Breathe

Chapter Ten Halfway Gone

Chace’s eyes opened and he blinked away sleep.

The strong Colorado sun was fighting his curtains and, as usual, winning.

Chace felt his body get tight.

Something was wrong.

He stared across the pillows at the empty bed.

He was on his side, one hand shoved under the pillow at his head, his other arm thrown wide.

No Faye.

Instantly, it felt like a hand reached in and gripped his gut in an iron tight fist.

Not a man prone to fanciful thoughts, not one he could recall in his life, it still hit him that the way his life had swirled down the toilet, it wouldn’t be a surprise that the last three weeks had been a dream. A cruel, twisted, dream.

A taste of sweet.

The touch of an angel.

A trace of a miracle.

Then gone.

He smelled bacon frying.

The moment he did, he rolled, threw back the covers, angled out of bed and prowled out of the room, down the hall, through the arch and toward the kitchen where he took five steps then stopped dead.

Because Faye Goodknight was standing at his stove at the island.

Faye Goodknight.

In his house.

In his kitchen.

At his stove.

All this the morning after she gave him her virginity and spent the night in his arms in his bed.

She was wearing the shirt he wore yesterday. It was unbuttoned and only partially covered the sexy as all fuck sapphire blue silk nightie that had thick lace at the top and, he’d seen last night but couldn’t see now, another rim of thick lace at the hem as well as deep slits up each side. A nightie the likes of which he figured no virgin would wear. The likes his ex-virgin was definitely currently wearing.

Her head was turned slightly to the side to take a sip from one of his coffee mugs.

But her eyes slid to him and she didn’t take a sip.

She lowered the mug to the counter by the stove and snapped, “You spoiled the surprise.”

“What?” he whispered, unable to make his voice louder but she still heard him because she answered.

“I’m making you breakfast in bed.” Her eyes moved the length of him then came back to his. “Or I was.”

Her words and her tone jerked him out of his stupor and he kept prowling toward her.

Her pretty, makeup-less face lost its mock annoyance and she stared at his advance, her body turning toward him as he rounded the island. She looked like a doe caught in headlights, just as terrified, just as frozen and just as cute.

She forced out a, “Chace –” but that’s as far as she got before he hooked her at the waist with an arm and yanked her into his body. He drove his other hand in her hair, cupped her head, tilted it to one side, slanted his then he took her mouth.

When he did, he took his time.

He didn’t break the kiss until he’d had his fill.

Or his fill for now.

When he lifted his lips from hers, he opened his eyes to see hers follow suit far more slowly. She did this often. Chace liked it. It made her look like she was waking from a really good dream.

He slid his hand down to curl it around the back of her neck and he whispered, “Mornin’, baby.”

She blinked and he watched her lick her lips, his gut clenching a good way this time, a fucking good one and she breathed, “That sounds a lot better in real life.”

Chace grinned.

“Not that it isn’t good on the phone,” she hastened to add.

Chace’s grin turned into a smile.

“Or that the phone isn’t real life,” she continued.

Chace just kept smiling.

“Just that it’s better in person,” she finished.

Chace’s body started shaking with his chuckle.

He might be amused but she was absolutely not wrong.

He bent his head, pressed his face in her neck and whispered against her skin, “You feelin’ okay?”

“Yeah,” she replied and his arm gave her a squeeze.

“Inside,” he clarified gently. “Okay?”

“A little achy,” she told him quietly. “Not a bad achy. Just a heretofore unknown, um… achy.”

“Bath didn’t help,” he muttered.

For some reason, his words made her relax deeper into his frame.

After this, her soft musical voice came at him, still quiet. “It isn’t bad but I’ll take some ibuprofen with breakfast.”

He lifted his head and looked down at her in his kitchen, his shirt, his arms in the morning.

He was wrong.

Or maybe it was just that yesterday, she was fucking pretty.

Today, she was beautiful.

And today, she was his.

She tipped her head to the side.

“Do you have any?”

He wasn’t following.

“Any what?”

“Ibuprofen.”

Right. She was achy.

“Yeah,” he answered.

“Good,” she muttered, her eyes drifted to the side and then came back to him. “Bacon, honey.”

“Right,” he whispered, bent his neck, kissed her nose and let her go.

She turned to the bacon.

