Limbo (25 page)

‘Like on
Numbers
?’

Dash frowned. ‘That FBI TV show about the maths genius?’

‘Yep.’

‘Yeah.
Just
like that,’ he muttered sarcastically as he turned back to the board. ‘Now, this guy…’ He pointed to the pockmarked face. ‘He’s another local. Joel Chancellor. He got released from jail seven months ago. He always has an accomplice and always uses a balaclava. His choice of weapon is different every time but they’ve always been hand guns.’

‘So…a shotgun doesn’t fit his MO right?’

Dash nodded. ‘No, it doesn’t. But I still like him for it. His release from jail coincided with the spate of liquor-store robberies and I’m not a huge believer in coincidence. And just because he didn’t use a shottie in the other stick-ups doesn’t mean he hasn’t got one, or access to one anyway. Or who knows, maybe he’s just…evolving?’

‘By abducting a mother and her kid? That sounds like devolving if you ask me.’

Dash gave a short sharp laugh. ‘Yes. And therein lies the real question. Or one of the two anyway.’ He threw his marker into the gutter and sat on the lounge. ‘
Why
would
any
of them want to abduct a baby if that’s how it went down? What the hell happened that night?’

She leaned forward. ‘Maybe…something happened with their…getaway car? And they saw Hailey’s unattended and decided to steal it? But then Isabella was in there and Hailey saw them doing it and rushed back? Do we know anything about the getaway cars these guys used? There is normally a getaway car right?’

‘Yes, usually. But there were no other feet in the video footage. Not crossing in front of the Pajero or trying to get in the driver’s side. Plus they hadn’t even robbed the store yet so why did they need the car at that stage?’

She flopped back against the corner of the couch. ‘True. Very true.’

‘But you make a good point.’ Dash stood and wrote getaway car above the three faces with two question marks beside it. ‘I’ll look into that angle. Ask Kimberley. Maybe the crime-scene photographer took some pictures of the cars parked in and around the car park that night that could lead us to them.’

He sat again because he liked to get a bit of distance between him and the board but he was excruciatingly aware of Joy sitting an arm’s length away at the end of the couch. He shifted away slightly so he couldn’t just each over and grab her, leaning forward at the same time, feigning interest in the board.

They both looked at the board for a few moments. ‘How much money was estimated as being stolen over all the robberies?’ Joy finally asked.

‘Forty thousand.’

‘
Jeez-us
,’ she said looking at him.

He didn’t look at her. Just kept his gaze firmly trained on the board. ‘Yup.’

Which wasn’t as smart a move as he thought because then she unfolded herself in his peripheral vision and headed for the board.

So now he was staring at that ass and it was definitely within grabbing distance. She paced up and down the length of the board stopping to look at each picture for long moments, the jeans cupping those cheeks to absolute perfection.

He remembered how that butt had felt in his hands, how it had filled them to
absolute perfection
. He dropped his face into his palms and prayed for patience.

And restraint.

She turned to him and he looked up, raking both hands through his hair. ‘What’s the other question?’

Every cell in his traitorous body booed when her butt disappeared from view. ‘What?’ He had way too much testosterone running around him at the moment to deal with vagueness.

She folded her arms across her chest. It gave her breasts a little extra definition and the cells cheered. ‘You said there were two
real
questions. One was why abduct a baby. The other one is?’

‘Oh.’ Dash fought through the heavy haze of lust blanketing his brain to the second question. ‘What happened after six months?’ he asked. ‘Why did they keep Hailey for six months? Was it deliberate? Was it random? Did something happen to trigger it? I just keep circling back to it.’

Joy chewed on her lip for a moment, clearly thinking through the possibilities. His gaze fell to her mouth. To where her teeth tortured her bottom lip.

Sweet Jesus, he wanted some of that.

‘I…don’t know?’ she said, shrugging her shoulders, her arms falling loosely to her sides as she looked down at him.

‘No.’ He lifted his gaze off her bottom lip to find her watching him. Watching him watch her mouth. ‘Neither do I.’

Their gazes locked for a few seconds before she turned back to the board to scrutinise the mug shots.

His returned to scrutinising her ass.

