Crazy On You

CHAPTER THREE

True to his word, that Sunday afternoon at around four P.M., Deputy Tucker Matthews knocked on Lily’s front door. She opened it and stood in stunned silence, like she’d suffered a blow to the head.

“Is Pippen around?” He had a new basketball tucked under one arm and a pair of silver aviators covered his eyes-eyes that were a warm brown and creased at the corners when he was amused, like when she’d threated to shoot him the other morning.

Lily was so shocked stupid that he’d kept his word that all she could utter was “Ahhh, yeah.” Her shock couldn’t have anything to do with him looking so good. She’d seen him yesterday, knew he was good-looking. A scar creased his forehead from the middle of his right brow to the line of his short brown hair. This, along with his rough, masculine edges, kept him from being a pretty boy, but allowed him enough intrigue to give a girl bad thoughts about body searches. So why did she feel so rattled today? He was wearing that same hideous gray Army sweatshirt he’d had on yesterday, with frayed sleeves, a torn neck-and he looked like he’d just dragged himself out of bed. He was all rough and scruffy and definitely needed to shave. “You’re here,” she managed.

“I told you I would be.”

Lily was five feet six inches tall and she noticed he was just a few inches taller-perhaps five ten. What he lacked in height, he made up for in pure, unadulterated hotness. So much hotness that it lit a little fire in her stomach and heated up her pulse. She held the door open for him and shocked herself further by wondering what he’d look like with that horribly ratty sweatshirt ripped off and his wrist cuffed to something. “Come in and I’ll get him.”

He took a step back instead. She couldn’t see his eyes but color crept up his neck to his cheeks as if he’d read her mind. “Tell him I’ll be in the driveway warming up,” he said and turned to go.

No doubt, her inappropriate thoughts were written on her face and scared him. They scared her too. “Pippen,” she called out over her shoulder, “Deputy Matthews is here for you.”

He stopped a few steps down and glanced back at her. “You can call me Tucker.”

No. No, she couldn’t. The guy was probably all of twenty-five, and she was thinking of him shirtless and cuffed to a bedpost. It made her feel a bit pervy. Although, to be fair to herself, she’d never had such a good-looking guy show up on her porch before. Not even when she’d been twenty-five. Not even the rat bastard she’d married, Ronnie. And even though she hated to admit it now, Ronnie had been damn fine.

“I’m coming,” Pippen hollered as he raced past his mother, shoving his arms into his jacket.

Lily shut the door behind her and leaned against it. Well, that had been weird and awkward. Yesterday she’d been fine. She’d seen him, seen that he looked much more like a faux cop from a Playgirl magazine than a real one. She’d acknowledged his good looks to herself, thought about body searches, and managed to speak like an intelligent woman. At least today she didn’t have rollers in her hair and half her makeup on her face.

Her hair was pulled back in a ponytail, and she was wearing a white cable knit sweater, jeans, and a brown woven belt around her hips. If she’d known company would appear on her porch, she would have done her hair and put on some lipstick.

She pushed away from the door and moved across the living room to the couch. On the top of the oak coffee table and across the back of the red sofa sat little teal bags with the logo of Lily’s spa embossed in white in each center. Several rolls of teal-and-white cellophane and bags of trail-size beauty products lay on the couch cushions. She moved the rolls aside and sat.

Tucker Matthews wasn’t company. He was the next door neighbor who was playing basketball with Pippen in the afternoon so he could sleep in the morning. He’d given Pip his word and he’d kept it, which was more than she could say for her son’s father, who didn’t pay attention to trivial things like court orders and visitation and keeping his word. He worked on Ronnie-time, which usually depended on the latest slootie pants he’d hooked up with.

Yesterday, when Lily had walked outside and seen a stranger in her driveway playing ball with her son, she’d been a bit freaked out. Today she wasn’t sure how she felt about it. Pip wanted a father so desperately. He loved any male attention, and would be crushed when the deputy tired of playing, took his ball and went home for good.

