Chapter 11
CHAPTER ELEVEN
WINSLOW
“What are you doing here? And why do you have flowers in your boots?”
Griffin walked into my office with the boots, each with a geranium poking out of the top. He eyed my desk, searching for a clear space to set them down. There wasn’t one.
“This was clean,” I mumbled, shuffling folders and papers out of the way. The mess I’d wrangled had returned. Story of my life.
The moment I thought I had something under control, it snuck up on me.
Sort of like Griffin.
I’d spent the past two days making peace with the end of our relationship. It was fine. Good, even. The right decision. It had been time to put Griffin behind me and focus on this job.
That was the reason I was in Quincy, right? I should be spending my evenings out and around town, not locked in my bedroom with a gorgeous man who knew how to deliver an orgasm. I’d tucked my weeks with him away on a shelf in my mind where they’d collect dust for the next decade.
Except then he’d walked through my office door with flowers and suddenly all I wanted was more.
More nights. More weeks.
More.
He set the boots down on the desk, then took an empty chair, leaning his elbows on his knees. Looking up from under the brim of his hat, those blue eyes didn’t have their normal glint. He looked worn, like the world was propped against those broad shoulders.
This visit wasn’t about me, was it? This was not an apology and whatever these flowers were, they weren’t a gift to work his way back into my bed.
I waited, giving him a moment. People usually told you the most when you lent them a minute to breathe.
“My uncle. Briggs.”
“The one from Willie’s with dementia.”
He nodded. “He had these boots at his place. Said he found them on a hike around Indigo Ridge.”
My body tensed. “When?”
“He wasn’t sure. I didn’t press. He found them and turned them into flowerpots.”
A unique idea, except he’d probably erased any evidence I might find. They were women’s boots, the intricate pink and coral stitching in the leather a pattern of paisleys and swirls.
“I did my best not to touch them,” Griff said.
I grabbed my phone from the desk and took a few quick pictures from all angles, then I left Griffin in his seat as I went to the bullpen. “Allen.”
He looked up from his desk and I waved him into the office.
“What’s up, Chief?” He dipped his head to Griffin. “Griff.”
“These boots were found on Indigo Ridge,” I said. “Without the flowers. Would you mind taking the flowers out and then cataloging these into evidence? We’ll want to dust for prints and see what we find. But I’m guessing these are Lily Green’s.”
“You got it. Want me to check with her mother to see if she recognizes them?”
“Please.”
Allen walked out of the office, coming back with two evidence bags. I helped him put a boot in each, then closed the door behind him as he left.
“I’ll be visiting your uncle,” I told Griffin, returning to my chair.
“Figured you would.” Griffin stood and walked to the bookshelf in the corner.
I hated how good it was to see him. His faded jeans draped over his strong thighs. They molded to the curve of his ass. The T-shirt he wore today was dusty, like he’d been out working all morning.
The scent of his soap and sweat filled the room. I’d washed my sheets yesterday, erasing him from my bed. I regretted that decision now because that smell was intoxicating.
He picked up a framed photo on the middle shelf. “Who’s this?”
“Cole.”
“Cole.” His eyes narrowed. “Another ex?”
“A mentor. We worked together in Bozeman. And he was my sensei.”
In the photo, Cole and I were standing together, each wearing white gis at the dojo in town where I’d taken karate. When I’d been promoted to detective in Bozeman, Cole had suggested I learn martial arts. Not only as a way to keep in shape but as a way to protect myself.
“You have a black belt.”
“I do,” I said.
“And these are your parents.” He pointed to the photo on the next shelf. Not a question, but a statement, like maybe he’d seen their picture before.
Mom and Dad stood beside me on the day I’d graduated from the police academy. I was wearing a black uniform and a hat. The smiles on all three of our faces were blinding.
“Your dad looks like Covie,” he said. “I’ve seen him around town before. And you look like your mom.”
He couldn’t have known what a compliment that was. My mother was the most beautiful woman I’d seen in my life, inside and out.
For a while after they’d died, I’d put their photos in storage.
It had been too hard to see them frozen in time, laughing and smiling and happy.
I’d walk into my bedroom, see their photo on a shelf and burst into tears.
But then the nightmares started, so I’d put the photos back, because even though it hurt to see them, to miss them, I’d take their smiles a million times over their deaths.
Griffin moved to the last picture on the shelf, one of me and Pops fishing when I was a teenager. “You had more freckles.”
