Chapter 4 #3
“Give me one more day, Jessup,” she said, and it sounded like it was through clenched teeth. “Don’t you dare go off killing people based on speculation. There’s been enough of that. In fact, someone’s counting on it.”
It did sound like a conspiracy theory. But who would benefit?
“You’ve got until the end of tomorrow. Then go do one of your booty call weekends in Naples. Keep out of it.”
“Oh, please,” she said, exasperation in her voice. “You think I’d run off and fool around while you’re here getting yourselves killed?”
“Be a lot smarter.” After a pause, Jessup asked, “Is someone here?”
“No, why?”
Kade stiffened. He leaned against the door, ready to put his weight behind it if they tried to open it. Unfortunately, he saw no way to lock it.
“I smell someone. I’d better check—”
“I was with someone. You smell him on me,” Violet said.
“Just now? Here?”
“No, in Miami. I needed…”
“Comfort sex. Got it,” the other brother said. “That’s why she’s got that I-just-got-laid-and-it-was-good fire in her eyes.”
The footsteps continued to the front door, and more speculation ensued. Kade listened as doors slammed and the conversation continued outside.
He supposed it could’ve been comfort sex. Not that they’d gotten to the sex part—a fact his body wouldn’t let him forget. Maybe that explained her need for touch, but it didn’t do a damned thing to excuse his loss of control.
Kade stretched out on the bed, his arms behind his head.
The linen bedspread was softer than he’d anticipated.
He had to stop thinking about her in bed, on his boat, naked.
But honestly, he’d just lived one of his teenage fantasies: a naked mud fight with a woman.
The girls he’d suggested it to went all squeamish on him.
The bedroom door opened, and Violet leaned against the frame, eyes narrowed and arms crossed over her chest. “You’re enjoying that a little too much.”
He arched one eyebrow. “Booty call weekend?”
“It’s none of your business.” She grabbed a small pillow and threw it at him. “Out of my bed.”
“Hey, I was just passing the time.” He ran a hand over the bedspread. “I guess it was a good thing we weren’t closer to this earlier.” Because he had no doubt they’d have been tangling these sheets…oh, right about the time her brothers came barging in.
“That would not have happened. I came to my senses before—”
“I got off.” With a smirk, he slid off the bed and came to his feet.
She blushed. And there it was, the hesitation and hint of vulnerability that told him she wasn’t nearly as unaffected as she pretended to be.
He chuckled, running his finger down her nose.
“Don’t worry none about me. It’s nothing a cold shower can’t fix.
” Except he’d already gotten one of those, thanks to the hose.
And it hadn’t helped. “I’m going to talk to Ferro and find out what’s going on.
Tell him to get at least some Arguses out here to discourage any further trouble.
If it’s because of the solar storm fluctuations, it’ll only be for a few more days.
We’re going to feel the brunt of it Thursday.
We can forestall any more violence, investigate the murders that have already happened, and keep the peace you want so badly. ”
Her eyes flared. “I hope so.”
They walked toward the front door.
She looked through the window first. “I want to make sure they’re gone. If my family finds out I went to the Guard, it won’t be pretty.”
“Would they hurt you?” Considering his mission, it was damned strange to be worrying about her safety where her own family was concerned. But if he was tabling the directive to kill, he’d be damned if someone else caused her harm on his watch.
“They’d see it as a betrayal. We have a punishment known as the wall of shame. The naughty are stripped to their underwear—the men, anyway—and cuffed to the outside wall of the barn.” She shuddered. “Sometimes for days. And they play whatever music you can’t stand.”
Exposed to the elements, to the ridicule of peers. “Sounds barbaric.”
“We have our own brand of punishment here in the Fringe.” She shrugged.
“I guess I’m used to it. And the threat of it works.
Two of our cousins were stealing oranges from our two trees up at the house.
Their punishment was being cuffed and having rotten oranges thrown at them.
After a couple of days, believe me, they didn’t want anything to do with oranges. ”
“You ever been put on the wall?”
“Once, when I was twelve. I borrowed my brothers’ fishing gear and accidentally dumped it into the lake. They hung bait fish all around me and played the twangiest country music they could get their hands on. I don’t want to suffer through that again.”
His image of her being tied up, in her grown-up state, had a decidedly different picture—and outcome. One that hiked up his physical discomfort by another couple of degrees. He kicked out those tantalizing thoughts and headed to the property line, knowing he’d be back. For Violet. For justice.