Limbo (23 page)

‘Even if it means you don’t have any?’

‘Sure. But everyone believes in something, don’t you think?’

Joy thought about that. She believed in being kind. She thought the whole world would be a better place if everyone was just kinder to each other but she wasn’t sure it was quite the same thing as a higher power.

‘Did you ever believe?’ she asked. ‘Surely you must have once upon a time if you were practically bought up in a church?

He reached for some chips and threw them in his mouth. ‘Sure.’

‘What happened?

Lance took a few long swallows of his beer. ‘Six years ago my best friend became a paraplegic in an accident, a favourite teacher of mine lost his sight and my mother died of cancer.’

‘
Jeez-us
.’ Joy guzzled her beer. ‘Now that’s an annus horribilus.’

‘Yes. I found it kind of hard to reconcile all that with a benevolent God.’

Joy nodded as she munched absently on some BBQ chips. She could see how that would upset the applecart. ‘It didn’t turn your father away?’

‘No. I think it bought him closer.’ Lance shrugged. ‘Faith’s like that for some people I guess.’

‘Yes.’ Joy had seen faith get people through horrendous suffering. People who had lost loved ones in terrible circumstances who could still stand beside the coffin and say
God needed a new angel in heaven
.

‘So why stick around? With your Dad. Why even be part of it all? Why let him press-gang you into the choir project if you’re not a believer?’

‘Because I believe in my father. And in good works.’

Joy remembered the five dollars he’d just shelled out. She lifted her Corona bottle to him. ‘Good answer.’

He grinned as he tapped his bottle against hers and drained half of it. ‘So. Are you going to tell me
how
you fucked up today or am I going to have to guess?’

Joy snorted. ‘Good luck with that.’ She was fairly certain no-one would think
nudie pic.
Not even in their top one hundred tries.

‘Oh come on. I told you about my crippled friend, my blind teacher and my dead mother.’

Joy absently thought what a great county song that would make. ‘Not even if you threatened to remove my vocal cords. I’m going to keep that particularly humiliating incident locked up in the vault. Forever.’

‘Dude, I wouldn’t tell a soul. Promise.’ He drew a cross over his heart.

She rolled her eyes at him. ‘I’m not worried about you telling anybody. I’m worried about you laughing your ass off.’

‘Yeah, I probably couldn’t promise not to do that.’

‘Exactly.’

***

They sat at the table for the next two hours, drinking beer, eating chips and talking music and the industry. They even talked some more about the choir.

Eventually Lance checked his watch. ‘Eight o’clock,’ he said. ‘Sorry but I gotta go. Gotta pick Dad up from his bowling game.’

Joy laughed. ‘Of course he’s a bowler.’

‘Not just any bowler. He’s in the 300 club. C’mon,’ he said, draining the last of his third beer. ‘I’ll walk you home.’

‘Nah. I’m going to stay for a bit longer.’

Lance hesitated as he shrugged into his jacket. ‘The streets aren’t exactly safe around here.’

She shrugged. ‘It’s okay. I can look after myself.’

He hesitated for a moment and then much to her surprise he leaned down and kissed her on the cheek. ‘Thank you for indulging my old man in this choir thing.’

Joy smiled, humbled by Lance’s sweetness and sincerity. ‘Hopefully we can pull it off.’

He nodded. ‘We will.’

Joy watched him go, her fingers caressing the place where his lips had brushed. It was a refreshing change to meet an optimistic guy. She’d lived in a tunnel for so long, where everyone in it had tried their damnedest to make it and so few ever did. Everyone was a pessimist. Even when someone was doing well and things were working out, the sense that it could all end tomorrow was never far away.

Chris had been constantly paranoid about their gravy train crashing. And the cocaine had fed that paranoia. Of course, the irony was that it
had
all come to an end
because
of him and the white powder that had enslaved him.

Joy started as a heavy glass tumbler landed on her table and some liquid splashed over the edge. She glanced up.

‘You’re in my seat.’

‘
Dash
?’ Clearly he
hadn’t
stroked out then.

Still, he’d been the last person she’d been expecting. She’d been steeling herself to deal with him tomorrow and now here he was standing there looking down at her belligerently, his hair its usual finger-combed mess, his mouth full and brooding.

