He could see her throat work as she swallowed. “Neither would I. Do I. I mean, I won’t. Either.”
He couldn’t help it. He grinned. “Now who’s flustered?” Perversely, that calmed him immensely.
“It’s been a while for me, too. Relationships, I mean. But this isn’t . . . I mean, it’s not really . . . that. Right? We’re just . . .”
“Winging it,” they said together, then laughed.
“I don’t know what it is or isn’t, and I don’t need to label anything. I just wanted to make sure you knew where I stood.”
“So, we’re good then.”
With one tug he pulled her fully up against him and slid his hand up and into those curls, cupping the back of her head, finally doing what he’d ached to do since he’d pulled her into his office. Hell, since walking away from her in his own bedroom. “Oh, I thought we were a lot better than good.”
“Me, too,” she said against his lips.
He’d meant to kiss her and let her go. He just wanted to taste her, even though his body wanted a whole lot more than a taste. But it turned out one kiss wasn’t enough, so he dipped in for another, then another still. And in some part of the back of his brain, he knew the very last thing he should be doing—even with blinds drawn—was to be essentially making out with . . . well . . . anyone . . . in his office.
As police chief, he did his best to conduct himself in as professional and responsible a manner as possible. Because everyone knew him so well, it was the only way to establish the respect the job demanded. He was accessible, approachable, friendly, and wanted every and anyone to feel they could come to him if they had a problem that required his help. But there had to be a line between being the friendly police chief and being a buddy.
Alex lifted her head and he liked—a lot—the way those dark blue eyes of hers got all stormy and darker when she was aroused. “I—uh, I should probably let you get back to work.” She swallowed again and he watched her throat work . . . and wanted to bite it. Then lick it. Then bite it again.
Yeah. He’d better get his head back in work as well.
“Don’t—ah.” Wow, his brain felt like scrambled eggs. “Don’t go into the cottage or the tower until I can go with you. Okay?”
“Okay. Are you sure? Because you don’t have to.”
“Certain. I don’t have a problem going in either. I just haven’t had any need to. Until now. Now I want to.”
She held his gaze, and the depth of what moved between them was equal measures provocative and disconcerting.
“Okay. Thank you.” She looked at him, and he thought she was going to ask him something, but she seemed to think better of it. She started to step back, but he stood and kept her in his arms.
He kissed her again, then smiled against her lips. “Remind me to kiss you like that every time I need to ask you to give in on something.”
She punched him lightly on the chest, making him laugh. “I might be stubborn, but I’m not stupid. I wouldn’t have gone in the cottage or the tower without some help.” She smiled at him. “I know. It’s shocking that I actually can be professional.”
“Yes,” he said, then laughed at her affronted expression and dropped a hard fast kiss on her mouth to close it again. “And no. That’s what gets me. I never know what to expect.”
“I thought that frustrated you.”
“That, too.”
She held his gaze, studied it, then him.
“What?” he asked.
“Well, as long as we’re being cheerleaders for honesty . . . you seem to truly get me. That’s a little scary. Maybe a lot. But comforting, too. I didn’t expect that.”
“Me, either.”
That confession surprised her.
Surprised him, too. Something about her made it easy—too easy—to say whatever popped into his mind. Probably because he knew she wouldn’t ask for explanations, but would simply accept what he said. She wouldn’t wheedle or make demands. Or assumptions. If she wanted to know something, she’d ask. Maybe she didn’t want to know anything. But he wanted her to. That was the scary thing for him. He did get her. Part of her anyway. It made him want to know more. For the first time, maybe ever, he wondered how he’d feel if she didn’t want the same from him.
His intercom buzzed again, startling them both. “Sorry to interrupt, Chief, but we’ve got a hostage situation.”
Alex’s eyes went wide and she stiffened. “Hostages? Oh, wow!”
Logan merely reached across his desk and pressed the button. “Does this hostage situation involve a very large water gun and a senior citizen with remarkably good aim?”
“It does, sir.”