He moved to the cupboard where he kept his vitamins and painkillers.

“So, making lemonade out of lemons, now I get to ask you since you’re awake instead of springing it on you,” she started. “Do you like poached eggs?” He grabbed the bottle of ibuprofen, looked at her as he closed the cupboard and saw she was grinning at him over her shoulder. “I make world class poached eggs.”

Chace felt his lips tip up. “World class?”

“Well, they haven’t been sanctioned thus by a cordon bleu panel but my Dad calls them that.”

He moved in behind her, slid an arm around her, hand gliding over his shirt and hitting the silk of her nightie at her belly as his other hand put the bottle by her coffee mug.

In her neck he muttered, “Yeah, I like poached eggs.”

That got him a breathy, “Good.”

He kissed her neck and moved away to get himself a mug for coffee.

“Honey?” she called as he was pouring it. His head turned her way to see her face soft, her ear dipped to her shoulder, her crystal blue eyes intent on him. “Hazelnut half and half,” she went on quietly. “Thank you for thinking of that. My favorite.”

Clearly, her father hadn’t phoned since his visit and briefed her about their plans for next weekend. Or if he did, he understandably didn’t share that part.

Chace was going to have to tell her about Silas Goodknight’s visit. He’d intended to do it last night.

He’d do it that morning.

After he very quickly ate her world class poached eggs.

And after he, not very quickly, ate other parts of her.

Then he’d tell her.

Something Chace learned about Faye the night before was that, with very few inhibitions and minimal coaxing to get her beyond them, Faye trusted him and had zero issues with giving herself to him, giving into what he was making her feel and enjoying the fuck out of it.

This was something that held true that morning after poached eggs, coffee and enough light, non-taxing conversation to ascertain that she was, indeed, comfortable with him in his house, his shirt and her nightie.

Which meant he was open to picking her up, carrying her to the couch and making short work of getting her excited and squirming under him so he could pull off her panties and give her a very hot, very long orgasm using his mouth between her legs to do it.

But something he learned about Faye that morning after he made her come, moved over her, settled them both on their sides, held her as she came down and their after oral sex whispers went from little bits of nothing to him telling her about her father’s visit was something that surprised him.

That was that Faye Goodknight had a fucking explosive temper.

It was, like everything about her, cute.

But it was also seriously volatile.

He learned this when he shared about her father and felt her body go rock-solid in his arms as he watched her eyes narrow.

His arms around her tightened in an effort at containment when he quit talking and she asked in a quiet voice that was not her usual sweet, cute quiet but a dangerous quiet, “Pardon?”

“Honey, it’s okay” he assured her. “He was doin’ his duty as a Dad and it ended well.”

She said nothing for several long seconds.

Then, as if he didn’t speak, she repeated, “Pardon?”

“Faye –”

He got no further because she tore out of his arms, sitting up abruptly. She rolled the half an inch she had to the edge of the couch which meant she nearly fell over the side. Moving quickly, if angrily, she somehow managed to get her feet under her, straightened up with her head bent, whipping around, taking her gleaming sheets of hair with it so they flowed with her movements.

She did this while she demanded to know, “Where’s my fraking purse?”

“Faye –” he tried again as she bent over, snatched up her sexy green satin panties and clumsily pulled them up her legs, nearly tripping, cute as all fuck.

Chace, head in his hand, elbow in the couch, watched with not a small amount of absorption as her heart-shaped ass appeared briefly before she settled the panties on her hips and his shirt fell over her again, hiding her from his view.

Through this, she cut him off and kept ranting.

“I’d kill him but I love him so that’s out. This means he gets the edge of my tongue. I mean, I like hazelnut half and half but I cannot believe he showed at your house unannounced to say what he said! Now where’s my fraking purse?”

She was stomping, heading toward the arch, her neck twisting this way and that. She spied something and changed directions jerkily, coming back his way as Chace got up on a forearm in the couch.

“Faye, honey, calm down. It was not a big deal.”

She snatched the phone out of the base that was on the table over the side of the sectional and her eyes sliced to him.

Oh yeah. Totally fucking pissed.

And totally cute.

Chace fought back a smile.

“It is to me!” she snapped loudly, bent her head, her hair fell forward and he heard his phone beeping because her thumb was jabbing at the buttons.

