[When SEALs Come Home 04] - Heated (6 page)

Brilliant. She should have done the same thing.

“I’ll share if you share.” Laura Jo waved a handful of quilt squares at Mercy.

“We did lose someone this week,” she admitted.

“
Lose
as in you misplaced him or
lose
as in his ass got fired?” Gia waved a knitting needle in their direction.

“He was asked to resign because he made improper use of his department cell phone and uniform.” The whole fiasco was public record, and she was fairly certain the town’s social media would be all over the resignation by tomorrow. Sharing now wouldn’t mean stepping on any toes. 

Laura Jo whistled. “You have to be pretty stupid to have sex and tape it for your boss to see. I mean, even
I
know not to use the ambulance.”

Ewww.

Katie made a face. “And this is why most of us plan on walking to the hospital if there’s an emergency. TMI.”

Laura Jo just grinned. “Don’t be jealous. Some of us just have a workplace sex fantasy that needs fulfilling.”

Gia looked over at her. “Our resident law officer disagrees.”

Sex at work only violated about a hundred state and federal regulations. So on paper, sure she disagreed. But sometimes the chemistry was so good that... off-limits suddenly seemed like a suggestion and not a rule. Like Joey.

Danger.

Laura Jo leaned forward. “Did you see the video? Can
we
see the video?”

“I didn’t.” But only because she’d refused to look. Some images she didn’t need burned into her brain for all eternity. Her ex-coworker seemed like a decent guy with poor judgment. She didn’t know him all that well, and now she never would. “Officer Belcome is on YouTube in all his nekkid glory already.”

“I thought they had rules about sex acts.” Laura Jo sounded doubtful. Mercy did
not
want to know why Laura Jo knew those particular rules.

“So we know he was sleeping with a bunny who has a fetish for the uniform. Do we know who she is?”

Mercy shrugged. “She’s not from Strong, if that’s what you’re asking.”

The talk turned more general after that. Who was dating who or who had broken up. Katie passed around pictures from Bree Medina’s honeymoon. There were plenty of PG shots of Bree kissing her husband in front of the Eiffel Tower and an incredible number of swank hotel bathroom shots. Apparently, Bree was planning to redecorate when she got home.

Kissing made Mercy think of Joey. She didn’t want to be that guy, the one who slept with the wrong person and flushed a successful career down the toilet. Joey Carter was tempting, but she had years of resisting temptation under her belt. Except when it came to sugar. She snagged another brownie from the plastic tree-shaped platter near her elbow. She should make time to learn how to cook—or to open the Betty Crocker box.

“So what about you and Joey McHottie Carter? Are you dating?”

Mercy choked on her brownie, and Laura Jo thumped her on the back.

“I’m giving him speeding tickets, not bringing him flowers.”

“You could be doing both.”

She shook her head. “Impossible. When I joined the sheriff’s department, I signed a contract that includes a morals clause. Dating a guy I’ve arrested wouldn’t be a smart move.”

“You’ve arrested Joey?” Katie perked up.

She supposed
almost
didn’t count. “Not yet, but if he keeps driving the way he does, I’ll be knocking on his door.”

“There are better reasons to knock on that man’s door.” Laura Jo nudged the brownie plate closer. “I can enumerate if you’d like.”

“Besides, how bad can Joey be?” Katie coaxed. “Why would he be a contract breaker?”

“It’s not like he’s a convicted felon.” Laura Jo paused. “Is he?”

“No! Not as far as I know!”

“So then what’s the problem?”

Mercy shrugged. “My contract has a clause saying I have to be of good moral character. It doesn’t come with a checklist or a set of metrics saying what that means, so it’s completely open to interpretation. Right now, after what happened with Officer Belcome, the department wants to clean up its image. We’re all supposed to live like vestal virgins until the public forgets.”

And from what she’d seen and heard of the video, it was going to be a long, long time before people forgot Belcome’s girlfriend riding him while he wore full dress uniform in the backseat of his cruiser. Hell would freeze over first.

“That’s not fair,” Katie protested.

“I didn’t say I liked it.”

And Joey was a good man, despite his reckless need for speed. And she understood running from things you couldn’t control, no matter how hard you tried.

“You should give him a shot. Bad boys are the most fun.” This from the nine-months-pregnant Gia. “You could have an undercover relationship.”