Lily rose from the couch and moved into her shiny white kitchen with yellow cupboards. She’d deal with that when it happened. God knew Pippen needed some testosterone around him, if only for a few hours. He spent most of his time with her and his grandmother. Occasionally, he spent time with her sister Daisy’s husband, Jack, and their son, Nathan, when he was home from college. Daisy and Jack had a six-year-old daughter and another one on the way.

Lily went to the kitchen sink and leaned across as far as she could. She pushed aside a bamboo plant, a pinch pot, and one side of her daisy-print curtains. She could see just a sliver of the driveway with the basketball hoop. The ball hit the backboard and bounced off.

She could clearly hear the steady bounce of the ball and then a shot that was nothing but net. Clearly, the shot was not made by her son, who hadn’t grown into himself yet.

Her cell phone on the counter rang and she glanced down at it. Ronnie. Great. He was probably calling to say he couldn’t take Pippen next weekend.

“You better not be calling just to piss me off,” she answered.

“Ha-ha-ha,” he chuckled in that stupid Ronnie way that she used to think was so cool but now was like nails on a chalkboard. “I need to talk to Pip.”

“Not if you’re going to back out on next weekend, you don’t.”

“I’m not backin’ out. I thought he might want to go see my parents in Odessa, is all.”

Pip hadn’t seen his grandparents in at least a year. “Seriously?”

“Yeah.”

Ronnie was a deadbeat. No doubt. But Pippen thought the sun rose and sat on that rat bastard’s ass. She could stand on her head and juggle cupcakes to make Pippen happy, and all his daddy had to do was pull up in his latest monster truck and Pip was in heaven.

“I’m sure he’ll like that,” she said as she moved out the garage door and hit a switch on the wall. “You better not back out.”

“I ain’t gonna back out.”

“That’s what you said the last time you backed out.” The door slid up and she ducked beneath it and walked out onto the driveway. Her son and the deputy stood near an imaginary free throw line. “If you do, it’ll be the last time, Ronnie.”

“He’s my son.”

“Yeah. You might try and remember that on a somewhat consistent basis.” The cool air touched her face and neck, and the heels of her boots tap-tapped across the concrete. “Pip. Your daddy’s on the phone.” She handed her son the cell and watched his little face light up.

“Tucker’s winning,” Pippen said, excited as a monkey on a peanut farm as he took the phone from her. “One more basket and I’m toast.”

She looked toward the man standing in the middle of the driveway slowly dribbling the ball. Sunlight reflected off the lenses of his glasses and shined in his rich brown hair. “I got your back,” she told her son and moved to stand in front of the deputy.

“What are you doing?”

“Making sure you don’t score while Pip’s on the phone.” She raised her arms over her head for added measure.

“We’re playing H-O-R-S-E.”

She had a vague memory of H-O-R-S-E from grammar school. It had something to do with the first player to spell horse winning. She’d never played. As a Texan and a girl, she’d played volleyball. She’d been one hell of a spiker.

“There’s no man-to-man in horse.”

She dropped her arms. “What?”

He said it again, only this time really slow. “There’s… no… man… to… man… in… H-O-R-S-E.”

She still wasn’t quite sure what that meant. “Are you being condescending?”

He bounced the ball and moved a few inches closer. Close enough that she had to tip her head back to look up. Close enough that she could smell sweat and clean Texas air. “No. You told me I talk fast.”

“I did?” She swallowed and felt a sudden urge to take a step back. Back to a safer distance. “When?”

“The other night when I pulled you over.”

She didn’t remember saying that, but it was true. “Where are you from, Deputy?”

“Originally Detroit.”

“Long way from home.”

“For the past eleven years, I’ve lived at Fort Bliss, then El Paso and Houston.”

“Army?”

“Staff Sergeant, Second Battalion, Third Field Artillery.”

He was in the Army and now the police force? “How long were you in the military?”

“Ten years.” He slowly bounced the ball. “If you want to play man-on-man, we can.”

Ten years? He had to be older than he looked.

“Or man-on-woman.” One dark brow rose up his forehead and his voice got kind of low and husky. “You wanna play a little man-on-woman, Lily?”

She blinked. She wasn’t sure what he meant. Was he joking or was that a real position or play or whatever in basketball? “Do I have to sweat?” She didn’t like to sweat in her good clothes.

