Ramsey Rules Page 25

  “Seems that way. Do you want to go up to bed?”

  “No. You just made that lovely fire. I want to enjoy it.”

  “Then that’s what we’ll do.”

  The words had hardly passed his lips when his cell phone began playing Wagner’s “Ride of the Valkyries.” Ramsey’s entire body jerked to wakefulness and she pushed herself upright as Sullivan reached for his phone in his back pocket. “Sorry. I have to get this.”

  “Please,” she said. “For God’s sake, get it.”

  Sullivan stood, tapped the phone, and raised it to his ear. “What is it, Mrs. Tereshko?”

  Groaning softly, Ramsey dropped back on the sofa and pulled the throw over her head. “The neighbor? Mrs. T. gets “Ride of the Valkyries” as her ring tone?” She stopped muttering to herself to hear what Sullivan was saying.

  “Are your doors locked?” he was asking. “Good. You stay inside, and you keep your shotgun with you. I’ll go out and have a look around. No. The person you saw earlier is not out there. Yes, I’m sure. No, I don’t know why someone would be trespassing across our backyards. Did you ever think this housing plan should have alleys? Yes, ma’am. It’s something to consider, isn’t it? All right. I need to go if I’m going to be of any use. Sure. I’ll let you know.”

  Sullivan ended the call and slipped the phone back in his pocket. “Sorry. I’ve got to take a look around.”

  Ramsey’s head emerged from under the throw. “Of course, but does she know about 9-1-1?”

  “She does, and I guess she used to be a frequent caller until I moved here.” He took his jacket out of the closet and slipped it on. “She’s seventy-two and head of the Neighborhood Watch.”

  “Ah. ‘Ride of the Valkyries’ is explained.”

  Grinning, he took his pistol out of the lockbox and tucked it into the small of his back. “This won’t take long. It was probably a deer. We get a lot of them foraging for food this time of year.”

  Ramsey sat up and scooted back into the sofa’s corner. “Wait,” she called to him as he took a few steps toward the kitchen and the back door. “Do you think she saw Jay?”

  “I think she saw a deer,” he repeated. “It wouldn’t be the first time.”

  Ramsey waited until she heard Sullivan leave before she got to her feet and went to the front window. She carefully lifted the light-filtering blind away from the window so she could peek out. There wasn’t any movement on the street or in the yard that she could see. She peered sideways for a better look. A car pulled up to the corner half a block away and turned up Sullivan’s street, moving considerably slower than the posted speed limit for a residential area. She watched its progress. The headlights gave her a wider field of vision until it passed the house. She was tempted to turn on the porch light, but stopped with her hand on the switch because she didn’t know if it would actually help Sullivan.

  She went to the back of the house and turned off the kitchen light before she looked outside. If it was Jay skulking around, there was no point in framing her face in the window. She saw a flashlight wavering in a neighbor’s yard, although whether it was Mrs. T.’s place or someone else’s, she didn’t know. She couldn’t make out who was holding the flashlight, but she hoped it was Sullivan. The light briefly illuminated a shed and then a swing set before it disappeared behind a thick row of cedars. The darkness was disturbing. She found herself holding her breath until the light reappeared and she could finally make out Sullivan’s shape. No one was with him. No deer or dog or coyote had bolted across the yard. No Jay Carpenter appeared from between the cedars. Likewise, there was no shotgun blast. She concluded that Mrs. T. had followed Sullivan’s instructions.

  Ramsey turned the kitchen light back on and opened the door as Sullivan was crossing the deck. “Anything?” she asked.

  “Let me get inside.”

  She stepped out of the way to let him pass. He tapped the door closed, pushing back on the cold eddy of air trying to follow him in. Ramsey took his jacket when he shrugged out of it and laid it over the back of a chair. Unable to manage her anxiety, Ramsey asked him again for information.

  “Well, it wasn’t deer,” he said, removing his gun from his waistband. “I need to put this away.”

  Ramsey followed him, hovering by the closet while he stored his Sig Sauer. “It was Jay, wasn’t it?”