The thing about Joey was that he was all laughter and teasing on the surface. A
nice
bad boy. He wasn’t an asshole, and she should know—she’d run into plenty on the job. He broke her rules. He accepted the consequences.

“Smoke jumpers are the most fun.” Katie fanned herself. “It’s like a handpicked team of ultimate bad boys. They’re buff, they’re heroic, and they don’t hang around the house all day driving you crazy.”

“Although I want honorary bad girl status,” Gia added. “Equal opportunity and all.”

Katie reached over and patted her baby bump. “You’re officially out of the running, honey, while you’ve got a baby smoke jumper on board there.”

“Except in the bedroom,” Laura Jo hooted.

Gia grinned and someone groaned. “Rio is pretty amazing.”

Faye made a shushing motion. “Don’t scar us. And don’t scare off the single ladies.”

“On the other hand, feel free to share all the details.” Katie Lawson leaned forward expectantly. “I’m always up for learning something new.”

Wow. Time to redirect this train wreck of a conversation.

“Have you ever thought about knitting something different?”

“She’s redirecting the conversation,” Laura Jo said to no one in particular.

“Like what?” Katie clearly was bored with quilt squares too. Mercedes figured they could buy baby blankets and save the Sacramento infants from lumpy swaddling.

“I’ve seen all sorts of patterns on Etsy. We could knit something more fun. Funner.” She needed a grammar lesson. And a head check.

“I need a for example.”

In for a penny... She whipped out her phone and brought up a few pictures.

“Wow.” Laura Jo blinked. “I had no idea you thought like this, Deputy.”

The first pattern was for a pair of gray knitted boxers made to look like an elephant. One eye dotted each hipbone, but the pièce de résistance was the impressive trunk fly.

“Does that pattern come in small, medium, and large? Because I think I’ve found Tye’s Christmas present.” Katie grinned. “And I might actually manage to knit the thing in ten months.”

“No one could fill out those shorts,” Gia protested. “Someone needs an anatomy lesson.”

“What we
need
are male models,” Laura Jo announced. “And perhaps a gallery show. Or you could do a new calendar this year, Faye.”

Mercy had seen the calendar Laura Jo was talking about. Frankly, it was hard to miss as there were stacks of them in every local store. Plus she’d discovered one on her desk the first day on the job. There was nothing unusual about the twelve full-color pages, one for each month. However, each month featured a different smoke jumper, some wearing less than others. Mercy had no idea how Faye had convinced the guys to shuck their clothes and model for her, but she was grateful. Joey made a stunning Mr. September.

Faye made a rude noise. “Evan swore never again. He was mad at me for a week.”

“Tell him he can keep his clothes on this time.” Laura Jo waggled her eyebrows. “At least until you talk him out of them.”

“I’ll volunteer Tye. Gia and Lily can work on Rio and Jack,” Katie said. “And Mercy can get Joey to model. That’s four months right there.”

Wait. What?

“Why on earth would Joey listen to me?”

She could imagine asking him though. His mouth would curl up in that naughty grin, and she’d bet he’d say yes. He was a good sport.

“Because he’s chasing after you?”

“And he thinks you’re hot?”

“Um. No.” She was fairly certain he thought she was a pain in his ass. What man wanted to date a woman who routinely ticketed him? It explained her serious lack of a dating life.

“He’s never asked you out on a date?” Gia sounded skeptical.

“I’ve pulled him over almost a dozen times and almost arrested him once. Why on earth
would
he like me?”

“She needs a mirror,” Laura Jo announced. “And an intervention.”

Katie nodded energetically. “You should totally take him for a test drive.”

Since Katie and Gia both had their own resident SEALs, Mercy figured they were either biased—or knew a good thing when they saw it. The idea of test-driving Joey Carter was certainly appealing on some levels. He was hot, and she was lonely. More importantly, he was nice and he liked to laugh. She was also dead certain that he’d never laugh
at
her. “Have any of you dated him?”

Everyone looked at each other and there was a round of head shaking.

“You’re good to go,” Laura Jo announced. “He’s a virgin date.”

There was more laughter as the Smoking Hot Knitters wrapped up for the evening, but Mercy couldn’t stop thinking about Joey. And test-driving. Had he meant it when he’d asked her out on a date?