He sighed and swore under his breath. “Who’s the hostage?”
There was a pause. Then Barb said, “The mayor. And pretty much the entire town council. Sir.”
He let his chin rest on his chest for a moment, then said, “Okay. Give me a minute.”
“Will do, sir.”
Alex started to scramble out of his way. “Hurry. That’s horrible. Do you have, like, a SWAT team or something?”
“Never had a need for one. And we won’t now. Water gun,” he reiterated. “Not one with bullets.”
“Still, if he’s crazy enough to storm city hall—I was just there!”
“Not he.”
He didn’t think Alex’s eyes could get any wider. “A woman? An elderly woman took a gun into city hall?”
“Water gun.” He did wonder how she’d gotten it past old Avery. The security guard wasn’t exactly spry, but he’d have to be blind to have missed it. The damn thing she’d aimed at him today was the size of a small bazooka.
“My guess is she just wants them to pass some ordinance that says she can keep her damn raccoon. We’ll get it all settled. Hopefully without any shots fired. I’m running out of clean uniforms.”
Alex opened her mouth, closed it again, then burst out laughing, anyway. “That’s why you came home this morning? Because an elderly woman shot you with a water gun?”
“A very big water gun. And she was in sniper position. I didn’t see her.”
Alex just grinned. “Sniper, huh?”
His face grew a tiny bit warm. “You laugh, but if you see a woman walking a small raccoon, steer clear. That’s all I’m saying.”
Alex was still laughing as she moved toward the office door.
“Hey, wait a sec,” he said. “What did you come in here for? Wasn’t it about the plans? When I looked out and saw you, you seemed . . . I don’t know . . . worried about something.”
Her laughter faded, but a hint of the smile remained. “See? That’s what I mean. That’s going to take some getting used to.”
“What is?”
“You reading me.”
“I’m a trained professional, too, you know.”
She grinned. “Good to know we’re behaving so responsibly, too. It wasn’t anything—well, it might have been. But I can talk to you about it later. I was going to stop by the grocery and pick up stuff to make my dad’s chili. Some cornbread. There will be plenty. Heats up easy, so it’s good leftovers whenever you get in.”
She didn’t ask when that would be, so he didn’t offer. It didn’t change the fact that he wished she had. But they were winging it. So he winged. “Okay. That sounds good. Thanks.”
She nodded, then ducked out.
And just like the house had felt empty that first morning when she’d taken off . . . his office seemed to echo a little bit, as well. He sank back down on the corner of his desk.
Winging it.
A new concept for him. Especially when the woman he was winging it with also happened to be living with him.
Not sure what he was feeling, but knowing
flustered
didn’t even begin to cover it, he grabbed his hat and his still damp jacket from the hooks behind the door and jerked it open. At least he knew what to do about the hostage situation.
“Good meeting? Sir?” Barb beamed a particularly knowing smile at him.
“Don’t start,” he said, which only added a twinkle to go along with the smile. “Did you call Dan? You might want to get Thomas out there, too.”
“Do you really think it’s going to take three of you?”
“No. But I want to impress upon Mrs. Darby that this isn’t the sort of thing we take kindly to. Just because she’s getting up there in years—”
“Hey now.”
“—doesn’t mean we’re going to treat her with kid gloves. You wouldn’t expect to be, right? Well, she’s proven she’s not exactly a wilting, fragile flower, either. Senile, maybe,” he muttered under his breath as he headed for the station door.
“I heard that,” Barb called out behind him. “Oh, and Chief?”
“What?” He turned back, knowing half his annoyance was really just a cover for the pulse-thumping panic rising inside him as he was forced to acknowledge that the woman who had so effortlessly turned his head was also quite probably going to turn his entire life upside down. Actually, it felt like she already had. Barb had probably called half the town already.
“You might want to check your uniform shirt before you storm the fort. Missed a button.”
Yeah. His nice, quiet, predictable life was doomed. “Be open to change, my ass,” he muttered as left the office and climbed into his truck.
