Chapter 6
Colin paced the floor of Jack’s apartment. The son-of-bitch was still on his date with some new babe and Colin hadn’t heard from Regan all day. He was starting to get nervous about why she wasn’t home and hadn’t returned his phone calls. He also had to be at work in half-an-hour. He had to meet with his lawyer in the morning after his shift, but tonight he was riding the pine on the front desk, again. Being late wasn’t an option. However, at night he could read or watch some television when no one was around.
He slammed his fist on the table. Where the hell was Jack? Just then, the door opened. Colin rushed him.
“Where the hell have you been? I’ve been calling you and trying to find you.”
“Why? What’s happened?” Jack asked, concern written on his face.
“It’s Regan. I can’t find her. She’s not answering her phone and our neighbor said she left with some guy hours ago. Did I tell you that she’s being followed? Someone is stalking her and I don’t know who it is and can’t do anything about it!” He was almost yelling by the time he stopped to take a breath.
“Regan is home. I left her there a few minutes ago.”
“What do you mean, ‘You left her there’?”
“We went out tonight. I didn’t think you’d mind, since you’re—”
Colin laid him out with one punch to the face.
By the time Jack woke up, Colin had an ice pack for him and felt a tad bad for hitting him, considering he’d been good about letting Colin live in his house.
“Dude. What’s wrong with you?” Jack said, pushing up on his elbow, holding his head.
“Regan? You went on a date with my wife?” Colin was calmer, but not by much. He kept his fists at his side.
“It wasn’t officially a date and you’re divorced.”
“Bro. Doesn’t matter. She’s off limits to you.” His breathing was coming in pants, and he thought he was seeing spots. That dick.
Jack stood up without Colin’s assistance. “I’m not sure this situation is going to work anymore. Maybe you’d better find somewhere else to live.”
“I’m sorry, Jack. I was worried about Regan and then when you said you’d been out with her, I snapped. It won’t happen again.”
Jack crossed his arms and raised his chin. “What if I want to see her again? She needs support.”
Colin raised his fist, but had a smirk on his face to show there were no hard feelings on his part. However, the smirk was a complete act. He wanted to punch the guy again and put him in his place as the frustration and anger burned a hole in his stomach. There was no way he wanted Jack near Regan. Everyone knew Jack was a bad-boy ladies’ man, the love ’em and leave ’em type. His reputation went far beyond the walls of the Port City Police Department.
“That’s what I thought,” Jack said. “You can’t handle the thought of Regan getting involved with someone else.”
“Exactly, and not with my best friend. Did you sleep with her?”
Jack held up both of his hands. “No, dude. Way out of line. Back down.”
Colin clenched his fists tighter. “I’m going out for a little while. I need to cool off.”
Jack didn’t say anything as Colin grabbed his keys from the sideboard and left. As he made his way to the car, he called in sick to work.
There was only one place Colin wanted to be. The car drove across town like it was on automatic pilot. He pulled over the curb so two wheels were parked in the grass and the other were still on the road. Regan’s light was on in their bedroom. He couldn’t see her, but she’d always been careful about being seen from the front windows. Jumping out of the car, he strode to the front door of his house and rang the bell.
There wasn’t time to remember that she would be freaked by having a visitor this late at night. He yelled through the closed door, “Regan, it’s me, Colin. Let me in.”
He heard her push against the door. She was checking the peep hole. He stepped back so she could see him. “Colin? It’s late. What are you doing here?” The deadbolt slid free and she undid the chain. “Is everything okay?”
As soon as the door was open, he flew at her and caught her off guard, his mouth seeking hers with precision accuracy. His lips met hers, and he felt hers make a little ‘O’ of surprise before she relaxed into his kiss. Her arms were around him and with a kick to the door, they were inside, grabbing and clutching at one another. He wanted to be the last man she kissed and loved before she went to bed every night. It was him he wanted her to dream hot, sweaty, steamy dreams about.
“Oh, Colin.”
“Regan. I don’t want you to be with anyone else, ever,” he said between kisses.
“No. I don’t want anyone else,” she said, tugging at his clothes.
With one motion, he pulled off her shirt and dipped his head to suckle on her nipple.
“Wait,” she said, stepping back. “We can’t do this. What if someone sees us? We’re supposed to be divorced.”
“I don’t give a crap,” he said, running his hands through her hair, snagging his fingers in the long curls. He missed her hair and the fresh scent that it released as he played with it.
She put her hands on either side of his face, and he watched the concentrated look she gave him before she put all her efforts on loving his mouth. He let her take over and the muscles that had tensed up when he’d heard she’d been on a date started to relax like she was massaging each taut knot. She slid her hands down over his shoulders, touching muscles that were releasing and becoming putty in her hands.
