She pulled away and stared at him like she’d discovered something new and amazing. Heaven knew he certainly had. Never had he been kissed like that—like the world revolved around that moment. And he wanted more. He wanted everything.
Ten
With one hand braced behind Freddie’s back, Rain threaded the fingers of his other in her thick, shower-wet hair at the back of her head and pulled her in for another kiss. The desk chair creaked as she shifted on his lap and fisted the back of his T-shirt, her tongue tangling with his.
The embrace could have lasted ten seconds, or ten minutes, or ten hours. It was as if Rain’s mind and sense of reality flipped off like a wall switch when he kissed this girl. Nothing but pounding blood and heat and her.
She pulled away, both of them breathing hard, faces only inches apart. Then her expression changed completely—like she’d remembered something horrible all of a sudden. Her eyebrows drew together, and she shook her head. “No.” She scrambled out of his lap and backed toward the bathroom door. “No. We can’t.”
What the hell? She’d been on fire a moment ago. Now this? “Why not?”
“I didn’t come here for this.”
“I never thought you did. Doesn’t mean we should stop. Sometimes things just happen.”
“This can never happen. I made a huge mistake. This is all my fault. I’m sorry.”
He took several cautious steps toward her. “What was a mistake? Coming here or kissing me?”
“Both. Bad ideas. Terrible, terrible ideas.” She backed into the bathroom.
“Tell me why this”—he gestured to himself, then her—“is a bad idea.”
“Nothing in this town is what it seems.”
“Things rarely are.”
“And to make it worse, you live with a cop.”
“Kissing isn’t illegal, Freddie. She’s not going to come in here and bust us.”
She rolled her eyes. “That’s not what I meant.”
He took several steps closer. “Yes, I live with a cop. Ironic, since I’ve spent my whole life running from them.”
“Why?”
“Because things aren’t always what they seem.” He repeated it in the same cadence and inflection she’d used. He braced a hand on the doorframe. “This isn’t about me. It’s about why you’re pushing me away. You trusted me enough to come here. Now trust me enough to tell me why you’ve changed your mind.”
Freddie paced Rain’s bathroom like a caged animal. She pulled her hair in front of her shoulder again and twisted it around her hand. “I’m in danger, and I’ll put you in danger.”
“What kind of danger?”
“I don’t know.”
With most people, he would chalk this whole scene up to drama, but with Freddie, he expected that danger meant the real deal.
“You’re talking to someone who lived on the streets and was hunted by gangs.”
She stopped pacing and faced him. Good. She was listening.
“You asked where I’d lived before this? It was a homeless shelter. Before that, it was a tent city under an overpass, then juvie. Before that, an abandoned warehouse where a guy killed another guy just to see what it felt like. I can handle danger. Let me help you.” He risked it and stroked her cheek with his fingertips. For a moment, she leaned into his touch, then she pulled away. “Let me in,” he said. “You can’t do this alone. Everyone needs someone.” Even him. “Please, Freddie.”
Her expression changed several times as she warred in her head. “Bad things are going on. I think lots of people are involved, but I don’t know who, and I don’t know why, and…” A tear breached her lid and stalled halfway down her cheek. She scrubbed it away with the back of her hand. “You wanna know why I hadn’t used the calculator? It’s because my dad gave it to me the day he was murdered. I’d made an A on a test, and he gave it to me as a reward before school the next day. It was the last time I saw him alive.”
Murdered. “When did he die?”
“October.”
Only six months ago. No wonder she was screwed up. He wanted to bombard her with questions but held his tongue.
Her brow furrowed. “I don’t know who did it, and I’m scared I’ll be next.”
“Are the police investigating it?”
“I think the police are in on it…”
Please no. “Ruby, too?”
She shook her head. “No. Not your aunt. She’s li— An outsider.”
Outsider? Interesting and specific, considering there were only two other people on the police force. Ruby had lived in New Wurzburg her entire life. She and his mom had grown up in this very house.