Chace pushed out of the couch, got to his feet and rounded it as he watched her put the phone to her ear and start pacing.

“Mom,” she said into it before he got to her, “I want to talk to Dad. Immediately.”

Since he didn’t make it to her in time, Chace decided to settle in and enjoy the show. So he rested his ass on the back of the couch, stretched out his legs, crossed them at the ankles, his arms on his chest and did just that.

“Yes, there’s something wrong,” she continued, still pacing. “Let me talk to Dad.”

There was a pause while she halted in a stilted way and stared obviously unseeing out his French doors.

Then she went on, “I know it’s time for church. I don’t care if you’re late. This is important. You can sneak in the back.”

Another pause to let her mother speak before she carried on.

“I don’t care if Dad’s favorite part is singing the hymns at the beginning of the service, I told you, this is important.” Pause then a hissed, seriously pissed, “Yes, it’s about his visit to Chace.”

She listened again as she yanked her hand through her hair, pulling it back, her body jerked with agitation and she started pacing again but when her hand went out of her hair, it fell right back around her face.

She was cute. She was being funny. She looked fucking fantastic pacing through the space between his kitchen and living room in her sexy nightie and his shirt, her long legs on display, her hair swinging around. Not to mention, his stomach was full of her damned fine food and the taste of her was still in his mouth.

All this meant Chace was amused, relaxed and content.

Therefore he was completely unprepared for Faye rocking his entire fucking world.

“That was not fraking cool Mom. It wasn’t cool. Dad doesn’t know and it’s none of his business but I’ll tell you since you won’t let me talk to him then you can tell him, Chace has been through enough. He doesn’t like surprises. He doesn’t need hassle. And I won’t stand for it!”

Chace felt his body get tight and he stopped watching her and started staring at her.

“Yes! I know that fraking means the f-word, Mom. In a television show! I’m the one who told you, remember? When the Cylons explode our world and we’re aboard a spaceship in a ragtag convoy trying to stay alive and find earth, you can take me to task for saying the word frak! Until then, no and definitely not now!”

She halted facing his French doors again and stared out as she listened.

Then she spoke again.

“Right, well, don’t hold your breath for that, Mom, seeing as I’m going to be a kickass fighter pilot like Starbuck so I’ll be out in my Viper most of the time, fighting the Cylons to keep you alive so you won’t have time to give me a lecture about cursing.”

Another pause, this one lengthy.

Then, “I don’t care. It’s not good that he shared his thoughts about Chace to Chace, thoughts he had because of town gossip. That’s not good. That doesn’t say nice things about Dad not Chace. It was judgmental and uncalled for. But it’s more, Mom. It doesn’t say good things about me. Because it says Dad doesn’t trust me to be smart enough to see past the hot guy Chace is to who he really is underneath. That would be a good man I can trust, who takes care of me, makes me feel safe, makes me feel good, teases me, likes me for me and who’s worth my time. Even if Dad had concerns about Chace, he should know me better than that. I may be a dreamer, Mom, but you raised me, so did he so I’m not a stupid dreamer. I’m just a dreamer. And I’ll point out he should have showed Chace respect not only as a man but as the man everyone in this fraking town knows him to be but also Dad should have shown me respect by keeping his mouth shut.”

She fell silent but this didn’t last long.

“No, I still want to talk to him. Tell him to call me after church. I have a few things to say.”

An even shorter pause.

Then, “Okay, and just so you know, I’m angry but still, if I found you were an unknown model of Cylon, I wouldn’t kill you because you’re my Mom. But I would find you a habitable planet and dump you there. I’m also angry enough to dump Gaius there with you. He’s brilliant but he’s annoyingly arrogant, smug, a total jerk, completely self-serving and unpredictable. You’d hate him. So that tells you just how angry I am at you for not letting me speak my mind to Dad. Enjoy church and I’ll see you next Saturday.”

Then without waiting for a response from her mother, she beeped off the phone and whirled to him.

Once she had his eyes, she snapped, “God!”

Then she clamped her mouth shut and glared at him.

Chace studied her, her cheeks pink, her eyes heated, thinking, with that hair, he shouldn’t be surprised her temper was fiery.

He studied her thinking that he was feeling something he didn’t quite get, didn’t know what it was because he’d never felt it before. He just knew that whatever it was was huge and it was good.

