Burnout (NYPD Blue & Gold) (11 page)

The men jumped to obey his orders and dragged Harding outside to a squad car. The sound of running feet caught Mike’s attention, and Rose flew into Jimmy’s arms. She clung to him, gripping his uniform shirt in her clenched hands.

“You’re safe now, Rosie. I’m here.” Jimmy kissed Rose’s forehead, then buried his face in her hair.

Mike choked back a tight laugh. So much for Rose’s determination to stave off the affections of his deputy chief.

When he turned back to Cassie, she gave him a weary smile. She’d been watching Jimmy and Rose. Her eyes glistened and a tear rolled down her cheek, leaving a damp trickling trail on her smooth skin. Without a second thought, he reached out to cup the side of her face, gently rubbing away her tear with the pad of his thumb. Protective urges welled up hard and fast.

“Did he hurt you?” he asked.

When Cassie shook her head, something inside him snapped and he clasped her shoulders. “That was the stupidest, most reckless stunt I’ve ever seen.” His voice rose as the gut-wrenching fear he’d kept tightly reined in exploded. “You could have been killed. What the hell possessed you to put yourself in danger like that? You should have waited for the police—for me, dammit—to get here.”

Other officers in the kitchen discreetly busied themselves with crowd control and answering their squawking radios.

“For
you
to get here?” She knocked his hands away and glared at him. “There was no time. I did what I had to,
when
I had to. If I hadn’t, Abby might have been killed. She could have miscarried from the stress. How dare you berate me as if I’m totally incapable?”

Mike stared at the vision of fearless, irate beauty refusing to back down. “I never said you were incapable.” Fact was, she’d handled herself amazingly, all cool under pressure.

She jabbed a graceful finger at him. “You think since you have a badge and a gun you have all the answers.”

“I never said that, either.”

“No, but you’re thinking it.”

Mike invaded Cassie’s personal space so they stood almost chest to chest. “What I’m thinking is that I want to throttle you.” He moved in closer and lowered his voice. “Or kiss you senseless until you shut up.”

Her narrowed eyes suddenly went soft, shimmering like emeralds. “Oh.”

“I’ll take that.” He grasped the butt of Harding’s gun still hooked in Cassie’s waistband. She reached for it at the same time and their hands touched. Something strong stirred within his chest, battling with his duty and his steely determination to stay away from her. Mike stuck the gun inside his belt.

To hell with decorum.

He was about to pull Cassie into his arms and kiss her when a white flash lit the kitchen, reflecting in all directions off the stainless-steel refrigerators.

The
Hopewell Springs Gazette
photographer snapped off shot after shot. Cassie held her hands in front of her face, trying to shield herself from the photographer. Was that…panic on her face? With his hand at the small of her back, Mike urged her out the back door. “Take her home,” he ordered one of his officers standing guard. To Cassie, he said softly, “I’ll come by later to take your statement.”

As she was escorted out the door, she sent him a worried, grateful look over her shoulder.

Rose and Jimmy still clung to each other while the photographer continued to snap away. Mike stepped in front of the man and covered the camera lens with his hand. “Outside. Now!” he ordered in a hard yet courteous tone. He’d learned long ago that news photographers were nothing but vultures hell-bent on documenting people’s misfortune for all the world to gawk at. When the photographer began to object, Mike scowled and shook his head. “Not a chance.”

The photographer reluctantly complied, going back through the dining area and exiting the front door. Mike strode into the dining room and issued commands to his men to cordon off the restaurant and commence interviewing witnesses. He stared at the location where minutes before, Harding held a gun to Cassie’s head.

Jesus, if the kid’s finger had slipped, she would have been killed before his eyes. Last time, it had been a woman whose name he hadn’t known until he’d woken up from a coma a month after she’d been buried. That had been bad enough. This time, it could have been Cassie.

Mike’s heart wrenched. He should let her go.

Her?

Cassie
and
the woman whose death he had caused. Both refused to leave him in peace. The dead woman still came to him in his nightmares. Cassie, on the other hand, haunted his nights
and
his days. But his track record was lousy. Since Elaine, he’d never let a woman get close, and he inevitably ended up hurting all the ones who’d tried. He didn’t have it in him anymore to let one get under his skin. Or had that already happened?