He leaned his shoulder against the bathroom doorframe. “Do your cousins know you’re looking for the killer? That you think you’re next?”
“No. Nobody does. Well, except you now. Everyone says it was an accident, but it wasn’t.”
“Let me help you.” If he could help her search for answers, he could stay close and keep her safe.
She was silent, as if considering his words, and his heart ached for her. He knew what it was like to be completely alone and afraid with no one to trust.
He shoved his hands in his pockets to keep from touching her again. “Coming from outside, I have a fresh perspective.”
“I can’t get you involved.”
“But I am involved. And maybe my aunt knows something you don’t.”
She gave a choked laugh. “Your aunt is in danger, too. You can’t tell her I’m looking for his killer.”
He held up his hands. “Okay. We’ll keep it between the two of us. Our secret.”
After splashing water on her face, Freddie sniffled as she dried off with a hand towel.
“I’ve gotta go.”
She hadn’t agreed to let him help, but she hadn’t said no, either. Rain nodded and stepped back from the bathroom doorway.
“Do me a favor,” she said. “Go do the routine on the porch again to draw attention away from your window, just in case.”
“So you don’t lose.”
She smiled. “Well, I did say I like to win.”
His throat constricted at the possibility that someone out there was waiting for a chance to hurt her. No way in hell would he stand back and let that happen. “So do I.”
After flipping on the porch light and calling, “Who’s there?” a couple of times, he returned to his room, finding it empty, as expected. When he went to pull the window closed, he found his red Nike T-shirt and gym shorts folded neatly on the sill.
Eleven
Freddie wasn’t at school the next day, but her cousins were. From the moment they hit the calculus classroom, they fired gonna-fuck-you-up looks at Rain. He answered in kind.
Mr. Pratt was back and acted no different than before, even giving the same senioritis speech before taking attendance. When he called Freddie’s name, Thomas told him she was home sick. Then he shot a threatening look at Rain who stared right back, relieved to know she’d at least made it home.
The boys’ body language was hostile, not only toward Rain but toward their other classmates, too. The students sitting near them leaned away, most likely subconsciously. Others darted worried looks in their direction. He wasn’t sure whether it was Freddie’s absence that fueled their aggression or something else.
After a lesson he paid no attention to, Rain held in his desk as the ending bell finally rang, not wanting a conflict with the guys. He’d wait until they cleared out, but they didn’t. Like him, they made no move to leave. Once the room emptied, they stood and so did he. No way was he getting trapped in that idiotic desk to have his skull cracked.
The tall, skinny guy, Kurt, was the first to speak. “Stay away from Freddie.”
He wondered if she was really ill. “Is she okay?”
Thomas spoke this time. “She must have gotten into something rotten last night that made her sick.”
“Yeah. Some disease,” Kurt added.
“Mad cow disease, maybe?” Thomas
snorted, and he and Kurt fist-bumped.
The third guy, Merrick, held back from the other two and didn’t seem as into the game. He was the weak link. If shit started, it was only a two-on-one situation. Piece of cake. If something was going to go down, though, Rain wouldn’t be the one to start it. He kept his expression mild and said nothing.
“First and last warning,” Kurt said. “Stay the hell away.”
“Or what?” Dammit. He couldn’t just keep his mouth shut. Inwardly, he kicked himself for being stupid and poking the wasp’s nest.
Thomas moved within punching distance. “Or I’ll slowly peel your skin from your body with my teeth while you scream and then eat you for dinner.”
Whoa. That was unexpectedly fucked up. Not the run-of-the-mill threat.
“Careful. That might give you mad cow disease or something,” Rain said, still reeling that the sick asshole had gone all Hannibal Lecter.
“Let’s go,” Merrick said. “He got the message.”
The boys grabbed their backpacks, and all three left the room without a backward glance.
