somehow bounced back, too, after probably the most destructive relationship of all time. So who better to try this out on than a guy who intrigued her and was as safe as dating a member of the Royal Guard. He was a cop. If he gave her the least trouble, she'd call the police chief, whom she'd met on several occasions at community functions. The only thing that could make this better would be if one of her teams cleaned the chief's house.

While she waited for Logan Danner, she ordered wine and pot stickers. This might take more than one wine. Would he give her a breath test before she got in her car?

Her pot stickers had barely arrived when he came in the door. And she got instant nerves. He was attractive; he wore jeans, a beige sweater over a white shirt, a leather jacket. His light brown hair was just a bit too long. Not shaggy, but no buzz cut for this guy. And he had a bit of a beard growth. That sexy I-have-just-too-much-testosterone growth.

He slid into the booth across from her and grinned. “Date night!”

“Don't get frisky,” she said. “This probably won't work out to be anything.”

He shook his head. “What an attitude.” The waiter came over and he asked, “Have you ordered dinner, Riley?”

“Just the pot stickers.”

“Great. Bring me a Tsingtao,” he said to the waiter.

Riley had a look of confusion on her face.

“Beer,” he said, smiling. “In the end, you asked me out. How's that for a major upset?”

“This isn't really a date. It's two people sitting in the same booth, eating dinner.”

“So you just couldn't stop thinking about me, is that it?” he asked.

“That is not it at all,” she said.

He put his napkin on his lap. “So tell me about your day. That's how most dates start out. Which, by the way, is usually two people sitting in the same booth, eating dinner.”

She leaned her head into her hand. “I knew I'd live to regret this...”

He laughed at her. “Okay, we'll start with my day. I was off today. I had stuff to do. I went to the gym, stopped by my mother's office—her car has a weird warning light so we swapped cars and I took hers to the shop. I did some laundry and ran the vacuum around the house, a couple of things I do every month like clockwork.” He stopped talking to check her expression. “I was starting to think about dinner but I had something more lively in mind.”

“Like a bar?”

“Yes. I have a foolproof system. When I'm flying solo I go to a noisy place where there will be people, some I know, some new to me. When I have a date, I pick a quiet place like this. Want to know what's different about tonight? I'll tell you—usually if I have a date and pick a quiet place like this, the woman talks my leg off and I don't have to work very hard to seem interesting and charming.”

“Huh,” she said. “I really don't date.”

He sat back against the booth's padded seat. “I guess that makes me pretty special.”

“I guess it does,” she said. “It also makes you the only person I know who has any interest. Besides my brother, that is.”

“I'll try to elevate my status,” he said. His beer arrived and he took a drink. “Just out of curiosity, why isn't anyone interested? Or am I going to understand why in another ten minutes?”

“It's a long story, really...”

“Maybe you could give me the bullet points,” he said.

“Okay, let's see. I'm a single mother. When my daughter was little...very little...I was so focused on working, staying one step ahead of the bills. I absolutely did not consider a date. I probably wasn't very...”

“Nice?” he asked, lifting his brows.

“I was going for another word. Like
receptive
.”

“So you were so not receptive that before you knew it, you gave off a vibe?” He cocked his head and waited.

“And this is your interesting, charming side?” she asked. She sighed. “Let's just order,” she added, opening her menu.

“Vibe,” he said under his breath.

She lifted her hand and the waiter was back at their booth.

“I'll have the chicken and broccoli with rice and egg drop soup and...” She looked at him. “Need a minute?” she asked.

He didn't even open the menu. “Shrimp lo mein, garlic chicken, another beer.”

“You already knew what you wanted?” she asked.

“I've been here before. I live about two miles down Wayside. So—how old is your daughter?”

“Fifteen,” she said, taking a sip of her wine, regretting more with every moment what she'd done and completely at a loss as to why she'd done it.

“And I'm your inaugural reentry into the world of men and women?”

She shrugged. “Time flies.”

“So now we're going to have to try to unlearn a few things, right?”

“Like?”

“Like having dinner out with someone of the opposite sex can be fun. Getting to know someone new is like... Well, making a new friend who has had experiences you haven't had can be stimulating. I can tell you lots of things about police work if you're interested, and you can tell me lots of things about...about...” He indicated her with his hand.

“Cleaning house,” she supplied.

“You clean houses?” he asked.

“Sometimes, but mostly I own a company that provides housekeeping services and other stuff. I bet you're fascinated.”

He shook his head. “This is going to take longer than I thought,” he muttered.

“What makes you such a know-it-all?” she asked. “Didn't you say you're divorced?”