Mike drew his brows together. The pain of Elaine’s duplicity didn’t compare to what he’d felt when Cassie had been in danger. They hadn’t known each other for very long, but if he’d lost her today…

Much as it killed him, his interest in Cassie was no longer strictly professional.

Against his better judgment, now it was personal.

Chapter Ten

“So much for keeping a low profile.” Cassie shook her head as she recalled Dom’s warning over the phone the other day.

Getting her picture snapped by the local news photographer hardly constituted keeping her head low. Maybe the photographer hadn’t gotten a clear shot, and even if he had, no one in the Big Apple would notice what happened in a backwater town this far north of the city, right?

Maybe.

She picked up a small branch that had fallen onto the back porch and heaved it to the far end of the yard. Raven’s nails scrabbled on the porch as she darted off to chase after the stick.

Suddenly exhausted, Cassie sank onto a green wooden rocking chair and watched Raven frolic in the yard. The uneasy feeling she may have just blown her cover simmered in her gut like an inflamed ulcer.

Cassie turned up the volume of the boom box sitting on the wicker table and Shania Twain’s smooth, mellow voice filled the evening air. She picked up her wineglass and took another slug of freezing cold Chardonnay. The cool liquid trickled down her throat to her empty stomach, and from there went directly to work numbing her brain. Precisely what she needed, not to feel or worry about anything. At least for one night.

Earlier, one of Mike’s men had ferried her Trail Blazer home, then Rose had called to check on her and assure her the Nest would be closed for the remainder of the day due to the ensuing police activity. Good thing, too. With no food in her stomach since breakfast, the alcohol was kicking in hard and fast.

The old rocker creaked as she pushed her bare toes against the warm porch floor. Raven amused herself by flipping the stick into the air, then trying to catch it. Birds in the tall maple trees bordering the property twittered away. Hardly seemed like anything bad could happen in a quiet place like Hopewell Springs. But it had.

Cassie grasped the bottle of wine, and it trembled in her hands while she poured. The clear golden liquid gushed out, some of it spilling onto the table. She set the bottle and glass down, but her hands still shook and she heaved a pathetic sigh.

As a seasoned city detective, guns were a regular and necessary part of her world, but having one jammed into the side of her skull by a shaky drug addict was an entirely different matter. If Mike hadn’t been there today, she might very well be dead. And that hit man would have lost out on a hefty fee.

A chill went through her. The hit man was still out there, searching for her.

If Gray and Dom couldn’t find this guy soon…

Hiding forever would be impossible, not to mention impractical. She had another life, another job deep in the bowels of New York City. Sooner or later, she had to face that reality. As the truth slammed into her, an unexpected lump rose in her throat. She didn’t want to leave Hopewell Springs. Ever.

For the first time in years, she was happy. Truly happy. Her dream job was at the Nest, not to mention all her friends. Everyone at the restaurant had already become an extended part of her family. And then there was Mike. Infuriating, confusing, gorgeous Michael Flannery. One minute he would say hurtful and insulting things and push her away, and the next he would surprise her with unexpected tenderness.

But the last thing she wanted in her life was another cop who played emotional mind games and could never treat her as an equal. She wanted a partner, a friend and lover who could be all those things a man should be without the macho need to stifle who and what she was.

Cassie drew a calming breath, inhaling the sweet, floral scent from her neighbor’s rose garden. Between the wine and sheer exhaustion, she managed to relax and close her eyes.

Raven’s claws clicked on the wood floor as she trotted up the stairs and shoved her head beneath Cassie’s hand. She stroked the dog’s warm silky ears, taking immense comfort in Raven’s protective nature. Anyone within a few feet of the property would set off the dog’s barking alarm.

Thump, thump, thump.

Cassie snapped open her eyes and jolted upright. She understood it was Raven’s tail making that noise, but why?

Something moved at the far end of the yard, and she gripped the arm rails.

“Oh, jeez.” Her breath came out in a loud
whoosh
.

It was Mike. Not the hit man coming to take her out.

Mike kicked the rear fence gate shut behind him and strode toward her, carrying a silver clipboard and a large paper shopping bag under one arm. In his other hand, he balanced a pizza box. Terror fled, replaced by a comforting warmth that spread through Cassie like a sip of hot chocolate on a ten-below-zero day.

