Chapter 20
Luke awoke the next morning with an armful of warm, naked Maggie. He stared down at her still-sleeping face, ignoring his morning wood pressed against her belly. Her dark red lashes fanned against her pale cheeks. A freckle or two highlighted smooth ivory skin.
He allowed himself to dream about a future together. About more mornings just like this. Waking her up with his mouth between her legs, then making sleepy love on a weekend before making waffles in their kitchen.
Then the reality of their situation hit him. All the women from his past who’d wanted more, but the facts of his job kept them apart. His wasn’t a job that he got to come home from every night. Sometimes he’d be out of contact for weeks or months, like this last assignment.
The vision of the future they could have morphed to a vision of her greeting him at the end of a long assignment with frustration and resentment. He shook his head to rid himself of that. He didn’t want to put her through that, and his heart would break if he had to see those emotions on her face.
Fuck. His heart was already attached. What was he going to do when his three months were up?
Maggie stirred, her arms reaching up for a stretch. “You’re thinking awfully loud over there.”
He smiled as she opened her sleepy eyes, and combed his fingers through her hair. She winced when he found a tangle. “Good morning.”
“Morning.” She tilted her head up for a chaste kiss. Morning breath, after all.
“Do you think Virginia will feed me? Or should we head to the diner?”
Maggie giggled. “Probably, but we’ll also be feeding the rumor mill.”
“Oh sweetheart, the rumor mill started as soon as I picked you up for that first date.”
That adorable blush stole over her cheeks. “I suppose you’re right.”
“I know I am.” He kissed her forehead. “We might as well get ready to face the inquisition.”
They took turns in the bathroom and dressed for the day.
Luke kept his thoughts on the future to himself.
He had time left on his leave to make up his mind.
And Maggie still hadn’t trusted him with what she’d told the police about her stalker.
He’d need that trust before they could make a go of any sort of relationship.
And she deserved to know the secret he’d been keeping as well.
Was he really contemplating leaving his job and settling back in Hawthorn Hills? The only answer he could come up with was, maybe.
Virginia, as he’d predicted, fawned over them, and insisted on them sitting at a table for two in the dining room. She fed them heart-shaped pancakes and scrambled eggs.
Subtle, she was not.
But seeing Maggie smile shyly at the attention proved how she wasn’t used to being appreciated. And he resolved to do it more.
“What are your plans for the day?” She popped a bite of egg into her mouth.
“Dinner shift at The Busy Bee. With you.” He winked. She laughed.
“I have to do some work online before that. Grace has me doing social media for half of Main Street. I had to put my foot down before she hired me out to the entire town.”
He reached across the table and squeezed her hand. “Grace is a good friend. You could do lots worse.”
“I know,” she smiled sadly, and her gaze flitted away. “Oh, shoot.” She patted her hands over her pockets, then breathed a sigh of relief.
“What did you forget?”
She pulled out two small oblong stones, one black and one pink. “Edith gave them to me when I got to town. She said to keep them on me at all times.”
“Edith’s a bit of an odd duck.” He chuckled. Her eclectic bohemian style stood out anytime she was at the diner.
“I went into her shop looking for work, but she gave me some tea and these instead.” Maggie rubbed her thumb over the stones in her palm. “She said the pink one would bring me love, and the black one would protect me.”
His brows drew down in concern, and his spine straightened. “Protect you from what?”
She tucked the stones away and bit her lip. “Um…From the stalker, I guess.”
“Maggie…” He’d left his hand in the middle of the table, and turned his palm up. But she didn’t reach for him. “You can tell me anything.”
She shook her head, her bright red hair a curtain over her face. “We had such a lovely night. I don’t want to ruin it.”
Luke sighed, but he let it drop. They finished up their breakfast and spent a long time saying goodbye at the front door. When he finally forced himself away from her tempting lips, she seemed in a better mood.
“I’ll see you later.”
“You will,” she promised. He hopped down the porch stairs and turned back to see her still standing at the door. They waved, and he headed to his car. He had to get home to change into his work shirt and check on Mom.
Maggie knocked on the door to Deb’s house and waited while Deb wheeled over to open it.
She breathed in the crisp spring air from Deb’s front porch.
Things were turning green again. Alex had been in touch, and while they hadn’t heard a word from Sean, she felt sure he knew by now she was serious about leaving him.