“That wasn't my idea,” he pointed out. “But we parted on very good terms, attesting to the fact that I'm an extremely amiable guy with lots of patience and am very nonjudgmental.”

“Then why'd you get divorced?”

“Now, that's a long story,” he said.

Elbow braced on the table, she leaned her chin in her palm. “The service here is slow. Give me the bullet points.”

He sighed. “My wife wasn't cut out to be married... To a man...”

“Huh?”

He looked trapped. “She's playing on the other team, okay?”

“Are you serious?”

“As a heart attack,” he said, making fast work of his beer.

Riley started to laugh. She covered her mouth, but then she just couldn't keep it in.

“I'm sure you're going to tell me what about that's funny...”

“Riley?”

She jumped at the sound of her mother's voice, tipping her wine over. She and Logan went after the spilled wine with their napkins. “Mom?” she said, looking up.

June had changed clothes. At least some of them. She wore a crisp white shirt with her jeans, covered by a blazer. She'd fluffed up her hair and put on lipstick.

“Mom?” Logan asked, sliding out of the booth.

“Hello,” June said good-naturedly, smiling at him.

“Mom, what are you doing here?”

“I ordered some takeout,” she said.

“But what about your meat loaf?”

“I lost interest so I put it in the freezer. My goodness, Riley, when you said you couldn't wait to get out of your panty hose, I had no idea—” She put out her hand to Logan. “I'm June Kerrigan.”

“Pleasure to meet you. I'm Logan Danner. Would you like to join us?”

“Not on your life,” she said with a laugh. “Have you two been seeing each other long?”

He gave a short laugh and looked at his watch. “About fifteen minutes now, as a matter of fact, though we've bumped into each other at the grocery store and Starbucks a dozen or so times.”

“Isn't that nice,” June said. “We'll visit more another time. I'm going to grab my dinner and head home. Have a nice time. Try to keep the drinks upright.”

“Definitely,” Logan said. He waited for her to pass their table before sliding back into their booth. “Your
elderly
mother, I presume?”

“She was a lot older last time I saw her,” Riley said.

“This is going to be more fun than I thought,” he said, his smile very wide. “You're going to need some training in dating...”

“You sure you're the one to do it?” she asked.

“Oh, yeah. I'm the guy.”

Chapter Eleven

After Riley's mother departed and Logan got her another glass of wine, the whole mood of the date lightened and they laughed together like old friends. Riley told him all about her family, how she came to Santa Rosa to live with her grandparents after her father's death, her brother the schoolteacher, her mother—not elderly at all but very hip and cool and someone who'd helped her so much with her daughter, she couldn't have survived without her.

“What about Maddie's dad?” he asked.

“Oh, he's around. He came by on Thanksgiving to see her. It was my mother and grandparents who got me through the pregnancy and early years and I really hated Jock for his negligence, but we were eighteen, for God's sake. He was useless, his support was erratic and insufficient, but he was just a kid. Immature. He grew up over time.” Then she laughed. “Not a lot, but he did grow up. He's good to Maddie. He loves her. He's very proud of her.”

“Does he still love you?” Logan asked.

“He never really did,” she said with a laugh. “I've been over him a long, long time.”

“What does he do?”

“He's a manager in a big electronics chain. You know the guy—short-sleeved dress shirt, bad tie, khaki pants, sort of athletic-looking and he watches over the nerds who help you find just the right phone or laptop or speakers. He's very personable. Kind of perpetually happy. A little bit like a puppy. Now that I'm over being pissed off at what a lousy boyfriend he turned out to be, we get along all right. What about you and your ex?”

“I think I told you—she's my sister's best friend. My sister's married...” He paused and grinned. “To a man—they're not that kind of best friends. And my ex is a nice person, a real nice person. I admit, it threw me, but that was years ago. I'm over it. She's happy, she has a good life, she's successful...”

“But you took some heat?”

“I'm a cop, what do you think? There are some good women in the department but it's still mainly a guy's shop and yes, they didn't let up for a long time. They still give it to me from time to time. But they also like my ex. Because she's...” He shrugged. “Likable. But it's mostly over now.”

“Mostly?”

“Well, there's that odd first date when you have to explain your wife left you because she's a lesbian...”

“I'm sorry, I was very rude. I shouldn't have found humor in it.”

“You laughed your ass off,” he pointed out.

“Well, just before that revelation, you'd been way too confident. So what does she do? Your ex?”

“Nurse practitioner. We dated a year, were married a year, been divorced eight years, still see each other all the time because she hangs out with Bernie, my sister.”

“It sounds kind of nice. Family-like.” She smiled at him. “Let's have coffee,” she suggested.