Mike had changed from his uniform into a pair of faded jeans and a navy blue polo shirt. Cassie’s gaze traveled up and down the length of him, absorbing every tantalizing detail of his perfect physique. She was still somewhat ticked at the way he’d behaved after Harding had been taken away, but for the moment it was impossible to ignore the way he filled out civilian clothes.

The polo shirt hugged his chest, outlining every ripped inch of his broad upper body. His muscular thighs would make any woman take notice. Sunlight glinted off his short dark hair and made his deep blue eyes bluer. As he walked toward her, he smiled in that roguish way of his, sparking a pleasant fluttering inside her rib cage.

It was a wonder he wasn’t married, or at least fending off advances from every female within a hundred-mile radius. Not only was he intelligent, but he had a wildly attractive, potently sexual side to him—the same side that had kissed her senseless. Cassie imagined stripping him out of his uniform, slowly, one piece of gear at a time.

She glared at Raven as her tail continued to pound the floor. The dog shot from the porch to cavort around Mike’s legs, brazenly begging him to pet her.

“Hussy,” Cassie muttered. Damned dog had the softest spot for Mike in her furry little heart.

“I knocked on the front door,” Mike said in his deep, sexy voice as he took the stairs two at a time, “but you didn’t answer.” He set down on the table what he was carrying and crouched to give Raven a quick scratch behind both her ears. Over the dog’s head, he met Cassie’s gaze. “How are you feeling?”

“Fine, just tired.” Exhausted, more like it.

Her eyes were drawn to Mike’s large, tanned hands as he patted Raven’s head. Tingles shot across her skin as she remembered the feel of those hands on her body.

Mike dodged Raven’s snout as she tried to land lick after lick on his face. “Okay, okay, girl.” He laughed and gave her one final pat before she flopped down and rolled onto her side for a nap.

He came to stand over Cassie until she had to crane her neck to see his face. There was genuine caring and worry etched in his features.

She smiled tightly. “Did you come here to yell at me again about how stupid and reckless I was?”

“I didn’t come here to yell at you about anything.”

“Or to bite my head off for not waiting for the police?”

A slow, sexy grin crept to his lips. “I didn’t come here to bite you, either.”

Too bad.
Cassie couldn’t help but smile back at his suggestive words.

“I’m here to take your statement.” Mike stepped closer, bringing with him the smell of soap, shampoo, and that spicy aftershave Cassie loved. “But I’m also here to talk if you need to.”

With alcohol lowering her defenses, she wanted to tell him everything. Anxiety was eating her up inside.

Not now…not yet
, a little voice inside her head warned. Mike was here to fulfill his professional obligations, but he’d brought her dinner, and the last thing she wanted was to spoil the moment.

“You did good today,” he said after a long moment. Cassie widened her eyes, eliciting a deep rumble from Mike’s chest. “You’re surprised to hear me say that.”

“Of course I’m surprised. The way you lit into me, I figured you for a macho cop who doesn’t take kindly to a mere woman usurping his authority.”

“Usurping?” Mike laughed, clearly amused at her word choice. “Maybe that’s what you want to think of me, but that’s not the way I am.”

“Then why did you get so mad at me?”

He knelt and grasped her hands. “Because you scared the hell out of me. You could have died today.”

The intense expression on his face touched her unexpectedly. “Gee, officer.” She batted her eyelashes. “I didn’t know you cared.”

“I do care.” His eyes bored into hers as he caressed her hands. “I know I don’t show it much. Been told I’ve got that down to a science.”

“Ya think?”

Mike laughed. “I should have known you of all people wouldn’t make this easy on me.”

He touched his fingers to her cheek, and Cassie nearly melted from the gesture. A couple days ago, she’d been ready to write him out of her life, and now she was thinking of doing a one-eighty and plunging headfirst wherever he wanted to take her.

“So tell me,” she said, leaning into his hand, allowing him to rub her cheek in delicious circles. “What happened to make you hold all these caring feelings inside?”

When his hand stilled, she knew the spell had been broken. Something in his past kept him locked up tight, and he wasn’t about to divulge it, at least not tonight.

Mike removed his hand, leaving her cheek suddenly cold. “All I’m saying is, next time leave the police work to me, okay? I get paid to put my life on the line, you don’t.”

