Blood Feud (24 page)

“God, Tessie,” he breathed, clasping my cheek in his palm, kissing me again and again. “I’ve missed you.”

“You silly boy. I just talked to you this morning,” I said, looking up at him with bedroom eyes. Had we been anywhere private, I would have ripped off my uniform and ravished him in a blink. Instead, I reached up and traced around his lips with my finger. His nostrils flared with desire. His arm whipped up and grabbed my wrist, pulling my palm to his mouth and kissed it.

“What you been up to since we spoke, baby doll?” he asked, kissing down my arm to my elbow.

“It’s been nothing here but penises, penises, penises,” I said smiling.

His head flung up, his amber eyes wide. I finally had his undiluted attention. “What the hell?”

I laughed. “Don’t worry. Not real ones. Graffiti. I think your young rellies have been up to some mischief again.”

He smiled indulgently and kissed me on the forehead. He would forgive his relatives almost anything. “Kids will be kids, Tessie.”

“You always say that.” I frowned up at him, pulling away. “What are you doing in town anyway, Jakey? You didn’t mention anything about it when we spoke not so long ago.”

“They made a mistake with the shifts and had too many rostered on this afternoon, so I was one of the lucky ones set free. I had to go to Mum’s place and thought I’d pop in to visit my favourite cop while I was here.”

“And what did Lola want?”

He flashed me his beautiful smile and leaned forward to kiss me again. “You didn’t tell me you were promoted to detective. Or are you just naturally nosy?”

“Just naturally nosy,” I smiled back, but my smile was a little strained and I didn’t move back closer to him.

“She needed some money,” he told me reluctantly, not meeting my eyes. It was another touchy subject between us. I thought his family freeloaded off him, taking advantage of his good nature and the fact that he was the only one in the whole rotten bunch with a steady job and income. But he couldn’t afford to hand out money. He didn’t earn too much as a prison officer and had a big loan on his ute to repay – an inconvenient fact I tried to remind him about as much as possible.

The atmosphere chilled between us. “Why did she need money?”

“For food.”

“The government doesn’t give people on welfare enough money to buy food these days?”

He squirmed with discomfort. Jake hated arguing. “Tessie, don’t start. Please. She finds it hard to make ends meet with everybody staying at the house with her.”

“Like Red, you mean?”

“No! I don’t mean him.”

“He was there this morning. I saw him.”

“I don’t know anything about his whereabouts, I swear,” he said earnestly. “Nobody tells me anything because they think . . .” His voice trailed away.

“They think you’ll go running to tell me?”

He nodded, unhappily caught between his family and me. Though I felt for him, I wasn’t letting up.

“You know you should stop giving your family money. There are lots of things they could do to afford the basics like food. Lola could stop smoking, for one. Or some of them could get a job,” I suggested tartly.

“Please, baby doll,” he pleaded. “I didn’t come for a fight.”

We looked at each other for a long time. I wished I could read his mind. I didn’t know if I could ever forgive him if he knowingly gave Red aid and comfort, fully aware his brother was a violent sexual predator. But all I saw was honest love shining back at me. Jake was careful to remain uninformed about certain of his family’s activities and from what he’d just told me, it appeared his family members were equally careful in keeping him uninformed.

I wanted to be angry, but bathed in the warm glow of his eyes, I relented. “I’m sorry, Jakey.” I reached up to kiss him and that kept us both quiet for the next few minutes.

The Sarge’s voice nearby made us spring apart. “Jake,” he acknowledged coolly.

“Finn,” Jake replied with matching coolness.

“I’m going home for lunch, Tessie,” the Sarge said. “Do you want me to make you a sandwich?”

“Thanks, Sarge. That would be nice.”

“Have you told Jake that you’ll be staying with me until his brother is recaptured.”

“I heard.” Jake’s tone changed from chilly to positively frosty.

Instead of taking that as a hint to leave, the Sarge lingered at the doorway. “You know anything about your brother’s location?”