Chapter 9
A
lex flipped the bacon over with a fork, making a mental note to get a pair of tongs next time she went into town. Maybe Logan had some on his grill. Was he the kind of guy who grilled? Toast popped up and she beamed at the perfectly golden brown color as she moved it to a plate. She dropped two more slices in, then, turning back, she dumped chopped mushrooms, onions, and peppers into the scrambled eggs she was making in the other skillet. Next up, grating some cheddar into a small bowl to sprinkle on top. It was day one of her new eating-actual-food-for-meals campaign. No more burnt toast and coffee for breakfast. Or lunch.
She’d slept well again. That made three nights in a row now. She was getting regular sleep, and now there would be regular meals. Life was getting better. Except for the part where she had no idea whether or not regular sex was also going to be part of it.
Logan hadn’t come home the night before, but they were winging it. No rules, no expectations. Other than there would be no sex with other people while they were having sex. Crazy, head-spinning, spine-melting, toe-curling, the-kind-you-read-about-but-never-thought-was-real sex. The exact same kind of sex she had kind of sort of been hoping to have again . . . last night.
She understood he was police chief, and handling a hostage crisis. And doing whatever else a police chief did. She was doing a job, too. She’d stayed up half the night documenting the interior of the main house, from warped floorboards to water-damaged crown molding. She’d made lists of the obvious structural issues and had even pulled up a corner of the kitchen linoleum. And wished she hadn’t, as it had added a whole new column to her list. She’d gone over the architectural plans she had for the house so far, and working from the oldest to the most current, she’d started to build a history of the place, noting what had been done and when. Sadly, when it came to upkeep and maintenance, it was more a question of how much hadn’t been done, ever, and not just during Logan’s time at the helm.
None of what she’d discovered in the house had been a good omen for what was likely going on inside the more neglected keeper’s cottage. She wasn’t sure why she already felt such an attachment to it. Maybe it was because the cottage was easier to tackle than dealing with all the emotional landmines the tower was sure to bring with it. In the end, she wanted to see both reclaim their former glory, and the more she learned about their history, the more personal it felt.
On most jobs it was the thrill and the challenge of the work itself that engaged her. She’d always had a healthy respect and a great deal of admiration for the towers she’d worked on, their architecture, their history, the steps it took to honor both and how gratifying it was to be a part of the restoration process. But this time it felt different. Probably because Pelican Point represented her return to the world she loved, the only one she’d ever known. It shouldn’t be surprising that she felt a more personal connection because it was a more emotional project on so many levels. Nothing that had come before could ever match that.
Some part of her knew it also had to do with Logan, his story, and his past. The more she learned about him, the more personal he was beginning to feel to her, too.
She’d stopped working long enough to make the promised chili and cornbread, then, when it appeared Logan wasn’t going to show, she’d ended up working while she ate, eventually storing the leftovers and cleaning up, which had only served to uncover more issues that would need repairing.
The freezer part of the ancient fridge didn’t work properly, not that it had been an issue for the sole bachelor living there. The man’s idea of stocking fridge and pantry began and ended with a bottle of wine, two loaves of sliced bread—each half gone—blueberry jam, a jar of super crunchy peanut butter, a few boxes of pasta, and canned cheese. She didn’t even want to think about how those all came together on any kind of regular basis. Clearly, he was eating out or ordering in because he was in great shape, and no genes were good enough to make up for such a dismal diet.
“You’re one to talk about dismal diets,” she murmured as she worked the eggs and other ingredients with her spatula. At least that was one thing she could change. Sleeping soundly still felt more like a lucky gift, but one she hoped would keep on giving as she got the other parts of her life more stable. She wasn’t sure what those “other parts” were going to entail, not entirely anyway. She’d told herself that maybe her uncertainty about her relationship with Logan would provide the exact distraction she’d hoped for, after all. By comparison, it made the work feel comfortable and familiar, the one known entity in her current universe.
She’d come close to texting him several times during the evening. Partly because she’d wanted to know when or if he’d be home, but also because she’d wanted to know what was going on with the situation at city hall.