He groaned at the pleasure that slowly curled through his body. He rubbed her scalp and then her neck. Her muscles were as tense as his own. The ones lower on her back reminded him of cement.
“What have you been doing?” he asked, rubbing her, his thumbs digging into her sensitive flesh.
“I’m a little tense, but I know what would help relax me.” She looked into his eyes. The twinkle he was used to seeing was there and his heart melted. He’d give her anything she wanted.
“Let’s go.” He took her hand and led her to their bedroom. She took off her jeans and socks. She left on her bra and panties, sexy, black, lacy things that made him consider naughty alternatives. “On the bed,” he ordered.
No protest from her. She lay back on the covers and smiled up at him. He got into position at the foot of the bed and picked up her right foot. He started rubbing the sole with his thumbs, smoothing the lotion he’d found on the bedside table.
She moaned, low and sexy, in her throat.
“That’s right. Relax.” He pushed on a spot that would help with her shoulders. After a minute, he moved to another pressure point to ease her aches and pains, a trick he’d picked up when he was a cadet at the academy. He learned how to get rid of headaches and other issues by using reflexology. He had also been dating a massage therapist at the time, which helped his hands-on lessons. Regan had always loved that he knew reflexology, and when she’d had a stressful day, she’d beg him to work on her.
He pressed on the part of her foot that made her wild with need for him. She started writhing under his touch. “No fair,” she groaned. He’d even made her come that way before and if he had his way she would again, tonight. Applying even pressure, he held on to her foot as she thrashed and tried to kick free.
“Lay still,” he ordered.
“I can’t,” she moaned. Her gasps and deep throat sounds turned him on more than seeing her completely naked. Moving one finger to another pressure point, she threw her head back and screamed her release. She convulsed and shivered as she rode her orgasm. As she came back to reality, he smiled at her and placed a hand on her pelvis to steady her.
“Relaxed?”
She sighed. “You’re the greatest thing since nine-one-one.”
“Shoot. I was hoping for greatest thing ever.”
“That too,” she said without opening her eyes. “Come up here.” She patted the bed next to her.
He slipped out of his jeans and curled up next to her, snuggling into her neck. “Isn’t there a way we can work through this trial thing? I don’t want to be away from you.”
“Jack said you missed me. Or, was it that he missed me cleaning up after you?” she asked, turning her head to wink at him.
“Don’t mention that traitor. I want to be the one you dream about at night.”
She grasped his hand. “You are.”
When the doorbell rang, both of them sat bolt upright. “What’s that?” Regan said to the dark room. She glanced over at the clock. It was one. “No one rings the bell at this time of the night.”
Sometime during the night they must have crawled under the covers and fallen asleep, but she couldn’t remember them doing it. She slipped on her bathrobe and padded to the door.
“Regan, no,” Colin said in a hushed tone. “Let me go.” He pulled a pistol from his holster hung on his pants.
Now she was afraid. Was the crazy stalker here, thinking she was alone? She hid behind a wall and watched Colin go to the dining room window and move the curtain to peek out.
She saw him grimace and then waved her to the door. “Answer it,” he mouthed. “It’s safe.”
She walked slowly to the front door and looked through the view finder. Stepping back, she gave a wide-eyed look at Colin. The police were here, at her house. She hadn’t called them. What brought them to her door? she wondered, yanking the door open. She’d been so blown away to see Colin she hadn’t even bolted the door. A careless mistake.
“Hello, Officers. Little late for a house call, isn’t it?” She recognized one of the two officers as a man who worked with Colin on the overnight shift.
“Regan, we received a phone call from one of your neighbors. He said Colin was here and forced his way into the house.”
“Why would Colin be here?” she asked.
“His car is poorly parked out front. How about you tell us what’s going on?”
Regan crossed her arms across her gaping robe and looked in Colin’s direction for advice. Seeing none, she invited the officers inside.
“Hey, guys,” Colin said, entering the living room from the dining room. “Someone really called to complain about me?”
The officers exchanged a worried look and reached for their guns. “Drop the weapon, Colin.”
Colin raised his hands over his head, still holding his department-issued gun.
“Put the gun on the table and step away from it,” the younger police officer ordered.
Colin rolled his eyes and did as he was told. “Did you think I was going to shoot one of you? You show up here unannounced and uninvited and expect I’m going to come to the door unarmed? You’re dreaming.”
“You don’t live here anymore from what I’ve heard,” Colin’s buddy said, scanning Colin, who was dressed only in his boxers. The man’s eyes narrowed.
Regan stepped in between the men. “Colin and I had some unfinished business to attend to. As you can see, everything is fine. Thank you for your concern.”
Looking at Colin, the younger officer smiled. “Next time, try parking in the driveway instead of on the curb.”