Before Logan knew what was going on, over two hours had passed and he'd had one of the best first dates he'd had in a long, long time. He found Riley to be funny, cute, sexy and smart. He was intrigued by how she built her business. He loved hearing about the way she grew up, the family's struggles, the family's close relationship.

She never once mentioned Emma Shay and he grew hopeful that there was no strong connection between them.

“Why am I telling you so much?” she said, well into her second cup of coffee.

He shrugged. “I'm a detective. I know how to ask the right questions. I know when to ask them. But hey, I play fair—this is a date, not an interrogation. I'll tell you anything.”

“Anything?”

“Pretty much. I can't talk about cases I'm working on but you'd find that boring anyway. Riley,” he said seriously, “this turned out really nice. I think your mother catching you having a date broke the ice.”

“I think you're right,” she said. “And I'm never going to hear the end of it.”

“Are you ever going to tell me why it was me?” he asked. “And why tonight was the night?”

She wore a mysterious smile. “Maybe next time,” she said. “Or the time after that.”

“That's what I wanted to hear.”

* * *

Logan wasn't allowed a kiss that first night, but she did make plans with him for the next day. She agreed to meet him Saturday afternoon for a movie and early, casual dinner. He took her to see a disaster film—a violent earthquake took out the entire west coast—and if it had been a test, it was a very successful one; she loved the movie and it had her nearly sitting on his lap through the whole thing. And then during a dinner of pizza and beer he was more than happy to tell her his life story.

Logan's parents had divorced because his father cheated on his mother when Logan was at a very vulnerable age of thirteen. Although his father never remarried and his parents seemed to have made their peace with each other, Logan wasn't over it. “I'm thirty-eight, my dad has always stuck around, made amends as best he could, I get along with him as well as possible but the truth is, I'm still pissed.”

“That's a powerful grudge,” she said. “Remind me not to make you angry.”

“Funny thing is, I don't think I'm that kind of person, not really. I didn't stay mad at my wife, did I? My sister's fine with him. But we just rub each other the wrong way. And the rest of the family gets chronically annoyed with both of us. Maybe we just don't like each other that much.”

“Did you like him once?” she asked.

“I worshipped him,” Logan said.

“And there's the problem,” Riley said.

If that had been a second test, she passed with flying colors. She was good to talk to—perceptive and sensitive. Intelligent and compassionate.

“Might be time to let that little boy in you grow up,” she said.

And she made him laugh. For Logan, a laugh was almost as good as a kiss.

Almost.

On Sunday they went to brunch in Bodega Bay then drove to a hilltop that overlooked the Pacific. Once there, Logan got his kiss and it was so excellent he helped himself to several more. He got the message Riley was just as pleased because in no time they were making out like teenagers. And it was good. She tasted good, felt good, responded to him in a lush and delicious way.

She stopped him. “Whew,” she sighed. “I'm not ready for more than that.”

He smiled and kissed her nose. “That's fine. You're probably the smart one here. But you have to admit—we have ourselves a very nice start.”

“Meaning...?”

“Three dates in three days, good food, good talk, excellent making out...”

“Yes... And now the workweek starts and...”

“And?” he asked.

“I have long hours, family obligations... I don't usually have this much time to play around.”

He hugged her close. “I'm not playing, Riley. And I understand about schedules, work, family. How about if I call you? How about we stay in touch? In close touch? Let's work out when we'll get together again.”

“I guess...”

“You sound a little cautious,” he said.

“It's been a long time,” she said. “But yes, let's talk.”

“When is too soon to call you?”

“Fifteen minutes after we say goodbye today,” she said.

He laughed. “You read me, all right. I'll call tonight.”

Then they kissed a little more.

* * *

Logan hadn't been looking. Well, he was always looking, but he hadn't been expecting to find anyone. This woman was a surprise—as pretty as any woman he might be physically attracted to, as smart as any he could be serious about, as sexy as anyone he could be completely into. It took him a little by surprise, but damn.

This one, he sincerely believed, had some outstanding staying power. A few things would have to be managed, however. Like the case he was working on. And the fact that Riley had only crossed his path because he'd been watching Emma Shay.

They talked late Sunday night, too late. That quiet, intense, getting-to-know-each-other, coming-on-to-each-other kind of talk. He had dreams. Fantastic dreams. He went to work early Monday morning tired with a love hangover.