S
tupid, used, piece-of-shit car. The sad truth was that she didn’t earn enough to send her mother a small check each month and pay a car loan. So she’d picked the more important of the two and sent the money to her
mama
, a decision she had no problem with except for nights like this when her beater car conked out on her. Nights like this, she wished her mother were a mechanic. Or that Mercy had taken shop in high school instead of the college prep classes she hadn’t been able to use.

She turned the key, but the car stayed dead. Luckily, she’d been able to coast to the shoulder when the motor had started acting up a quarter mile ago. Unfortunately, her cell phone was dead, and there were no call boxes on this stretch of road—an oversight she’d planned on remedying. If she’d known her car would die on the way home from the vet, she’d have bumped the item up her to-do list.

“How do you feel about hiking?” She looked down at her feline companion. The cat carrier alone weighed five pounds, plus it contained an additional fifteen pounds of His Royal Highness. Her arms would fall off. Or her legs. She was reasonably fit—part of her job description—but it had already been a long day, and Strong was
uphill.

Clearly, she’d pissed off Karma at some point.

HRH chirped encouragement, ready to trade in his cat carrier for home and a can of Fancy Feast. She reached a finger in and scratched him underneath his chin.

“Working on it, buddy.” Part Siamese, part Maine Coon, Bob was an oddball. Her big blue-eyed boy had a white belly and matching socks, but he’d inherited dark ears from his Siamese daddy. He also came with lots of brown fur that routinely covered her furniture and her clothes. He was a talker, loyal to the death, and he slept with her without fail, which was more than she could say for the men she’d invited into her life. Better taste in cats than men. That was her.

“I don’t suppose you know how to fix a car?”

Bob chirped. Definitely a negative.

She got out of the car, popped the hood, and stared inside, but it was like randomly picking lottery numbers and hoping for a payout. She felt a headache coming on and added car repair to the list of books she needed to check out from the library. She could learn to do this too.

When headlights flashed over the trees, signaling an incoming car, she swallowed her pride and waved. Not frantically. Just nice and fast and deliberately. Asking for help sucked, but walking back to Strong with Bob sucked more. The pickup was a big, black solid number with a metal tool container bolted onto the back. Thank God. It might be sexist, but she’d take a guy with tools over a mom with a minivan full of groceries right now. Although she wouldn’t say no to a Pop-Tart. Or Cheetos. Both, if Karma was in the mood to make up for the breakdown.

The pickup pulled in. Thank God. She eyed the windshield, trying to make out who the driver was. Nope. Karma was still mad as hell at her, because that was Joey grinning at her through the driver’s side window.

“Are we playing role reversal? Usually, I’m the one on the side of the highway.”

The words stuck in her throat. Exercise would be good for her. Lord knew, her butt wasn’t getting any smaller.

“Problem?” Joey prompted.

She sighed. “Yeah.”

He didn’t make her beg, though, so apparently he really didn’t hold a grudge about all those speeding tickets. Or the arrest. He threw the truck into park and killed the engine before hopping out and coming around. She, on the other hand, was still standing there, hands curled around the edge of the engine compartment. Blinking at him like an idiot.

He nudged her out of the way.  Long legs encased in worn denim with some very yummy white stress points ended in the usual pair of motorcycle boots. He wore a fire department T-shirt beneath an open flannel shirt. She awarded him bonus points for radiating heat. Standing out here in the night air, poking at her engine, had been chillier than she expected.

He looked underneath the hood, and she looked at his ridiculously long lashes. Life just wasn’t fair. “Tell me all about your problems. The doctor’s in.”

She wasn’t really going to turn down a free mechanic, not when she was stuck out here in the middle of nowhere. “One minute I was driving along and the next, the motor died. I coasted a few hundred yards, and now here I am.”

He nodded. “Have you had car problems before?”

“It’s a fifteen-year-old import with two hundred thousand miles. What hasn’t broken?”

“True.” He stuck his head under the hood and started fiddling with various bits. He hummed as he worked, looking perfectly happy parked by the side of the road, fixing her car. She wasn’t sure how she felt about that, but apparently she’d hit on one thing that made him slow down. Sitting around and twiddling her thumbs didn’t appeal, so she moved closer so she could see what he was doing.