  “It was a person. There’s no way to know if it was Jay.” He moved to the living room, warmed his hands at the fire before he turned to the sofa. Ramsey hadn’t moved to sit down. It was impossible to miss the thread of tension running through her. One tug and she would unravel. “Let me call Mrs. Tereshko and let her know I’m going to ask for a patrol of the area. I don’t want her shooting an officer.”

  “A patrol? Is that necessary?”

  “A precaution and a courtesy. That will calm the waters.”

  “Right. We don’t want the Valkyries riding again.”

  “Exactly.” He made both calls. The one to his neighbor was brief; the one to the station was a bit longer because he conveyed his suspicions that someone was wandering in and around the houses on his block. When he hung up, Ramsey still hadn’t taken up her seat on the sofa, so he resumed his position in the corner and patted the space beside him. He picked up his drink and took a swallow. “You might as well sit.”

  “Do I need to?”

  “Ramsey. Come here.”

  She did. Lifting the throw, she sat down into a comfortable curl at his side and smoothed the throw over her legs. “Tell me,” she said. “You think it was Jay, don’t you?”

  “It was someone,” he said. “There’s some frost on the grass. I tracked your footprints leading up to my deck and I found another set, a set of bigger prints, in the yards on both sides of my house and then to the houses closer to Mechling Street. I saw your Escape.”

  “Did you see an Audi?”

  “No. A Highlander. A Chevy truck. And a MINI Cooper. There was a sedan cresting Mechling when I got there. It might have been an Audi. I’ll have to look at some taillight images to identify it. I couldn’t see a plate.”

  “Was it silver? Jay’s car is silver.”

  “Couldn’t tell.”

  “How did he find me?”

  “You don’t know that he did. Don’t get ahead of yourself. We have a Neighborhood Watch for a reason. Sure, Mrs. Tereshko jumps at shadows, but sometimes she gets it right. It’s always worth a look. We’re all taking a hit from this opioid crisis. The addicts are after whatever they think they can sell for quick cash. You see it at the Ridge all the time.”

  She nodded. “You’re right. I know you are. I’m the one jumping at shadows.” She dropped her head to his shoulder. “I’m happy to spend the night here, but I have to go home sometime. He’ll be waiting for me.”

  “Do you work tomorrow?”

  “Mm-hmm. Daylight, and I can’t be late again. I have to be in at seven.”

  “Did Paul give you trouble today?”

  “I got a lecture. A long one. It wasn’t too bad as these things go, but he knows when I zone out so I have to make sure I nod in all the right places. It’s okay, though. I snookered him by not stopping a single thief today.”

  Sullivan raised an ironic eyebrow. “Oh, good for you.”

  “I’ll make up for it tomorrow. Do you work?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Then you’re going to be busy.”

  “Why are you working at the Ridge?” he asked. “In fact, why are you working at all?”

  “I can’t believe you asked me that. That’s a Jay question.”

  “Ow. That hurt.”

  “Not apologizing for it.” But she did raise her head long enough to place a kiss on his shoulder. “There’s the obvious reason that working gives me cover for where my money comes from. Full-time volunteering would eventually give rise to questions. How do I live? Who’s my sugar daddy? Where’s my wealthy family? I didn’t want any part of that. As for the Ridge, it’s simple. I applied and they hired
me. I started out in the deli, went to stocking shelves, and after I happened upon a couple of credit and gift card scammers, the manager invited me to apply for a loss prevention position.”

  “Paul?”

  “No. He came from another Ridge store when Annette Carstairs was promoted to regional manager. She didn’t have a say in who took over for her, more’s the pity.”

  “Paul isn’t so bad, is he?”

  “No. Not really. Just a little full of himself.”

  “Huh. You know who isn’t full of himself?”

  “Umm, Chief Bailey?”

  “Exactly.”

  “I haven’t dismissed the idea.”

  “You haven’t acted on it either.”

  “I need time, and no, I don’t know how much. I’ll know when I know and then you’ll know. Got that?”

  “I think so.”

  “It’s an intriguing notion,” she said. “One that never would have occurred to me. I hope the chief wasn’t acting out of a need to fill some quota.”

