everything worked and it wasn’t even in the same universe as the worst place he’d ever lived.
Though it well might be the worst place Jennifer Burton had ever lived. It was sure as hell a huge step down from Taylor’s house over on Beachcomber Drive. She was a tad materialistic. Though she’d worn jeans and a sweater tonight, he would bet they were hundred-bucks-plus jeans, and the sweater was probably silk or cashmere. She was expensive, Taylor had often said with pride, because he could afford to keep her.
He made sixty-two thousand dollars a year and paid his officers less than a third of that. Yet he lived in a four-thousand-square-foot house in the best part of town, drove a Hummer that was less than a year old, took regular ski vacations to Colorado, an anniversary cruise every summer and three-times-a-year gambling trips to Las Vegas. His wife dressed in designer clothes and had enough jewels to stock a small shop. His fishing boat must have set him back forty grand, and her recently junked Beemer had had less than five hundred miles on it.
Something wasn’t right in Belmar, and Mitch wanted in on it. Taylor had promised him the time was coming, but he was growing tired of waiting. This apartment might be a hell of a lot better than the worst place he’d ever lived, but it was also a hell of a lot worse than the best. He wanted to move on.
Water gone, he returned to the bedroom. He’d rented furniture when he’d moved in—bed, nightstands, dresser and a desk, plain and functional. The sheets were white cotton, the bedspread light brown. The only items of a personal nature in the room were his pistol, his wristwatch and his laptop.
There was nothing personal he wanted anyone in Belmar to see.
A thump came from next door, drawing his gaze to the connecting door that had survived the renovations. Jennifer’s bedroom was on the opposite side of that door. Her bathroom backed up to his, and sometimes, before the hurricane, he’d heard her shower running while he’d been in his. Sometimes he’d fantasized…but not often. She was a married woman. Married to his boss. His oldest friend.
That meant something to him even if it didn’t seem to matter to Taylor.
He slid between the sheets, shut off the light and, with a weary sigh, closed his eyes.
The rumble of a finely tuned engine woke Jessica Wednesday morning. She blinked, needing a moment to remember where she was, then rolled over to glare at the drape-covered window. To her, cars were transportation, nothing more, nothing less, but whoever owned this one—likely male—was probably extraordinarily proud of the noise it made.
Probably next-door male, she reflected. Mitch Lassiter.
The prospect of seeing him wasn’t what drew her out of bed and across the room. She just wanted to see if it was daylight yet—such grumbling should be illegal between the hours of sunset and sunrise.
She parted the curtains an inch or so and peered through the gap. The car, parked a few spaces away, was an old Mustang, midnight-blue and a convertible. That was the best description she could offer. The owner was next-door male, and he was fiddling with something under the hood.
He wore clothes this morning—khaki trousers, khaki shirt with dark green epaulets, green tie, black shoes and black gun belt, complete with gun. Black and lethal was the best description of that she could offer. His hair was a shade short of shaggy, and his jaw was clean-shaven. He looked sinfully handsome. Dangerous.
He straightened, wiped his hands on a rag, then closed the hood. Abruptly he looked over his right shoulder. She dropped the curtain, then took a few steps back for good measure. Her face flushed, as if she’d been caught spying on him. Granted, she had, but the odds that he knew that were minimal. He couldn’t possibly have seen her, couldn’t even know she was there.
Unless he noticed the slight sway of the curtain as it settled.
Shivering in the morning chill, she grabbed her robe, adjusted the thermostat, then went into the bathroom. When she emerged thirty minutes later, showered, shampooed, powdered and lotioned, the Mustang’s rumble was gone.
Older, bolder and braver, she scoffed. Officer Lassiter could intimidate her with nothing more than his presence—and he wasn’t even the real danger. According to Jen, Taylor was the boss in both his law-abiding and lawbreaking pastimes. Everyone else, including Mitch, just did what they were told.
Not that he struck her as much of a follower.
In the kitchen, she rooted through the grocery bag for something to calm her stomach. The choices were chips, popcorn, cookies, cupcakes and a half-dozen of her favorite candy bars—her idea of “staples.” She settled on popcorn, washed down with a bottle of diet pop, then sat down at the glass table.
She was going to have to face Taylor today. Given her choice, she wouldn’t see him at all, but the odds that he would let her waltz into town after having been missing for three weeks without seeing her were somewhere between slim and none. Belmar was a small town. The first time she walked out that door, the gossip would start to fly. People would be watching Taylor for a reaction, and he wouldn’t let them down. She wouldn’t let them down.
Every weekday, according to Jen, Taylor had breakfast at the diner across the street from the police station. Joining him were a select few of his officers—his corrupt officers. She thought they did it as a show of force, reminding the other customers that they stood together, that they were in charge and there was little anyone could do about it.
A restaurant seemed as good a place as any for Jessica to meet her brother-in-law—correction: her pretend estranged husband. Public. Safe.
She dressed in a skirt and blouse from the closet. The labels were pricey, the fabric and workmanship excellent, but puh-leeze…the skirt was a floral print that covered her knees and the blouse had a ruffle around the modest V-neck. Granted, it was a wide, kind of flirty ruffle that draped nicely, but she hadn’t voluntarily worn ruffles since she was two, when they’d covered the butt of her diaper-padded sunsuit.
“Oh, Jen,” she said on a sigh as she studied herself in the mirror. “What did he do to your fashion sense?”
She applied makeup with a very light hand—Taylor likes the natural look—and sprayed on Jen’s top-dollar perfume, then grabbed her purse and left the apartment. The clothes made her feel more like an impostor than ever.
The day was sunny, and already the combination of heat and humidity was oppressive. She drove the half-dozen blocks downtown and found a parking space in the middle of the block. Flipping down the visor, she checked her face in the mirror, then cut her gaze to the cell phone dangling from her purse strap. “I could use a little encouragement,” she murmured, but the phone remained silent.
With a breath for courage, she got out of the car, walked to the restaurant and stepped inside. The dining room was full, but locating Taylor was easy; he and his officers occupied the largest table and made the most noise. At least until they became aware of her.
The place literally fell silent as Taylor stood. He was exactly as Jen had described him—blond, blue-eyed, tanned, with a cleft in his chin and a crook in his nose. He had a nice body, though not as nice as Officer Mitch, a devil whispered in Jessica’s head. He looked strong, capable, authoritative, the kind of man who had always appealed to Jen’s fragile-woman sensibilities. How sad that she’d fallen so hard for his outside that by the time she’d learned what he was like inside it was too late.
When he smiled, it would probably stop women in their tracks, but he wasn’t smiling now. He simply stared, showing no surprise, no emotion at all. Of course, he’d had about seven hours to get used to the idea that she was back. Since her oh-so-nosy neighbor had blabbed.
And speaking of the devil, sitting to Taylor’s left was Mitch himself. Unlike everyone else in the place, whose attention was ping-ponging back and forth between her and Taylor, his gaze was fixed on his boss, watching him as if he might see straight through Taylor’s head and into his thoughts.
Curious.
Now what should she do? Approach Taylor? Snub him? Join