“Weapon of some type hidden in his pants,” she announced, feeling the dimensions. “Blackjack, or”—she traced the length of the object—“possibly a gun.”
“I hate to break it to you, choux, but that weapon you’re handling is one I’ve been packing since birth.”
“What are you talking about?” Despite the annoyance in her voice, Brixton’s hand slowly ceased its movements as his words sank in. Then she yanked it back. Over classmate laughter, and the instructor’s call for quiet, she muttered, “You’re disgusting.”
“Hey, I’m just a red-blooded boy doing my best to submit to your search. It’s not my fault you found more than you bargained for.”
“More than I…oh, please.” Brixton pushed him face front again. “Don’t flatter yourself, Swain. I detected a small caliber weapon, at best, and I stand by the ‘small’ part of that assessment.”
The volume of laughter rose several notches at her comeback, but she simply continued the search, crouching to feel around his ankles. “Knife concealed in the left sock.” She withdrew the switchblade as she spoke, holding it aloft for the class and her instructor to view.
While the instructor took the weapon and ran through the finer points of the procedure, West leaned toward Shaun and murmured, “Brixton’s got balls. I like her for our team. Who’s the guy?”
“That’s Marcus Swain,” Shaun said out of the corner of his mouth. “Sheriff Malone’s cadet. Former marine and anticipated counterpart for our joint op.”
West rocked back on his heels and blew out a breath. “Those two, undercover together? That should be interesting.”
“Yep.”
…
From her perch on a barstool in a well-lit corner of Rawley’s main room, Roxy strummed the final notes of “Friends in Low Places” while she scanned the crowd. They’d drawn a good turnout for a Wednesday night, but West wasn’t in the house. He usually arrived midway through her first set and stuck around until she’d wrapped up the second to give her a ride home. She secretly dedicated the second set to seducing him from the stage, turning the hot summer evenings into a slow burn with a little musical foreplay. If she did her job right, they wouldn’t make it all the way home. West would steer his pickup down a dirt road, spread a blanket in the bed of the truck, and send her to heaven while a star-strewn sky glittered overhead.
But tonight, she might have to catch a ride with Junior and Lou Ann, because West had gone to Richmond with Shaun to meet a new recruit. Assuming the meet-up also involved dinner, and factoring in the ninety-mile drive back, she’d be lucky to see him at the pub before closing.
The knowledge left a stupid little ache in her chest. Stupid, because she’d see him later, for God’s sake, but not really surprising, because there was a lot of stupid going on with her lately. It was stupid how her heart tripped into a drum cover tribute to “Breakdown” whenever he walked into the diner. It was stupid how she of the rampant insomnia found sleep easily when she spent the night in his arms. It was crazy-stupid how often she caught herself weaving plans for the future—daydreams about sneaking kisses behind the bandstand in the town square during the Labor Day festivities next month, or taking turns giving out candy to pint-sized Avengers and Elevens over Halloween, or snuggling in front of the fireplace in his living room while the first snowflakes of winter settled softly on the windowsills.
She wouldn’t be there on Labor Day or Halloween, and she sure as hell wouldn’t be spending the winter. She couldn’t. One of these days—probably soon—her luck would run out. She knew this. If she stayed put, Randy Boudreaux would find her, or worse, Uncle Billy, and for West’s sake as much as hers, she couldn’t let that happen. She was already on borrowed time.
Since that thought sent a jolt of panic right to her stupid aching heart, she took her bow as applause washed over her and made a beeline through the kitchen to the back door, only stopping long enough to snag her emergency cigarette and lighter from her purse.
She slammed out the screen door, out of the clatter and steam of the kitchen, and into an equally steamy night. Even with shaking hands it took less than ten seconds to light the cigarette and savor the first deep kiss of nicotine, the instant loosening the vice clamped across her chest. On the long exhale, a calm born of deep breathing and soothing habit settled on her. She closed her eyes and cleared her mind. The sounds of the kitchen carried, but the scents of fried food and beer faded, replaced by the smell of smoke and…she inhaled again and frowned…garbage, stewing in the dumpster parked against the wall to her left.
The view from the small, mostly empty back parking area didn’t improve matters. Poorly lit by one miserly bulb dangling from an off-kilter pole, encroached on all sides by tangles of brush, it bore all the signs of neglect. There’d been a time in her life when she would have happily spent the whole night right there, impervious to the foul smell and dingy setting, focused solely on the high. Now they turned her stomach so drastically she stubbed out the cigarette with a disgusted sound and started to head back into the pub.
A thump, followed by a sudden, broken wail, stopped her. The sound came again, louder and longer, followed by the low staccato of a male voice.
An angry male voice.
Roxy made her way toward her best calculation of