She took him out of his thoughts when she said quietly, “Chace, I’m so sorry Dad did that.”

“Faye,” he called softly. “Come here.”

“Give me a second,” she replied. “I’m fighting the urge to throw your phone across the room.”

She was too far away and what he was feeling was too big so he pulled out the big guns.

“Baby, come here.”

She came to him immediately.

Chace buried a smile, uncrossed his arms and ankles, bent his knees so his feet were to the floor but his legs were open and he leaned forward, reaching for her hand when she got close. He took the phone out of her other hand, tossed it to the top of the couch and guided her between his legs. When he had her where he wanted her, he let her hand go but both of his arms circled her loosely though not loose enough not to communicate he didn’t want her pressing close. As she always did, she got the message he didn’t need to verbalize, leaned her body into his and looked into his eyes.

“We got a problem,” he murmured.

“I know,” she agreed.

“Actually, you got a problem,” he told her.

“I know,” she agreed again. “I have an overprotective father who I’d like to kick in the shin.”

Chace gave her a squeeze and shared his thoughts. “He did right. I took no offense. Honest to God, I had a daughter whose first boyfriend had my reputation, I’d do the same fuckin’ thing. Wouldn’t think about it, wouldn’t give a shit she got pissed. I’d make my thoughts known, feel him out and make sure he knew he had in his hands something precious. It ended good. I understood why he did it. I admire him for doin’ it and it shows how much he loves you. And, I’ll repeat, I’d do it myself. So quit bein’ pissed.”

As he spoke, the anger shifted out of her face, her eyes went from heated to warm and her body relaxed deeper into his.

When he was done speaking, she asked softly, “So what’s my problem?”

“Faye, seriously, you’re hilarious when you’re angry.” He grinned at her, one of his hands trailing up her spine and into her hair as he continued, “This does not bode well for you, baby, ‘cause you ever get that pissed at me and you start talkin’ about Cylons and bein’ a fighter pilot, I got no choice but to laugh which’ll likely make you more pissed.”

Her lips twitched and she whispered, “Likely, seeing as Mom laughed through nearly that whole conversation and that only annoyed me more.”

Chace didn’t doubt it.

“What’s a Cylon anyway?” he asked.

“Robots that look like robots, the scary kind with a red eye that flashes back and forth but there are other models that look so much like humans they’re nearly undetectable from real humans. This means they’re very dangerous because they can infiltrate the human world and even if you cotton onto one of the models, since they look and act so much like humans, you never know what they’re up to. You might think you can trust them but you can never be sure.”

He felt his lips tip up. “Which one of your shows is this from?”

“Battlestar Galactica.”

His hand cupped her head, pulling her face closer to his as he whispered, “Honey, you are one serious geek.”

“It’s a good show,” she whispered back.

“Right.”

“You might like it.”

He doubted that.

She read his doubt and pushed, “Seriously, Chace, Admiral Adama is your type of guy.”

“Should the unfortunate event occur that I’m in a full body cast and unable to move for months, there’s no sports on TV and I’ve rewatched reruns of Friday Night Lights so often, I can quote them, you have permission to introduce me to Admiral fuckin’ Adama.”

At that, she gave him a soft giggle then her eyes dropped to his mouth. Her ear dipped toward her shoulder, the smile faded from her lips and her hand at his chest trailed up before she whispered a very hesitant, “Chace?”

“Right here, baby,” he whispered back, his gaze moving to her bubblegum lips.

“Um… earlier…” she trailed off and didn’t start again.

His eyes moved back to hers. “Yeah?” he prompted.

“You got to… I mean I got to… but, you know, you got to… and then you didn’t get to…” she stammered then stopped again but he got it and his arm around her tightened.

“You’re achy. We’re givin’ it a day or two.”

Her hand had curled around his neck and her thumb came out to stroke his jaw when she whispered, “Isn’t there some other… I mean, could I… or you that is, um, could you teach me to…” she pulled in an unsteady breath and her eyes left his lips and looked into his, “use my mouth?”

His dick started getting hard, his hand in her hair spasmed and his stomach got tight.

“You ready for that?” he whispered hoping to Christ she was.

“You ready to teach me?” she whispered back.

The answer to that was fuck yes.

