No Vance.

I told myself this was good. I didn’t believe myself and was beginning to think myself was a big, fat moron.

Luke picked me up. We drove around for two hours, doing mostly nothing and saying absolutely nothing (Luke, I found, wasn’t a big conversationalist). We stopped a couple of times so I could talk to some kids and that was it.

* * * * *

At my door I pulled my keys out of my pocket.

Luke pulled my keys out of my hand.

“What the…?” I started but with a Super Dude super-door-unlocking-power he was already pushing open my door. When he was inside, he turned to my alarm and punched in a code.

“How do you know my code?” I asked, coming in behind him.

He threw my keys on my chaise and walked into the house. “Everyone knows your code,” he told me, still walking across the living room.

I stared at his back.

So much for my life going back to normal.

I closed the door, turned on a lamp and followed him. I saw the light go on in the kitchen and heard Boo talking to Luke.

Luke was making himself at home and opening a bottle of Fat Tire beer when I arrived. Boo was asking him who the hell he thought he was and also could he spare a few kitty treats for a poor, abused house cat?

“What are you doing?” I asked as he leaned his h*ps against the counter and took a pull off the beer.

“Havin’ a beer,” he answered when he was done swallowing.

“I can see you’re having a beer. Why are you having a beer?”

“I’m thirsty.”

Oh for goodness sakes.

“Luke. It’s late. I’m tired. I’ve just been bored out of my mind. I don’t even know what patrol is, all I know is, so far, field work sucks.”

“Field work is the business.”

“My business is plastic wrap and canola oil,” I told him.

After I was done with my statement he gave me one of his half-grins and I realized what I said sounded like.

“Go home,” I ordered, deciding to get snippy instead of blush.

“If you’re worried Vance can see us on the cameras, don’t. He’s after a skip.”

With everything that happened, I’d forgotten about the cameras.

I did a mental review of my time in the house without Vance and realized with relief I’d been clothed through all of it and hadn’t done anything embarrassing like dance around singing “Sir Duke” with Stevie Wonder (which I was prone to do).

I decided to ignore the cameras, for now. “A skip?”

“Someone who skipped bond. Vance is in Wyoming.”

For some strange reason knowing that and finding out from Luke slid in deep like a knife to the chest and it hurt like hell.

He pushed away from the counter, index and middle fingers around the neck of the bottle, and walked up to me, like Vance did, overpowering and right in my space.

Then he put the hand not holding the beer to my neck, thumb at my jaw. I had no idea what he was up to but I stood my ground, head-crackin’ mamma jamma that I was, no retreat.

I rethought my decision when I looked in his face.

This was not badass, Super Dude Luke. His look was gentle and if he was kickass hot normally, gentle would have taken me to a serious Grade Three belly flutter if I wasn’t hung up on Vance.

“He shouldn’t have f**ked a virgin,” Luke said to me.

Oh my God.

Any hint of a belly flutter disappeared. Mace had heard the cherry popping discussion and talked.

I tried to jerk my head away but his fingers tightened around the back of my neck and I felt the warmth of his body as he got closer, way closer but still not quite touching me with his body.

“Nothin’ to be embarrassed about, Jules.” His voice was soft.

“Maybe you should go home now,” I suggested, deciding he was wrong. There was indeed something to be embarrassed about but I didn’t want to have this discussion with him (or anyone for that matter).

“It’s sweet as hell and every f**kin’ guy at the office wished they’d gone after you and trapped you in that alley after you shot out Cordova’s tires. Including me.”

Oh… my… God.

These guys gossiped like a bunch of women.

“I wouldn’t have f**ked you and left you though. No f**kin’ way,” he went on, still talking softly but sounding like he meant it.

Um.

Wow.

I swallowed and straightened my shoulders. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I know Vance.”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” I repeated and he didn’t and I wasn’t going to tell him.

He stared at me a beat.

Then he said (luckily deciding to switch topics), “Tomorrow, training early. I’m takin’ you out to dinner then we’re going on patrol.”

“Tomorrow’s Saturday. No training and I’m going to annoy some dealers tomorrow night. I haven’t done it in days. I don’t want them –”

“Training at four. Dinner. Patrol. You need to take a break from the dealers,” he interrupted me.

“Luke, I’m not going to stop.”

“I’m not tellin’ you to stop. I’m tellin’ you to take a break, make them think Darius negotiated you off the streets. Get some action where you can try what you’ve learned. Then you can go back after them.”

“Luke –”

“Give it a week, with me.”

I didn’t know what he was asking and I didn’t want to know mainly because I was afraid of what he might be asking.

He knew what I was thinking. “Just training, just patrol, just ride-along when I’m workin’. Anything else you can think of that doesn’t have to do with that, I’m open to it.”

I couldn’t help myself; a ride-along while he was working was too good to miss.

Anything that didn’t have to do with that I wasn’t going to think about.

“Okay, training and patrol tomorrow… no dinner,” I gave in partially.

“Dinner.”

“No dinner.”

He got closer and my br**sts brushed his chest.

Um.

Yikes.

“Dinner,” he said softly.

Time to retreat.

I pulled back. “Training and patrol, if I’m hungry, dinner.”

“You’ll be hungry.”

Whatever.

Time to stop talking.

I frowned at him. He gave me a half-smile.

Then he touched my nose with his finger and was gone.

I stood in the kitchen and wondered what in the hell just happened.