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The scrubbing, sweeping, and buffing helped more than Callie expected. Alice and Mamie kept up a constant chatter as they unpacked boxes and helped sort through her things. They hung her pictures on the walls, put her clothes in her dresser, and argued over the best color to paint her office. Their insistence on sprinkling salt outside the entrances confused her, though, and the colliding scents of sage and incense made her nose tickle. Still, their presence pushed away the lingering sense of invasion and helped her stake ownership in the place. They stayed until the first floor of the house was polished and homey. They’d offered to help with the second floor, but she’d given them a reprieve. They’d done more than their fair share of work, but more importantly, she’d noticed “the look.”
She took a long drink of the Coke she’d pulled out of the fridge. She’d seen that look on so many people’s faces, she was beginning to expect it. Even Officer Raikins had worn it last night, and he’d had a gun on his hip. Carter was the only one who seemed unaffected.
The question was, unaffected by what?
She listened to the bubbles popping inside the can. She knew fear when she saw it. She’d experienced it up close and personal, but what reason could everyone in town have for being so twitchy? Had something like this happened before? Was that why Carter had given the dispatcher special notice?
Trees stood outside her windows, maybe a hundred feet away. To someone of the criminal element, the house would be a prime target. It was dark and secluded, with the woods offering good cover.
She shivered. She felt better with new locks on the doors; Ernie had replaced them himself. She was certain that was how someone had gotten in. Carter had convinced her of at least that.
She brushed her hand along the top of the sofa. Nothing had made her feel safer than he had.
Her insides warmed. She’d tried to be quiet when she’d snuck out of her bedroom last night. She just hadn’t been able to stay there, but finding him asleep had made her drop her clutch of pillows and blankets. He’d been too big for the sofa, and his arms and legs had fallen off in every direction. She’d had the most incredible urge to climb onto the couch on top of him, but she’d settled for the floor instead. She’d been out like a light within minutes. Just having him nearby had eased her nerves, made her feel secure and—
She jumped when someone knocked on her door.
“Ahh, darn it.” She set down her can of cola and licked the splotches off her hand.
She hurried to answer. Even though it was past noon, she took the precaution of looking through the curtains before opening the door.
“David. What are you doing here so early? Is it a short day at school?”
He lifted an eyebrow. “It’s Saturday. I’m late.”
Oh, wait. That was right. The Friday night game. She ran a hand through her hair. With all that had happened, she’d lost track of her days. “I guess I’m a little spacey. I didn’t get much sleep last night.”
“I heard.”
She winced. She supposed that couldn’t be helped. “I hope I didn’t wake up the entire neighborhood.”
He shrugged and gave the house one of those cautious looks of his. “We’re used to it.”
There it was again.
“Why is that?” she asked, pouncing. “Why are people so used to the police coming out here? Did something happen in this house that I should know about?”
His guarded eyes connected with hers, and for a split second, she thought he was going to say something. Then, suddenly, his gaze flew over her shoulder to the living room. She nearly reached for him when his face paled to the color of a new moon.
“And now the latest on the search for those escaped convicts,” came a voice behind her.
Callie whirled around like a top.
“As we’ve been reporting, John Smith was captured in the town of Colrain early this morning. Authorities are still on the lookout for Clive Morton.”
The television was on. She could hear the midday news report from where she was standing.
She took an instinctive step backward. “How did that turn on? Did you see someone?”
“No,” David said.
“Are you sure?”
“I’m sure.” He pulled back from her and left her standing in the doorway alone.
“Authorities are turning to the public for help in finding this last escaped convict. Morton is five foot, ten inches tall and weighs two hundred pounds. He has dark hair, a beard, and a mole on his left cheek. If you see anyone matching this description, authorities request that you contact them immediately.”
Callie shot David one last pleading look, but he was immovable. It made no sense. The thing shouldn’t just turn on all by itself. What had he seen?
“You stay right there,” she ordered him. “Right there.”
He nodded, and she summoned her nerve. She took two slow steps toward the living room, but then spotted her tennis racket against the wall. She swept it up and held it, poised to do damage as she peeked into the open room. It was empty, but the television was blaring. Morton’s mugshot was on the screen, and his blank, soulless eyes made her stomach curdle. No wonder Carter was on an all-out manhunt.