“You’d have done the same thing if you’d been in my position.”

“Probably, but being the head macho cop in town, that’s my job. Not yours.”

The next thing she knew she was hauled to her feet and Mike’s arms were around her, enveloping her in a warm cocoon of comfort and security. And there was nowhere else on earth she’d rather be.

He kissed the top of her head and nestled his jaw against her hair. Pressed as she was against his hard, protective body, it was as if he could shield her from all the evil closing in around her.

“Hey.” Mike glanced down to where she had his shirt fisted in her hands. “It’s normal to have a reaction like this after extreme duress.” He dropped a soft kiss on her forehead.

Mike was right, Cassie realized, releasing the death grip she had on his shirt. The stress of the armed robbery combined with the constant and growing anxiety over waking in the middle of the night to find a man with a goatee and hook-shaped nose pointing a gun at her was finally hitting home.

Not wanting to give up Mike’s warm, protective embrace, she snuggled tighter against his chest, sliding her hands up his solid back. No Kevlar this time, nothing between her fingers and his body but thin fabric.

A light breeze rustled the maple trees and curled around them, blowing several strands of hair across her cheek. Mike tucked a lock of hair behind her ear. “Sorry about the photographer. He’s not usually so ballsy, but nothing this exciting has happened around here in years. Probably thinks he’ll win a Pulitzer.”

“Maybe all he got was a nice picture of my hands in front of my face.” Or so she prayed.

Her stomach took that moment to let out a loud growl. Raven responded with an equally unfeminine whine.

“Have you eaten dinner?” Mike raised his eyebrows.

She nodded to her wineglass on the table. “Just grape juice.”

“You need food.” He released her and went to the table to pull paper plates from the bag he’d set down next to the pizza.

Cassie sighed. The heck with the pizza. All she wanted was Mike’s strong arms around her for the rest of the night.

“Let’s eat,” he said, then lifted two slices of pizza from the box and set them on paper plates. The smell of hot cheese, peppers, and sausage teased her nose. He reached into the bag again and came out with a six-pack of beer and a bottle of Chianti. “Didn’t know whether you preferred wine or beer. Seems you’ve already chugged half a bottle.” He nodded to her half-empty bottle of Chardonnay.

Cassie let out a strained laugh, feeling much of her tension float away. Being around Mike was becoming more than comfortable. It was becoming…what?

Exciting one minute, gooey and warm like a freshly baked cinnamon bun the next.

Could it be that amid all the chaos and craziness, right smack in the middle of an armed robbery and being pursued by a relentless hit man, she’d not only discovered a new career but perhaps something else, something equally important?

…

Mike grabbed his beer from the porch table and took a swig. Cassie sat across from him, inhaling her second slice of pizza. While she chewed, he rolled the cold bottle between his palms.

Just as he had back in the Nest, he was knocked speechless by how close he’d come to losing her. It had felt like a hockey puck whacked into his chest.

He set down the beer, grabbed his third slice, and began to make quick work of it. His eyes were drawn to Cassie’s mouth as she wrapped her lips around a piece of crust and pulled off a large bite. He imagined her pink lips wrapped around part of
him
, and he instantly grew hard.

Shit.

He reached for his beer again and chugged it.

There was no denying he wanted her. Wanted to make love to her until the sun rose, but what she needed most right now was sleep. Lots of it. Sleep was the best remedy for shock and stress, not some horny guy jumping her bones.

Focus on something else.
Anything
else.

Despite the missing parts to Cassie’s past, she was a good person, he knew that now firsthand. He’d seen her caring for her customers and colleagues as if they were her own family. During the robbery, she’d put her life on the line for Abby, a woman she barely knew. Cassie was one hell of a courageous, compassionate woman, and she deserved better than someone who could never open up to her.

The way he never could again.

“Mmm,” Cassie moaned as she chased after a runaway strand of stringy mozzarella hanging from her slice of pizza. Mike watched, spellbound as she entwined the long strand of cheese around and around her tongue before swallowing it. “I didn’t think you could get pizza this good so far away from New York City.” An orgasmic smile lit her face.

“Huh?” Mike blinked, then cleared his throat. “So you’re from the city?”