“Good,” Ashley murmured, feeling a little uncomfortable that Jake was listening to the conversation. It was such a casual conversation, surely it couldn’t matter. She still felt uncomfortable.
He set down his empty cup. “Thanks for the tea, and sorry for the disruption,” he said. “Good night, all. I’ll let everyone get some sleep.” He started out the side door, then turned back. Ashley thought he might be about to apologize for tackling her. He wasn’t. “I will see what I can find out about your friend’s case,” he said.
“Thank you.”
He exited, and Nick rose to secure the door.
“I guess I’d better go and get what sleep I can,” Ashley murmured.
“Of course. Good night, dear,” Sharon said.
Ashley blew Nick a kiss and started back through the house. She should have been exhausted, but she felt wired instead, and found herself wondering why Nick had brought Jake into the house at that hour of the night. Neither of them had explained.
Her television was still on, and Lucy and Ethel were at it again.
She plunged into bed, then rose and went back to the window to the right of the door. Pulling back the drapes, she looked out.
Detective Dilessio was standing on the deck of his houseboat again, hands on his hips, studying the bar.
Why?
She watched him for a few moments, once again noticing the way the moonlight fell on him. She gritted her teeth and gave herself a mental shake. He was the last man on earth to whom she should feel the slightest attraction.
But she did. It wasn’t physically possible, but she could still feel where his body had been against hers in those few moments when they had been locked in a fierce embrace on the kitchen floor.
She had always been the practical one among her friends. If it isn’t good for you, don’t do it. Don’t take a puff of a cigarette. Why start, when you know it’s bad? Don’t take a chance on a guy you know is bad news. If you don’t start…
She wasn’t starting anything. She went back to bed and stared at the television. Once again, she eventually drifted back to sleep.
Not even sleep could help her over-exhaustion. She started dreaming again, knowing she was dreaming….
She was there again, on his houseboat. They were discussing white briefs, though once again he wasn’t wearing any. She kept trying to look into his eyes, to keep her gaze from dropping downward….
She wanted to talk to him about something very important, but she couldn’t remember what it was, because she couldn’t keep her eyes on his.
The alarm rang. She was jerked out of the dream, still painfully aware of it, the vision of him clear in her mind.
She bolted upright, miserable, feeling as if she’d never gone to sleep. Shit!
She just knew it was going to be a wretched day.
CHAPTER 9
The room wasn’t small, but it felt confining. Stifling. There was a brown table. The walls were a sanitarium green—two different shades of sanitarium green. There was nothing in the room other than the table and two chairs.
Peter Bordon sat in one, staring across the table at Jake, who sat in the other. A guard was right outside the door. Jake didn’t think he’d be crying out for backup—Bordon wasn’t impressive in any physical sense. He was about five feet ten inches tall, and no more than a hundred and eighty. He was tight and compact, but not in any way heavily muscled.
Even now, so many years later, he had that strange power in his eyes. Scary, in a way. Very creepy. He had smiled with secretive amusement when he first saw Jake, and the guard had promised he would be just outside the door.
“Guess he doesn’t know you once beat the shit out of me,” Bordon said.
“I didn’t beat the shit out of you,” Jake countered.
Bordon inclined his head to the side, shrugging off the comment. “Sorry, you were strangling me, I think.”
“You look alive and well to me.”
“I am well. Very well, thanks.”
Only a few hints of gray teased at his light brown hair. Those strange eyes were hazel, and it often seemed as if Bordon could lighten and darken them at will. He had an ability to focus on a person that was almost hypnotic. His voice was low, but full. He was soft-spoken, but there was a strength in his tone that could cover tremendous distance.
“Maybe I shouldn’t call you Jake? Is that too personal? Me, using your first name? I should be calling you Detective Dilessio. But then, I feel that I came to know you so well. I know you’d be pleased if I was dying of a slow and painful disease, choking daily on my own vomit. There’s so much anger and hatred in your heart. But I forgive you.”
“Fuck your forgiveness,” Jake said, then gritted his teeth. Bordon was baiting him, a talent of his. Jake swore then that he wasn’t going to rise to that bait again.