She hadn’t been in town long, and yet she’d already come to know a number of people. She’d seen and chatted with Fergus, Delia, Brodie, and Owen at the hardware store on a few occasions. They’d all made her feel welcome, chatting her up as if they’d known her for ages—which meant she knew a lot about other folks she hadn’t even met yet.
How she was in the Cove was different from how she normally was on jobs. Normally, she had her father and crew members to keep her company. They had been her world, so she hadn’t connected with the locals, not in any lasting sense. Given how often she’d moved around, it had made sense to stick with those who’d moved with her. That had always been enough. More than enough. But now that it was just her, she found herself engaging in conversation instead of simply listening to it going on around her.
She’d been surprised to discover she’d worried about Logan as the evening had stretched into night. It was morning, and still no word on what had happened, if he was okay, or when he’d be back. Not that she really thought he’d been in any danger. He certainly hadn’t seemed all that concerned about the situation. More annoyed. Still, she’d like to know how things had gone. Or, more to the point, she’d like it if he wanted to share how things had gone with her.
Winging it
apparently wasn’t going to include that kind of thing. She got that, too. She was sure it was life upheaval enough for him that she was living under his roof. And working there. Yes, they’d had sex. And yes, they’d made it clear they wouldn’t be having sex with anyone else as long as they continued to have sex with each other. But that didn’t mean they were a couple—one that texted and kept in touch and told each other where they would be and when they’d be home and how their day had gone. That wasn’t them. They weren’t even really a
them
. Or an
us
.
So she hadn’t texted. Or called. If he’d wanted to keep her informed of his whereabouts, he had the means to contact her. He was a grown single man doing whatever it was he always did. And she was a grown single woman who could certainly sleep in her own bed, and fix her own dinner, and her own breakfast.
So what if she was also a grown woman who’d risen with the sun because as soon as she’d opened her eyes that morning, she’d wondered if he was upstairs sleeping alone. Alone and probably naked in that amazing, sexy sex bed made for sex. With his Sex-god Voice that grew deeper when he was aroused, and that body of the gods that could perform amazingly devilish things to numerous parts of her anatomy. And all of that tangled up in those soft cotton sheets, sprawled across that sea of mattress. A mattress she knew felt as wonderful as she’d imagined, lying on it on her back with him on top of her, driving every hard, pulse-pounding inch of himself into her very willing body. Making her scream, making her come, making her—
She had leaped right out of bed and found something else, dear God, to distract her from those indelibly imprinted, highly detailed images.
To that end, she’d taken apart the ancient toaster and replaced one heating coil and rewired it with a new electric cord. Then she’d fixed the wonky burner on the stove, and, feeling cocky, had even gone another round with the bathroom plumbing. This time with the leaky faucet on the sink. She’d won, thankyouverymuch. She was feeling pretty accomplished. Her industriousness had taken her mind off the rest of it for whole seconds at a time, win-win. She didn’t even really care if Logan had already gone to work without even leaving a note. Or some of his amazing coffee in the coffeepot.
They were winging it. That’s what winging it people did.
Presently, she was whisking the scrambled eggs in the skillet so hard, she was leaving marks. She gently laid the spatula down and grabbed the next round of toast as it popped up, then took the nicely crisped bacon strips off the old cast iron griddle one at a time, letting them drain on the stack of paper towels she’d set up. So what if she’d made enough for two people? Especially if one of them was really big and ate like a grown man? She could always reheat the eggs and the bacon for breakfast tomorrow. Or make a sandwich later. “That’s what winging it is all about, baby!” she exclaimed, tossing the last piece of bacon on the stack with a little flourish.
Her gaze tripped over the empty coffeemaker. She had ice cold orange juice, just the way she liked it, already poured and waiting for her, so there was no need to glare at the empty pot. At some point later on, she’d get him to show her how to make his kind of coffee. She’d looked, but hadn’t found his bean stash or grinder. If she was really missing her morning coffee that much, she could get some later in town. Maybe Fergus had a pot on. He probably knew what had happened at city hall, too.