“Summers in the sun. That was before I wore sunscreen every day.”
He hummed, then resumed his seat, leaning forward once more. His eyes stayed glued to the edge of my desk, and once again, I waited until he was ready. “Do you still think that Lily’s death might not have been a suicide?”
“I don’t know,” I admitted.
As the days went on, the uneasy feeling hadn’t faded, but the logical part of my mind had begun to yell. There was no evidence pointing to anything but suicide. At some point, I’d have to let this go.
Maybe the boots would help.
Maybe not.
Griffin looked up and there was desperation in his eyes. Like he needed me to give him a different answer.
“It’s still not sitting right,” I said. “Every time I talk to someone who knew her, they are shocked. Friends. Family. No one had a clue that she was struggling.”
“Yeah, that’s pretty much what I’m hearing too.”
“It doesn’t mean she wasn’t hiding it. Mental health is usually a well-kept secret. But I would have expected to find one person she’d confided in.” Either there wasn’t that person. Or I hadn’t found them yet.
If he or she did exist, I suspected it was probably whoever had been with Lily before her death.
Maybe those boots would provide a clue, assuming they were hers and if any fingerprints hadn’t been erased while they’d been turned into garden décor.
“Thank you for bringing in the boots.”
“I’ll get out of your hair.” He stood and took a step for the door.
“Griff,” I called, waiting for him to turn. Then I squared my shoulders and straightened my spine.
I hated the question I was about to ask. “Are you sleeping with another woman?”
“Excuse me?” His jaw ticked.
“That woman on Wednesday. Emily.” The reporter. “Are you sleeping together?”
He fisted his hands on his hips.
“We used protection but it’s not foolproof. I’m on birth control but I’d like to know so I can get tested if necessary.”
Griffin raised his eyebrows, then with two long, stomping strides, he planted his hands on the desk, leaning so far down that the fury in his gaze hit me like a heat blast. “I don’t fuck two women at the same time.”
The air rushed from my lungs. Thank. God.
Ending this relationship was for the best, but that decision hadn’t exactly translated to my emotions. Every time I pictured Griffin and blond Emily, jealousy would eat at me for hours.
“That’s not the type of man I am,” he said through gritted teeth.
“Okay.”
“It’s not fucking okay. You shouldn’t have had to ask me that question.”
“Well, you seemed rather cozy at Eden Coffee.”
“Did I touch her?”
“Um . . .” She’d touched him. But he hadn’t touched her, had he?
“No, I didn’t fucking touch her. Did I kiss her?”
I swallowed hard. “No.”
He was pissed. Really pissed. I liked that he was mad. His character was in question, and for good men, they’d stop at nothing to set the record straight. “No, because I don’t play with women. Understood?”
“Loud and clear.”
“Good.” He shoved off the desk and stormed out of the office. His footsteps down the hallway pounded as hard as my heartbeat.
It wasn’t until I heard the exit door open and shut that I breathed. Then a smile tugged at my mouth.
There was nothing going on with the reporter. I sighed, sinking into my chair. The days I’d spent being angry at Griff had been for nothing. Maybe I should have trusted him.
It was Skyler’s fault I’d jumped to this conclusion. Being betrayed by the man who’d promised to love me, to be my companion, to be my friend, had left its mark.
Griffin wasn’t Skyler. There was no comparison.
Griffin was honest and true. And he knew his way around my clitoris.
The smile was still on my lips as I shook the mouse on my computer and got back to work. Maybe tomorrow I’d see the surface of my desk again.
And maybe the next time I saw Griffin around town, I wouldn’t want to hit him with a rock.
The cork in my wine bottle popped free at the same moment someone pounded on my door. Not a knuckle tap. A full-fisted hammer.
Only one person in this town beat on my red door.
I poured a glass, then carried it with me as I went to answer. “I have a doorbell.”
Griffin’s scowl was fixed in place. Clearly, an afternoon and evening hadn’t made him any less angry than he’d been at the station. “What about you?”
“What about me?” I took a sip of my cabernet, letting the dry, robust flavor burst on my tongue as he glowered.
“Are you fucking anyone else?”
I nearly choked on my sip. “No.”
“Good.” That large body forced me out of the way as he strode inside.
I closed the door behind him and followed as he walked into the living room and glanced around.
“You unpacked.”
“For the most part.”
“Where’s your furniture?”
“On backorder.” Just like my bedframe had been.