She tiptoed deeper into the room and peered into the kitchen. Bright sunshine lit it up. There weren’t any signs that anybody had been there.
She looked at the TV like it was a two-headed snake. It had never acted up like this before. Had someone bumped a switch as they’d rearranged the furniture? Jiggled a cord?
Or had it turned itself on, just like her lock?
She quickly punched the power button. It was time to call an electrician. Two light bulbs had already burned out, and others in the house tended to flicker. Maybe there was something wrong with the wiring. God knew there was something wrong with everything else.
She headed back to David. He hadn’t listened to her. Instead he’d moved even further away, onto the front lawn.
“Maybe I shouldn’t work here anymore,” he blurted when he saw her.
“What?” She nearly tripped over the doorstep. “Why?”
He gave the classic teenager because-I’m-bored shrug, only he didn’t pull it off. It came off more as a because-I’m-upset-about-something-but-I’m-not-going-to-tell-you shrug. Callie knew the difference in the nuances. She’d been a teenager once herself.
She rubbed her arms against the cold as she stepped out onto the porch. “You said you wanted to help... that you could use the money to fix up your car...”
“I know.”
“So? What’s changed?” She wanted to get some of the rotted wood on the porch replaced before the first snow, but that wasn’t the real issue right now. Something was off with him. Wrong. She clicked her tongue as she considered how to get him to talk to her. “People warned me that you couldn’t be trusted. Are you going to prove them right?”
“Who said that? Your cop?”
Her cop? “Whoa, now. He’s not mine.”
“He acts like he is.”
The thought wasn’t as unpleasant as it might have once been. “I have my own brain in my head, David, and I use it on occasion. Don’t you dare quit on me because you think I’m taking Chief Landry’s side on anything. Give me a little more credit than that.”
She had his full attention now.
“Are you sure you want me around?”
She frowned. “Why would you even ask me something like that?”
A muscle in his jaw worked. She’d thought he was upset, but now she could see that didn’t even come close. He was ready to pop. She took a hesitant step closer to him. Had she done something? If she had, she didn’t know what that could possibly be. In this town, she was his biggest supporter.
“I didn’t know if you’d want me to work for you after what happened last night,” he finally admitted.
The gears in her head turned, but she couldn’t figure out what he was talking about. Unless... Ohhhh. The truck in the driveway. Carter had spent the night. Suddenly, all David’s talk about the police chief made sense. Flustered, she fluffed her hair. “Don’t worry. There’s nothing going on between me and Chief Landry.”
At least, nothing he needed to be concerned about.
There was confusion in the teenager’s dark eyes. He stared at her until she started to get self-conscious. “You didn’t put him up to it,” he finally said.
“Who up to what?”
He let out an unflattering snort. “Landry.”
A twitchy feeling caught Callie between her shoulder blades. She knew the relationship between Carter and David wasn’t good, but just how bad was it? “What did he do?” she asked.
“Dirty Harry accused me of breaking into your house last night and trying to get into your bedroom.”
“He did what?”
“He was ready to string me up by my thumbs.”
“But why you?”
“How the hell would I know? Convenience? I’m always at the top of his suspect list.”
Outrage clogged Callie’s chest. “But you... You’d never do anything like that!”
David dragged his hand through his too-long hair. “Thanks,” he said roughly. “I wasn’t sure what you were thinking. He was pretty hot, and I thought maybe he’d gotten to you.”
Carter had gotten to her, but on a different level, and she was a fool for letting that happen. She couldn’t believe she’d been walking around all day, daydreaming about “sweet” Chief Landry. “What exactly did he say and what did he do?”
“I was at the park when he came at me on a rampage. Man, I’ve ticked him off before, but I’ve never seen him like that.” David stuffed his hands into his pockets. “I didn’t even know what had happened. When I heard, all I could think about was you. I told him the truth—that I had been with my friends all night—but he didn’t believe me. He wasn’t happy when he left.”
Callie’s hands opened and clenched into fists. “I told him it wasn’t you.”
David shrugged again, but he didn’t seem as unhappy as he had when he’d first knocked on her door. “So does this mean that I’m not fired?”