Rain had exchanged a lot of trash talk in his life, but that was some of the freakiest shit he’d ever encountered. Peel his skin from his body? He shuddered, adrenaline still pulsing through his veins.
In the hallway, he caught sight of the guys following a group of girls. He sped up to get closer. They were making the same mooing sounds they’d made at him the day before. Every now and then, Kurt bleated like a sheep. The girls didn’t look angry, as Rain would have expected; they looked terrified. In fact, students parted when they passed, like in the video he’d seen one time when a shark passed through a school of fish.
The boys split up right before the tardy bell rang, and Rain leaned against the wall of lockers, puzzling out what he’d witnessed. The first time he’d seen Freddie and her cousins, he’d equated them with a gang. Maybe they were, and it was Freddie who kept these guys in check. Maybe she was the gang leader, and in her absence, they went rogue. He needed to keep an eye on them until she returned, which he hoped was soon.
Evidently, she’d told her cousins where she’d been last night. That, or they’d put two and two together and figured it out on their own.
He wondered if she was really sick or simply avoiding him. Maybe he shouldn’t have kissed her. Perhaps he’d moved too fast. No. She’d kissed him. Practically climbed him like a jungle gym. His body heated at the memory, and he shook his head to clear it. A long, hard run was just the thing he needed right now.
…
The school workout gym smelled like plastic mats, metal, and sweat. It was raining, so the coach told the guys they could lift weights instead of run today.
“I’ll spot,” Grant offered when Rain stopped at the bench press.
“Cool.” Rain slid another set of forty-five-pound plates onto the bar and lay back on the bench, testing the bar before lifting it.
Grant took his place behind him to catch the bar if it didn’t make the hooks. “So, Friederike Burkhart, huh?”
Rain relaxed his grip before he even attempted the lift. What the hell? Had Freddie taken out an ad announcing she’d dropped by his place?
He positioned his hands and pushed up, lifting the bar from the hooks. Just right. Enough weight to be a challenge but totally manageable. He lowered the bar to his chest and pushed up with a grunt. Three reps should do it.
“I was surprised, honestly. She’s usually not receptive,” Grant said, voice conversational.
Rain took another breath before lowering the bar again. Receptive. What kind of term was that? With a grunt, he raised the bar back and kept it suspended, muscles vibrating under the stress. One more rep at this weight.
“You good?”
“Yeah” With a deep breath, he lowered the bar to his chest and shoved it back up with a fierce growl.
Grant assisted as he let the bar fall back into place. “Hmm. I guess I can see your appeal.”
What was with this guy?
“Mom and Dad said you came by the store for a job.”
Rain sat up. “Yeah. I start Monday. Thanks for that.”
“No big deal. Glad I could steer you in the right direction.” He took a seat on the bench, evidently planning to press the same amount of weight. He pushed the bar out of the brackets and centered it. “You made an impression on my little sister. She wouldn’t shut up about you all through dinner.”
She’d made an impression on Rain, too. Not a good one.
Grant lowered the bar and pushed it back up with what appeared to be little effort.
“Where is Friederike today?” Grant asked after another rep.
“How am I supposed to know?”
“Because she was at your place last night.”
Was everyone in this town a member of some online gossip chat room or something?
Grant did another rep, and his muscles vibrated on the press. Rain spotted the bar back to its bracket. “You and Freddie must be close for her to share her private life with you.”
He barked a laugh as he sat up. “Her cousin told me.”
It seemed odd she would have told her cousins, since she had been hiding from them in the first place.
“Merrick saw her climb out of your window.” Grant punched his shoulder in that conspiratorial, macho guy kind of way.
Rain wanted to punch him back in a knock-his-teeth-out kind of way. “Another round?”
“Nah. I’m done.” Grant extended his hand. “Thanks for the spot.”
Warily, Rain took his hand. Like yesterday on the track, a warm buzz traveled up his arm and a strange appreciation for the guy washed through him. Not right. Nothing about this was right. This whole town was off somehow, and he planned to get to the bottom of it, starting with the mystery of Freddie’s dad’s murder and who might be out to harm Freddie.