He didn’t give her that answer. He held tight and fell back, twisting so he landed on his back in the couch taking her with him so she landed on him.

Then he pulled her head toward him but shifted it so her cheek slid down his until he had her ear.

“Do whatever you want, whatever comes natural. Pointers, suction is important. Movement is too. Adding your hand is hot. Always check your teeth and the tip is the most sensitive so payin’ special attention to that occasionally means payoff for me.” His arms gave her a squeeze and he finished with, “Yeah?”

“Yeah,” she breathed in his ear, squirming on top of him.

She liked that. She was working herself up.

And he liked both.

Christ.

Never would he expect this to come this soon. But he was not complaining.

“Go for it, darlin’,” he encouraged, he heard her pull in a deep breath then he felt her lips at his neck. Then her tongue. She moved down and, so as not to take her attention, he carefully reached for some toss pillows and shoved them behind his head in order to watch.

Then he watched as Faye got sidetracked by his chest, seemingly fascinated by studying it, running her hands over his skin and chest hair but her light touch and the trail of her crystal blue eyes felt so fucking good, Chace wasn’t going to complain about that either.

The same with his abs, which contracted at her touch, something she noticed and it brought those clear blue eyes to him.

Heated again, turned on, lips parted, wonder, cute, sexy, fuck.

“Keep goin’,” he urged, his voice deeper and rougher than normal, she gave him a small smile that cut through him straight to his dick.

Then she put her mouth to his abs and down, down, she pulled the string on his pajama bottoms, yanked them down and she had him.

She slid to the side, pulling his bottoms off and she took him.

Chace didn’t know what to expect. He’d never gotten head from a woman who hadn’t done it before. But experience was clearly unnecessary when there was off the charts enthusiasm. Not to mention she obviously memorized every word of advice he’d given her and he knew this because she put it into practice brilliantly.

When he was close, he yanked her up his body but took her hand, wrapped it around his cock and they both finished him off together.

When he came down, the look on her face told him she liked what she’d caused. So much, even with the mess on his stomach, he moved her hand with his into her panties and used her finger against her clit to finish her off, doing that together too.

He knew she liked what she’d done and what they’d done together because even though he’d given her a climax not long before, this didn’t take long.

When her eyes fluttered open as she was coming down and then after he kissed her, he took her to his shower so they could both clean up.

It was after their shower.

After Faye located her purse which had fallen off her arm when he carried her to his bedroom. He must have kicked it after she dropped it since it was in the living room. She had found it the night before to get her shit to get ready for bed and left it there but clearly in her anger forgot she did.

She searched for her purse in one of his clean tees so it was also after she located her purse, dug out and tugged on another pair of sexy panties, these ruby red. After that, Chace caught her in his arms and told her he appreciated her jewel-themed underwear collection, something that made pink hit her cheeks and him chuckle.

It was after she did the breakfast dishes during which her cell rang. After Chace listened to her side of the slightly less irate conversation she had with her father which was no less hilarious but far more confusing. She went on about someone called Walter who apparently had a chunk of his brain cut out, but who would also never disrespect his son called Peter, even though Peter wasn’t really Walter’s son but an identical person Walter kidnapped from an alternate earth. From her side of the conversation, it was clear her father found her analogy just as confusing as Chace did. Chace didn’t try to swallow down his chuckles because the whole thing was so fucking hilarious he knew he wouldn’t succeed. And he had no problem enduring Faye’s annoyed glares because those were equally hilarious.

It was also after she finished the call with an exasperated but nevertheless heartfelt “Love you, Dad,” that didn’t include her threatening to dump him on a habitable planet with an asshole, that she explained to Chace her analogy was from a show called Fringe. After this she spent a little time explaining the show and zero time attempting to convince him he’d like it since, from what little she said and since she knew him, she also knew she had no hope of achieving that.

It was after she made him lunch, they did the minimal dishes and she suggested they relax in front of the TV. This filled him with dread and he didn’t hide it which made her laugh, wrap her arms around him, lean in deep, tip her head way back and promise in her sweet, soft, musical voice she wouldn’t lead him astray.

Therefore, he’d agreed.

So it was also after she found he had Netflix and convinced him to try the TV show Psych. She told him it wasn’t geeky but hilarious. He’d agreed mostly because she was in his house, wearing nothing but his tee and ruby red panties, he was in track pants and a long-sleeved thermal and he didn’t much give a fuck what they did just as long as she was close when they did it.

