Heat of the Night Read online

  12

  Erin didn't get as far as the shower before reality came crashing back. Well, beeping back. In the form of Brady's pager.

  With the shower pounding next to them, it had taken a moment for the sound to penetrate the fog. Actually, Erin never would have heard it, but Brady had spent enough years with lives depending on his hearing that beeping noise that he picked up the sound almost immediately. He'd sworn loudly, as had she when he ducked out the door to snatch up the pager. But he hadn't promised he'd only be a moment and then they'd resume where they'd left off. She supposed she was at least thankful for that. No promises that couldn't be kept.

  He'd come back in, with his cop face…and his trousers on. She'd quickly grabbed her robe off the back of the door, feeling somehow exposed now that reality had intruded on their private little world. She'd nodded in complete understanding when he'd explained he'd had no choice, that he had to go. After all, she was an adult and it wasn't as if she hadn't known going in that something like this might happen. Wasn't this why she'd told Gina she'd never get serious about Brady?

  As he dressed, she'd rested against the doorjamb between the bathroom and bedroom, telling herself it was better this way. No awkward morning goodbyes, or even late-evening ones. It would end as abruptly as it had begun. No need to explain or say anything. He seemed to understand that as he silently dressed. He tugged on his holster, which underscored her resolve that this was for the best. He followed that with his jacket, eliciting a small smile from her. Not surprisingly, it didn't look any more rumpled than usual. Unlike herself.

  She caught her reflection in the mirror over her dresser. Tousled was probably the word for how she looked. Tousled and well pleasured. Like a cat who'd lain in the sun all day after spending the morning lapping rich, thick cream.

  She pulled her gaze back to him as he paused at the door and looked back to her. She made herself smile. It was that or fling herself at him and beg him to come back when whatever had called him away no longer needed his attention. She needed his attention. Craved it. "Goodbye, Brady," she said softly, hearing the finality in the words. He must have, too.

  But he held her gaze for such a long moment, she felt her resolve waver. Okay, it more than wavered. It was bordering on crumbling to dust when he finally nodded and replied with a gruff, "Yeah."

  Then he was gone.

  She stayed right where she was, hoping the door-jamb would keep her upright until she heard the front door close. Then she could slide into a boneless heap and start the long agonizing process of analyzing every last detail of this wondrous evening. And figuring out how she was going to get past it.

  She strained to hear the click of the front door, her knees already trembling. What she heard instead was a sharply emitted epithet, then his heavy tread coming back across her living-room carpet. He burst into the room looking larger than life, and so damn good she had to lock her knees against the urge to run to him. He'd probably just forgotten something.

  As it turned out, he had. Her.

  He never slowed, crossing the room with his gaze squarely on her, that intent, possessive look all over his face. She froze in place, not daring to believe that look again. Still unsure what it had meant that first time. But she did nothing to avoid him as he tugged her hard into his arms and kissed her so thoroughly she was too breathless to speak when he finally let her go.

  He looked into her eyes for a long moment, then suddenly said, "It will probably be late by the time I'm done," as if the words had been torn from him. His gaze continued to search hers.

  She nodded. It was all she could do. What was he saying? Asking?

  "Probably too late to…to come back here."

  She didn't nod this time. The words simply tumbled out of her. "I don't care." She probably should, for lots of reasons. But the truth was she didn't. Not if it meant this wasn't over yet. She'd care later. Hopefully much later.

  His eyes glowed at her response. "Yeah," he said roughly. Then a grin teased the corners of his mouth, as if he couldn't quite believe he was this lucky. "Okay." He kissed her again, grinning fully when he lifted his mouth from hers. "Good."

  Erin touched her lips, wondering just what she'd done as she watched him walk away once again. This time she didn't even make it till he was halfway across the living room before sliding to the floor.

  Don't think about it, Brady. The job is waiting. Think about the job. The fact that he even had to remind himself was the biggest warning signal he could have asked for. If he'd been even close to being in his right mind, he'd have listened to it. Probably. He couldn't worry about it now. He had a dead body to deal with.

