“Hell no, I’m not.”
“Hell yes, you are,” she snapped, noting his glittering eyes. “Until you’re ready to face that ex-wife of yours and your brother—and make peace or at least confront the two of them, wish them well, but call a truce on interacting with them for the next year or so—you’re still dealing with shit. I’m done with people who need to deal with shit. So get your act together, and then there’s time for us.”
He stared at her, dragged her into his arms, and kissed her hard.
She melted against him, completely overwhelmed in their shared passion, in a heat that fogged her brain, and then he set her back. She gave her head a shake and said, “Don’t do that.”
“What? Don’t kiss you? Too damn bad,” he said, “because I’ll do it again.”
“Don’t scramble my brains so I can’t think,” she said.
He looked at her, and a huge grin slid across his face. So he pulled her closer to him and whispered, “How about I scramble your brains and just keep them that way for a while?”
“That would imply that we actually had a bedroom we could access right now and not a shooter still out there,” she said against his lips.
He closed his eyes, whispered, “Great reminder.”
“Just shitty timing,” she said, “but I’m really glad you came back again.”
“All I was waiting for, apparently, was an invitation.”
“And that’s just being an idiot too,” she said affectionately. “It’s not like we haven’t had years to get to know who we are.”
“And our relationship hasn’t changed over all those years,” he noted.
“No,” she said, her tone adamant. “You just were afraid we’d changed.”
He had assumed that they had changed, both of them, as they’d grown up, but what he hadn’t expected was to feel the same connection he always felt with her. And holding her close in his arms, as he stared out in the direction of where the shooter had been, he realized this was the feeling he’d been looking for in his marriage. That same oneness, that same connection that he’d always had with Laysha, and yet, for some reason, had never seen this relationship as being one on a sexual or romantic level. “What the hell happened to us anyway?” he murmured. “Why didn’t we see this before?”
“Because I think we were so busy trying not to see our attraction, so we wouldn’t mess up the good friendship that we had,” she said. “We were great friends, so I guess we thought we had to find someone else to date. I don’t know. I only married after you married.” She said, “I married so that I wasn’t alone because I felt so alone when I lost you to Sarah.”
He just shook his head. “So stupid. Both of us.”
“Very,” she said, “but, if we’re not being quite so stupid right now, that’s a good thing.”
“I’m not planning on being stupid,” he muttered. “Are you planning on being stupid?”
“I never plan on it,” she said with emphasis, “but somehow we manage to do it regardless.”
He chuckled. “Oh, God, that’s true,” he said. “I really have to face them, huh?”
“You sure do,” she said, “and you’ll be facing it in such a way that you know for sure that it’s over and that you don’t harbor any ill will because that’s the only way that you’ll know if you care about me.”
“Nope,” he said, “that’s just silly. I already know I care about you.”
She squeezed him tight, and he smiled, holding her even closer. “You’ve always cared about me but not in that way.”
“I think …” he said, “I think you’re wrong. As I think about it now, I think I was always looking for that same connection that I had with you. But why the hell I didn’t see that as you, I don’t know.”
“I never really let you see how I felt.” She added, “So maybe I just hid it too well.”
“I don’t know. It just feels like we wasted a ton of time.”
“We did, but the good news is,” she said, “we’re here now.”
“Yep, whatever that means.”
“Depends on how you feel about that marriage of yours.”
“What marriage?” he teased.
She chuckled. “You’re funny.”
“No, you’re funny.”
“Nope, you’re funny,” she said, laughing. “And you’re an idiot.” She pulled away from him. “Now go get the damn sandwiches. I’m hungry.”
“I will now that I hear the cops coming,” he said. He leaned over, gave her a hard kiss, and said, “And you need to be prepared for lots more questions.”
She groaned. “Who the hell wants cops around?”
“You were happy I called them before.”
“Sure, but you know …” And she waggled her eyebrows.
“We can’t even get to your bedroom,” he said.
“Really, a guy like you can’t figure that out?”
He stood and grinned, as the sirens blared, and the cop cars ripped down the driveway.
She looked out where the shooter probably had been. “Any sign of him?”
“No, not yet. I suspect he’s long gone.”
“Well, if it was me, I would have booked it immediately,” she said.
“Depends on whether he thinks he got you or not.” He held out his hand to help her up.
“True enough.”
He led her to the front door, where they waited till the cops got out, and then he opened the door and stepped outside. The detective looked at him and said, “Seriously, a shooter?”
Caleb gave them directions on which corner of the property the shot came from, and the teams fanned out.
“What the hell did you do?” the detective asked Caleb. “It’s been a long time since you were in town, but isn’t it time for you to leave already?”
“Too damn bad,” Laysha said in his arms. “I don’t want him to leave at all.”
“The two of you together? Oh, my God,” Ansel said, “you guys are just bad news.”
“Well, maybe he’ll go into police work,” she said, “and he can help you solve some of the stuff that we’re forever digging up.”
At that, the detective just rolled his eyes. “Like that’ll