Which meant it was also after she found one of her favorite episodes, turned it on and they settled stretched out on the couch, Chace with his back to the back of couch, head in his hand, elbow in the couch, Faye tucked in front of him in the curve of his arm, head on a toss pillow.

And last, it was after he was relieved to find she was right about Psych. It wasn’t geeky. There were no spaceships, alternate universes or fantastical explanations for ridiculous plot devices. It was just damned funny and, to top that, clever.

So it was then, when the episode ended, she reached to the big square coffee table that sat surrounded by his sectional, hit the button to take them back to the Netflix menu, she turned on her back in front of him and gave him her crystal blue eyes.

“So?” she asked and he grinned down at her.

“You were right, baby, not geeky, just funny.”

She grinned back. “Isn’t Shawn the bomb?”

The guy was funny but that wasn’t the word Chace would use.

Still he said, “Yeah.”

She turned his way and got up on her elbow, head in her hand and suggested, “Maybe you need a fake psychic detective at the Carnal Police Department.”

Chace chuckled, carefully tangling his legs with hers, an intimacy like all of them that he’d cautiously initiated with her that she took without reaction except to allow it and settle in.

And as he did this, he replied through his chuckle, “He’s just hyper-observant with an understanding of detective work. That’s kinda my job so we already have one and that would be me except the fake psychic part.”

Her eyes slid to the side and she mumbled, “Oh, right.”

Which was so cute, he had to lean forward and touch his lips to hers.

So he did.

As he was doing it, his cell on the coffee table rang.

Faye twisted her neck to look over her shoulder at it but Chace tightened the arm already around her waist, leaned into her, let her go to reach and nab his phone then brought them both back.

He looked at the display and let out a sigh.

Then he looked at her and said, “Hopefully this won’t take long, honey, but I gotta take it.”

“Okay,” she murmured and he took the call he didn’t want to take.

When the phone was at his ear, he said, “Keaton.”

“Chace, hey. Sorry to disturb your Sunday.”

It was new Carnal detective and Chace’s co-poster boy hero in saving the CPD, Frank Dolinski. A good guy. A smart cop. A local since birth. A police brat who wanted exactly the same things in life that Chace had wanted before his life turned shit. To earn his badge. To go about his business respecting it. To stay true to his oath to protect and serve. To find an attractive wife that cooked well, gave great head, made him laugh frequently and could shoulder the burden of his coming home from a bad day.

During his tenure on the Force, unlike Chace, Frank stayed clean through the entirety of it. This didn’t mean he didn’t have to look the other way but he also didn’t hide the fact that he didn’t like it. This made him not Arnie’s favorite person. It also showed he was courageous. He’d approached IA some months after Chace did but he did what he could inside to try to turn boys back to the right side. But when Ty Walker was coming up for probation and it came clear that hell could easily break lose when he got it, Frank decided he had to do what many cops had a great deal of trouble doing.

Turn on his brothers.

Last night they’d had a discussion with the Cap who decided that Frank should stay as primary on the Newcomb case. The kill site being Harker’s Wood, the dump site the access road to Miracle Ranch, too many similarities to Misty’s murder, Cap felt Chace was too close to it. He also felt Frank needed the experience. Last, they all knew Frank would get nowhere. The investigation into Misty’s murder had been purposefully jacked but Chace conducted his own. There were few leads and the ones there were went nowhere.

But the men of the Department knew Chace was still looking so Chace handed over all he had to Frank and Cap told him to take Frank’s back.

Frank, Chace and the Cap had another conversation about Clinton Bonar’s warning and what this move against Newcomb meant. This meant Bonar would get a visit. It also meant other powerful men with motive would be approached too. All strictly protocol. All following standard investigative procedures.

So last, this meant things were going to heat up in Carnal and Frank, the Cap, Chace and a new, inexperienced Force were going to have to do what they could to make sure no one else got burned.

Chace did, however, have to go with Frank to Newcomb’s sister to inform her that her brother was dead. It was her who had called the Station Saturday morning to say he hadn’t come home the night before and she was looking after his kids so she expected him at nine. She waited as long as she could before all out panic ensued. She knew he was into bad business, something that couldn’t be missed because he was fired from CPD for his participation in Arnie’s corruption but had stayed out of jail due to his willingness to testify. CPD knew he was vulnerable. Thus began the search.