It had been almost two months, after all.
The door swung open and Deb waved her inside. “Maggie! Come on in.” She hugged the older woman who was fast becoming the mom she’d never had growing up, “What are you doing here?”
“It’s Tuesday! I wanted to come over and help with the cleaning again.”
“You’re so sweet. Luke left a load of laundry for me to fold, but I know there’s more.” She followed Deb inside and shut the door.
“Before we get started, I was about to make some lunch. Do you want any?”
Maggie shrugged. She could eat. “If it’s not too much trouble, sure.”
She followed behind Deb’s scooter to the kitchen, where Deb had sandwich fixings laid out on the small kitchen table. “Help yourself.”
They put their sandwiches together, piling them high with sliced roast beef and cheese, lettuce, and tomato.
Maggie chose mayonnaise over the horseradish dressing Deb preferred.
She’d had something on her mind recently, and while it might be awkward to talk to Deb about her son, she also knew that Deb would be the best person to ask.
“Hey, Deb. Can I ask you something?”
“Sure, Hun.”
Maggie played with the napkin in her lap. “How do you do it? Luke being away all the time, I mean. How do you…” Her voice trailed off, not sure how to finish her question.
Deb swallowed her bite and one side of her mouth turned up in a half smile. “How do I handle the uncertainty? Knowing he could be in danger?”
Maggie gulped. She hadn’t considered he might be in dangerous situations. “Is he often in danger?”
Deb shrugged. “I don’t know. He’s not allowed to talk about ongoing investigations. And usually by the time he could talk about them, he’s off on another assignment.” She took a swig of her water, then set it down and fixed her attention squarely on Maggie.
“It’s like this, Hun. For the first part of his life, it was Luke and I against the world.
Then Marcus, my husband, came along. And then Aaron.
But I knew from his first ten years that Luke was a tough guy.
We had to deal with a lot, me being an unwed mother.
It wasn’t as accepted as it is today, especially in a small town. ”
Maggie nodded. Luke had mentioned something like that, but he hadn’t gone into detail.
“That, coupled with the fact I know the FBI trained him to defend himself, I choose to trust him to be safe. And because I love him, I don’t tell him how many nights I’ve spent waiting by the phone when he’s supposed to call and can’t.
Things come up often in his line of work.
But I know he’s doing important things out there.
And a little therapy never hurt anyone.” She opened a bag of potato chips, placing a handful on her plate and offering Maggie the bag.
“Bad guys don’t take holidays, and my son is my hero. ”
She smiled, taking her own handful of chips and laying them on her plate.
“That’s a really nice way of looking at it.
” She let the salty crunch take over, her mind absorbing Deb’s words.
Therapy would be nice; there had been therapists at the non-profit who had helped her initially, but they always recommended getting someone else long-term.
But until she got off Sean’s health insurance, it wasn’t possible without him knowing about it.
Once the divorce was final, she’d look into it.
“Table sixteen, order up!” Luke called out the last of the lunch rush as he hefted the plates onto the pass-through. Maggie swept by and picked them up with a wink as he blew her a kiss.
Yes, he was in deep. No, he hadn’t figured out what he was going to do about it.
He still had time.
Cliff, the mail carrier, knocked on the back door, despite it being open to let the heat of the kitchen out. “Hey, Luke.”
“Afternoon, Cliff. What have you got for us?”
He handed over the mail, a small pile of envelopes he’d take home to Mom later. But there was one addressed to Maggie again: a large manilla envelope about an inch thick.
His instincts screamed at him. Something wasn’t right.
He nodded this thanks to Cliff and poked his head through the swinging door to the dining room. “Maggie? Can you come here when you get a sec?”
She looked up from pouring coffee for Mr. Roberts and nodded. Luke ducked back into the kitchen and tucked the other envelopes away to give to Mom later.
Maggie met him in the kitchen, her forehead creased with concern. “What is it, Luke?”
He hesitated, holding the thick envelope with its chicken-scratch address close. “There’s another piece of mail addressed to you.”
The color drained from her face. “Damn it.” She covered her face with her hands and took several deep breaths. Then she lifted her head and pulled out her phone. “I’m calling MacDonald.”
“Good plan.” Her phone call didn’t take long, and MacDonald appeared at the back door in only a few minutes.