It Had to Be You (5 page)

“I can’t let you in there,” Aubrey said. “It’s against the rules. But I can take it for him.”

“It’s not work related,” Ali warned her, leaving out details on purpose. People loved Teddy, she got that. But that’s not why she kept quiet about their breakup. She kept quiet because she didn’t want to be pitied.

There was an awkward silence.

“What is it?” Bree asked. “The ex-boyfriend box of crap?”

So they did know.

“Facebook,” Aubrey said. “Lucille knows all.”

“I have to go,” Bree said. She looked at Aubrey. “I’ll be in the office on Monday with the new office chairs we talked about.” And then she clicked off.

Aubrey quit Skype and looked at Ali. “I knew you two lived together, everyone did, but the general consensus was that you two were just friends. At least that’s how Teddy always made it sound.” She pulled out her keys. “You can leave everything on his desk, but I did
not
let you in there.”

“Never saw you.”

And so Ali found herself in Teddy’s office for the second time in as many days, which was two more times than she’d been here all month. Teddy had been far too busy for far too long. It burned deep that she’d let it happen, that she’d let him put her on the back burner without a thought.

Why had she done that? Why had she accepted less from him than she deserved? Because he was the golden boy? Because she’d gotten herself infatuated with the idea of a relationship?

She sat in his big, leather chair, set his things on his desk, and eyed the blotter scribbled with Teddy’s familiar scrawl.
Call CPA. Order cards. Email reports.

Huh. No
Screw over Ali
anywhere on the list.

She grabbed a new sticky note and let out the beast:

She set the note front and center on his desk, next to the things from her truck. She studied her handiwork a minute and decided it wasn’t quite enough. She added a few more thoughtful sentences on what she thought of his skills as a boyfriend, and finally feeling marginally better—and grateful that Mrs. Burland wasn’t here to smack her upside the head for her language—she exited the office.

Aubrey was no longer at her desk, which was just as well. Ali wasn’t sure if she could muster a smile as she exited the building.

Of course it was still hot. Once again Ali made her way to her truck and cranked on the AC, which was making an ominous grinding sound. Today would be a great day for it to break.

She wasn’t sure where to go next. She didn’t want to crowd Luke in his own home after he’d been so generous by letting her stay an extra night. The flower shop was only a half block away. She could grab her paycheck. Russell would probably be in his office in the back, watching Bravo, yelling at whatever
Real Housewives
show was on. She could spend some time online and see if an available apartment had come up.

With that decision made, she got out of the truck, into the sweltering day, and walked over to the flower shop. The old Victorian building had long ago been divided into three storefronts: the flower shop, Leah’s grandmother’s bakery, and an old bookstore that had been closed all year.

Most of the other downtown buildings had been renovated in the past decade, but not this one. It needed a major overhaul, but Ali loved it. The place had quirks and its own charm and character in spades. The flower shop was on the left, painted pastel yellow with white trim. The wood floors creaked and the lights always flickered, but to Ali, those things gave the place personality. It felt like her home away from home.

If she had a home…

Russell wasn’t here, and as she moved through the front room, she inhaled the familiar scent of flora and tried to relax. She went through the available rentals again, lowering her expectations, trying to find something that would work. There were two, but one was subletting a room in some guy’s house, and that felt a little sketchy for a woman. The other was on the outskirts of the county, far more remote and isolated than even the beach house. Not ideal…

She looked around Russell’s office, which held a tiny desk, two filing cabinets filled to overflowing, and enough room to stand.

Nowhere to sleep.

Knowing she’d stalled as long as she could, she got up to go and opened the top desk drawer to grab her paycheck. But Russell hadn’t written it, and one glance at the balance scrawled in his checkbook told her why. He was short again. He’d left her an envelope with half of what he owed her in cash, and a note that he’d get her the rest by the end of the week. Oh boy.

Things were going to be okay.

But she didn’t know how. She moved to the office window and looked out. She could see the pier from here. The Ferris wheel was turning. The trees lining the street were swaying. She knew if she opened the window, the breeze would be scented with an intoxicating combo of sea salt, pine trees, and hope.

She craved that. The fact was Lucky Harbor gave off a quiet serenity and strength, and she craved that too. She’d grown up in smoky, noisy, colorful lounges and bars. Mimi Winters had a long work history, from waitress to “dancer,” and then back to waitressing when it got too hard on her body. She might not have been all that good with money, but she was good with love. Some would argue too good, as she’d rarely met a man she didn’t fall for. But when there’d been trouble—and there
had
been trouble—Mimi had always come through for her girls, and together they’d handled whatever had come up.