She remembered the nudie pic she’d sent and she was grateful for the poor lighting as he sat down in the seat Lance had just vacated.

‘Isn’t he a little too young for you?’

Tension crept along her neck muscles as Joy’s hackles rose. She refused to let Dash reduce her friendship with Lance to something sordid. Plus, she didn’t like his tone. ‘Have you been watching me?’

‘I came in five minutes ago. Couldn’t sit at my usual table because you and
blondie
were staring into each other’s eyes.’

Joy frowned. What the fuck was his problem? She hadn’t heard diddly squat from him since she’d practically sexted him this morning and
he
was pissed at
her?
She couldn’t believe she’d sent this asshole a picture of her breasts.

And
wasted her time second-guessing herself about it.

He was clearly
not
worthy of such a privilege.

‘Aren’t you supposed to be at home researching bad guys who stick up liquor shops?’

Raw heat and energy rolled off Dash as his glare cut through the dimness, piercing her with a predatory glitter. He raised his glass. ‘I needed a break.’

He swallowed it all down, his gaze never leaving her face. A hint of his aftershave wafted towards her, suddenly spicing the air between them and causing a little extra skip in her pulse. She sucked in an unsteady breath. Her horniness from earlier returned full throttle, growling through the fibres of her belly.

She pushed it away in disgust as she squeezed her thighs together tight.

He was pissed at her. She was pissed at him.

This was
not
a signal for sexy times.

But maybe there was just something flawed about her. This was how she’d always found Chris most attractive. When he was all moody and sullen and spoiling for a fight. She loved needling him just a little, ready for the moment he went all rocker bad boy, exploding in a passionate stream, gesticulating wildly and ranting with such devastating poetry. It was when he wrote his best lyrics. It was when they’d had their best sex.

God, it had turned her on so freaking bad.

Their blow-your-head-off make-up sex had been seriously hot stuff.

But that was fucked up.

And this was Dash.

Jules came to their rescue, smiling at them as she collected their glasses. ‘Another?’

‘Yes please,’ Dash said. ‘A double.’ He looked at Joy. ‘You want something else?’

‘I’ll have another Corona.’

He snorted. ‘Chick’s beer.’

Jules raised her eyebrow at Joy. Joy shook her head slightly then glared at Dash. ‘I’m sure all those hot Mexican dudes would disagree but hey, if it’s too lightweight for you, I’ll have a tequila.’ She looked at Jules. ‘Double thanks.’

‘Coming right up, darlin’.’

Joy watched her walk away, conscious of Dash’s heavy gaze. Was he thinking about the nudie pic?

What the fuck had possessed her?

‘So,’ she said, forcing herself to face him, to smile pleasantly. If he was pissed at her about the picture he could damn well tell her or he could pull his head out of his ass. ‘Have you gleaned anything yet?’

Whatever this weird, unwanted sexual energy was between them, Isabella Richardson was still out there somewhere. So they might as well stick to safe topics.

Dash looked like he was going to argue for a moment. Or blow her off with some inane comment. But maybe he, too, saw the merit in moving the conversation into safer territory.

‘There are about three good possibilities. I think.’ He shoved his hand into his hair and, with his hostility gone, Joy realised how tired he sounded. ‘Although there are probably a dozen others who could also fit the bill.’

A dozen? Joy’s shoulder’s fell as her heart sank all the way to her boots.
Crap.
‘That sounds like a lot.’

He nodded. ‘It is. But I’m sure I could eliminate most of them. I need to go through everything again and eliminate the least likely from what I know.
After
I’ve had a break. I’ve been looking at them all day and it’s all just blurring together.’

Jules arrived with their drinks. ‘Get that into you,’ she said to Dash as she placed his scotch in front of him. ‘You need to relax honey.’

‘Thanks,’ he said, and took a decent swallow from his drink.

Joy slammed her tequila straight back. It burned all the way down. ‘Maybe I can help?’ she asked.

It was the wrong thing to say entirely. Tequila had a nasty habit of making her say the wrong things. Also of making her clothes fall off.

She
really
should know better than to drink tequila by now.

The last thing she needed with this weird vibe between them tonight was to offer her services. Either after tequila or because of it.