Chace had been the one to tell Tonia Payne’s parents their daughter was dead including, at their insistence, how she’d died and her death was uglier than most. He’d also informed Misty’s folks. Throughout his career, not regularly but too fucking often, he’d had bad news to give about car wrecks and arrests.

This was less fun than all of that shit and none of that had been pleasant. This was because Newcomb’s wife had taken off, whereabouts unknown which meant his kids, one of them gravely ill, had lost their last parent.

Newcomb was a moron, racist, wife-beating, asshole pig. He played with fire for understandable reasons but should have been smart enough to know that when he got burned, the ones who would live with the scars were his kids.

He wasn’t that smart.

And now they were fucked.

“How’s it going?” Chace asked a question he knew the answer to.

They had DNA on this guy from his semen. But the samples were deliberately tampered with, the tampering explained away as a “mistake”. In fact, they were so tainted, they couldn’t even run them.

Reports were probably not in yet but it was doubtful they’d find semen on or in Newcomb. Possible but doubtful.

They didn’t even have slugs. Misty was done by a gun stolen by one of Carnal’s own in an effort to frame him. From visuals on Newcomb, he was done close range with a high powered assault rifle. Overkill. But this meant the shots were through and through. It also was a likely reason why Newcomb didn’t fight or attempt to flee. A man carrying an assault rifle undoubtedly struck an imposing figure. If you tried to run, if that rifle had a scope, you’d still be fucked. So this time, the killer collected the bullets and shell casings leaving them with next to nothing.

That was what they had. Next to nothing. No locals to either site reported seeing vehicles in the vicinity. No bullets, shell casings or DNA that could be found unless something came up on tests run at the lab. Nothing except footprints which, from preliminary investigation of both scenes, kill site and dump site, was all they got this time too.

“We know he wears construction boots,” Frank answered. “But since every third guy in this county wears motorcycle boots, cowboy boots or construction boots, that narrows our suspect pool down to about two thousand guys.”

Chace could hear the frustration in Frank’s voice and he understood it. He wanted to get this guy for four reasons. The guy was a murderer likely times two, at the very least, and he needed to be stopped. CPD had a nasty case file open and unsolved that fell on them during a time when it was infested. Frank wanted to make an important bust because it would look good. And he wanted this off Chace’s shoulders and he was one of the few men who knew it was weighing there. Not because Chace had shared. Because he worked side by side with Frank and Frank was observant.

“He’s not local, Frank,” Chace said quietly. “He’s a professional. He could be from anywhere.”

“Yeah,” Frank replied quietly then in a normal voice, “Old Man Harker’d pitch a fit, he knew this shit was goin’ down in his wood.”

Frank was not wrong about that. Old Man Harker died seven years ago, luckily before the major garbage started piling up at the CPD and they found a serial killer lived local. He’d given his wood to the city before that, he was that proud of it and he loved Carnal. Knowing blood had been spilled and mouths had been raped in a spot where Harker and many others in town thought a miracle had occurred, he’d lose his mind.

Luckily in this instance, he no longer had a mind to lose.

“This isn’t why I’m callin’,” Frank went on.

“Yeah?” Chace prompted.

“Like you asked when you called in yesterday, had the interns run the name Malachi. They report nothin’ comes up. No one is lookin’ for this kid. Or at least, if they are, they haven’t reported him missing.”

“Could be a fake name,” Chace muttered.

To which Frank asked incredulously, “Malachi?”

“The kid reads four, five books a week, Frank. So yeah, Malachi.”

At this, he felt Faye’s hand press into his chest and he dipped his chin to look at her to see he had her full attention.

Thus he muttered into the phone, “If you don’t have any more, Frank, appreciate the call but gotta go.”

To this, Frank asked searchingly, “Faye still there?”

Jon had opened his big fucking mouth.

Not a surprise but damned annoying.

“Gotta go,” Chace repeated.

“Right,” Frank murmured, a smile in his voice and Chace couldn’t see it but he bet it was knowing.

Jesus.

“Thanks for the call,” Chace told him.

“Not a problem. Enjoy the rest of your Sunday with Faye,” Frank replied.