Ali had gotten good at handling things, real good. This was just another of those times. Needing to connect to someone who loved her, she pulled out her cell phone and texted both her mom and sister with:
Missing you, how’s things?

Harper replied right away.
Got a hot date with Lenny. Remember Lenny? He’s hot as ever and running his dad’s plumbing business now.

Mimi’s response was just as fast.
Ali-gator! Miss your pretty face! Gotta run, caught some OT to help cover rent. Oh and I’m taking an online business class that’s gonna change everything, you’ll see.

In Mimi’s world, there was always something that was going to change everything. And the thing was, Mimi honestly believed it. Optimism was one of her most endearing qualities, but it also left Ali as the only realistic one in the family. She looked in her envelope again and worked some fancy math before texting her mom back.
Got some extra this month. I’ll send.

Mimi’s response was immediate:
You’re an angel. What would I do without you?

Exactly what Ali worried about.

Luke woke up with a start, heart thundering in his chest, the vision of a drowned Isabel Reyes crystal clear in his head. Her hair had been floating behind her in a terrible parody of beauty, eyes open in permanent terror, skin so pale as to be translucent.

He’d been there when they’d pulled her body from the water, but he’d seen plenty of dead bodies before. It wasn’t the image haunting him now so much as the failure to save her.

It was pitch black in the room, but he didn’t need a light to remember where he was. In hell. He sat straight up. It was dark outside. He’d slept all day.

Scrubbing his hands over his face, he let his wits catch up with him. He would’ve rolled over and closed his eyes to take the rest of the sleep he still needed, but his stomach rumbled in protest. Damn. He reached for his phone and saw he had messages. No big surprise there.

His commander, wanting him to get his ass back to San Francisco in one week, not the three Luke had asked for, because “vacation time was for pussies”—not to mention that it left him dealing with the “media shitstorm” on his own. His mom, reminding him that sometimes things happened for a reason. His dad, telling him to work through it and stay strong. Last was Jack’s message, suggesting that Luke not read the news or turn on the TV.

So of course Luke went straight to the browser app on his phone and brought up the news. Yep, the media storm was still raging, with people blaming the DA and the entire SFPD.

And Luke, of course.

That was okay. Luke blamed Luke too.

He was starving. He slid off the bed and staggered up the creaky stairs and into the kitchen. He could drive into town, but he’d have to get dressed, and plus, he had no idea where he’d left his keys. He rarely did. Without turning on the light, he pulled open the refrigerator door.

He had no idea what he was expecting. He hadn’t yet stocked any food. He hadn’t thought that far ahead. Hadn’t thought of anything other than getting away to hear himself think.

Or better yet, not think.

But there was bottled water, milk, eggs, cheese, luncheon meats, apples, oranges, and—hitting the jackpot—beer. A plate on the middle shelf had a colorful note stuck right on the top of it, from Ali.

He’d nearly forgotten about her.

Curious, he pulled out the plate. An omelet. He’d have preferred pie, but this looked good.

Hell, who was he kidding?
Anything
he didn’t have to cook would have looked good to him. He nuked the plate, and then wolfed down the omelet where he stood. He was moving to the sink when he heard a whisper of a sound.

Footsteps.

Luke reached for his gun before remembering he was unarmed and in his boxers. Christ, he needed more sleep.

“Hands where I can see them, dick breath,” a female said, and then the overhead light was slapped on.

Turning slowly, Luke came face to face with Ali standing in the kitchen entryway with an umbrella in one hand—aimed in his direction like a sword—and the other hand still on the light switch.

Clearly, she’d been in bed sleeping. Her hair was wild, like an explosion in a mattress factory. Her eyes were huge in her pale face. She wore a thin, white wife-beater tank top and sweatpants that were so big they were slipping off.

She lowered the umbrella and hitched up the sweats. “I thought we had an intruder.”

“We do,” he said. “
You.
” To distract himself from the fact that she was very braless, he eyed her stance. She wasn’t new at protecting herself. “Dick breath?”

“Sorry, I was trying to sound tough.” She shoved a hand through that crazy hair, looking a little bit wild and a lot off her game, and yet, he thought, there she stood ready to defend his house.

The first person on his side in a good long time.