“Take care, Aaron Ryland,” Grant said before Rain reached the door. Somehow, it sounded more like a warning than a friendly parting comment.
Twelve
Rain pulled the hood of his jacket lower over his face and crossed the street. The one-story, tan brick building looked more like a post office than a police station. A dented blue Toyota Corolla with a red right front quarter panel from another car, a sleek pearl-finish Mercedes, and Ruby’s cruiser were the only vehicles parked out front.
He took a deep breath. Moth would get a huge kick out of this: Rain Ryland entering a police station by choice. Man, oh man, how his life had changed.
Under the overhang, he shook off the water and pulled back the hood. The door stuck when he pulled the handle but eventually broke free with a loud squeak of the hinges. Ruby’d said Gerald was the catchall guy, from dispatch to handyman. Hopefully he was better with the phone than he was with a screwdriver and a can of WD-40, which was all it would take to repair the door. The interior of the station was in no better shape. The first thing that caught his eye was the dinginess of the place, punctuated by the hum and flicker of fluorescent tube lights in the yellowed tile grid ceiling, half of which were burned out. Gerald should be fired as handyman for sure. At least he was good with dirt bikes.
“What do you want?” a balding middle-aged man said from a scratched metal desk in the back left corner of the room.
What kind of greeting was that?
“Hey, Aaron!” Ruby rose from behind a desk in the opposite corner outside a door labeled Chief Wanda Richter. “He’s here to see me, Gerald. Thanks.”
“Oh, this is your nephew.” The man scanned him up and down with a grimace that looked like he’d just chewed up a bug. Screw you, too, buddy.
“What are you doing here?” his aunt asked, helping him out of the rain coat and hanging it on a hook inside the door. She gestured to the metal folding chair in front of her desk.
“Just dropping in to say hi.” That sounded lame. Better than the truth: I came to see if I can find out what’s going on in this crazy town, specifically with regard to Freddie’s dad’s death.
&nb
sp; “Have a seat. How was school?”
Weird as hell. “Good.” He slipped out of his backpack—still dry because he’d worn it under his coat—and shoved it under the chair with his foot. “So…” He gestured to a novel opened facedown on her desk as he sat. “Is this your typical day?”
“Yep. It’s a safe, quiet little town.”
Safe, my ass.
A glance at Gerald confirmed he was listening in.
Ruby picked up the novel. “My book club meets tonight. I haven’t finished this week’s chapters.” It had an orange and black cover with a guy dressed in black on the front. “It’s about space aliens in high school. You might like it. You could catch up easily by next week. Wanna sit in tonight?”
The chief’s door opened, and a woman dressed in a black pantsuit like on the TV detective shows stepped out. It was hard to tell how old she was. Maybe sixtyish. She had shiny blond hair with silver streaks in it, coiled in a braid around the top of her head like a crown—the kind of hairstyle that looked like it was a pain to do and uncomfortable to wear, which suited. The Mercedes out front made sense now.
“I need the Schmidt Ranch file,” she ordered Gerald. “Fetch. Now.”
Holy shit. She commanded him like he was a pet dog or something. Rain hated her immediately.
“Anything new, Ruby?” Her tone for his aunt was civil in comparison.
“No, Chief. Not a single call.”
“I’m going to check out that report from the ranch. They lost another calf last night.” Her gaze froze on Rain, and he felt pinned in place. Unable to move or even breathe for a moment.
With a low growl in his throat, he broke free of whatever had frozen him up and stood. What was wrong with him? Maybe it was the lack of sleep last night.
“Uh, Chief. This is my nephew, Aaron. Lynn’s boy.”
The woman didn’t move a muscle. “That’s obvious.”
Again, he felt that odd paralysis, and once more he shook it off, staggering back a few steps.