He definitely would.

And yeah, Frank’s smile had been knowing.

“Later,” Chace gave his farewell.

“Later, buddy,” Frank gave his and Chace disconnected.

“Malachi? A professional?”

She didn’t even wait for him to toss his phone on the table which was what he did before answering.

Once he’d shifted into her, did that and brought them back, he told her, “Asked the interns to run the name Malachi, see if anyone reported him missing. They did. Nothing.”

“What does that mean?”

“It could mean a lot of things, honey. What it means most is that we gotta talk to this kid. He’s not registered in school. He’s not reported missing. He’s like a ghost and kids aren’t ghosts unless serious bad shit is going down. We gotta push the breakthrough tomorrow and get him talkin’. You gonna be up for that?”

She nodded immediately and Chace ran his hand up her back, pulling her closer as he did and dipping his face to hers.

“You gotta go gentle but you gotta get a good result. If you don’t, I’m steppin’ this shit up another way. We need him safe. We need him fed. So, it sucks, baby, but we need him in the system.”

She slid her bottom lip to the side and bit it. She often bit her lip. She often licked her lips. He’d learned to read why she did both. He didn’t see the slide and bite often but it usually meant she was either very nervous, feeling more than her normal shy or a little bit scared.

“He’ll be okay,” Chace assured gently.

She let her lip go and asked quietly, “What does stepping stuff up mean?”

What it meant was setting Deck on the kid. Deck would find him. Deck wouldn’t be outrun because he wouldn’t give up. And Deck would likely scare the shit out of the kid.

He didn’t tell her that.

Instead he said, “I’m still figurin’ that out. But we’ll hope we break through tomorrow. Yeah?”

She nodded.

Then she changed the subject.

“A professional?”

He shook his head and told her softly, “Police business, honey. Can’t talk about that.”

“The murder last night,” she guessed.

“Yeah,” he answered and she pressed in closer as her eyes went from holding his to studying him.

“That was unfun,” she whispered.

“It was but it’s also something I can’t talk about,” he replied.

“It brings up Misty,” she pushed and Chace sighed.

“Yeah, baby, it does.”

“You should –”

“No,” he cut her off.

She pressed in closer, opened those bubblegum lips of hers to say something and serious as fuck, she got closer, in his tee, with him on his couch, she pushed it, he’d give her anything she wanted.

So he had to shut this down.

“Give me this,” he said quietly and quickly she shut her mouth. “This day, with you after what you gave me last night. This one day, you and me and food and TV and champagne with the hamburgers I’m makin’ tonight and all of it good. All clean. All normal. All right. No Misty. No murder. No history. None of that garbage. Just us. You had what you had to give me last night to give once and I had it to get once. We shared that and it was beautiful. So let’s keep it beautiful, just us for a day. Tomorrow we can try to talk to abused kids and let the world back in. Today, tonight, give me,” he tightened his arm around her and finished, “this.”

“Okay,” she whispered immediately and he hadn’t even had to use the word “baby”.

Chace stared down into those blue eyes in that pretty face with those extraordinary cheekbones all of it surrounded by her fantastic hair looking up at him with warmth and understanding in her eyes and he knew in that instant he was falling in love.

Christ, he could have none of the beauty that met his eyes, her heart-shaped ass in his bed, the gift of her virginity and only have her giving in last night and just now when he needed her to and calling her folks to ream their asses about hassling him and it would have started happening.

But he had all of that and her being a geek, her imagination, her humor, her immense care for a kid she didn’t know and fuck him, he wasn’t teetering. He was halfway gone.

Ty and Tate had this. One was a brunette. One was a blonde. Neither of them were shy.

Both of them gave this.

Jesus. He got it.

And he had it in the curve of his arm.

Fuck, he wanted to make love to her.

Fuck.

He couldn’t without maybe causing her pain.

So he did what he could. He kissed her. He did it soft, he did it long, he got his hands up her shirt and she got her hands up his.

When he broke the kiss, he asked her softly if she wanted popcorn and to watch another episode of Psych. She grinned at him huge because she did.

Before they settled back in the couch with a bowl of microwave popcorn and cans of soda, he informed her she was again spending the night.

Not that it was a question.

But her answer?

She directed another huge-ass smile at him.

Then she whispered, “Okay.”