“No,” replied Jake curtly. “I just told Tessie that. I have no idea where he is.”

The Sarge sized him up with an unfriendly eye. “If I ever find out that you’re bullshitting me, there will be hell to pay. Just remember that.”

Jake scorned. “Am I supposed to feel intimidated by that?”

The Sarge took a step back into the room. “I couldn’t care less how you feel about it. But for once, you should put Tessie above your family.”

“Fuck off, Maguire. I don’t need you to tell me how to run my relationship. You can’t even convince your own woman to be with you.”

“Jakey! That’s enough,” I interrupted, embarrassed.

It was as if I hadn’t even spoken.

“Yeah?” countered the Sarge. “At least I’m willing to commit to my
woman
. She knows she means more to me than just a quickie on the side whenever I have the urge.”

“Sarge! That’s totally uncalled for,” I said, shocked he’d say something like that. I was nobody’s ‘quickie on the side’ and I never doubted that Jake genuinely loved me.

The Sarge’s eyes rested on me. “Uncalled for maybe, but true,” he insisted quietly, closing the door behind him.

“Great. Now he’s angry with me,” I bemoaned.

“He should mind his own fucking business. I’ll be glad when he’s gone.”

“He’s not going anywhere.”

Jake cut me a pitying glance. “You really believe that, don’t you?”

“Why wouldn’t I?”

“A rich, snooty prick like him staying in this town for long? It’s not like you to fool yourself into thinking something that unrealistic, Tessie. And I’m beginning to wonder why you would.”

And without sparing me another word, he also left. A minute later I heard his ute door slam and the engine rev, before he screeched out onto the highway and back to the prison.

I leaned on the counter and covered my eyes with my hand. Why were men so complicated?

Chapter 16

We ate the tuna salad sandwiches that the Sarge made in silence. He’d closed himself off, unapproachable. I kicked myself again for being so sharp with him earlier.

After we’d finished, I collected the plates and washed up, desperately scrabbling around in my mind for something to say that would crack his icy veneer. I’d never been any good at small talk and my lack of casual conversational skills let me down once more. But in the end it was him who broke the silence.

“I don’t intend to go back to the station again today unless we receive a call-out.”

“Okay,” I said, grateful that he’d finally spoken.

He came over and leaned against the bench I was wiping down, forcing me to reach around him to finish.

“I’m not going to apologise for what I said to Jake, even if you think I was speaking out of turn. I meant every word of what I said. He needs to put more commitment into your relationship. And he needs to sort his family out. The way they treat you is appalling and he doesn’t do anything about it.”

I stayed silent.

“You don’t deserve anything less than his full commitment and support.”

That was nice of him, but I had no idea how to respond. I hung up the kitchen cloth to dry and scuttled away to the bedroom to change out of my uniform.

The afternoon passed peacefully, the Sarge busying himself outside doing little chores while I did some laundry and tidied up a bit around the house to help him out. When he came back inside again to shower, he’d regained his normal equilibrium and smiled at me briefly before disappearing into the now gleamingly clean bathroom.

We were enjoying an afternoon cup of tea and having a friendly argument about what the enigmatic ending of a movie we’d recently watched together really meant, when my phone rang. Expecting it to be Jake ready to apologise, I eagerly hunted it down.

The voice that greeted me was not Jake.

“Hello, Tessie.”

“Stop contacting me, you jerk. Give yourself up.”

“Neither of those is going to happen. What are you doing sleeping over at that copper’s place? Are you riding his pork sword, Tessie? Hmm? Swallowing him down? Letting him fuck you? Letting him taste your sweet, sweet pussy? What would Jakey say about that, you sexy little dirty whore?”

“Stop being so disgusting.”

“Oh, I get it! He’s
protecting
you. How damn cute is that.”

“It’s just a matter of time before you’re recaptured.”