“We got a break in the Compton surveillance,” his partner Georgianna Severs said. “Her relationship with the Kerrigans flared—she took a job from Riley Kerrigan and it appears her casual friendship with Adam Kerrigan has been upgraded. I reviewed a week's worth of her phone log and she calls the brother at least three times a day. She took a job with Riley and she's boinking the brother, Adam. We've got her on tape referring to both Adam and Riley Kerrigan multiple times. I guess we know why she's back here.”

Logan felt the shot to his gut. His suspect was involved with his new girl...

Logan slid down in his desk chair and said, “Fuck.”

“What?” Georgianna asked him. “We knew they knew each other.”

“Everyone knows everyone around here. She went to school with half the town but she hasn't been in touch with them. The word was they were estranged, hadn't talked in years. In four months we had one text to the brother's cell. One! They weren't in touch!”

“That we know of,” Georgianna said. “Our warrant is limited to her phone and her banking. We don't have her under surveillance.”

“We've been watching her,” he said.

“Hit and miss, not surveillance. We're not sitting on her.”

“I thought we'd be cutting this loose pretty soon...” He shook his head miserably.

They occupied a little cubicle, but it was early. Not too many people around. They wouldn't even have their morning briefing for another half hour.

“What did you do?” Georgianna asked.

“I'm hooked up with the friend. Riley Kerrigan.”

Georgianna was silent. It took her a long time to speak. “Why?”

“Why? Why?” he asked incredulously. Then all the wind out of his sails, he put his head in his hands. “The flesh is weak,” he muttered.

“Oh, my Jesus,” she said tiredly. “What were you thinking?”

“What do you know?” he asked. “You were born married. You were seven the last time you were tempted. She's beautiful, all right? She's funny in a ridiculously arrogant sort of way—she thinks she knows everything, like all women, as you should understand. Besides, this just wasn't that much of a case. I thought she might accidentally give me some useful information and probably never even know it and
poof
—the warrants would expire, it would be over and—”

“And we agreed it certainly would be a major case if we caught her transferring money from a hidden account. In which case it would be a career maker. And there was probable cause for the warrant.”

“Very thin probable cause that had nothing to do with Riley Kerrigan,” he argued.

He got up from his desk and went for coffee.

A little over six months ago, shortly before the suicide of Richard Compton, Emma Shay Compton's cell phone had gone missing. So she claimed. It was not recovered, but in the interim the FBI monitored calls and there had been two placed from that number to Aruba where the Comptons had owned a beachside estate—their winter place. Based on the suspicion that Emma might have offshore funds in the islands, money set aside from her husband's estate for her to access, a judge had granted a warrant for surveillance of phone and banking records for six months. The six months would be up in February and if there wasn't any new probable cause, it would not be renewed.

It was a soft case now with Compton dead, everything either liquidated and auctioned or held by US Marshals for auction. The apartment in Manhattan and the estate in Aruba had been sold. Emma Shay had been thoroughly investigated and if no new incriminating evidence turned up before the expiration of the warrant, it was likely the case would be closed. The FBI was being assisted by local detectives Danner and Severs, but after the expiration of the warrant the local police would be off the case and it would be up to the FBI to sniff around Emma to see if she suddenly started living large or if she bought airfare to another country where she might access her nest egg without the interference of the US Government.

Law enforcement could investigate her forever if they chose to, but they couldn't access her property, phone records, banking records or other personal property and space without a warrant.

Logan and Georgianna had been watching, listening, and there had been nothing to indicate the former Mrs. Compton had access to illegally received money. And they had other cases to work. They were actually property crimes cops but both had had some previous experience in intel and fraud and it served a purpose to have them working in a division that didn't normally deal with white-collar crime. No one would suspect them of investigating Emma Shay.

Logan went back and sat at his desk. Their desks were pushed together, back to back so the partners faced each other. There were two computers, two phones, a couple of bulletin boards, a couple of shelves where spiral notebooks and loose papers were constantly stacked. George had pictures of her kids, parents and her framed awards on her side of the cubicle. Logan had a picture of his last dog, a German shepherd named Suzanne after an ex-girlfriend he hadn't had a great experience with. The accoutrements in the room were heavy on George's side.

“It's not going anywhere and we know it,” he said.

“You have to tell Mike,” she said.

Mike was the captain in charge of the fraud unit.

“When there's something to tell him, I'll tell him,” Logan said.

“There's something to tell him now,” she insisted.

“Are you going to get in my business here?”

“He's going to ask you to either drop and hand off your investigation or make yourself available to detectives for questioning. He's going to ask you, ‘Do you want to work this case, which could be a career making case if you find something, or do you want to fall in love?' Because you can't have both. If you want to work it, then you're now undercover and everything you do with Riley Kerrigan is subject to examination, but you can't have both.”