Indivisible. Part 37

"You're not?"

"I never did get what you were trying to prove. Or who you were proving it to."

Tia woke to the smell of steak and coffee and a pair of golden eyes. She didn't dare move until the animal brushed past with a furtive gait no one would mistake for tame. A small version of the mother wobbled up behind on stumpy legs.

Coyotes. Liz hadn't lied.

The moment the animals pa.s.sed, she shot upright in Jonah's recliner, a blanket slipping to the floor. The last thing she remembered was telling Jonah about Reba's new baby and their inadvertent nondisclosure. She dropped her face to her hands, ma.s.saging her eyes-and froze at the touch of Jonah's hand on her neck. She turned. Rumpled and ragged, he looked achingly irresistible.

He whispered, "Sarge sleeps in, so let's take our plates out to the porch and let the dogs roam."

He acted as though it were nothing, having her there in his kitchen in the morning, handing her steak and eggs that wafted a glorious aroma and a mug of coffee creamed blond, the way she had drunk it as a teenager-and still did when she didn't have tea.

"Come on." He balanced his mug on his plate to open the door and motioned her silently out into the misty mountain morning.

A stream that would eventually feed Kicking Horse Creek burbled in its bed, while jays and chickadees hopped and twittered in the trees. He held the door for the coyote and her offspring. When the puppy whined at the perilous ledge of the first step, Jonah set his plate on the half-log railing and carried the pup down, carefully setting it on its wobbly legs. Enola knocked it over with her tongue.

"Now was that necessary?" Jonah put his hands to his hips.

The dog must have thought so since she kept licking. Jonah came back up.

Tia set her dishes on the railing, the end of her nose and fingertips chilling, her jeans and brown ramie sweater barely warm enough. She could just imagine her hair. "People will think we slept together."

"We did."

"I mean-"

"I know what you mean. You need to stop worrying what people think."

"Right." She expelled her breath. "Jonah, I've worked hard to repair my reputation. I've been scrupulous about appearances, but people haven't forgotten. There are plenty out there just waiting for me to show my stripes."

"Like who?"

She looked over her shoulder. "Like Sarge for one. If he sees me here, he'll know everything my mom said about me is true."

"You misjudge him."

She dropped her head to the side. "Jonah, I know exactly what he thinks of me."

He frowned. "I'd have expected this conversation if we'd done something last night. But I'm having a hard time seeing what I should feel guilty about."

"I'm not saying you should feel guilty. But I don't have the luxury of everyone's respect. I've had to overcome years of my own rebellion and others' judgment. Now it looks like-"

Jonah spread his arm. "Who's going to see?"

She looked around at the dark trees and aspen. Maybe she was overreacting, but, "All it takes is one word, and the whispers start again. The looks, the raised eyebrows. People thinking they know." She glared. "I've had to live down what we did, on my own. I can't risk-"

"Being with me?"

"Being with anyone in a way that dredges it all up again."

"We're having breakfast. And by the way, I like it hot." Scowling, he lifted his plate and stabbed a bite of eggs, the yolk running down his fork.

"I didn't know you're grumpy in the morning."

"You'd know a lot of things if you hadn't kicked me to the curb."

Touchy too. She cut a sliver of thin, rare steak. "You'd know some things also."

"Like what?"

"I prefer my steak medium." She'd been joking, but he grabbed her plate and swept back inside. She stared at the swinging screen, jaw slack. Obviously neither were at their best today.

Gripping the hot cup, she took a sip of coffee and watched the coyotes sniff around the base of the porch. The puppy could not be more than a few weeks old, still tumbling off his legs. She could see what looked like German shepherd markings in the mother, although her shape was all coyote.

Jonah came back, returned her plate, and took a bite from his own cold steak. He chewed in silence.

"I was joking."

He washed his bite down with coffee. "Let me tell you about appearances, Tia. My father sat in a pew every Sunday with his lovely wife-except for the times when her bruises would have shown. He and other respected officials chuckled together as they wove their webs and slept with other men's wives and decided who should be punished and who got a pa.s.s." He speared her. "So guess what? I don't care about appearances."

"But that's your world, Jonah. You haven't had it held over you for nine years."

"The h.e.l.l I haven't."

"Not by everyone you lost."

"By the one who mattered." He put his half-eaten breakfast on the porch floor and turned to her. Leaning one arm on the post, he said, "I need to know if you're in this with me."

"Or what? You have someone else?"

His face darkened. "Yeah, Tia. I have them waiting in line."

She looked down. "That's what Liz said."