“It means that you’re getting a raise.” She ground her teeth together. Fuming, she spun around on her heel. “Start working on the porch. I’ve got something else I need to do.”
* * *
CARTER WAS TYPING UP a report when he heard the door to the station open and stick. The sound made him scowl, and he hit the enter key with a sharp tap. That damn thing. He was pushing himself out of his chair to go take a look at it when Bill went flying by his office window. He’d never seen the guy move so fast.
“I’m sorry,” came a feminine voice. “Did I do that?”
Carter swore and pulled his hand away from his holster. With the way his officer had responded, he’d thought they were being ambushed. He shook his head. It wasn’t an ambush; it was Callie.
“It’s all right, dear,” Nancy said. “We’ve been having problems with the door.”
“Ah gee, let me get that for you,” Bill said. Carter heard a swift kick, a groan when his officer stubbed his toe, and the sharp creak of the door closing.
“Thank you, Bill.”
“You’re welcome, Ms. Thompson,” Bill replied, his voice strained.
“Call me Callie. Is the police chief in?”
“He’s in his office,” Nancy said. “Let me tell him you’re here.”
“I’ll just surprise him, if you don’t mind.”
She was surprising him, all right. He hadn’t expected her to show up at the station. Uneasiness unfurled in Carter’s stomach. Had something happened at the house after he left? Alice and Mamie hadn’t gone back to that cleansing nonsense again, had they?
He realized he was tapping his fingers against the desktop and made himself stop. So she was setting foot in his territory. They might be a small operation compared to Boston, but he was proud of the place. He made sure that his people were well trained and had the best tools their budget could buy.
At last, she appeared in his doorway. “Hello, Carter.”
He stood there, poleaxed. No wonder Bill had lunged to get the door for her. She always looked good, but this was something else entirely. She was dressed to kill, and his gaze was drawn to her legs like a moth to the flame. The short leather skirt and matching boots were enough to make him want to cry.
He shook his head to clear the cobwebs. His staff was already looking at him funny as it was. “Everything okay at the house?”
“It’s spick-and-span.” She leaned against the doorframe. “May I come in?”
Looking like that, she could do just about anything she wanted. He pulled out the chair in front of his desk. “What are you doing here?”
Her heels clicked against the floor with an even staccato. He knew he was staring, but he couldn’t look away. Her walk had a predatory strut to it that made him hard. He lifted his head slowly. He didn’t know the reason, but she was on the hunt.
And Lord help him, he was her prey.
“I thought we could chat.” She glanced over her shoulder and waved at the redheaded cop planted behind her. “Thanks, Bill. I’ve got it from here.”
“Ooof.” The officer promptly bumped into the corner of a desk.
Carter walked over and closed the door. When he turned, he found Callie shrugging out of her jacket. Her pink sweater was soft and clingy. It didn’t show skin, but it showed shape. He felt a light sweat break out on his brow. Damn, what was she up to? “What do you want to talk about?” he asked.
“David Hughes.”
The tension in his shoulder pulled tight. He’d been wrong; this was an ambush. No wonder she’d come dressed for battle.
She lowered herself into the chair he’d offered her and crossed her legs. “You accused him of breaking into my house.”
Carter looked her straight in the eye and saw the fire she barely kept banked. “I questioned him. He had opportunity and motive.”
“What motive?”
Did he really need to spell it out for her?
At last, Carter found that he could move. He rounded his desk and opened the lower drawer. He grabbed the biggest file in there and unceremoniously dropped it on his desk. “There it is, the David Hughes file. You’re new in town, so you might not have known, but he’s our most notorious juvenile delinquent. If I’d known you were thinking about hiring him to work on your house, I would have warned you earlier.”
Her hands closed around the arms of the chair, but she kept that temper of hers on tap. “I don’t care about your little file. I only care about what I know, and that’s that David would never do anything to hurt or scare me.”
“Don’t be so gullible, Callie. It doesn’t suit you.”
Color dotted her cheekbones, and for the first time, Carter realized he’d made a tactical error. She ranted when she was irritated. This went deeper.
“You told me that it appeared as if the intruder had a key. I told you I didn’t give him one.”