But it sounded like he needed a fresh set of eyes.

Maybe that was her?

‘You can’t help.’

His voice was rumbly. Forbidding. It should have been enough to make her back off. It wasn’t. ‘You said it helps to talk things out. To bounce things off other people.’

‘I didn’t mean you.’

Joy raised her eyebrows at his very definitive reply. ‘Well I’m all you’ve got tonight, buddy.’

He stared into his drink. ‘I’m fine with waiting til tomorrow.’

Joy shook her head. The more he resisted, the more determined she became. ‘Why put off til tomorrow? We could solve this whole damn thing tonight and anyway, I’m dying to see what you
do
have now. Plus…I’m feeling lucky.’

Not to mention really freaking horny.

‘C’mon, drink up,’ she said, standing.

He looked up at her. ‘Where are you going?’

‘I’ve had three beers and two shots of tequila. I need to pee. Then you and I, we’re going to go look at bad guys.’

Joy made sure she put an extra swing in her hips as she walked away.

Boots? She was wearing her regulation black skinny jeans tucked into
knee-high boots
. Where the fuck were her Docs? Dash dragged his gaze off her boots
and
that ass with difficulty then threw back the rest of his drink. He did not need Little Miss Nudie Pic in his apartment tonight.

His concentration had been shot all day because of that little stunt she’d pulled. And it didn’t matter that he’d deleted it straight away — well, within the hour anyway — because it was in his head now.

Occupying grey matter. Taking up space. Space that should be reserved for figuring out where the hell Isabella Richardson was.

As if it wasn’t bad enough having fornicating fish to distract him, now he had Joy’s breasts to contend with as well. The only thing she could have done worse was taken a picture of her ass.

She was definitely not —
no way, no how
— coming home with him. The only way she could
help
him involved her showing him some more of what she had on under her clothes and he was just horny enough to tonight to push his luck.

He had to remember that this wasn’t like last time. She wasn’t in town for a few hours before buggering off overseas, never to be seen again. She lived ten minutes from him. He was working a case for her.

Eve dug her. Katie adored her. Ralph was probably going to name every single one of his offspring after her.

She’d only been back in his life for a couple of weeks and she was already permeating every corner. And you didn’t mess with that. She was forever destined to be off-limits.

The last thing she wanted was a broken-down ex-cop, twelve years her senior, with a huge black mark against his name. And the last thing he needed was to screw up and piss off a woman who had a stash of ouija boards at her disposal.

Besides, he had Katie to think about. Occasional meaningless sex was going to be his lot for a long time to come.

He caught some movement in the arc of light that shone from the restroom corridor and turned his head. Joy was there with some guy. He was standing in her way and when she tried to pass him he grabbed her arm.

What the fuck?

A surge of adrenaline pushed Dash to his feet in a nanosecond. His inner turmoil fell away to nothing as rage crystallised like ice in his veins and his feet kicked into gear.

Dash reached them in time to hear Joy say, ‘Listen, dickwad, if you don’t let me pass you and your balls are going to wish you did.’

The guy was big. He towered over Joy. Hell, he probably had Dash by an inch or two. He could probably pin her to the wall just by leaning into her. But he stunk like a brewery and was unsteady on his feet.

‘You heard the lady,’ he said.

The guy spun to find Dash standing behind him, his big paw still on Joy’s arm. ‘This ain’t no lady,’ he sniggered drunkenly.

‘You got that right, moron,’ Joy muttered and Dash watched as she bought the wedge heel of her boot down on his instep. The guy cried out, swinging back to Joy in surprise, crumpling over a little as he reached for his injury. Joy took full advantage, lifting her knee hard in the direction of his groin.

Even Dash winced as the guy let her go in deference to his smashed nuts. ‘Why you little bitch!’ he snapped, grabbing for her again but Dash was done with standing back. He blocked the guy then yanked him up and slammed him back against the wall, pinning him there by his throat, pushing in a little harder against his trachea than was absolutely necessary.

Dash was breathing hard as adrenaline buzzed through his veins and his pulse swooshed through his ears. The guy made some incomprehensible gurgling noises and his eyes bulged a little and Dash eased up slightly.