Beth Andrews – Unraveling the Past (страница 10)

Layne laughed harshly. “You’ve never put anyone first but yourself. Your wants. Your needs. I mean, a prime example is how you were with Evan. Flirting with a kid who’s ten years younger than you, all for what? So you can feel good about yourself? So you can pretend you’re special? The way you dress…how you act… You’re…” She snapped her lips shut and shook her head in disgust.

“I’m what? A tramp? A slut?” Tori’s voice was low. Shaky. But under the tremble, Layne heard the resolve that told her to step carefully.

She heard it. She just chose to ignore it.

She was terrified. Scared of what the next few days would bring and while she and Tori weren’t exactly close in the best of circumstances, their snarky spats rarely took on this edge. She should shut up. Better yet, she needed to apologize. Blame the stress and her going over twenty-four hours without sleep for making her so bitchy.

But she couldn’t. Not when Tori stood there pushing Layne’s buttons simply by wearing her snug, revealing clothes and a bring-it-on smirk.

“Worse,” she said, meeting her sister’s eyes unflinchingly. “You’re just like our mother.”

CHAPTER FOUR

THE ARGUMENT IN THE break room grew louder and, from what Ross could tell as he stormed toward the room, more heated.

Meade stood. “Chief, I don’t think—”

Ross didn’t even slow, just held up a hand. The other man shut his mouth and sat back down.

Smart call.

As he opened the door, Ross heard the unmistakable sound of a splash and a gasp.

Then Sullivan said in her husky voice, “Truth hurts, doesn’t it?”

“Go to hell,” a woman snapped as he stepped inside.

After a beat of stunned silence, Sullivan—wiping liquid from her face with both hands—noticed him. “Perfect,” she snapped. “Just freaking perfect.”

“Ladies.” Behind him, he heard the scrape of chairs and then footsteps as Meade and Campbell maneuvered closer in the hopes of catching part of the upcoming conversation. Ross shut the door and spoke quietly, hoping it would encourage the women to do the same. “Is there a problem here?”

Sullivan used her inner forearm to wipe soda from her chin. Her shoulders were rigid, her face white except for two bright spots of color high on her cheeks. Damp hair clung to the sides of her neck and the front of her shirt was soaked.

“Everything’s dandy,” she said stiffly.

Ross glanced from her to the life-size brunette Barbie, and back to Sullivan again. The resemblance between them was striking. Though Sullivan’s face was clean of any paint and the other woman’s features were made up—smoky eyes, slick red lips—the shade of their dark hair, the shapes of their mouths and the sharp angle of their jaws were the same. They were both tall and had legs that went on forever. And they were both seriously pissed off, with neither showing any sign of backing down.

He inclined his head toward the other woman. “Your sister?”

Sullivan’s mouth pinched. “One of them.”

“Tell me, Captain, how is it you thought having a family argument in my police department was a good idea?”

Sullivan pulled her shoulders back causing the damp material of her top to hug the curve of her breasts. “We weren’t arguing. Sir.”

“No? Because not five minutes ago I was three doors down in my office with Mayor Seagren discussing the department’s—” he flicked a gaze at the civilian “—current investigation—”

“Is ‘current investigation’ official cop code for the body discovered out at the quarry?” the sister asked. “Because half the town already knows about it.”

Another similarity between the women. Their smart mouths.

“—when we were interrupted by shouting coming from this room. Care to explain that?”

She pursed her lips for a moment, as if considering his question. “No, sir, I don’t.”

He pinched the bridge of his nose. Turned his attention to her sister. “And you are…?”

“Leaving.” But when she stepped toward the door, he shifted to block her exit. She jammed her fists onto her hips. “Really?”

“Ma’am, are you aware of what the penalty is for assaulting a police officer?” he asked.

She shook her hair back. “Nope. But say…how long do they send you away for tossing a carbonated beverage in a cop’s face? Five years? Ten?” She waved her hand as if wiping it all away. “Whatever it is, it was worth it.”

“There was no assault,” Sullivan said, shooting her sister a warning glare. “I apologize for our behavior and any embarrassment it may have caused the department.”

Not the most sincere apology he’d ever heard but it would do. “Next time you decide to have a family disagreement, do so outside of work. Being a good cop means being able to keep your personal life and professional one separate.”

