Just a Little Series (Parts 1 - 4) (7 page)

I hadn’t known Luke long, two weeks to be
exact, and each day we spent together came with its own set of
surprises. When it came to Officer Lucas Reibeck, there were only
two things I knew for certain. One, there was no one in the world
who could hold a candle to his physical assets. His dark hair,
brown eyes, and strong stature only began to lay the groundwork.
And two, the crush I’d developed during my first ten hours of
job-shadowing hadn’t come close to subsiding. If anything, it had
only grown by leaps and bounds, and I blamed a lot of that on the
fact that I’d been forced to shadow a man who was the walking
definition of
irresistible
.

“Three minutes, Little,” Luke tapped on the
door.

I mustered the energy to stand and traipsed
across the room to my workout attire. I stripped my pajamas to the
floor and slid into the sports bra and workout shorts before
completing the ensemble with a pair of pink tennis shoes.

I stopped at the mirror and ran a brush
through my hair and meticulously styled it back into a ponytail.
With a quick application of lip gloss and a single brush of
mascara, I dubbed myself acceptable.

Yes, it was only a run. No, I didn’t have to
look beautiful. But it was a run with Luke, and I couldn’t squander
a single opportunity to catch his eye.

I left the room and reminded myself that
just down the hall my cousin Matt was sleeping soundly. Lucky for
him he had another two hours of beauty rest before he’d have to get
up and be ready for school.

I took each step down the back staircase a
little slower than the one before. With heavy feet and a yawn, I
took the last step to reach the first floor. When I stepped into
the kitchen, Luke and Charlie looked up from the table with wide
eyes.

“What are you wearing?” my Uncle Charlie
asked, shielding his eyes. “For the love of God, Julie, go upstairs
and put some clothes on.”

I looked down at my outfit. Sports bra and
shorts, what was so wrong with that? “I thought we were
running—”

“We are,” Luke interrupted, standing up to
take a step closer. I caught his eyes wandering down my torso for a
brief moment before he looked up to meet my gaze. “I guess you’re
ready?”

“Guess so,” I turned to Charlie. “You comin’
with us?”

Still shielding his eyes, he shook his head
and motioned for us to leave.

“He’s not comfortable with you baring so
much skin,” Luke said as we walked out of the kitchen and through
the living room to the foyer.

In his running shirt and black shorts, Luke
looked just as irresistible as he always had in his police uniform,
if not more so, but I didn’t really mind either way. The way the
material clung to his muscles made my heart flutter a bit off beat.
As I stood in front of the door assessing his shoulders and tight
chest with a mindful eye, I caught him gazing at me yet again.

“Is it that bothersome?” I looked down at
myself. “Would you like me to go upstairs and put a shirt on?”

He closed his parted lips and shook his
head. “We don’t have time for that now, Little. I’ll just have to
suffer.”

With a quick wink and a light smirk, he
walked out the door, leaving me stunned in the doorway.

Was Luke flirting with me?

The morning sky was dark as night, and the
sun hadn’t yet begun to show. I followed closely behind Luke and
met him on the sidewalk where he was already bent over at the
waist, touching his toes, and stretching his muscles in preparation
for the run. I stood and watched as he stretched, appreciating his
loyalty to everything he did.

“You need to warm-up, Julie,” he glanced up.
“You’ll pay for it if you don’t.”

“I’m young,” I waved my hand. “Stretching is
for the elderly.”

“And exactly how old do you think
I
am?”

“Old enough,” I said, not disguising my
disappointment for a single moment.

Yes, Luke was old, every bit of twenty
three, give or take a few months, making him six years older and in
his opinion, six years too old for me.

I watched as he finished his stretch and
used each moment he was bent over to my full visual advantage. He
finally stood and looked at me, the street lights dancing off of
his brown eyes.

“You’re really not going to stretch?” he
asked.

I smiled and shrugged, hoping that would be
answer enough.

It was a five-mile run. How hard could that
possibly be?

And before I had time to register another
thought, Luke set off on his run. I watched him from the sidewalk,
knowing I’d be scolded if I didn’t soon follow, but I took a brief
moment to appreciate the alone time we’d spend together, even if
that time
was
limited to complete exertion.