Firmly ignoring the odd feeling in his gut, he shook his head. “Bad idea, coming up on a pissed-off, hungry, exhausted cop like that.”

“I didn’t know it was you,” she said. “And you’re not a cop right now. You’re on leave.”

He could have told her he was
always
a cop. “What if I’d shot you?”

“Would have ruined my whole day,” she said in a tone that told him her day had been shitty. Then her gaze ran over him, and he knew the exact second she registered that all he wore was boxers because her breath caught audibly.

She was aware of him as a man. Ted might have dented her heart but he hadn’t broken it.

“Is that a gun in your shorts,” she asked softly. “Or are you just happy to see me?”

A
li worked at not swallowing her tongue, as Luke—after a speculative, edgy look—turned and vanished down the hall without responding to her question.

Good Lord, the man wore nothing but boxers like no one else. She’d known he was good looking, but she hadn’t known he had acres of hard sinew that bunched and flexed with his every move.

And she had no idea what she’d been doing baiting him like that. She certainly hadn’t expected to feel scorched by heat just from looking at him. The man was drop-dead sexy, that was for sure.

Equally for sure was relief that he hadn’t responded to her. It’d been a rhetorical question anyway, one uttered only because her brain had clicked off at the realization that he was half naked. But before she could reboot, he was back, wearing low-slung Levi’s, shrugging into a shirt that he didn’t bother to button. He had that whole dangerous, brooding air going on, spilling testosterone and bad boy vibes all over the place.

It did something very unwelcome in the pit of her belly. And lower. She cleared her throat. “I found two possible rentals today.”

He didn’t speak.

Good to know where she stood. Probably he was so thrilled and overjoyed that he
couldn’t
speak.

He went to the fridge.

“One’s on the outer edge of the county,” she said. “In the Highlands. The other’s a room from the guy who owns the hardwood store. Anderson something.”

“No,” he said.

“No?”

“The Highlands is a bad neighborhood. And you’re not renting a room from Anderson. Hell no.”

She stared at him, but he was head first in the fridge. “You still hungry?” she asked. “I can make you something.” She moved over there just as he turned to her. She tried to nudge him out of her way, her palms settling on his chest, absorbing the heated, hard strength of him.

He didn’t budge.

She pushed a little harder and this time he stepped back. “Thanks for the omelet,” he said.

“Want another?”

“Sure.”

She pulled out the eggs, cheese, broccoli, and a red pepper. Grabbing a pan, she turned on a burner. “Oh, I almost forgot. I have something for you.”

His gaze went hooded, and she felt herself blush. She wasn’t sure what he thought she might be offering, but given what she’d said about the gun in his boxers, it was probably far more than she’d meant to offer.

“There,” she said, gesturing with her chin to the envelope on the kitchen table. It was the cash equivalent of three nights’ worth of rent. Last night, tonight, and hopefully tomorrow night as well.

Optimism. Guess her mom wasn’t the only Winters with that particular trait after all. The fact was that she’d hoped to get into a place tomorrow, but he’d just shut down her two current options.

He didn’t make a move for the envelope, a fact Ali ignored as she began cutting up the pepper and grating cheese while he just stood there looking rumpled and sleepy and on edge. “Ironic, don’t you think?” she asked.

“That you’re more at home in my kitchen than I am?”

“The fact that we’re complete strangers, and yet we’ve already seen each other in our underwear.”

“Yeah.” He stole a piece of cheese and popped it into his mouth. “I noticed that
you
didn’t hand me a sweater like I did for you.”

She smiled. Her first of the day. Maybe of the week.

He actually smiled back, which had to count for something, especially since he had a pretty great smile. She flipped the omelet and then a moment later transferred it to a plate, placing a few small broccoli spears on top before handing it to him.

He stared down at the broccoli. “I don’t like broccoli.”

“Why not?”

“Because it’s green.”

“When was the last time you tried it?” she asked.

“I don’t like it,” he repeated, as if this answered her question.

“Eat around it.”

He stood there eyeing the offending vegetable like it was a bomb, and then his stomach grumbled loudly.

“Eat.”

Kicking out a chair, he sat. “Thanks,” he said around a mouthful. “I hate to cook.”

She smiled. “My mom always said I should know how to feed a man. She says most women assume a guy’s most critical body part is considerably lower than his stomach, but they’re wrong. She says it’s a man’s stomach that does his thinking for him, not—” She broke off and felt herself flush. “Anyway, cooking is how she caught all her boyfriends.”