  But even as he called in his location and estimated time of arrival, cutting across the dark city streets toward the crime scene, his thoughts remained on Erin. On her actually wanting him to come back. And damn but he did want to go back. He'd honestly tried to leave, knowing from her silence as he dressed that she was tacitly agreeing to simply let this be a one-night thing, no explanations, no apologies. No regrets. What more could a guy ask for?

  He'd almost been there, almost to the door. But it had just felt…unfinished. He'd told himself he needed one last kiss, something to finalize it. He'd kiss her, smile, get that dry smile of hers in return so he'd know she was really okay with everything, then leave.

  But that plan had gone all to hell the moment he'd walked back into her bedroom and seen the naked hunger leap into her eyes. A hunger he'd matched, mind, body and soul. He'd never, not ever, been a possessive man. Had, in fact, gone out of his way to make sure any woman he was involved with knew for certain he never would be. He'd stayed true to that, with no doubts, his entire adult life. Until that moment.

  It defined what had passed between them when he'd been inside her, that hunger he saw. The same hunger he felt, the kind a starving man would feel. It explained to him, in no uncertain terms, that he was well and truly in a deep load of trouble here. Because he absolutely felt possessive now. He'd wanted to lay claim, right then and there. And he'd been greedy, too. Because he'd wanted it all. Heart, body, soul, mind. All his.

  He took a corner and lowered the window, hoping cool air would clear his head. Probably going back to her place later would be the antidote for this…whatever it was he was feeling. Surely he'd go back and realize it had all been some kind of hormonally induced lunacy. He'd see her again and wonder what the hell had possessed him to think there was something else going on here besides two people who just happened to have a spectacular way of making the earth move. Yeah, that was it. Probably.

  Then it would be over. Just this one night, then they'd move on. Enjoy the memory of it. He wouldn't think of her and wonder what if, because he'd realize when he went back that he didn't want the responsibility of her feelings, her needs, her desires. And he sure as hell didn't want her to be responsible for his. No way. His life, his needs, his desires were his to fulfill. First, last and always.

  He couldn't want Erin in that equation. It would lead to certain disaster. A disaster he'd seen play out so many times before. So he'd take what they'd shared tonight and be thankful he'd figured out that he didn't need more than that. More always spelled trouble.

  He fingered his cell phone as he drove, then realized he was unconsciously punching in her home number. He hadn't even realized he'd committed it to memory. He put the phone down, then picked it right back up again. Maybe he should call and cancel, let it be over now. He swore under his breath even as he laughed at himself. God, he'd never been this messed up over a woman. He punched in the number, knowing this was the right thing to do.

  "Hello?"

  Brady's heart sped up. Just like that. One word from her and he was primed and ready to go. Yep, ending it now was smart, prudent. He should be damn proud of himself for being on top of this. "Yeah, hello. It's me."

  There was a pause and he smiled despite himself as he pictured that wry curve of those unbelievable lips of hers.

  "Me, huh?" she said. "I don't th
ink I know any Me."

  "Oh, you know this me. Very well, I believe." Jesus, he was flirting. How in the hell did she do that? He was calling to end this. So end it already, O'Keefe. What are you waiting for?

  "Oh," she said, amusement clear in her tone. "That me."

  Another pause and in the space of those few, torturous seconds he was hard as a rock. This was insane.

  "Why yes," she went on, "I do believe I recall now. Some vague notion of a shower I ended up taking alone. Was that you who was supposed to lather my…back?"

  "Yeah," he choked out, unable to keep from visualizing that scene in his mind. "That would be me."

  Then her voice abruptly changed. "Uh-oh. Did something happen, Brady?" She was all business now.

  The sudden change threw him. "What?"

  "I just realized that maybe you were calling to tell me you wouldn't be able to come back."

  I am. Only the words weren't coming out of his mouth.

  "I'm really sorry," she went on. "But I…I understand. Really."