“That doesn’t mean he doesn’t have one.” Carter began feeling a little hot under the collar himself. He jabbed his finger at the file. “The kid is a known shoplifter, and he broke into Alice’s shed right before you moved to town. It’s not that big of a leap.”
“But why would he do it? I’d let him in if he asked.” She tapped her fingernail on the file in question. “This is not a motive.”
“The kid has a crush on you,” Carter growled. “There isn’t any bigger reason for a man to go lurking around a woman’s bedroom than that.”
“What?” She blinked, and he knew he’d caught her off guard. “He does not.”
“Huge crush.” She’d wanted to hear it. He’d give it to her straight.
She shook her head. “He’s just a kid.”
Carter ran his hand through his hair. She sat there dressed like a manhunter, but he couldn’t believe the naivety that was coming out of her mouth. “I could see it in his eyes last night. He’s sixteen, and you’re the sexy blonde next door who pays attention to him. It’s not rocket science, honey.”
Her mouth dropped open before snapping shut.
Carter picked up a pencil and nearly broke it in half. The hell of it was that he knew how the kid felt. “You need to be careful of him.”
“I need to be careful with him. He’s incredibly sensitive, and I don’t think many people listen to him. His mother certainly doesn’t.”
“His mother might not, but I’ve listened to him plenty. I’ve listened to his excuses why he spray-painted the school, why he cherry-bombed the toilets, why he played mailbox baseball with the city council’s—”
She held up her hands. “Enough. I’m not saying that he doesn’t have a wild streak. I’ll give you that. I just... Well, I’ve seen another side to him. I think there’s more to him than most of us know.”
Carter felt the knot in his back tighten so hard, it was amazing his shoulder didn’t separate. “I know all I want, and I don’t like him sniffing around you.”
“For God’s sake, Carter, he’s not ‘sniffing around me.’ I’ve been blond all my life. Do you think I really would have made it this far without knowing how to pick up the signs? I know when a guy is interested.”
Their gazes met—and held.
“Fine.” She leaned back in the chair, but the swinging of her leg gave away her inner turmoil. “Keep him on your stupid suspect list. Just do one thing for me.”
A muscle in Carter’s jaw ticked. “What’s that?”
“Dust my house.” She uncrossed her legs, and her heel came down on the floor with a crack. “Dust every last inch of it. You won’t find any of David’s fingerprints. I guarantee you that.”
“If he’s been in that house, we will.”
Her eyes flared. “Exactly. David has never been in my house. He won’t even set foot inside the door.”
Carter paused. Ah, hell. He hadn’t thought of that.
“And you know why!” She leaned forward and pointed at him. “You know why everyone is so damned afraid of my house.”
“Nobody is afraid of your house.”
“Liar. You tell me, Carter Landry, or I swear I’ll... I’ll... I’ll park in every restricted zone in town.”
He dropped the pencil on his desk and rubbed the bridge of his nose. “I’ll have your car towed.”
“I’m not leaving this office until you tell me.”
“Damn it, Callie.” He reached for his shoulder.
“Would you do something about that already?”
She jumped out of her chair and was around the desk before he realized what she was up to. He swiveled around to face her, but she caught the arm of his chair and twirled him back the other way. He started to stand, but nearly collapsed when her hands settled onto his shoulder and began kneading it.
“How am I supposed to fight with you when I’m feeling sorry for you?” she grumbled.
Her thumbs found the center of the knot and pressed deep. Carter nearly whimpered with relief, but he didn’t like how she’d turned the tables on him. Instinct made him look up. He found two very shocked staffers looking at him through the windows of his office. He started to push her hands away, but she bopped him lightly on the head.
“Sit still.”
He couldn’t help but watch the back of her long legs as she went around the room closing the blinds. He swore. He was going to have a lot of explaining to do, but at the moment, he didn’t have the will to stop her. Every time she lifted her arm to twirl the controls, her skirt hitched up a little higher.
When she finally blocked the room from prying eyes, she turned around to face him. “You’re going to tell me about my house.”
He paused. With that look and tone of voice, she could teach his staff a thing or two about interrogation. “There’s nothing wrong with that house.”