“Was your dad one of those boyfriends?”

Ali’s dad lived in Tacoma, and last she’d heard, he was a bartender. By all accounts, he was an effortless charmer who meant well, but she knew him as the guy with all the unfulfilled promises. Long gone were the days where she’d wait by the phone for the call he’d promised, but the memories still made her ache a little bit. “He didn’t stick around. The first boyfriend who did was a dentist.” She let out an involuntary shudder. “He was a pincher.”

“A pincher?” Luke asked.

“Yeah.” She opened and closed her first finger and thumb together a few times to demonstrate. “Whenever we annoyed him, he’d pinch. Always where the bruise wouldn’t show too. Hurt like hell.”

Luke didn’t show much in expression or body language, and he had a way of staying very still. But his eyes had gone hard, pissed off on behalf of a young girl he’d never known.

“Your mom let him touch you?” he asked.

“Oh, we didn’t tell her,” Ali said. “She liked him so much, it would have killed her. But one day we were shopping and she saw a bruise on my sister in the dressing room.”

“I hope she kicked his ass,” Luke said.

“She took a baseball bat to him.” Her smile faded because Mimi had cried for a week when he’d moved out. “She didn’t bring another guy home for a long time after that.”

“Good.” Hooking his bare foot in a chair, he pushed it toward her. “Sit with me.”

She put the pan in the sink and sat, shaking her head when he offered her a bite.

“So you learned to cook so you could catch a man?” he asked.

“No. I learned to cook because I like to eat,” she said, “not because I want a string of boyfriends. Because I don’t.” Not until she figured out how to pick them anyway. She watched Luke work his way carefully around the broccoli. “Broccoli has almost as much calcium as milk,” she told him, amused. “It gives you strong bones.”

His gaze slid to hers, and she felt her face heat again. He had strong bones. And as they both knew, a few minutes ago, he’d had one particularly strong boner to boot. But mercifully he let the comment go.

Setting down his fork, he opened the envelope she’d left on the table, staring in surprise at the cash she’d carefully counted out. “What’s this?” he asked.

“What I owe you for a few nights’ stay. I prorated what I was paying monthly. I hope that’s okay.”

He was quiet for a full sixty seconds, and when he spoke, his voice was low. “I got the impression you were hard up for money.”

“Not that hard up.”

He looked at her for a long moment, then set the envelope back on the table and pushed it toward her with one finger.

She slid it back. “I pay my debts.”

“How much does it leave you?” he asked.

She felt a small smile curve her lips. “Worried I won’t have enough to find another place?”

“Hell yes.”

She laughed softly. “Don’t be. I’m not your responsibility.” She wasn’t anyone’s responsibility and hadn’t been in a long time.

He went back to eating. When a tiny piece of broccoli found its way on his fork, he gave it a look, but shoved it in his mouth.

She waited, but he just shrugged.

“Don’t overwhelm me with praise or anything,” she said dryly.

He flashed a quick grin. “It’s good,” he said. “Really good. You’re holding up your end of the bargain.” His smile faded. “But I’m not taking your money, Ali.”

Bossy alpha. She got up and loaded the few dishes into the dishwasher, trying to pay no attention to the silent man behind her. Hard to do when he rose and put his dish in for her.

A
neat
, bossy alpha.

“You should go back to bed,” she said softly. “You look beat.”

He gave her a long look, which she decided was best not to decipher, before walking away, leaving her alone with her thoughts.

Ali didn’t sleep well and got up before dawn. With several hours before she had to be at the shop, she quietly made her way to the garage. She pulled on an apron that said Florists Do It with Style. Retrieving fresh clay from her storage bin, she worked it for a few minutes, trying to lose herself.

From the other side of the garage door, she heard a car pull up, but it didn’t really register until the doorbell sounded. Startled at the early hour and pissed that another reporter might have found Luke, she wiped her hands on her apron and left the garage, moving quickly through the house to the living room. Prepared to kick some ass, she opened the front door, shocked to find two police officers standing there, flanking Teddy.

“Are you Ali Winters?” one of the cops asked.

“Yes, yes, it’s her,” Teddy said impatiently.

“Is something wrong?” Her heart dropped. “My mom? My sister, Harper? Are they okay?”