She sank a hip against the counter.
Okay, okay.
What she was really missing was the guy who made the coffee.
Dammit.
She sucked at winging it. “Pathetic, that’s what you are.”
“I don’t know about that. I’m pretty sure this is what heaven smells like. Is that bacon?”
Alex spun toward the door. Her erstwhile coffeemaker and partner in winging it stood in the doorway in full uniform. But it wasn’t a first-thing-in-the-morning crisply pressed uniform. It was . . . well . . . she didn’t know quite how to describe it. But there was nothing crisp about it. The stubble on his handsome cheeks was well past five o’clock shadow, too. Unless it was five in the morning shadow when you hadn’t been to bed the night before. Which, he clearly hadn’t.
“What happened?” she asked. “Are you just now getting home?”
“The town councilmen and mayor are fine. The city municipal building security has been restored. And the raccoon has been relocated.” He looked utterly exhausted.
She tried not to smile, much less snicker. “I’m afraid to ask, but what about the water gun wielder?”
“Successfully disarmed.”
“Behind bars?”
“Out on bail.”
Alex’s mouth dropped open. “You arrested her?”
His eyebrows lifted, even as the rest of him sank against the door frame. “You just asked if she was behind bars.”
“I was joking. You said she was a senior citizen. How old is she?”
“It’s not about age.”
“It was a water gun.”
“It was a water
bazooka
. Given the escalation of aggression in a short period of time, we had concerns that it might be a . . . a gateway weapon.”
Alex couldn’t contain the snicker any longer. “You mean to harder water weapons? Like what, a fire hose?”
“No, to the kind that shoots bullets instead of water.” He blew out a long, weary breath. “I’m glad this amuses you, and at some point in the very distant future, we might all have a good laugh over the events of the past eighteen hours. But at the moment, I’m tired, I’m hungry, and a little out of sorts for being put in a position where I had no choice but to arrest a woman old enough to be my grandmother. That’s why I’m just getting in. I stayed for her arraignment this morning to be sure she made bail.”
She looked at him more closely. “And possibly helped her out a little with that?”
“I can’t.” He glanced away. “Not directly, anyway.”
Something shifted in her chest. Trying to ignore it, Alex slid the skillet with the finished scrambled eggs to a cool burner and turned the hot one off. She moved a few steps away from the hot stove and leaned a hip on the counter, putting her a little closer to Logan. What she wanted to do was fold herself in his arms and hold him up a little. But she didn’t know if they were doing that sort of thing. “I’m sorry. I can’t even begin to imagine what it’s like, doing what you do. And doing it for people you know. I wasn’t making fun of the work, just the circumstances, but that’s no excuse. Was anyone hurt?”
“I think our collective pride took a pretty good wallop. It’s a good bet Teddy and the rest of the council won’t be letting us forget that anytime soon. Especially Ted.”
Hearing that name brought her thoughts back to the reason she’d stopped by the police station the day before. As a newcomer to town, she hadn’t been sure it was the right call to make, and after she’d left the station without discussing it, she’d more or less made up her mind to let the matter drop. But seeing the look on Logan’s face when he’d said the man’s name—no love lost there—made her reconsider. She’d felt the same way after knowing the man for all of five minutes. “Are you talking about Ted Weathersby? He’s like . . . what? The grand pooh-bah of the league of extraordinary town councilmen or whatever it’s called, right?”
That got a hint of a smile out of Logan. “I will pay you large sums to never ever let him hear you call him by that name. He would have it printed on shirts that he’d make the entire council wear.” Logan’s gaze strayed to the counter behind her. “I will pay you even more money if you’ll agree to part with even a piece, or ten, of that bacon.”
“I made plenty. Eggs, too. And toast. There’s juice. I couldn’t find your coffee beans.” She hadn’t meant that last part to sound at all like a pouty accusation, but a hint of it might have been in her tone.