“Was somebody murdered there? Was it a meth house?”
“No.”
She lifted an eyebrow. When she circled behind him, he prayed he was in for more delirious torture. His head dropped forward when she again began massaging his shoulder.
“If there’s nothing wrong with the house, why do I practically have to kick people in the butt to make them go inside?” she asked.
“You didn’t have to kick my butt.”
“I will.”
“It’s been abandoned for a long time.”
“What does that have to do with anything?”
“You know how big, abandoned buildings are. There are stories,” he finally admitted. He couldn’t help his weakness. He was feeling jolts of electricity all the way down to his fingers. He hadn’t realized how much circulation the tightness had cut off.
“What stories?”
She began working on his neck, and he was putty in her hands. Her thumb applied pressure to a particularly sensitive spot, and his eyes drifted shut. For the first time in what felt like weeks, he relaxed. “God, you’re good.”
* * *
CALLIE FELT THE CHANGE in Carter’s body under her hands, and her fingers tingled at the power submitting to her commands. Nerves suddenly hit her. He kept in shape. Like, mouth-watering shape. With those arms and that chest, he could probably bend her into a pretzel if he wanted. She needed to remember that when she was antagonizing him.
“What kind of stories?” she asked, trying to keep control of the situation.
“Town legend, gossip, that kind of thing.”
He rolled his shoulder, and a knot as big as a quarter popped under her fingertips. “You idiot,” she said softly. “You shouldn’t have let this get so bad.”
She couldn’t imagine how long he’d let the tension build for his muscles to become so rigid. She was still upset with him, but her touch automatically gentled. He needed about an hour on a massage table. She exhaled slowly. Now, wasn’t that just the picture?
“It couldn’t be helped. We’re swamped around here.” He settled his elbows onto the desk and began rubbing his temples. “There’s the search for Morton, the break-in at your place, and the Halloween pranks have started already. They’re about a week early this year for some reason.”
“All I’ve ever seen you do is work. Why do you have to handle everything?”
“Because there’s nobody else who can.”
She rolled her eyes. “My, aren’t we a little full of ourselves?”
He shook his head, and she had a crazy urge to slide her fingers into his thick, dark hair.
“I’m not full of anything. I’m shorthanded. I’ve got one officer on maternity leave and another out with a broken arm. It’s a small department. What would you have me do, Quick Kate?”
Her hands stilled on his back. He was asking her for advice? Her anger with him came down at least three notches. “See this contraption?” She nudged the trash can on the floor with her foot. “You put things in it, and they disappear.”
“Callie.”
“It was a joke,” she said with a sigh. He still had a long way to go in the humor department. “I’m usually wittier than this, but you delegate. This cop with the broken arm, can he still use a computer?”
“I can’t order him to come back. He’s on medical leave.”
“You don’t have to order; you can ask. Maybe he’s banging his head against the wall with boredom. See if he can come back for a couple of hours a day. He might be more willing than you think.”
Carter grunted, and she knew that she’d made a point.
“That doesn’t help with the legwork,” he said.
Still stubborn. “There’s this newfangled tool we have called a phone. If he can’t run a computer, he can certainly run that. Teenagers can run them with only their thumbs.”
His shoulders were wide and muscled, but even they couldn’t support the whole world. She put her elbow against the huge knot in the center of his shoulder blade and applied pressure. No wonder his body was buckling under the load. “You can’t tell me that everyone in your department is as busy as you are.”
“They’re carrying their weight.”
“And you’re carrying about three elephants.”
He glanced over his shoulder at her, and she was secretly pleased to see that his neck had limbered up even with the small amount of work she’d done.
“You’re bossy when it comes to this advice stuff.”
“I’m a professional.” A fuzzy feeling settled in her chest when he faced forward and sat there compliant, ready for more. She couldn’t avoid the temptation any longer. She slid her fingers into his soft hair and began rubbing the base of his skull. He groaned, and she nearly joined him.
The fuzzy feeling drifted lower and became an ache. What had started as an act of compassion was quickly turning into something more dangerous. “Let’s try something else,” she said unevenly. “What case is your top priority?”
“Have you been living underneath a rock? What do you think?” He pointed toward a map on the wall. “That’s the priority of every lawman in the state.”
