Total pages in book: 138
Estimated words: 138981 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 695(@200wpm)___ 556(@250wpm)___ 463(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 138981 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 695(@200wpm)___ 556(@250wpm)___ 463(@300wpm)
The cozy cricket chirps become a muffled scream of warning all around me.
Just below my window, I stop.
Right where the grass is already crushed in the shape of a large bootprint.
Nope.
Definitely not my imagination.
Neither is the far less subtle sight I don’t expect.
My heart restarts, thrashing against my ribs as what I’m seeing sinks in.
It’s sprayed on the wall right below my room.
A giant red X, and the paint is still wet and dripping.
6
Red Herrings (Lucas)
There’s proud. Independent. Guarded.
Then there’s damn fool stubborn as a mule in a carrot field.
I know too well Delilah’s the first three, and now she’s leaving less doubt about the fourth one, too.
I’m outside The Rookery, keeping my feet planted just outside the evidence markers in the grass surrounding the footprints we could make out.
They trace a path around the back of the building toward the lake.
It’s not the footprints I’m glaring at, though.
It’s that ugly honking X painted on the wall, glaring blood-red in the morning sun.
“So you say the paint was wet when you saw it last night? Fresh?” I ask, trying my damnedest to keep my voice neutral as I snap another photo and tuck my phone away. “And less than sixty seconds after you saw a stranger under your window?”
A few feet away on the walk, Delilah leans against a standing roller suitcase, tapping her keys restlessly against one tanned, lush thigh in a pair of ragged denim cutoff shorts.
She’s avoiding the grass religiously, like she doesn’t want to tamper with evidence. I’m grateful for that.
Little less grateful for a few other things, and it’s taking every ounce of restraint I have to keep my temper in check.
Especially when Delilah just shrugs and gives me a one-word answer.
“Yes.”
This is going mighty fucking well.
“And you didn’t think to call me last night?” I demand. “Call anyone? What if the asshole who did this hurt you?”
I can’t keep the worry in my chest from clawing its way out.
“Well, I guess then I wouldn’t be here to call you at all,” she shoots back, her indigo-blue eyes snapping and her mouth set in that obstinate line that tells me I’m in for a fight.
“Goddammit, Delilah,” I huff out. “I don’t get what the hell you were thinking. Leaving it like this, not only did you scare Miss Janelle half to death when she woke up and found it, but—”
“Boys, I’m fine!” Janelle calls from where she’s hovering behind Delilah. “Just a bit startled is all.”
I sigh. “Now the scene’s gone cold. There’s probably accidental evidence tampering from groundskeepers, wild animals... hell, maybe the guy who did this shit himself. I don’t know which of these footprints are from him, or which ones are from Waylon when he showed up to mow the lawn this morning. Why didn’t you call me?”
She actually looks sheepish for a second, hunched into her bare shoulders. The slitted eyes of her dragon tattoo seem to glare at me.
She mumbles something I can’t hear.
“Sorry, didn’t catch that,” I clip, leaning in. “And woman, you make one wisecrack about small towns closing up shop at nine p.m. and I will take you over my goddamned knee.”
That gets her attention.
She shoots me a hot-eyed glare.
“Try it and you’ll limp away with a nub for fun,” she hisses. “I’m not discussing my kinks with you, Officer Horse Cock.”
My brows go up.
If it were any other situation, I’d thank her for guessing half right about my size.
But Miss Janelle’s here and her face is burning hot. She clutches her hands as she sputters “E-excuse me!”
“Sorry!” We both belt it out at the same time.
I look down.
Delilah clears her throat, still scowling at me. “I just didn’t want to bother anyone, okay? No point in starting a mad panic.”
“New York, we’re the cops. It’s our job to get bothered by things like this. Fuck’s sake, I spend most days sitting on my ass and doing ride-alongs for teenagers. You could at least give me something important.”
“Oh, my bad. Didn’t realize I was cutting into your productivity metrics—or your ego.” Grumbling, Delilah wraps her arms around herself in that guarded way she has, jerking her face to the side in a flare of wispy hair.
She’s looking at that big red X instead of me now.
There’s a nervous fury vibrating off her. I wonder how much is just masking her fear.
“Look,” she says more slowly. “I get it. I know it was a dumb move and I was being ridiculous. I wasn’t thinking. But if this is my problem, why can’t it stay that way, Lucas? It shouldn’t be anyone else’s.”
I eye her. “How is it your problem, specifically?”
She stays silent, her teeth clamped together so hard I hear them click.
Fuck it, I can’t help myself.
Crossing the lawn, I give the evidence markers a wide berth and catch her chin lightly.