  Take the easy out. One word and it will all be over, no harm done. "No. At least, I don't know if I can or not. I'm not on the scene yet." Dammit, what was he doing?

  "So why are you calling me?"

  Damn good question, O'Keefe. Surprisingly, he began to laugh. "I have no idea," he said, as honest as he'd ever been in his life.

  There was a pause, then a little surprised laughter from her end. "Okay."

  "I'm not sure of that either," he murmured, wondering how he'd let things get so out of hand. He pulled up to the scene at that moment, red lights were flashing, police cruisers lined the street and people clustered and clung to each other. Finally some semblance of sanity returned. This was chaos he understood. "I'm here. I'll call you when I know what's going on."

  She'd obviously heard the shift in his tone. Hers shifted as well. "Just do what you need to do, Brady. I'll be here if you get done in time. Okay?"

  He threw the car into park, but just sat there.

  "Brady?"

  "Yeah. Yeah, okay." He blew out a deep breath, knowing that rather than end it, he had somehow taken another step. One he wasn't sure he was fully prepared to take. But he took it anyway. "I'll call you, Erin." Then he disconnected and climbed out of his car. He walked away from the confusion he'd just landed himself in, moving almost gratefully toward something he knew a whole lot more about. Homicide.

  As he neared the buzzing crowd, he was already shifting to the task at hand. Yet a small part of him wondered if maybe, just maybe, there should be more to life than this. If maybe, just maybe, it would be nice to occasionally set this insanity aside, even for a few hours.

  Especially if those few hours were spent like his last few had.

  But the key word in all that was occasionally. Because, like it or not, his job was a demanding mistress and her demands could be untimely and sometimes downright cruel. And who wanted to settle for being his occasional companion? Certainly not Erin. She wanted white picket fences, dogs and kids. He felt an odd ache when he pictured that scenario, her standing in the middle of it, smiling as she waited for him in the midst of domestic chaos. It amazed him that it had appealed to him, even for a brief moment. But when he tried to put himself in that scene, what he saw were flashes of the increasingly unhappy family life he'd been raised in.

  And that was one path he wasn't going to go down. Especially not with Erin. She deserved far better.

  His debate ended in the next instant as a young officer stepped forward to tell him the identity of the victim.

  Erin told herself she was absolutely not waiting up for him. She certainly wasn't staying up because she was caught in the supposed riveting suspense in the mystery she'd been looking at and not reading for the last thirty minutes. She slapped it down on the coffee table and grabbed the remote. She let the soothing sounds of sports highlights fill the room as she got up to refresh her coffee.

  "You're waiting up for him," she muttered. "Face it."

  Okay, so maybe she was. Or maybe she was simply dying to find out who won the PBA Canton, Ohio, Bowling Open. And who knew that high-school cheerleaders could throw people that high in the air? She sat back on the couch and flicked through several other sports channels, then shut the television off and flipped the remote in the same direction as the abandoned paperback. Okay, so she was definitely waiting up for him. She stared at the phone. "So call me, dammit."

  It was now past two in the morning. She and Gina had a meeting at ten to go over any ramifications or potential fallout from ending their business with the mayor. It would be in the papers in the morning. Probably had made the eleven o'clock news as a mention in the ongoing campaign coverage. But she'd been doing other things at eleven o'clock.

  She let her head drop back on the edge of the couch and stared at the ceiling. Lord, had she been doing something. Despite the late hour her body responded very clearly to the mental stimuli of her visualizing just what she'd been doing. And with whom.

  She sat up. So, did that mean she just wanted him back for more spectacular sex? She laughed. Hell yes. She wasn't stupid. She sighed and let her head drop back again. But there was no getting around the rest of it. And there was most certainly a rest of it. In fact, Brady was a whole lot more than she'd bargained for. He was direct, honest and straightforward—in bed and out. There was no game playing with him, but he had a sense of humor and didn't take himself, or anything else, all that seriously. Probably the only way he dealt with the side of life he was exposed to on a daily basis.