As I took my first step forward, a light
inside the neighboring house came on, attracting my immediate
attention. The face of a teenage girl appeared behind the curtain
of the downstairs window. I turned to watch her for a moment,
looking on as she stared at me intently from inside the house.

It was odd to see her there in the first
place, let alone at that hour—it was so ungodly early in the
morning; there was no reason any ordinary person should be awake,
let along standing in their window and watching their neighbors.
Anyway, I’m not sure the hour of the morning surprised me nearly as
much as the fact that there was even anyone in the house. The
neighbors had moved out months ago, and last I’d heard, the house
still hadn’t been sold.

But there was definitely someone there, and
she hadn’t taken her eyes off of me. If I didn’t know any better,
I’d think her staring wasn’t nearly as innocent as it was supposed
to seem.

Wednesday, September 12 | 8:00 a.m.

I was ready to die one mile into the
run.

Luke hadn’t taken kindly to my complaining,
especially when I whined about the pain in my legs and back.
You
should’ve stretched, Little
, he’d said over and over. I wished
someone would’ve told me that running wasn’t as easy as it
looked.

By the time I reached school, the thoughts
of the morning were far from distant memories. The aching in my
legs served as a constant reminder that Luke expected only the best
from me, and that required full dedication to each and every task
he threw my way. If I wanted to earn his respect, I’d have to start
taking him and his tasks seriously.

I slid into the first desk and threw a
sideways glance at my cousin.

“Rough morning?”

“You have no idea,” I dropped my head on the
wooden surface in front of me.

A sympathetic look crossed Matt’s face as he
leaned over to pat my back. “Trigger’ll have you whipped into shape
in no time.”

Trigger—the official Oakland PD nickname for
Lucas Reibeck. And yes, it had everything to do with him accidently
shooting himself in the foot last year during target practice.

“I only logged an hour with him this
morning,” I said, lifting my head. My messy hair shielded my face
as I turned to look at him. “That’s nine more hours of doing
whatever in the world he comes up with. He’s killing me.”

“Because you’re letting him,” he pushed his
fingers back through his hair. “Just go along with his plans for
the next few days, and before you know it, he’ll be gone and out of
your life. You’ll never have to worry about him again.”

I didn’t need the reminder. I could only
foresee another nine hours with Luke, and it pulled at my heart in
ways I couldn’t even describe. After the shadowing was over, would
I ever see him again? Would
he
ever want to see
me
again? How would I make it through each day knowing I wouldn’t get
to see him, even if only for a moment? I knew I hadn’t known him
long; I wasn’t oblivious to that at all, but something about Luke
had just made me feel so normal for a change.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” Mrs. Brown stood in
front of the class, “I’d like to introduce you to our newest
addition.” Standing in the front of the room was a small, petite
redhead with eyes as emerald as I’d ever seen. The girl watched
over the class with a freckled smile—one that was somewhat
mischievous, and somewhat familiar. “This is Hannah Jones.”

Hannah, the redhead, nodded to the class
before her gaze immediately fell on Matt. The two of them stared at
each other for what seemed like forever, but Mrs. Brown finally
spoke up again, breaking their staring match, and assigned Hannah
to the empty desk in the back of the room.

By the end of the class period, our teacher
had explained our latest current events project and assigned
two-person teams across the board. Hannah’s addition brought about
an odd number. Because Mrs. Brown didn’t think it would be fair to
make the new girl work alone, she gave her the opportunity to pick
which group she’d want to work with. Of course, given her
glazed-over staring match with Matt earlier, she chose to work in
our group, making us the only three-partner team in class.

The rest of the day went as smoothly as any
other, and after school, Matt and I met up with Hannah at her
locker as promised. “Thanks again for letting me join you,” she
said, looking past me to watch Matt. My cousin grinned sheepishly.
He had never been one to get nervous around a girl, especially
since he usually spent his days fighting flocks of potential
suitors. But Hannah seemed to affect him in ways even I couldn’t
understand.

