Breaking Bad (17 page)

When she didn’t respond to his repeated texts that day or the next, he started to get angry. When he learned that she had been burning up the phone with Flynn, he came unglued.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

S
tevie had been gone four days and it felt like four years. He missed her. He wanted her. But he told himself he couldn’t have her. Angrily, Jack paced the HQ office. When he got his hands on Ryker, he was going to tear him apart.

“What’s your deal, Thorn?” Ryker asked as he entered the small room, soundly closing the door behind him.

Jack turned and kept himself from lunging at his turncoat friend. “Stay the fuck away from Stevie.”

Flynn shrugged off his suit jacket, rolled up his sleeves, then turned and faced Jack. “You want to take this outside?”

“She’s off limits.”

“Only because you’re my friend who is about to fuck up his life am I going to say this, Thorn, and I’m only going to say it once: I won’t stay the fuck away from her. We’re working a case together. If you have a problem with that, it’s your damn problem.”

“She’s shutting me out.”

“Because you’re an asshole.
You
shut the door, live with it. As far as the case goes, she’s on it, and I’m on it.” He leveled Jack with an intent stare. “Maybe it’s time you recused yourself.”

Fury and jealousy tangled in his gut. He wasn’t about to step aside and let Ryker take his case or his…what? What was Stevie to him? He’d set her free, he had no claim. But the thought of any man, even his good friend, touching her, ripped him up inside. “Stay away from her.”

“If you’re saying that because you think I have a shot with her, forget it. You fucked her up for anyone else.”

“Son of a bitch!” Jack punched Ryker in the jaw.

Flynn fell back against the table and swiped the back of his hand across his bloody lip. “You’re losing it big-time, Thorn.”

Jack moved in, furious his friend had gone poaching. Stevie was on her own special pedestal. Untouchable. “I told you to stay away from her and you hit on her the minute my back was turned,” Jack accused. He knew he was being completely irrational. But the thought of Stevie with his friend was too much to stomach. Because he knew Flynn was a love-them-and-leave-them kind of guy—just like he was. Jack’s blood chilled in his veins. Stevie deserved more. Was Flynn willing to be that guy?

Fuck it all to hell. Jack wanted full rights to Stevie.

Flynn shook his head, wiping at his lip again. “Asshole, I didn’t hit on her. A blind man can see she’s hurting. That’s all on you, buddy, not me.” He faced Jack squarely. “Now if that isn’t good enough for you, let’s take this outside.”

Jack exhaled and jammed his fingers through his hair.

“You cut her loose, now live with the choice.” Flynn chafed, sitting down at the desk. “That means you have no say in her life, Jack. Zero.”

“I had to,” Jack choked out. He couldn’t bear losing her.

“You’re running scared.” Flynn pushed his chair back and looked up at Jack. “It’s unfortunate what happened to Joan Schillner. But you didn’t pull the trigger. You’re not responsible.”

“It’s more than that.”

“What more?”

“When I saw the victim’s dead eyes staring at me, it took me back to Melissa. I can’t do that again.”

“Mel wasn’t your fault.”

“Yeah, it was.”

“You told her to stay put until you arrived on scene. She ignored your order and got herself killed. Stevie isn’t inexperienced like Mel was. Yeah, she’s high-strung, but she’s also a badass and can take care of herself. You need to allow her that and stop wringing your hands and crying like a baby about something happening to her.”

“I was Melissa’s training officer. She was my responsibility. I should have been there.”

Flynn shrugged and leaned back in his chair. “Then beat yourself up over it for the rest of your life, Thorn, but let Stevie go. She deserves that much from you.” He turned back to the laptop and began inputting case notes. “I’ve been updating the case files and should have the file complete in a few hours. There’s a lot of new information you need to read through.”

Jack jammed his fingers through his hair again.

Over his shoulder, Ryker said, “She’s on her way in. Do us all a favor and take some time off until you settle down.”

“Yeah,” he said. Ryker was right. He needed to get out of the building and clear his head. He grabbed his jacket and as he shrugged it on he opened the door. When he looked up, he saw her standing at the end of hall.