If looks could kill, Layne Sullivan wouldn’t need to carry a sidearm. “It won’t happen again.”

“See that it doesn’t.” He opened the door and gestured for Sullivan’s sister to precede him. “Ma’am. Let me walk you out.”

She smiled, but it didn’t hide the calculating gleam in her eyes. “Thank you, Chief Taylor. You’re not nearly the asshole Layne said you were.”

Behind him, Sullivan snarled.

Ross fought a grin. “I appreciate that, ma’am,” he told the sister.

He also appreciated that when he glanced back at Sullivan as he stepped out of the room, she held his gaze. She didn’t try to make excuses or claim she’d never said any such thing.

He respected that.

Besides, he didn’t need her or any of the other officers below him to like him. He just needed them to obey him.

Walking beside Sullivan’s sister through the squad room, he couldn’t help but notice the changes in her demeanor. Her expression softened, her body lost its stiffness as she crossed the floor in a hip-swaying walk too rehearsed to ever be called natural. And enticing enough for most men not to care.

“Bye, Jimmy,” she said to Meade, giving him a little finger wave. A finger wave Meade started to return only to freeze when Ross glanced at him. “Evan, you be careful on that new Harley.”

Ross held the door for her and she went into the lobby where Officer Wilber shoved the hunting magazine he’d been reading under the counter. “Chief,” he said in greeting as the phone rang. He slid the clipboard holding the sign in/out sheet to Sullivan’s sister. “All set, Tori?”

“You bet.” She wrote the time next to her name—Tori Mott—while Wilber answered the phone. “So nice of you to walk me all the way out here,” she said, shooting Ross a glance from underneath her thick lashes.

“My pleasure, ma’am.”

This time when she grinned, it was less sultry, more genuine. “Oh, I doubt that.” She tipped her head to the side and studied him. “We both know you only did so you could make sure I left without causing more trouble.”

“If that was the case, I would’ve had to escort your sister out, too.”

“Please. Layne’s the original good girl. She spends all her time making sure everyone else is keeping their noses clean.”

“Including you?”

“Well, I do try… .” She skimmed her gaze over him, her meaning, and invitation, clear. “But somehow Old Man Trouble always comes along and nudges me off that straight and narrow path.” She stepped close enough for him to notice her eyes were a shade darker than Sullivan’s, her forehead wider. “You interested in walking down that road with me sometime?”

Her voice was throaty, and as smoky and sexy as classic jazz. But beyond the seductive act, he saw glimpses of humor and intelligence. She was mysterious and smart and hot enough to melt a man’s brains—and his good intentions—in her painted-on black skirt and snug, white top, the top three buttons undone. And she knew it.

She could bring a man to his knees with a single look. She also knew the score, knew exactly what men wanted from her. A few hours of dark pleasure. Nothing more.

If they’d been back in Boston, he might have been tempted enough not to care that she was a magnet for mayhem and heartbreak. He would’ve walked her to her car. Asked if she’d be interested in going to dinner. But this was Mystic Point and he had Jess to think of, had an example to set for her.

Plus, he wasn’t kidding about keeping his professional life separate from his personal one. And while asking out the sister of one of his officers didn’t necessarily step over that line, it blurred it.

He liked things—rules and his own moral code—to be crystal clear.

And when he looked at her, he saw Sullivan. Compared her blatant sexuality, her coyness with the captain’s blunt, what-you-see-is-what-you-get attitude. In that comparison, Tori came out lacking.

He deliberately stepped back. “Have a good day, ma’am.”

She didn’t seem disappointed by his lack of response toward her. Which made him wonder if she really had been interested or if it’d all been part of some show he hadn’t been invited to.

“You do the same,” she said. “And good luck solving your first big case as chief.” She picked up the set of keys from the plastic bin provided for visitors’ keys, cell phones and other devices that would set off the metal detector they needed to pass through before entering the squad room.

Her key ring was a plastic frame with a picture of a dark-haired boy in his baseball uniform, a bat over his shoulder as he smiled for the camera. A member’s benefit card for a local grocery store was hooked onto the frame along with a small, silver heart hanging from a thin chain.