He grabbed her chin and raised her face. "The only women in my life are that four-legged one and you." His eyes pierced. "If there's no chance-"

"I wouldn't be here." The words wrenched her emotion out with them.

He searched her face, then buried his hands in her hair and kissed her. Eyes closed against the tears, she kissed him back with nine years of loss and longing.

They both stiffened at the snarling growl, and Jonah's fingers slackened, coming to rest against her cheek. "Don't panic."

She tried to look around him at the coyote.

"Hold still." He slowly lowered his hands, moving back inches at a time from her.

The animal's hair stood like a spiny ridge, her hackles quivering.

Jonah said, "Easy," to the dog, then, "Tia, look at me. Don't challenge her."

"Challenge her?"

The snarl rose in pitch.

He took a half step back and pivoted, his back to her, facing the animal. "Easy now."

Hard to say which of them he addressed, but she drew a long breath through her nose and dropped her shoulders. Slowly, slowly he went down on one knee, his hand out, fingers curled under. He held his hand there for three long beats, before the curl left her lip and she stretched her neck to b.u.t.t his hand with her nose, then sniffed.

"She's taking your scent with mine."

"Lovely."

"You're the first female she's had to accept."

Tia cleared the fear from her voice. "What about Liz?"

"Liz only had contact when Enola first came, too injured to strike. I lock her up when Sarge's nurse comes over. She and Sarge can get contentious."

"The nurse or the dog?"

He chuckled. "Both."

Tia looked into Enola's hard golden eyes. "Does she like anyone but you?"

"Jay."

"Who's Jay?"

Giving the dog's head a slow stroke, Jonah looked over his shoulder. "We have a lot of talking to do."

"Didn't we do that last night?"

"About ten minutes. Then you dropped off midsentence."

She sighed. "I drove twenty-one hours on four hours' sleep."

"That's why I didn't send you back out on the road." He stood up.

"You could have driven me home like a responsible officer."

"Yeah." His mouth pulled. "I could've." He looked at his watch. "Speaking of which, I have guys on surveillance I need to relieve."

She hadn't even thought about the time. And then suddenly, "Miles!"

Twenty-Five.

"Forget thee?" If to dream by night and muse on thee by day; If all the worship, deep and wild, a poet's heart can pay; If prayers in absence breathed for thee to Heaven's protecting power....

If this thou call'st forgetting, thou, indeed, shalt be forgot.-JOHN MOULTRIE, "FORGET THEE?"

Piper excused herself from the couple sampling her morning special and pushed open the bakery door. "Miles."

Dressed in pressed khakis and a crisp white shirt that hurt her eyes in the morning sun, he turned from Tia's door. "She said nine o'clock."

"I just talked to her, and she's on her way. Come in and have something while you wait." The brisk morning air had brought in an early rush eager for hot rolls and coffee, but the crowd had thinned now.

When she'd left the house before dawn, Tia's door had been ajar, her room empty. In her brief call, Tia made it clear she had merely dropped from exhaustion in Jonah's recliner. Piper was just glad they'd made it through the night without killing each other. She served up the couple's to-go order and thanked the three that got up from their table to leave.

In the doorway, Miles looked back over his shoulder. "I told her the shop didn't open until ten, but she wanted to meet at nine, before she had customers."

"Things happen." Piper moved back behind the counter. "What can I get you?"

"Surprise me."

Smiling, Piper slipped on a glove and used a parchment to hand him a sour-cream cinnamon puff. He paid her with four crisp single-dollar bills. None of the bills in his wallet appeared to be hundreds, and she wondered if the ten he'd given Tia had wiped him out.

He said, "Keep the change. Some places have a tip jar."

"Thanks, Miles." She pocketed the extra dollar and ten cents.

"What happened to Tia?"

Before she answered, Bob Betters pressed the door with thick, gold-bedecked fingers. "There she is, a vision of loveliness." In his lavender shirt and white tie, every blond hair and smile in place, he looked like a spanking new Ken doll.

She did try to smile. "What would you like?"

"One Piper to go." His chuckle was high and nasal. "Excuse me," he said to Miles still standing at the counter.

Miles didn't move.

"You've been served, mister. Go have a seat."

Miles took a bite of his puff, chewed carefully, and announced, "Needs more cinnamon."

"You think?" She watched it register in Bob's face that this was the guy who had gotten the last fig roll and held him up last time.

"The sour cream is nice."

She turned again to Bob. "Are you ready?"

"Honey, I've been ready since you brought your pretty face to town." He looked again at Miles. "You mind?"