His body jerked in reaction. Heat rushed through his veins. No matter how she was dressed, she always took his breath away and today was no different. She wasn’t wearing her normal work attire. Today she was dressed casually in a short white skirt that hugged her hips and a fitted blue tank that sculpted her full breasts. Her long tan legs went on forever until her pink polished toes peeked out from a pair of wedge sandals.

Her hair was pulled back in a ponytail, not her usual braid. Had she just come from the airport?

She strode past him as if he were invisible. In her wake, her coconutty scent flirted with his nose. Blood roared to his dick. Fisting his hands, he set his jaw and stalked from the squad room.

“Cavanaugh?” he heard Captain Russo call from his office. “My office.”

Jack moved down the hall and took the stairs three at a time. The last thing he wanted to do was leave Stevie and give her space, but he knew if he stayed, he’d make a bad situation worse.

He needed to clear his head, sort it out. He’d take
Miranda
out for a run along the Farallones. A nice rough sea to take his mind off the churning inside of him was just what he needed.

Twenty minutes later he was standing in the galley, pouring himself a healthy dose of Jameson when he heard the determined footsteps on the pier coming straight for him. He knew without looking who it was. She probably shot the lock off the security gate to get in. Blood shot through his veins. And damn if he wasn’t getting hard.

“Jack Thornton, you son of a bitch!” Stevie yelled from the pier. The boat rocked slightly as she boarded. As she climbed down the steps into the galley, she came down swinging and punched him in the jaw.

Stunned, he stared at her. “That was for what you did to Ryker!” She cocked her arm and swung at him again, hitting him hard in the chest. “And that’s for lying to me, you cowardly bastard!”

She pulled her arm back again and when she went in for the third punch, he grabbed her fist in midswing. Spinning her around so that her back was against his chest, Jack wrapped his free arm around her arm and chest, staving off further attacks.

“Damn it, Stevie, stop!”

She stomped on his foot with her wedge sandal, loosening his hold, then elbowed him in the ribs. Grunting in pain he caught her harder against him. She was having none of it. She threw her head back to head butt him. He ducked sideways, barely missed getting his nose broken. Then she back-kicked him, tipping them both off balance. Inertia threw them forward. To cushion her fall, he twisted, catching the carpeted edge of the stairs with the back of his upper arm, then rounded her out, pressing her chest-first against the treads. Now she was pinned between his body and the stairway.

“I said stop it,” he growled against her ear. Her scent tore mercilessly through his senses, provoking his lust. His nose pressed against her clean silky hair. Closing his eyes, he set his jaw. There was no fighting what she did to him. Red, hot, raw desire unleashed within him.

“I hate you, Jack Thornton! I hate you with every fiber of my being!” she screamed, fighting to break his grip on her.

He only tightened it. Her ass pushed back into his groin, igniting him.

“Stop it,” he roughly commanded, his lips brushing her ear.

Her body stilled instantly. He felt the rush of her breath from her lungs and the hardening of her nipples against his forearm.

Closing his eyes, he nuzzled her ear. His hands slid down her waist to the cradle of her hips. “You’re in my blood, baby.” His lips grazed her neck.

She arched, grabbing the top step.

He bunched her skirt in his fists, pulling it up, then slid his palms along her sultry skin. “I can’t live without touching you again.” His fingers slid between her panties and her warming flesh.

She moaned, and though her body was stiff and unengaging, she didn’t stop him.

“I need you. God help me, but I do.” His fingers slid along her smooth mound. “You need me, too, Stevie. I can smell it on you.”

She made a strangling sound as she shook her head.

Sliding a thick finger along her wet seam, Jack inhaled sharply. “Your body doesn’t lie, sweetheart.” He nudged a fingertip into her. “Tell me you want me, too.”

“No,” she breathed.

Parting her thighs with his knee, he nudged her up a step, and pressed deeper into her slick folds. He could feel the hard thud of her heart against his chest.

Still she didn’t engage. Still she didn’t push him away. Unbuttoning his trousers, Jack yanked down his zipper. Hot and heavy, his eager cock sprang out. He couldn’t control it. His need for her overrode every other need. Spreading her wider with his knee, he slid his finger from her, replacing it with the swollen head of his cock.