  “No. I swear. He thinks women on the force are a good idea. Simple as that. And he thinks you’re a good woman.”

  “He might have second thoughts when you tell him about Jay.”

  “I don’t see how any of that would factor.”

  “It speaks to my judgment—or lack of it.”

  “Or it speaks to you coming out on the other side of a mistake. Not a bad thing. Not at all.”

  Ramsey lifted her head and caught him under the chin with a fingertip. She nudged him to look at her. “You’re good for me. Really good for me. I don’t even know how to think about that.”

  “What’s to think about? Just accept it.”

  “Mm.” She leaned in and kissed him on the mouth. “Fire’s dying.”

  Sullivan looked past Ramsey’s shoulder. “I’ll take care of that.”

  She smiled, and it touched her eyes. “You already have. Let’s go to bed.”

  33

  For the first time they’d been together in bed, Ramsey thought of their intimacy as making love. There was warmth and tenderness and something intangibly sweet about the way his lips felt against her hair, her cheek, and the corner of her mouth. He walked his fingertips between her breasts to her navel and when her skin jumped under his touch, he pressed a smile at a curve of her neck. He whispered her name against her ear. Then he whispered what he was going to do and made her wait for it. The anticipation was delicious, exciting all of her nerve endings so that she was sensitive to the slightest brush of his body against hers.

  It was not so different for him, she thought, as her mouth made its way across then down his chest. She felt the steady thrum of his heart under her palm and the rumble of his pleasure against her lips. He sucked in a breath when she slid her hand over his abdomen and followed with her mouth. She liked that she could make him do that.

  Her skin tingled. It was exquisite. Sublime. She reached for his cock, stroked it, and then told him what she wanted. He slid inside and the walls of her vagina contracted. “Venus fly trap,” she murmured.

  He expelled a lungful of air on a low burst of laughter. “Is that what we’re calling it now?”

  “We never called it anything before.”

  “True.” He began to move.

  She hummed her pleasure and made small whimpering noises at the back of her throat. Her nails made crescents in the taut muscles of his back. It was a smooth joining at first. Easy. Slow. It would have been a good test of her patience, but then she didn’t care if she passed or failed. She wanted him and her need was reciprocated in spite of his efforts to linger and last.

  She strained against him, lifting her hips and digging her heels into the mattress. He pressed her down, ground into her, and the lovemaking that had begun so gently erupted into something sweaty and energetic and just this side of rough.

  Ramsey’s head fell back on the pillow as she shuddered in climax. She held onto him as he pumped, and when he collapsed on her, she didn’t ask to move. A little winded, her voice was husky, “This must be what it’s like to wear one of those thunder shirts.”

  Sullivan raised his head, stared at her for a count of three before he buried his face against her neck. “Dogs wear those.”

  “I know. I’m just sayin’. The weight’s comforting.”

  He breathed laughter into her shoulder. “Won’t be for long.”

  She hugged him. “Don’t move. Not yet.”

  So he stayed where she wanted him until he felt another shiver slip under her skin as she orgasmed a second time. “Ah. That was it.”

  “I was on the edge again,” she said a bit defensively.

  “Hey. I think it’s great. I would if I could.”

  Ramsey gave his shoulders a nudge and he obligingly removed himself and rolled onto his back. She lay beside him for all of a minute before she threw off the covers and bounded out of bed for the bathroom. “Shower!” she called over her shoulder.

  “Announcement or invitation?”

  “Could be both, Sullivan.” Except for a couple of inches, she shut the door and then spoke through the opening. “You decide.”

  Sullivan stayed where he was until he heard the water running and judged enough time had passed for it to get it hot. God, he hoped she didn’t take cool showers. He liked them at a temperature hot enough to peel paint.

  The bathroom had a nice steam going when he walked in. He took two white bath towels out of the linen cupboard and set them on the counter before he slid the shower door open. Ramsey was facing the shower spray, which gave him a very nice view of her flip side. He took a moment to observe and admire and then he lathered his hands and set them on her shoulders. He leaned in. “I’m jealous of the water.”

