Haynes, K. R. - The Light in Her Eyes [In Her Eyes] (Siren Publishing Classic)

THE LIGHT IN HER EYES

In Her Eyes

K. R. HAYNES

Copyright © 2012

Chapter One

Exhausted from another long night on patrol, Officer Randall couldn’t help but wish this damn shift would end already. Nights like these Randall could just kick himself for losing his self-control with that dumbass wannabe bomber a few weeks back. Randall’s fists had ended up costing him a two month suspension from the Bomb Squad for disciplinary reasons for knocking the wannabe bomber out cold.

So now Randall was stuck serving his two-month suspension on patrol instead of disarming bombs for the Bomb Squad. All because that dumbass wannabe bomber had squealed to Randall’s team leader about police brutality or some shit like that. Hell, the dumbass had deserved the beating down he received after attempting to blow up the bank downtown.

His suspension sucked even more since Randall’s captain vowed to detain his ass permanently to the dreaded graveyard shift if Randall so much as sneezed in the wrong direction. It was no coincidence either that the graveyard shift happened to be the worst shift a cop could be stuck with when on active patrol.

A cop’s only entertainment on the graveyard shift was to charge as many reckless drivers as possible for any driving infringements, no matter how minor they were. So Randall was none too pleased when he noticed a blue hatchback driving recklessly in front of him. He didn’t hesitate in trailing the vehicle for a couple of blocks while he decided whether or not to pull the young woman driver over. Could he really turn a blind eye to her blatant disregard of the road rules? Not in this life time. That woman was getting a hefty ticket with her name on it whether she wanted one or not.

With a flick of a switch Randall flashed his patrol lights at the woman driver, signalling for her to pullover to the side of the road. He parked his patrol car behind the offending woman’s car and then exited the patrol car and made his way over the woman’s car.

“Damn female drivers,” he grunted out as he stopped beside the driver’s side door and tapped lightly on the tinted window.

Randall waited patiently for the woman inside the car to roll down the car window. The last person he had expected to see tonight was his old high school flame. Chloe Watson.

“License and registration, please, miss.” Yeah, curt and polite that was him all right. Not a flicker of recognition danced across her angelic face. Chloe didn’t even bat her eyelids at him. Randall watched in almost disbelief as she pulled her license and registration papers free from the glove box and handed them over to him. It was like Chloe hadn’t even recognised him, didn’t even know who he was. How could she not know him, when Randall had been the one who had stolen her heart and her virginity more than ten years ago? Well, maybe stolen was too harsh a word to use, being that they were both no more than teenagers at the time. Still, stolen sure felt pretty damn close to the truth though.

Her sharp hazel-coloured eyes lifted to his face to study him. A hint, just a hint of remembrance danced in her eyes for the briefest of seconds. Then, just like that, it was
gone.

“Here you go, officer.” Chloe’s voice still sounded remarkably soft and subtle, just the way he remembered it.

Taking the papers from her outstretched hand, Randall warned Chloe to wait in her vehicle while he checked them out. Ambling back to the patrol car he could feel her eyes on him. She seemed nervous around him. Or was it more the uniform that made her tense? Randall nearly made the mistake of saying Chloe’s name out loud before even glancing down at her license details. A mistake he couldn’t afford to make again with her.

* * * *

Sitting silently in her car chewing nervously on her bottom lip, Chloe couldn’t figure out why she suddenly seemed so nervous. There was something about that officer, something that had the ability to shake her to her very soul and make her feel like some giddy teenager all over again. What’s with that? She was nearly twenty-seven years old for Christ’s sake. Yet this cop made her feel like she was sweet sixteen all over again.

Chloe had no intention of reliving her sixteenth year.

Although, these days she had trouble recalling much of what had happened during her sixteenth year. Most of it was one gigantic blur, and not because she had partied hard celebrating her sixteenth birthday. It was more the fact that she had absolutely no memory of what had happened in her life during the first six months of her sixteenth year.

Every so often she would get moments, flashes of those missing six months. But they weren’t significant enough to provoke a full memory. Everything else in her life, events and birthday celebrations, et cetera, Chloe could remember with full clarity except for those missing six months. There was no medical explanation for her memory loss. She hadn’t suffered any head injuries or traumas that could account for it.

The only other plausible explanation to account for her memory loss was an emotional blockage caused by a breakdown in a relationship, or from heartbreak, even. But with no memory of a bad breakup with a former boyfriend or a relationship meltdown, it was pretty hard for her to know if that was the cause or not. Her doctor had advised her at the time that it was only temporary. Over ten years, however, wasn’t temporary by her book.

When the officer made his way back over to her parked car, Chloe couldn’t resist watching the muscles in his taut legs twitch with each step he took. Even when he leant his tall, lean muscular frame against her car, she couldn’t stop staring at him or breathing in his scent.
He stood so close to her, his masculine scent infused her senses, causing her hormones to leap with joy. Not to mention the effect he had on her heart rate, which was currently beating at a million miles an hour. All of which had absolutely nothing to do with being pulled over. It was all
him.

This officer had this effect on her.

Her
gaze shifted up to
his strong, masculine face, made harsher and way sexier by the five-o’clock shadow dusting his jaw line. The growth from a long day’s work, no doubt. Chloe tried to find something that made this officer seem vaguely familiar to her. Her eyes took in his strong-featured jawline, the darkness of his blond hair, even the intensity of his penetrating glare he was throwing her way. The blueness of his eyes reminded her of a cloudless blue sky on a hot summer’s day.