A rush of perspiration flushed her skin as her body shuddered. She could no more resist him than he could her.

He pulled out of her, yanked her ponytail back, forcing her to bow, and bit down on her neck as he nudged into her again, this time an inch past his head. Air whooshed from her lungs.

“Tell me you forgive me for being a coward.”

“No,” she whispered.

He withdrew again. He pushed her arms over her head and held her hands together at the wrists. His lips trailed along the curve of her cheek to her ear. “Tell me how much you want me inside of you, Stevie.” He nudged another inch into her, then withdrew. “Or I take it all away.”

“No,” she said, her voice a strangled whisper.

He pressed the head of his swollen cock to her slick opening, and swirled his hips. Her body went corpse still. He pushed deeper into her.

“God,” she breathed.

With his free hand, he pulled her back against his chest. “Don’t hate me, sweetheart. I need you to love me.” Tortuously slow, he pushed deeply into her. Her hot, wet cunt gripped him like a fist, her slick velvet muscles contracting around him, and pushed him to the edge of shattering.

“I can’t love you,” she rasped.

He slowly withdrew, then thrust slow and deep. God, she felt good. “I need you to.”

“Can’t,” she sobbed. “Hurts too much.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

H
er words cut him to the marrow. He moved to turn her around, but she shook him off. “Don’t,” she whispered hoarsely. “Just—” She pressed her ass back into him. “Finish.”

“Stevie,” he exhaled. He wanted her more than he had ever wanted anything in his life. But he didn’t want to hurt her.

“Finish,” she rasped.

His hands slid down to the curve of her hips. God he loved touching her. Closing his eyes, Jack dug his fingers into her pliant flesh and pulled her onto his stiff cock, hitting her deep. She softly exhaled as she grabbed the rails on either side of the stairway. He pulled her ponytail, and her neck bowed. Her jugular pulsed wildly, and he scraped it with his teeth. He nearly withdrew from her, then thrust again, loving the way her sweet pussy clung desperately to his hungry cock.

He hit her hard. He hit her deep. He hit her long. Her rigid body liquefied around him and she cried out as one spasm after another wracked her. The tension that had been building for days exploded from him in a thick stream of hot semen. Her body milked him, ravenously extracting every drop he had.

Dropping his head to the crook of her shoulder, he wrapped his arms around her. She stiffened and pushed him off. As she turned around, he stopped breathing. She looked crushed. Her big soulful blue eyes stared at him, the pain emanating from them unbearable. The tracks of tears streaked her cheeks. He’d done that to her.

“God, Stevie, I’m so sorry.” He hated himself.

“You said that the last time, too.” She tapped the nearest step three times. “I’m tapping out, Jack. Don’t come near me again.”

She shoved her skirt down and without looking over her shoulder, she climbed the stairs and walked out of his life.

Numbly, he blinked. When it finally registered that she was gone, he sat down on the edge of the counter and knew he had made the biggest mistake of his life by letting her go. He yanked up his trousers and as he climbed the stairs, he pulled up his zipper.

“Stevie!” he yelled to her retreating body. Instead of stopping or even slowing down, she started to run. He ran after her. She came to the open gate and as she went through it, she slammed it shut and held it closed.

He grabbed her fingers through the chain links. “Don’t go.”

Mascara streaked tears streamed down her face. “I can’t stay. Please. Leave me alone.” Releasing his fingers, she stepped back. Their gazes locked. Then she turned away.

He didn’t come after her. Stevie sobbed harder. She’d told him not to. For once he respected her boundary. It was the right thing to do. She couldn’t do the roller-coaster ride that was Jack. She wasn’t cut out for emotional upheaval. She deserved more than a man who just wanted sex from her. She wanted it all. To love and be loved. She would never have it all with Jack. He wasn’t capable of giving it all.

Knowing the reality made it that much more difficult to accept the finality of it. Walking away from Jack was as heart-wrenching as losing a loved one to death. There was no getting them back. No deals with God or the devil. No magic wand, no amount of pleading or promising would bring them back. It was just
done
.