‘You know —’ Her voice sounded husky and she stopped to clear it before continuing, pulling Joel Chancellor’s picture off the board and inspecting it more closely. ‘What I don’t get is why a person who just gets out of jail starts knocking over liquor stores straight away?’

She turned back to face him and the first thing he noticed was the way her nipples were pebbled against the fabric of her shirt.
Ho. Ly. Fuck
. His heart just about seized in his chest. Was she trying to kill him?

They’d been like that in the nudie pic too. All scrunched and pebbly. And so damn
suckable
.

Crap.
He was actually salivating now.

‘Is forty K
really
worth going back to jail for?’

Dash realised for a moment that the question was for him and his brain took a few more seconds to catch up with it as it fluttered through his head.

Get your shit together man
. ‘Because,’ he said, also clearing his throat and keeping his gaze firmly trained on her face, ‘jail is all he knows. It’s home to him. It’s his… tribe. Some criminals just can’t make it on the outside. Kind of a better-the-devil-you-know thing.’

She blinked, her face a picture of you-must-be-shitting- me. ‘That’s seriously fucked up. I spent four hours in a holding cell once, that was enough for me.’

It was Dash’s turn to blink.
She had?
‘You did?’

Joy may be slightly…alternative but she didn’t strike him as someone who’d ever seen the inside of any kind of cell. But at least it had taken his mind out of the place it had spent ninety percent of its day — inside her shirt.

She placed the picture back on the board. ‘Oh yes.’

‘What happened?’

She walked back to the couch and settled herself in the corner again, this time with her knees drawn up to her chest, the folder of research near her feet.

Much better for his sanity.

‘It was in the States. I got caught up in a drug bust.’

Jesus Christ. ‘A
drug
bust?’

She nodded, staring at black socks. ‘Boyfriends with cocaine habits get you into all kinds of shit.’

Dash had seen Joy serious before. It was practically her default position but she looked plain old bleak now. He was almost afraid to ask. But he did. ‘Oh yeah. Like what?’

‘Like…car accidents at two in the morning. Out-of-control credit-card debt.’ Her voice was soft and she was staring at her feet as if they were the portal back through time. ‘Lying for them. Covering for them. Falsifying documents for them. Turning a blind eye to all kinds of illegal substances. Participating in certain…
acts.’

Dash swallowed.
What the fuck had he done to her
? ‘Acts?’

She glanced up at him and their gazes locked. ‘I once let a friend of his screw me while Chris watched.’

Dash shut his eyes briefly. Her words sounded so empty, so matter-of-fact but there was a world of hurt in her eyes. A burning sensation flared to life in the vicinity of his stomach. When he opened his eyes she was still looking at him.

‘And that’s what you wanted?’

‘Sure, why not?’

The burn blazed a little harder at her flippant response ‘Don’t.’

She shrugged belligerently. ‘It was what Chris wanted and Chris always got what Chris wanted. That’s rock and roll, right?’

The burn kicked up another notch. ‘Is it?’

If that was rock and roll, if that was the music industry and being in a band, he was pleased she hadn’t made it. And if Chris fucking Maddox had been here right now Dash would have flattened the guy.

No way in the world would he let another guy lay one fucking finger on Joy or even look sideways at her if they were together. His chest practically combusted at the thought.

She looked back at her feet. ‘He had a way about him. And…I was an idiot.’

He watched her downcast head, her strip of pink fringe falling forward. ‘I’m sorry.’

She glanced up at him and their gazes locked again. ‘You live and learn.’

Her easy acceptance of a very harsh life lesson was heartening and as quickly as the burn had flared it subsided. Joy could have been embittered by her experiences. They could have well and truly fucked her up. But she’d chosen to learn from it and go forward.

He nodded. ‘Yes’ he said. ‘Yes we do.’

He was overwhelmed suddenly by the urge to pull her in close and just sit here with her in quiet companionship. God knew he’d learned some pretty hard life lessons himself — they made a good pair.

But that wasn’t a wise move. Companionship would last all of about ten seconds before he started to notice other stuff. Like the press of her thighs and the squash of her breasts against his ribs.

‘So,’ she murmured, their gazes still locked, ‘are we seriously just going to sit here and not talk about the elephant in the room?’

Dash gave a few seconds consideration to feigning ignorance but it just wasn’t the moment for that. Joy had just told him that her ex had
shared
her with his friend. If ever there was a time for being honest it was now.