Nothing about the officer seemed familiar to her, yet at the same time
Chloe couldn’t shake off the feeling of knowing him somehow.

Hearing the officer pose a question to her brought Chloe back to the reality of being pulled over by him.

“Miss, were you aware you were driving your car with a blown taillight?”

Shit. She wasn’t. “No, sir, I mean officer, I wasn’t.”

Chloe watched as the officer’s body tensed up upon hearing the word
sir
slip past her lips. Even if she had said the word by mistake there was no mistaking the effect that lone word had on him. A quick glance down at his crotch confirmed just how much it affected him. She stared in amazement as his groin twitched right before her eyes.

Her cheeks warmed when she heard the officer clearing his throat. Glancing back up at him, it was clear to her he enjoyed her perusal of him. She swallowed hard as he leant further in to her car, his sharp eyes narrowed down at her.

He asked her point blank, “Do you mind telling me why you are driving your car around without a seat belt on, Chloe?”

Oh hell, he had noticed that, too. Now how she going to explain herself without sounding like a complete fool in front of him? “Well, umm, it’s kind of stuck, officer.”

The officer raised an eyebrow at her lame answer. “Stuck?”

“Yes.”

“How do you mean, stuck?”

“Well, it was working this morning when I drove to the bus station, but now it’s, well, stuck.” To demonstrate what she meant, Chloe reached behind her for the seat belt and gave it a few good tugs to show him. “See, nothing.”

“Stuck, is it?” the officer offered, the slightest hint of sarcasm entering his voice.

She nodded her head. The officer narrowed his eyes further down at her, giving Chloe the impression he viewed her like he would a lying kid. He knew damn well she hadn’t lied to him and most definitely wasn’t a kid. The officer’s attitude toward her irked her to no end. Christ, the officer didn’t even know her as a person and yet here he stood, viewing her as a liar.

As if she could or would lie to a cop. Come on. Yeah, sure, Chloe knew she made rash, stupid decisions when it came to men sometimes. Well, hell, most of the time. However, she wasn’t so stupid to lie to an officer of the law. Not when the officer in question just happened to be a rather striking specimen of the male species, standing there in his dark navy blue police uniform.

Turning in her seat to face him,
Chloe glared up at the officer. The officer in turn pierced her with his own glare.
Silently she sat there, challenging the officer to come right out and tell her to her face that she was indeed lying to him. The need to set him straight driving her, Chloe wanted to clear her name. It was a matter of principal. She wanted to tell him he had no right in judging her when he did not even know her. She held her tongue instead. She bit the inside of her cheek to stop the words from tumbling out of her mouth, knowing no good could come from them. Her heated words would only get her into more trouble than it’s worth. At the end of the day it so wasn’t worth it.

A thought blasted through her brain then. Was the officer himself worth it though? Chloe couldn’t allow herself to think along those lines, not tonight, and most definitely not about him!

Hearing the officer advising her to exit her vehicle so he could take a look at the seat belt for her, Chloe unlocked her door as the officer stepped away allowing her to exit the vehicle safely.

Standing at the front of her car on the side of the road, Chloe couldn’t help but let her eyes roam over the officer’s taut frame as he leaned inside her car. His roughened-up hands gripped the seat belt and gave it a few good tugs to test it out.
There was no doubt in her mind that he was probably also testing out the truth to her words, seeing if she had flat out lied to him or not.

The officer turned to face her
. “You’re right, miss, it does seem to be locked, or stuck, as you put it.”

Told you so,
was on the tip of her tongue to say back to him. Chloe remained silent, figuring telling the officer that she had been right all along was probably not in her best interest right now.

The officer
squared his shoulders back and narrowed his eyes further at her silence.
His eyes never left hers as he continued to stare her down. It was only by a miracle that Chloe didn’t shiver from the strength of his unyielding stare. She took a tentative step back from him, which had him instantly shifting forward, crowding back into her personal space once again.

“You mind telling me why you risked your life tonight while driving your car unprotected from the hidden dangers these roads are known for, Chloe?”

“I–I…”

“You what, miss?”

The gruffness of his voice should have scared her, but it didn’t. Yes, the officer had every right to be angry at her for playing a foolish game of Russian roulette with her own life. And it was her life, not his, at the end of the day. It still didn’t explain his overreaction toward her driving recklessly though.

When the officer explained to her how he had seen too many accidents and deaths caused by those same hidden dangers these roads were known for, and how nine out of ten times those same accidents could have been prevented if the driver had paid more attention to their surroundings, Chloe was left reflecting on how stupid her actions had been tonight.

She had taken a stupid risk by driving without a seat belt, and yes, she probably shouldn’t have been so flippant about her safety either. That, however, didn’t explain the officer’s overreaction toward her foolhardiness. The way the officer acted confused her. He acted as if she meant something to him. How could that be when she didn’t even know his damn name?

“I don’t know,” she said to him. Resting a hand on her hip, Chloe stared defiantly back at him as she continued to rant at him. “I mean it’s not like I could leave my car at the bus station unattended and walk home in the dark unprotected now, could I?”

His reaction to her sassy comment wasn’t missed by her. Chloe knew damn well if she belonged to him, the officer would’ve thrown her over his knee right there and then and slapped her arse until it blushed to his satisfaction.

Her sassy comments toward him and her flippant attitude toward her own safety seem to flip something inside him. His whole demeanour changed right before her eyes. His stance became more dominating and brooding. Chloe found she wasn’t fearful of this sudden change in his attitude. In fact she was rather turned on by it. Even the authority in his voice when he spoke to her sent a delicious thrill racing throughout her body.