She had to accept it. Not accepting it would drive her insane.

Her cell chirped that she had a text. Thinking it was Jack, her heart leapt. She hated that. Despite all the pain he had inflicted on her, her heart still leapt with hope.
You’re a fool.
She slid her cell from her little strap purse and saw an unfamiliar number.

Hi, Stevie, it’s Katrina. Simon and I wanted to know if you and Jack would like to join us for dinner at my place in the city this Saturday night?

Sadness swept through her. She liked Katrina and while Simon was a bit much, he was no more to handle than Jack would have been. It would have been nice
. I’m sorry, Doc, but Jack and I are no more.

As Stevie got into her car her cell chirped again.
I’m so sorry. I’m here if you need to talk.

Thanks

She didn’t need to talk. There was nothing to say. They’d just had their final fuck. It was over.

A deep sob constricted her chest. Her body still pulsed from his touch. His ejaculate, still wet from his body, smeared the inside of her thighs. He said he needed her to love him. She did, God help her, she did. But she needed him to love her back. Enough not to run when he got cold feet, but to stand beside her and fight for her, not against her.

She sat for a long time staring out the windshield at the estuary. Watching the seagulls swoop and turn, then fly high into the sky. They were free. No worries except what was for dinner. All her life she had been trapped. Trapped by what others decided for her. She wanted the freedom to make her own choices, not be beholden to anyone or any entity.

She exhaled sharply. That was a lie; she wanted to be beholden to a man who wanted to be beholden to her. She’d wasted the last seven years of her life so focused on Jack; she hadn’t given herself the chance to look past him.

Her heart ached. He’d promised not to pull the no-explanation-disappearing-act again, but he had. Why couldn’t Jack commit? What was he so afraid of?

Grabbing a tissue from the console she blew her nose. They had seemed to be on the right track, but in the end he just couldn’t do it. The old insecurities crept up on her. She’d shown her weakness for him repeatedly. It was her fatal flaw. Her undoing.

She turned the key over. “Jesus,” she swore. After seeing what Jack had done to Flynn, she’s come loaded for bear, ready to let him have it. How dare he go after Flynn like that when he’d cut her loose? If she wanted Flynn she’d have him!

Bitterly she laughed. Yeah, she’d let Jack have it all right, just like she always did. She couldn’t stop him from taking what he wanted because despite it all, sick twisted sister that she was, she wanted him inside of her. Hard and rough, just like he took her.

Heat flushed her skin. She’d come so hard she could barely stand. Tremors had continued to roll through her as she left the boat. Her body still craved the pulse of him inside of her.

She put the car into drive and slowly navigated from the parking lot, knowing this time it
was
over. The deep black abyss of life without Jack wrapped its lonely fingers around her heart and squeezed.

She drove home on autopilot. She needed a break from the PD, her case, and her life. With Spoltori on the lam, there was nothing more to do until they got him. They had enough to not only arrest him, but convince a jury he was a serial killer.

This wasn’t how she’d wanted it to go down. She’d dreamed of striding into his office and arresting him in front of his staff. Exhaling a long breath, she shrugged. Nothing went according to plan lately.

As she drove down her street she was surprised see two Pleasanton PD patrol cars parked out front of her house. Pulling up she rolled down her window. “You guys don’t need to hang out, I’m good.”

“We have a few hours left to our shift, Detective,” one of the officers said. “If it’s all the same to you, we’ll hang out until then.”

Stevie shrugged. “Suit yourself, but if something pops, go for it.”

They nodded.

She let herself into her house, stopped at the threshold, and shivered. It was freezing cold. Had she left the air on when she left for the airport earlier in the week? Checking the thermostat she frowned. It was at sixty-six. The house smelled clean. It was probably her cleaning lady, Imelda. It was hot as hell in the valley this time of year. Stevie kicked her shoes off, and dropped her overnight bag and purse on the kitchen table. Her stomach growled, but she wasn’t hungry. She opened the fridge anyway. Except for a few condiments, a couple of beers, the leftover pizza from the other night, and an open bottle of Chardonnay, it was empty.