  Frowning, she turned her head a fraction as he began to run soapy hands over her back. “What?”

  “The water. That way it’s sliding over you. I’m jealous.”

  “You’re sweet, but you’re an idiot.”

  He shrugged and lightly pinched her bottom. When she yelped and came up on her toes, he attended to the abused cheek with a soapy hand until she relaxed and settled in. “This is a first for me. Showering with a woman. High school locker room was an open shower. Coed classes but segregated showers. College was mostly the same. Diane read somewhere that cooler water was better for her skin and she more or less froze me out. I guess I mean that in every sense.”

  In spite of the heat, Ramsey felt a shiver roll down her spine as Sullivan soaped the small of her back. “Before you get any ideas, you should know I’m in here for a shower, not funny stuff.”

  “Funny stuff?”

  “Uh-huh. You know. Where intercourse and slapstick intersect because there are no grab bars in here and the shower mat’s slick with soap and we end up bangin’ against the wall but the faucet pokes me in the back and I shove off and we stumble, slide a little, and fold like lawn chairs. One of us is concussed. The other has a bruised butt and a bruisier ego. And then we spend the rest of the night in the ER.”

  Sullivan chuckled. “Bruisier?”

  “Yeah.” Ramsey turned, raised her arms to his neck, and leaned in. Her breasts flattened against his chest. “You get it.”

  He smiled. “Mm. I do.” He touched his forehead to hers. “You want me to wash your hair?”

  She nodded, rubbed her cheek against his. “Would you?”

  In answer, he reached behind her for the shampoo in the caddy and squirted a quarter-sized dollop into his palm. Ramsey finger-combed her hair, separating the thick, wet strands plastered to her skull. She bent her head, closed her eyes and hummed a little when his fingers slid into her hair, against her scalp.

  “You like that?”

  “Bliss,” she said. “It’s bliss.”

  Chuckling, Sullivan worked the shampoo into a lather, massaged her scalp with his fingertips, and drew the lather to the ends of her hair. He gathered her hair in one hand, twisted it, and arranged it on her head. The crown of lather did not last long. Sull
ivan took a moment to admire his work before he tipped her head back and let the needle spray sluice the shampoo from her hair. He sifted stands with his fingers until he knew it was clean. “Conditioner?” he asked.

  “If I’m ever going to get a comb through it again.”

  “Coming up.”

  While the conditioner was doing its job, Ramsey insisted that they trade places so Sullivan had the pleasure of being under the water and she had the pleasure of soapy hands exploration. If it wasn’t the Merriman-Webster definition of win-win, it should have been.

  Wrapped in the bath towels that he’d put out, they staked out territory on either side of the sink to complete bedtime rituals. Ramsey applied Jack Black Face Moisturizer after carefully reading the label to be sure she wouldn’t grow a beard while Sullivan brushed his teeth and towel-dried his hair. He watched her detangle her hair, but she gave him his marching orders when she found the floss. Some things, she told him, were simply too intimate this early in their relationship.

  Sullivan was sitting up in bed, reading, when she reappeared. He closed the book and set on the nightstand. “Ready for bed?”

  “Almost. May I have something from your closet to sleep in?”

  “Take whatever you like.”

  “Thank you.” She went to the walk-in. “I love this space. I swear I almost came the first time I saw it.”

  “I don’t know what to say to that.”

  Ramsey huffed a laugh. “Do you own pajamas?”

  “A drawer full. When I was kid, I got a pair every Christmas Eve. To dress up for Santa, according to my mum. Later, long after the Santa discovery was made, she still made me a present of them.”

  “Found the mother lode!” she called out. “Holy sleepwear, Batman. Did you save all of them?”

  Sullivan didn’t dignify that question with a response. He’d saved maybe a third of them. When the bath towel came sailing out of the closet, he figured she’d found something to her liking. A minute or so later, she struck a pose in the doorway wearing a red-and-white diagonally striped flannel top and bottom. The sleeves, which ordinarily would have ended at her fingertips, were folded neatly back to her elbows. The pajama drawers had also been given a couple of turns so they didn’t get under foot. “You look like a candy cane.”