Regan could tell that Colin didn’t appreciate the editorial comments. “I’ll be leaving soon anyway. We were done.”
“What was it you were doing?” the older officer asked.
Regan shot a look at Colin, begging him to create a plausible story. After a full minute, Colin answered, “My wife, ex-wife, needed some signatures on some banking papers.”
“This late at night?”
“Yes. She was out earlier this evening and I had things I was doing.” He’d been busy sitting on the couch at Jack’s house watching TV and wondering where the heck Regan was, but he wasn’t going to say that.
“We can walk out with you,” the older officer offered.
Colin knew this was all standard domestic violence protocol and he resented them using it on him. He was not there to harm the woman he loved.
“Give us a few more minutes, Officers,” Regan said with a sticky sweet tone to her voice.
The officers stepped back onto the porch so she could shut the door with them on one side and she and Colin on the other. “Seriously,” she said, stifling a giggle.
Colin knew he had only a few minutes before officers knocked on the door again, so he scurried up the stairs, grabbed his shirt, jacket, and whatever else he’d brought, and reluctantly got dressed.
“I don’t want to leave you, but if I don’t those two guys down there will make me regret it.” He placed a quick kiss on her lips and ran downstairs.
She stayed where she was in her room, dazed and frustrated with the way things were going. She heard Colin say as he left, “You guys really know how to mess up a guy’s night.”
The officer replied, “I thought you two were divorced.”
Regan hurried downstairs and relocked and bolted the door, then trudged back upstairs, her feet feeling incredibly heavy. There had to be a way to clear Colin’s name. It had to be done. She needed that man back in her life and not just for quickies, but for everything. She scooted under the covers and fell asleep, dreaming of her husband.
~ ~ ~
“I’ve got mediation in an hour with the family of this guy,” Colin told the group of women gathered around him in the dispatch office when Regan got to work a few weeks after he’d been kicked out of her house. “You know, the dead guy. The one they can’t find.” The women all broke into brittle laughter. “Anyway did I tell you the best part in this charade?” He glanced over at Regan.
She’d taken a seat at her console and turned on the computer, but she looked over in time to catch his eye.
“Her brother is one of the lawyers for the plaintiff.” He pointed in her direction. “Can you believe that shit?”
She felt the blood in her veins run cold. She hadn’t heard that level of contempt in Colin’s voice in, well, ever. He actually sounded like he was disgusted with her.
Swiveling around in her chair, she opened her mouth to say something to him, but at the last second she thought better of it and closed her mouth and swung her legs back under her desk. She shut her eyes and took a deep breath. Having Brian on the opposite side of the aisle from Colin was a bad idea and awkward, at best. She knew this as well as Colin did.
“She doesn’t even seem to care,” he added.
The women gaped between the two of them. Regan gave him a dirty look, hoping it would shut him up. How could he be so sweet and passionate with her one day and a few days later be a complete ass?
“What’s wrong, Regan? Problem?”
“Not with you, jerk.”
It was his turn to look unhappy. She suppressed a smile. Two could play at the game he’d started. “I was wondering what you would look like crying when my brother brings you down.”
His face turned from unhappy to murderous. Pushing the women aside, he approached her, leaned into her personal space, his hand on her shoulder burning through her thin shirt, and whispered, “You’d better be joking, because I’m innocent and the only way your brother will win is if hell freezes over.”
“You’re taking this act a bit too far. Knock it off,” she said.
He straightened, and, turning to his audience, bowed. “Ladies, it’s been a pleasure, but things have gone sour, so I will take my leave and go meet with the mediator. Blech.”
Regan rolled her eyes. He was laying it on thick. He turned back to her.
“I’ll catch your act in court.”
She grinned at him. “You’re on.”
Regan swiveled in her chair, trying to get to work after thoughts of Colin’s words swirled in her brain. Had he said those things for the act or because there was truth in them? She hoped it was for the performance. His words stung deep. She wasn’t rooting for her brother any more than Colin was interested in dating Kim. She only hoped he knew that.
As soon as Colin left, Regan found herself infested with nosy women. “Can you believe how obnoxious he was?”
“You poor thing,” Sheila said, grasping Regan’s shoulder right where Colin had touched her only seconds before.
“I’m so sorry you had to see him,” another woman said.
“Don’t worry about it, ladies. I’m getting used to seeing him around the station with women drooling all over him.” Using the word “ladies” was an insult in Regan’s mind. They were weak and simpering petty girls. With her well-placed barb, the women lost all pretenses of sympathy and scurried back to their cubicles, exactly as she intended.
Petty, but Regan was proud of herself. It was pathetic that her co-workers, the people who were supposed to be loyal to her were caught fondling Colin. At least she knew where she stood with them.
Very low.