“It’s not good if at least one person doesn’t work up a sweat.”

Okay, she was pretty sure he wasn’t talking about basketball. She glanced over at Pippen standing at the edge of the driveway listening to his daddy. She looked back at Tucker, at her reflection in his glasses. If she leaned forward just a bit, she could put her face in the crook of his neck just above the torn collar of his sweatshirt. Where his skin would be cool and smell like a warm man.

“You’re blushing.”

In his glasses, she could see the pink creeping to her cheeks. Could feel it heating her chest. He was young and attractive, and she wasn’t used to men flirting with her. At least men she hadn’t known most of her life. “Are you hitting on me?”

“If you have to ask, then I’m not as smooth as I think I am.”

He was hitting on her! “But I’m a lot older than you,” she blurted.

“Eight years isn’t a lot.”

Eight years. He knew her age. No doubt from her driver’s license. She was so flustered, she could hardly do simple math. He was thirty. That was still young, but not as young as she’d thought. Not so young that thinking about him as a faux cop in Playgirl was perverted. Well, not all that perverted. It wasn’t illegal anyway.

“Your cheeks are getting really red.”

“It’s chilly out here.” She turned toward the house but his hand on her arm stopped her. She looked down at his long fingers on the forearm of her white sweater. She ran her gaze up the frayed wrist of his sleeve, up his arm and shoulder to the scruffy growth on his square jaw. He had the kind of mouth that would feel good sliding across her skin.

“What are you thinking, Lily?”

She looked up into this mirrored glasses. “Pure thoughts.”

A deep chuckle spilled from his lips. “That makes one of us.”

For the second time in less than an hour, Deputy Tucker Matthews stunned her into silence.

“Momma!” Pippen called out as he headed toward her. “Daddy and me are going to Odessa next weekend to see Memaw and Papaw.”

She tore her gaze from Tucker’s face. “I know, sugar.” She took her cell phone from her son. “We’ll pack lots of road snacks.”

Pippen turned to the deputy. “Is it my shot?”

He shook his head. “Sorry. I gotta go take a shower before work.” A slight smile curved his lips. “I worked up a sweat.”

“Not me,” Pippen told him. “I don’t sweat. I’m too little. Momma doesn’t sweat either.”

He raised his brows above the gold frame of his sunglasses. “That’s a shame. She should do something about that.”

Lily’s own brows knitted and her mouth parted. Was he hitting on her in front of her son? And was she so out of practice she didn’t know?

Tucker laughed and looked down at the young boy in front of him. “But I have tomorrow and Tuesday off. We can finish then.”

“Okay.”

He shifted the ball from one arm to the other. “See ya later, Lily.”

No way could she call him Tucker. He might not be as young as she’d first thought, but he still was young and hot and an outrageous flirt. He was dangerous for a single mother in a small town. A big old hunk of hot flaming danger for a woman who’d finally lived down her wild reputation. “Deputy Matthews.”

Tucker stretched his arms upward and moved his head from side to side. It was 0800 in Amarillo and he was just finishing up the paperwork from the night before. He’d made two DUI arrests, issued three moving violations, and had responded to a 10-91b in Lovett. The noisy animal in question had been a fat Chihuahua named Hector. The dog’s elderly owner, Velma Patterson, had cried and promised to keep the ankle-biter quiet and Tucker had let her off with a verbal warning.

“It was that horrible Nelma Buttersford who called. Wasn’t it?” Ms. Patterson wept into a rumpled tissue. “She hates Hector.”

“I’m not sure who called,” he’d answered.

Tucker rose from the desk. That’s what he liked about working in Potter County. There wasn’t a lot happening on a Sunday night. Not like Harris County. He liked the slower pace that gave him time to plow through his paperwork.

No, not much happened, and he was fine with that. He’d seen a lot of action in Iraq and Afghanistan, and later after joining the department in Houston. Here, there was just enough going on to keep him interested, but not so much that it kept him up at night.

At least not yet. But it would. Bad things happened sometimes and he’d signed up for the job to deal with them. For as long as he could remember, he’d been dealing with bad things. He knew how to survive when shit went south.