She grabbed the bottle, pulled the cork out with her teeth, and took a long swig. Maybe she’d get drunk and go drown herself out back. She walked back to her bedroom and scowled. The bed was rumpled. Had Imelda not made it?

Shaking her head, she stepped into her walk-in closet and stripped. It was past dinnertime. It was hot, she was getting a buzz, and she wanted to cry. But she sucked it up, and after grabbing her terry pool robe, a big beach towel, her flip-flops, and her bottle, she trudged to the backyard and the black bottom pool.

And there she sat at the beach entrance to her pool as the warm water lapped her feet and ass, wrapped in the damp towel, drinking the wine, and watching the red and orange hues of the sunset turn to purple, then black.

Jack paced the small confines of the galley. He was so torn up inside he didn’t know which way to lean. He wanted Stevie more than life itself, but he was terrified of losing her in the end. He couldn’t handle that. It was better this way.
It had to be.
She’d find some nice normal guy with a nice normal job and they’d have a nice normal life with nice normal kids. She’d make chief and all would be well in her world. Jack couldn’t offer her that. He had no control over where he was assigned. He couldn’t expect her to just quit her job and follow him. Her career was too important to her to uproot and follow him off to wherever the federal government decided to send him next.

“Fuck!” he cursed, punching his open palm. It wasn’t that. He was lying to himself. He’d fucking flip hamburgers for a living if she asked him to. His issues went far deeper than their respective careers.

He exhaled. He couldn’t promise to protect her. He had a shitty track record there. He would die if his lack of action caused Stevie harm.

His cell phone rang. Stevie?

“Thorn.”

“Jack,” Flynn said, “I just received Spoltori’s cell phone records for the last two years up to this morning, as well as Miss Schillner’s.”

“And?”

“Schillner’s was part of The Edge Fund’s phone plan. Spoltori had a record of who she called and when. He also had the GPS set up on her phone so he could track her. I’ll bet my retirement he could also track her calls as they came in and went out, on his phone. He knew she called you, Jack. Because right after she did, it shows a call from his cell to hers. A five-minute conversation ensued. He called her again fifteen minutes before you and Cavanaugh showed up. That call ended five minutes before you arrived. I think he was tracking her as he was talking to her and while she was on the phone, he shot her. As he was getting away, he called Cavanaugh, knowing damn well she’d see his handiwork within minutes.”

“Five minutes. I should have been there.”

“She was dead the minute she called you the first time, Thorn.”

He shook his head, refusing to let himself off the guilt hook. “What else do you have?”

“A shit ton of paperwork to sift through.”

“Any word from Menlo Park?”

“Not yet. They’re working on it.”

“Keep me posted.”

“I will. And, Thorn? Cut Cavanaugh some slack, this case has taxed her to the max.”

Jack stiffened. “I don’t need you to tell me how to handle her.”

“Apparently someone does, because you’re acting like a fucking asshole.”

Jack hit the End button and hurled the cell across the salon. It shattered.

He stood staring at the pieces. It was how he felt inside. Shattered. He didn’t know how to fix it.

Feeling stifled, he dressed down in a pair of jeans, boots, and black tee shirt. He shoved his nine into a waist holster, grabbed his helmet and keys, and headed for his Harley, parked in the secured marina lot.

Two hours later he stopped at the end of the canyon road leading to Stevie’s house. He owed her an explanation. He knew she was beating herself up when she had nothing to do with his failure to commit. Maybe if he told her the truth, she could move on. And maybe it would relieve the pressure of some of the shit he’d been carrying around for so long.

He gave the big V twin some gas and frowned when he saw there were no patrol cars out front of her house. Spoltori was still at large and as long as he was, Stevie wasn’t safe. He pulled up beside her Mustang, killed the engine, and kicked the stand out. Hurrying, he jogged to her front door. When she didn’t answer, he got nervous. He pulled his helmet off and from the back of the house he heard the thud of bass.

He walked around to the side gate and when he pushed it open and walked through, he caught his breath.