She squinted across the room. “What is it?”
He mumbled something and rubbed his eyes. “You really do have tunnel vision. It’s a map pinpointing the sightings of Concord’s escapees.”
Callie did a double take. She’d forgotten about his conference call this morning. She’d meant to find a distraction, but that particular case was bigger than that. She looked closer at the map and the pins. “What do the colors mean?”
“Red is Smith—or I should say ‘was.’ Colrain PD got him this morning.” He settled his elbows on the desk and looked at the map with her. She’d bet he saw it in his sleep. “Fleiss was blue, and Morton is green.”
“I saw Morton’s picture on TV earlier today. He scared me.”
“He should.”
The flat, unemotional tone flustered her. She remembered Alice’s story about how Carter had tackled Fleiss in order to arrest him, and didn’t like the feeling she got in the pit of her stomach. By his own words, Morton was the most dangerous of the three. What risks would he take to capture the man atop the most-wanted list? “How long do you think it will be before you find him?”
His shoulder muscles bunched up, and she realized she’d asked the wrong question.
“We’re doing our best, but he’s a slippery son of a bitch. He needs money, food, shelter, and transportation. We think he was behind the theft of a Dodge pickup not far from Concord, but we found it broken down in the Berkshire foothills. We haven’t figured out how he’s fulfilling any of his other basic needs. We’re dead in the water until he makes a mistake.”
“All right, big boy. Ease up.” She looked at the map again and quickly saw the problem. Whereas blue and red pins were dotted across the state, there were hardly any green pins at all. Morton had been lying low. “You’ll get him.”
Carter went very still. “I’m going to need a bigger calendar. That’s twice in one day.”
“Funny.” She smoothed her hands over his shoulders. “Okay, so I’ll give you that one. The Morton case is yours. What’s that you’ve got on your computer screen?”
“Nancy had a load of laundry stolen off her clothesline earlier this week.”
“That doesn’t sound too major. Give it to Bill.”
“Nancy is my assistant. I can’t give the case to someone else.”
“Why? Bill looked perfectly competent to me last night.”
Carter pinched the bridge of his nose, and she smiled. She liked poking at that unbending conscience of his.
“Raikins is my best worker.”
“Then let him take lead on the case. Nancy won’t be offended. Bill will ask you if he needs help.”
Callie waited for the next excuse, but Carter said nothing. She took her chances and pointed at David’s file. “Why don’t you give that to someone else, too?” She stepped back quickly when he put his hands on the desk and pushed himself to his feet.
“No.”
“It’s obviously stressing you out.”
“I said no.”
He turned and, all of a sudden, she felt like she’d let a tiger out of its chains. He rolled his shoulder and tilted his neck to the side. Lord help her if he’d been operating at anything less than a hundred percent.
“I haven’t ruled out David Hughes as a suspect in your break-in, and that’s one case I’m not delegating to anyone. It’s mine.”
Oh, was it? Callie lifted her chin. “Maybe it shouldn’t be.”
He took a step toward her.
“Just when did I become the bad guy?” he asked, his voice dropping low. “Last night, you seemed pretty happy to have me around.”
And she had been. She’d been glad he was there, but she’d also been in a state of shock. “Last night, I didn’t know that you’d accused my friend after I’d specifically told you that he didn’t have anything to do with it.”
Carter’s eyebrows rose. “So you came here looking for a fight?”
“I came looking for justice.”
He moved closer and braced his hand against the wall beside her head. “Dressed like that?”
His gaze swept down her body, and heat trailed behind it. Callie willed herself not to tug at her skirt, which suddenly seemed too short. She’d dressed for power when she’d decided to come down here to confront him. He had his sunglasses; she had her leather skirt. Only one problem: its power was backfiring on her. She felt strong, but she also felt sexy. And hot and bothered...
“I can dress any way I want.”
“But why all the touching? What was that about? It didn’t feel like you wanted justice when you were running your fingers through my hair.”
She swallowed hard. His jaw was rigid, his lips were tight, and his eyes... Oh God, his blue eyes burned. When their gazes finally connected, the air practically ignited.
“Maybe I didn’t.”