  She wondered what he was doing right now. Being that he was a homicide detective, she had a fairly good idea it wasn't pretty. What did he do after a night like this? Dead bodies and crime scenes, possibly hysterical or devastated people involved. At some point the night would come to an end, then what? Her lips quirked. Probably back to his desk, rumpled suit and all, to write up endless reports. Her expression sobered. But after that? Did he go home and sleep, only to get up and go back again? He didn't talk much about his life outside the job. Probably because he didn't have one. Which meant what?

  She groaned. "Which means you've gone and fallen for the worst man you could have fallen for."

  The phone rang just then, making her start badly. Her heart continued to race as she reached for it, but in anticipation now. "Hello?"

  "It's me."

  She would have smiled, maybe teased him again, but he sounded unbearably weary. "Hi, Me. You don't sound so hot."

  "Yeah." He paused, then blew out a breath. "I know it's late and I'm sorry to wake you, but I didn't want you to worry or wonder… Hell, I just looked at my watch. I didn't realize it was this late. You were probably sleeping. I'm sorry."

  Erin debated for about three seconds on whether to tell him, but honesty had gotten them this far. "No. I couldn't sleep. I was waiting to hear from you. I tried watching some national high-school cheerleading competition thing. Too damn perky for two in the morning, though. I had to shut them off."

  He chuckled and she thought she'd never heard anything sweeter than that. His life might be one long stretch of shift work, but she could at least do this. It didn't feel like much, but— Well, no, that was a lie. It felt good to be the one he called, the one who might lift his spirits after a hard night, even if only for a moment.

  Jesus, she'd really gone around the bend, hadn't she?

  "I have news for you," he said, breaking into her reverie. "The homicide tonight. It's likely it was connected to the Sanderson case. I wanted to be the one to tell you. It was Bradford Pitts."

  Erin froze, her throat closed over. The reporter Bradford Pitts? He'd been sort of sleazy and all, but she'd never imagined— "Why? Do you know who did it?"

  "Apparently he's been snooping around in the Han family business, still working the angle with Sanderson. I guess he got too close to finding the answer."

  "But he's not much more than a tabloid reporter. What could he have known that was so threatening?"

  "T
hat's what we have to find out."

  Erin slumped back on the couch. "Okay," she said quietly, still stunned by this turn of events. "I'm glad you called and told me. Thank you."

  "Yeah," he said gruffly. There was a pause, then, "Listen, Erin, I—"

  "Don't worry about it," she broke in, knowing what he was going to say. "I understand. You're going to be tied up for a long time on this, I'm sure." She paused, knowing he was a long way from getting some sleep. It was one thing staying up all night working on some press release or ad campaign; Brady was staying up in order to track down a killer. "I don't know how you do it."

  He gave a short, humorless laugh. "I'm beginning to wonder about that myself."

  She smiled now, but it was a melancholy one. So this was it, she thought. Probably better this way. God, she hated that. "Well, we're all thankful you do it."

  "Someone's got to."

  Yeah, she thought. Someone who can't imagine doing anything else. "They have the right man for the job then. Good night, Brady. I hope you get some sleep soon. Even superheroes need to take a break sometime."

  He didn't laugh as she'd hoped he would. He didn't say anything, in fact. So much for being the one he could turn to, the one who knew the right thing to say.

  The silence spun out, stopped being awkward and started being…something else. She felt the tension spike, and her grip on the phone tightened. Say it, she silently urged. Just one word to let me know this isn't over. God, how pathetic was she? But she couldn't stop hoping anyway.

  Finally he blew out a long, deep breath. "Right," he said. Then, more quietly, more resigned, "Right."

  "Brady?" Shut up, Erin, just let the poor man go. But she couldn't. Foolish or not, pathetic or not, she couldn't just let him walk away. And then she was blurting out the words herself. "If you need somewhere to go and take that superhero cape off for a while…" Oh God. She took a steadying breath. It didn't help. "You can come here," she finished in a rush. She squeezed her eyes shut. "Okay?"