“Sadly, time’s the one thing I have plenty of at the moment,” he laughed. “The problem is that I’m a little bored already. Sharnee’s always been a boring fuck and nothing’s changed since I’ve been in the clink. After fucking her a couple of times, I’m ready for a taste of something different. Someone different. I need fresh bitch flesh. Soft, perfumed bitch flesh. Perfect for biting and bruising. So I’m thinking if I can’t get close enough to
you
. . .” He paused, reeling me in.

“Then what?” I asked, taking the bait, knowing I shouldn’t but not able to help myself. I should hang up on him and not feed his desire for attention. Intellectually I understood that, but still some part of me needed to hear what he was going to say.

He laughed again, his soft, warm chuckle at odds with his chilling threat. “I’m thinking I might go nightclubbing in Big Town tonight. Lots of bitches out there who wouldn’t mind a bit of romance with an experienced, good-looking bloke like me. And I promise I’ll give one bitch a night to remember for the rest of her life.”

This time I did hang up on him, punching in another familiar number.

“Midden. Speak.”

“Ma’am, I’ve just had Red Bycraft on the phone. He says he’s going nightclubbing tonight up your way.”

“I don’t give a fuck about his social life,” she dismissed. “I hope he gets beaten to death by one of those bouncers.”

“
Ma’am!
You know what that means,” I implored. “He’ll be hunting a woman tonight. Or maybe even a girl. Think of that teenager he did over last time. The poor girl couldn’t walk for weeks.”

“Fucking hell,” she muttered into the receiver. There was a lengthy silence before she sighed resentfully. “I suppose I don’t have a choice but to put all available teams on nightclub surveillance tonight. You can join us. No one knows that double turdburger better than you. Get your arse up here ASAP.”

I winced with dread. “I can’t, ma’am. I have a hen’s party to go to tonight.”

There was an ominous silence from the other end. “A fucking what?”

I swallowed, my mouth suddenly dry. “A hen’s party, ma’am. For Lizzie Lavering, the herb and flower farmer. She’s marrying Brett Cusack and . . .” I explained, lamely trailing off, feeling her annoyance through the phone.

“I don’t give a flying fuck if it’s a coming out party for Farmer Daisy Gobshite, the duck-fucker. Get your soon-to-be kicked arse up here now!” Call me intuitive, but I was sensing that she was a little angry with me. Or maybe a lot angry.

I steeled myself and put my life on the line. “No ma’am, I can’t. I promised her.” The phone slammed in my ear and I was left standing there, stupidly staring at it. “Oh dear.”

“Trouble?” the Sarge asked.

“She’s a little miffed with me for not being available.”

“She’ll get over it. You have to be able to have some free time now and then.”

Though I agreed with him, it didn’t stop me feeling angsty about how angry Fiona was. Nobody liked to upset their mentor.

My phone rang, and once again it was Red on the other end. “Hasn’t anyone ever told you that it’s rude to hang up on someone, Tessie? I really am going to have to teach you some manners.”

“Piss off, Red.” I moved to hang up again.

“I’m going to be thinking of you when I do it tonight, you know. Whoever she is will just be your replacement. It should be you, Tessie. It should be you tonight. Remember that.”

Something in me snapped – the stress of the last few days finally catching up with me.

“
Why don’t you just leave me alone? I hate you!
” I screamed into the phone to more of his mocking laughter. I threw my phone on the kitchen table where it bounced off onto the floor. It landed roughly, facedown. I covered my face with my hands, my elbows resting on table, trying not to release the hot, unwanted tears that suddenly filled my eyes. The Sarge leaned over and placed an arm around my shoulders.

“He’s going to hurt another woman because of me. Why can’t my life just stop being so shitty for once?”

The Sarge tightened his arm around my shoulders. “Whatever happens is not going to be your fault. It’s Bycraft to blame, not you.”

Though I knew he was being supportive, his comforting words rang hollow to me. Nothing could make me feel better about the brutal prospect of some poor, unknowing woman making a terrible judgement of error tonight by trusting a dangerous snake like Red. She would suffer and all because of his violent obsession with me. How could it
not
be my fault?