He moved to the locker room and opened the locker with his name printed on cloth tape. He unbuttoned his beige and brown long-sleeved work shirt and pulled at the Velcro tabs at his shoulders and the sides of his waist. The vest weighed a little under ten pounds. Nothing compared to the body armor he’d worn in the military. He set it inside the locker and buttoned his shirt over his black tactical undershirt.

“Hey, Matthews,” Deputy Neal Flegel called out as he entered the locker room. “Did you hear about the 10-32 up at Lake Meredith?”

He’d heard the call over the radio. “Yeah. What kind of idiots are out on the lake that time of night?”

Flegel opened his locker and unbuttoned his shirt. “Two idiots fishing in a leaky ten-foot aluminum boat, no life jackets, and a cooler full of Lone Star.”

He knew from listening to the radio that they’d recovered one body close to shore. Another deputy, Marty Dingus, entered the locker room and he and Neal shot the shit like two old compadres. Brothers. Tucker had had a lot of compadres. Brothers in arms. Some of them he’d straight-up hated but would have died for. A sheriff’s department wasn’t unlike the military in that regard. They both played by big-boy rules. He was the new guy in Potter County. He’d been in this spot before, and he knew how to roll and adapt and get along for the sake of the job. He looked forward to getting to know the deputies here in his new home.

“How do you like Potter County so far?” Marty asked. “Not quite as hot as Harris County.”

Tucker reached for his jacket inside his locker. Marty wasn’t talking about the temperature. “That’s what I like about it.” He’d been in a enough “hot” places to last him a lifetime.

Neal peeled off his vest. “Did you find a place to live?”

Tucker nodded and shut his locker. “I took your advice and found a house in Lovett. On Winchester. Not far from the high school over there.”

“Winchester?” Neal frowned in thought. Both deputies had been born and raised in Lovett and still lived there with their families. “Do we know anyone who lives on Winchester?” he asked Marty.

“Now?” Marty shrugged and shook his head. “When we were in school, the Larkins… Cutters… and the Brooks girls.”

“That’s why it sounds familiar.” Neal set his vest inside his locker. “Lily Darlington lives on Winchester. She bought the house right next door to her mama.”

Marty laughed. “Crazy Lily?”

Crazy Lily?

“Some of my earliest wet dreams involved Crazy Lily.” Both men laughed and Tucker might have appreciated the humor if he hadn’t recently had his own sex dream about Lily Darlington.

“She’s my neighbor.” Tucker shoved his arms into his jacket. “Why do you call her crazy?” She hadn’t acted crazy around him. More like she’d driven him crazy in that white sweater yesterday. He’d taken one look at her tits in that sweater and all the blood in his head had drained to his pants.

“I don’t think she’s crazy these days,” Neal said. “Not like when she used to dance on tables.”

Lily danced on tables? “Professionally?”

“No. At parties in high school.” Marty laughed. “Those long legs in a pair of tiny shorts and Justin’s were something to see.”

Jesus.

“She’s not like that anymore,” Neal defended her. “I think that concussion she got driving her car into Ronnie’s front room back in ’04 knocked some sense into her.”

Jesus, Joseph, and Mary. “Who’s Ronnie?”

“Her ex.”

“And she drove her car into his front room? On purpose?”

“She always said her foot slipped on account of a migraine,” Neal answered. Both men laughed and Neal continued: “She was never charged with anything, but everyone knows Crazy Lily Darlington drove her car into that house on purpose. She came real close to being 5150’d.” Neal shrugged. “But she was already in the hospital for few days, so it didn’t make sense.”

5150? Tucker had picked up a 5150 last year in South Houston. The schizophrenic woman had locked herself in her bedroom for three days and had been eating her mattress.

“It was just a good thing Ronnie was off with his latest,” Marty added.

Holy Jesus. He was having crazy sex dreams and lusting after a crazy woman. A woman who’d possibly tried to kill her ex by running her car into his house and had almost been locked up on a 5150 hold. That piece of info should be enough to shrivel his nuts, but it didn’t. He thought of her and Pippen and her fierceness. He thought of her hands on his own chest, and his hands running up long legs, and he didn’t know who was crazier. Him or Crazy Lily Darlington.