“I’m sure you’re still busy with the move
and getting settled in, so we understand if you aren’t able to
start working right away,” I said, making my presence known. “We
have plenty of time.”

“Oh no,” she wore her mischievous smile, “I
think it’s best that we get started right away.” She looked to Matt
as if she needed him to take her side—not that there were even any
sides to take. All I’d wanted was to make her feel as comfortable
as possible, and I’d hoped to give her time to ease into her first
major assignment. “What do you say, Matt?”

“I’m with Hannah,” Matt turned back to me.
He almost acted as if she’d put a spell on him; he was so taken by
her. “We should put in as much time as we can as soon as possible.
It’s always smart to stay ahead of the curve.”

If Matt and Hannah wanted to get started
right away, that was fine by me. And fortunately for them, I hadn’t
scheduled any shadowing hours for the evening. My 4:00 a.m. run was
all the Luke I could handle for one day, at least in
that
capacity. So for the night, my focus belonged solely to them.

CHAPTER TWO

Wednesday, September 12

“This is where you live?” Hannah assessed
our two-story brick house.

Matt smiled proudly and nodded, “Home, sweet
home.”

Hannah turned and pointed to the neighboring
house. “Then I guess we’re neighbors,” she giggled. “My brother and
I just moved in next door.”

I stared at Hannah, suddenly realizing that
she was in fact the same girl who’d watched me that morning as I’d
set off for my run with Luke. Just like earlier that day, she kept
her green eyes fixed on mine as if she’d taken a special interest
in me.

An eerie chill ran up my spine as I returned
her stare; there was just something about her. Something about
Hannah Jones didn’t rub me the right way.

Once inside the house, Matt and Hannah
spread the morning newspaper across the dining room table and began
assessing the latest articles. As I struggled to fit between them
in order to contribute to the assignment, Hannah moved back and
looked at me straight on.

“Julie,” she said with an edge in her voice,
“two newspapers are better than one, wouldn’t you say?”

I nodded as if the answer should’ve been
obvious. I hadn’t known the girl for eight hours, and I was already
ready to wring her neck. Her attitude just didn’t sit well with
me.

“We don’t use our paper next door,” she
said, almost too sweetly. “It might be easier if you just run over
and get it from the driveway. That way you can have your own.”

“Great idea,” Matt put an arm across her
shoulders. “Isn’t that a great idea, Julie?”

I rolled my eyes in complete disgust at how
quickly he’d taken to her.

“I’ll be back,” I said, taking her order,
but not doing so happily.

As I reached the edge of the neighboring
driveway and picked up the paper, a loud voice called over.

“Hey! What do you think you’re doing?”

I looked up to find a man somewhere around
Luke’s age, I’d guessed, perched against the porch railing and
looking down on me with a grin. His short, strawberry-blond hair
moved slightly in the wind as he shook his head. Though he was
close to Luke’s age, the similarities stopped there. This man was
thin and cute, not rugged and handsome. He wore silver
rectangular-framed glasses, and a grin that could make any girl
fall weak in the knees. In the simplest of terms, he was as
adorable as a dorky man could be; he was adorkable.

“You go around stealing everyone’s
newspapers, or you just targeting the new guy on the block?”

Half-smiling, I stood tall as the man
stepped off the porch and met me mid-driveway. He reached forward,
took the newspaper from my hand, and nodded in thanks.

“I’ll take that.”

“I’m sorry,” I said, looking back at our
house. I suddenly felt like an idiot. Of course he thought I was
targeting him, I hadn’t even tried to explain myself. “You must be
Hannah’s brother?”

I extended my hand to shake his, but he
didn’t return the gesture. “That depends,” he said, his expression
growing a little grim. “How do you know Hannah?”

“Oh,” I mentally smacked myself,“she’s in my
current events class. She’s working on a project with me and my
cousin.” I nodded at our house. “We started working right after
school, but only had one paper and well, I guess three was a
crowd.” He nodded, still looking for elaboration. “She suggested
that I come over and take your paper. I didn’t know it was going to
be a problem. She said you guys didn’t need it.”