She didn’t know why she said it. Maybe it was a challenge. Maybe it was a tease. Either way, he picked up the gauntlet.
He came right at her, and her breath caught when his arm snaked around her waist. His head dipped down and, before she could form a complete thought, his mouth was on hers. Hot and hard. Her heart began thudding in her eardrums, and the ache that had started in her belly when she’d first touched him clenched tighter. Oh, God. He slowly crowded her back against the wall, and something close to a moan erupted from her throat.
“Carter.” Her fingers dug into his shoulders, and her knee brushed intimately against the outside of his.
His dark gaze smoldered as he judged her reaction. Then his mouth settled over hers again, and he took his time. The kiss wasn’t a tentative, first-time brush of the lips; it was the type of kiss that had been stored up for weeks and allowed to age. Callie shuddered and slid her hands up from his shoulders into his hair.
He let out a sound that was half desperate/half demanding and tilted his head to the other side. His tongue slipped into her mouth as his hands found their way under her sweater. The skin-to-skin contact made heat rush through her, bold and sweet. Instinctively, she lifted her leg higher, wrapping it around his thigh. Her other leg nearly buckled when he situated himself more intimately against the niche at the top of her legs and pressed firmly.
“Do you have any idea how crazy you make me?” he whispered into her ear.
She clutched at him. “As wild as you make me?”
It was the wrong word to use, and way too accurate.
His eyes sparked. “That’s good to know.”
His hands began sliding upward, and her skin prickled in anticipation.
An unexpected knock at the door jolted her back to reality. “Chief?”
He swore hard. His secretary. Callie pulled back, but bumped her head against the wall.
His fingers tightened around her ribcage as he tried to catch his breath. “Yes, Nancy?” he finally called.
Callie quickly sidestepped away from him. He reached for her, but she batted his hands away. Her movements were clumsy as she tried to smooth her clothes back into place.
“I hate to interrupt your...uh, meeting,” Nancy said through the door, “but the dispatcher just received a 911 call. I thought you’d like to know.”
Callie could feel Carter staring at her hard, and she put more distance between them. She rubbed the back of her head, not so much for the pain, but to get her brain working. What had just happened? That was not what she’d had planned.
He wiped her lipstick off his mouth with the back of his hand. “Come on in.”
She spun around and feigned interest in the map on the wall. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw him sit behind his desk.
“What happened?” he asked when Nancy hesitantly opened the door and poked her head inside.
“The Lutheran church is reporting a robbery.” The older woman folded her hands primly in front of her. “Sally MacDonnell, the church secretary, had some money locked in her desk and now it’s gone. It looks like someone pried open the drawer.”
“She kept church money in her desk drawer?”
Callie could feel the curious glances being thrown in her direction. She ignored them and stared at the map as if it were the most fascinating thing in the world. Fortunately, Nancy was discreet enough not to say anything.
“They had that pancake breakfast this morning. Sally didn’t finish cleaning up until after the bank was closed. She thought the money would be safe in her desk until Monday, but it was gone when she went back to get her coat.”
“Did she see anyone?”
“I thought you’d like to talk to her yourself, chief. That’s what you usually do.”
Callie felt another look hit her in the middle of the back. Enough. She wasn’t going to stick around to generate any more gossip. She’d already given the town plenty. She steeled her spine and turned around. She hoped she didn’t look as thoroughly kissed as she felt. Her belly was still doing flip-flops, and her lungs felt like bellows. “I’ll be going. You’re busy, and we were through here anyhow.”
Nancy stepped aside, but Carter’s blue eyes flared. “The hell we were. Hold on. I’ll get Bill to handle this.”
This was not the time for him to take her advice.
“No, no. You’re needed at the church.” She grabbed her things and moved quickly to the door.
He started to stand, but stopped. Callie knew why. She’d felt the evidence he didn’t want Nancy to see pressing between her thighs. She used the opportunity to make her escape.
She needed time to process this. She needed to figure out why he threw her thoughts into havoc.
And she needed legs that weren’t the consistency of Jell-O.
She was halfway out the door when she stopped. She’d come here for a reason. She took a deep breath and schooled her face. Slowly, she turned. “And remember what I told you about David. Back off... Please.”