He swallowed. ‘I thought I might incriminate myself by saying anything so I decided to shut the hell up.’

‘Because you didn’t like the nudie pic but you didn’t want to offend me by telling me?’ Her brown unwavering eyes didn’t leave his for a second.

Didn’t like the picture?
Was she mad?
He’d gone into the bathroom and jerked off while he’d looked at it. But that would
definitely
incriminate him.

And he didn’t think he could use a
goldfish pheromone
defence in court.

‘Er…no…I —’

‘You thought it was inappropriate,’ she interrupted. ‘Look, I’m sorry. Clearly you’re pissed about it. It was just a stupid, spur of the moment thing and I thought, you know…you’d seen them before and we’re both adults so it wouldn’t be a…thing. It was meant to be just a bit of fun. But I should have thought it through
a lot
more. I really do sincerely apologise for putting you,
putting us
, in an awkward position.’

Dash blinked.
Inappropriate? Pissed?
Hell, did she have the wrong end of the stick. He was depositing that image into his spank bank permanently.

He sighed. ‘Joy —’

‘I know,’ she interrupted again. ‘It was…unwise.’

Unwise?
For someone who had slept with him within a couple of hours of getting reacquainted with him and led a bit of a fast and loose life in a hillbilly-punk band she was surprisingly straight. Surely she’d know how much something like that turned a guy on?

He’d bet good money grubby Chris Maddox had been into nudie pics big time.

‘Joy…no. Well yes…it was in some ways. Putting my cop hat on here you do know it’s not advisable to send pictures of yourself like that over unsecure networks, right? Well, at all really…you never know who could get hold of that image. Hell
I
could have forwarded that to anyone.’

She sat up a little straighter. ‘Oh my god, you didn’t, did you?’

‘
No
. Jesus. What do you take me for?’ Dash was not a good sharer. ‘Absolutely not. I deleted it.’ Almost straight away.

She narrowed her eyes at him. ‘Really?’

‘Yes.’

She dropped her hands from her knees and shifted into a cross-legged position again, tucking the folder with all his research safely under her knee, as she held out her hand palm up. ‘Show me your phone.’

He raised an eyebrow. ‘Really?’

‘Yes.’ She wiggled her fingers at him.

Dash rolled his eyes and pulled his phone out of his back pocket, keyed in his security pin and slapped it in her hand. He watched her quickly navigate to his messages with several thumb swipes.

Her gaze flicked up to meet his. ‘Okay,’ she said as she handed it back, settling herself into the comfy corner of the couch.

Things shifted nicely beneath her shirt and he noticed her nipples were erect again as he absently put his phone in his back pocket. He realised he’d been staring a bit too long and pulled his gaze back to her face. But she’d well and truly sprung him.

She raised an eyebrow at him. ‘You taking a brain picture now?’ she asked.

Dash cringed.
Fuck.
Classy, man. Real classy.

‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘I have…breasts on the brain today. I think the fish have been secreting some wild…pheromone or something…and then you sent the picture and…’

‘So…’ she frowned. ‘You didn’t mind me sending the picture?’

Dash raked a hand through his hair. ‘Joy, I’m a guy. Of course I didn’t mind. Guys like breasts.’

‘Even miniscule ones?’

Dash dropped his gaze to her small, perfect breasts. To the large nipples that were practically poking through her shirt. He couldn’t help himself. ‘Yes,’ he said, his voice all kinds of husky as he glanced back at her.

‘Oh.’

She bit down into her lip again and there was a sudden shift in the air between them. A vibe. A pulse. It swirled around Dash and tugged at his groin.

‘I thought you didn’t approve.’

‘Oh I approved,’ he murmured. ‘I just don’t think it’s…a good idea for us to go down this track again. It’s not like it was last time, you know?’

She nodded and even that motion was enough to rub her shirt against her breasts. ‘And yet there you are, taking brain pictures again.’

‘Oh god.’ His eyes flew to her face as he ran a shaky hand through his hair. ‘I’m sorry.’

She shook her head slowly, the slightest smile touching her mouth. ‘How about I give you some help with that?’ she murmured. The she grabbed the hem of her shirt and pulled it up.