“This isn’t about your damn family,” Teddy said in disbelief. “It’s about the fact that you stole that money to fuck me over. You’re
that
pissed at me, that you had to try to ruin me?”

Ali shook her head in confusion. “What?”

“Ma’am,” one of the cops said, “we need to bring you down to the station to ask you some questions.”

Her heart stuttered to a stop just as someone came up behind her. Luke. She could feel the warm strength of him at her back.

“What’s the problem here?” he asked calmly.

“Who the hell are you?” Teddy demanded.

Luke ignored him and waited for the officers to speak.

“We have a situation in regards to a theft that occurred at the town offices over the weekend,” the first cop said. “A briefcase of money went missing from Ted Marshall’s office.”

Ali felt the horror fill her—they thought
she’d
stolen the money?

“It didn’t go missing,” Teddy said. “She stole it to get back at me for breaking up with her.”

“Hey,” Ali said, “
I
broke up with
you
!”

The officer went on as if neither of them had spoken. “The missing cash was from Friday night’s town auction. According to several eyewitnesses, you were the last one in his office.”

“Twice,” Teddy said. “You were let into the office first by Gus on Saturday and then again by Aubrey on Sunday. Christ, Ali, how could you do this to me? I thought we were friends, at least.”

“Friends don’t sneak out in the middle of the night,” she said, hating that they had an avid audience soaking up the exchange. “And I didn’t steal anything.” She recognized one of the cops. He’d been in the shop to buy flowers for his girlfriend. She spoke directly to him. “I’ve
never
stolen anything. Not once in my whole life.”

Well, except she had. She winced. “Okay,” she said, “so maybe one time I took a lip gloss from the drugstore, but I was twelve and stupid and my mom made me take it back. I had to work there for free for a whole day to make up for it. I haven’t stolen anything since.”

The second cop was rubbing his temple. Men did that a lot around her. Apparently she gave good headache.

“You have to believe me,” she said. “I didn’t take any cash. How much is missing?”

“All of it,” Teddy said tightly. He was wearing khakis and an untucked, white button-down shoved to his elbows. He looked like he’d walked right out of a
GQ
ad, but instead of feeling her heart sigh, it hardened. The dreamy quotient of Teddy Marshall had run out.

“So you just showed up here to accuse Ali?” Luke asked him.

Teddy stared at him. “Seriously, who the hell are you?”

“Detective Lieutenant Luke Hanover.”

“My landlord?”

“
Ex
-landlord,” Luke said.

Ali’s stomach was somewhere in the vicinity of her toes, so she couldn’t process the exchange of testosterone at the moment. “So what now?” she asked the first cop.

“You come to the station for some questions, ma’am.”

“Even though I didn’t do it?” she asked.

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Ali,” she managed. “You keep saying
ma’am
, and I want to look over my shoulder to see who you’re talking to. Why can’t you just question me right here?”

“That’s not policy, ma’—”

At her glare, he wisely swallowed the “ma’am” part.

“Look, Ali,” Teddy said, clearly attempting to soften his voice. Once upon a time that might have charmed her, but not today. “You’re pissed at me,” he said. “I get that. So just give us the money back, and we’ll all go to our separate corners. No harm, no foul.”

“I don’t have the money; I didn’t take it!”

When the two cops just looked at her, she let out a breath. “I didn’t.”

“Go through her stuff,” Teddy said wearily. “There isn’t much. It shouldn’t take long.”

Luke put a hand to Teddy’s chest, halting his forward progress. “No one’s searching her
or
the premises,” he said, still calm but with one-hundred-percent authority. “Not without consent or a warrant.”

Ali turned and looked at him for the first time. He was in black board shorts, still damp enough to cling to his body. No shirt. Bare feet. A towel was slung over his shoulder, his hair wet and uncombed.

He’d been in the water, she realized, swimming or maybe on the paddleboard she’d seen leaning against the back deck. She wasn’t sure if she was grateful for his intervention or pissed that he clearly thought she needed the protection from a search due to what they might find.

“I didn’t do it,” she told Luke. “They can search.”

“Good.” Teddy pushed his way in through the door. “Where’s the stuff you took out of Town Hall, Al?”

“I brought the floral arrangements to the senior center yesterday,” she said. She pointed to her purse and the box of small ceramics on the foyer bench. “That’s all that’s left from the auction.”

Teddy reached for the box, but the first cop stopped him. “It can’t be you, Marshall, sorry,” the cop said, and grabbed the box.