Do You Take This Cop?

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“It’s no imposition on either of us,” Nick assured her. “He’ll still get paid, but it’s up to you. It won’t save you a lot, just a couple hundred dollars.”

“Did he happen to mention how much he thinks it’ll cost?”

Nick named a figure that, while still high enough to make her checkbook whimper, was two hundred dollars less than the quote the plumber had given her over the phone this morning. She stuck the meat loaf into the preheated oven, rinsed two small potatoes and picked up her coarse vegetable brush.

It was only one more time, a few more hours of having Nick in here, around her son. And he wouldn’t really even have to be around them. She could leave Nick and his friend to do their job while she and Austin steered clear. Surely they could get through it unscathed.

“On second thought,” she said, scrubbing the potato so hard she almost took the skin right off, “I’d be…grateful for your help.”

“No problem. We’ll swing by tomorrow after work. It shouldn’t take more than an hour or so to finish the job. Six o’clock work for you?”

“Sounds good.” Could he stop staring at her now? She’d given in. What more did he want? Pleasant conversation? That was just way beyond her acting capabilities at the moment. Besides, she needed to get back to Austin, to reassure herself he really was okay.

She set the potatoes aside and, inwardly cringing at her own rudeness, said, “I guess I’ll see you tomorrow, then.”

As a nudge, it was less than subtle, but at least it worked. Humor lit his dark eyes. “Right. I can find my own way out.”

“Oh, no, let me just—”

But he picked up his toolbox and left, with Faith racing after him. She stopped in the doorway to find Nick crouching next to the couch, talking to Austin.

“I was apologizing,” Nick said to her, even though he didn’t look her way, just watched her son while Austin kept his gaze glued to his comic book.

Her stomach dropped. “Apologizing for what?”

“I’m not exactly sure.” Nick drummed his fingers against his knee. “But I think it had something to do with my asking if Austin was interested in playing baseball.”

“I’m not,” he muttered.

“Yeah.” Nick nodded. “I got that. Anyway,” he told Austin, “I didn’t want you to think I was trying to pressure you—”

“I didn’t,” the boy said, still not so much as glancing Nick’s way.

“Does that mean we’re okay?”

Austin lifted a shoulder. Faith opened her mouth to scold him but caught the quick head shake Nick gave her. “Great.” Nick stood and grabbed his toolbox once again. “I guess I’ll see you tomorrow.”

He held out his fist. For a moment, Faith had no idea what he was doing until Austin, still staring at the comic, bumped his own fist against the man’s much larger one. Nick grinned, gave her a wink and walked out the door.

Faith watched him leave.

Then she crossed the room and locked the door behind him.

“HOW COME I GOT this end?” Nick asked the next evening, struggling down Faith’s steps backward while he and Ethan Crosby hauled a new water heater to the basement.

“Quit bitching. I had the low end when we moved that Ping-Pong table, remember? And that thing weighs at least fifty pounds more than this.” Ethan shifted his side of the heater a few inches higher. “I have two kids to send to college—”

“They’re both still in diapers.”

“—and I can’t risk having my neck broken because you can’t hold up your end.”

“Get over it,” Nick said, referring to Christmas Eve two years ago when Ethan had helped him move an assembled Ping-Pong table into Kathleen’s basement. “You only needed four stitches.”

Nick took a careful step backward, his arms stretched wide to hold on to the bulky, heavy box. He glanced over his shoulder.

Three more steps and they made it to the bottom without any casualties. Most importantly, they made it without dropping the damn thing. After carrying it to the far end of the basement, they set it upright and took a moment to catch their breath.

Faith came down carrying a tray with a pitcher of lemonade, two glasses and a small plate of chocolate chip cookies. She faltered when she spotted them, but it was so brief, Nick doubted Ethan even noticed.

“I’ll just leave this here,” she said, setting the tray down on top of the short stack of storage totes. She wore baggy jeans and an oversize black T-shirt. He wondered if she even owned a pair of shorts. And what her figure looked like under all those shapeless clothes she insisted on wearing. “Uh…if you need anything, I’ll be outside.”

Ethan smiled. “Thanks.”

She returned his smile with a nervous one of her own and went back upstairs, her thick ponytail swinging in time with her movements. Ethan picked up a cookie and took a bite.

“How about you eat when we’re done?” Nick asked, grabbing a plastic bucket. “I’d like to get home in time to watch the ball game.”

“Game doesn’t start for two hours.” Ethan helped himself to another cookie, then wiped his hand on the side of his khaki work pants. “And you’re not usually in a hurry to get away from a pretty woman. Usually they can’t wait to get away from you.”

Nick set the bucket underneath the spigot and turned it on to drain the remaining water from the heater. “The only reason I’m doing this is because Brit nagged me into it.”

“Bullshit,” Ethan said cheerfully. “You’re interested in Ms. Lewis. What’s the matter? She have enough sense not to be interested back?”

“I wonder,” Nick said thoughtfully, tapping a wrench against his palm, “what Lauren would say if she discovered what really happened the night of your bachelor party.”

Ethan’s smirk faded. “That’s cold, man. She can’t ever find out about that.”

Nick feigned a puzzled expression. “No? Huh.”

“I was drunk.”

“I’ll tell you what. I’ll keep my mouth shut about her dog’s Mohawk—and who really held the clippers—and you can keep your mouth shut about me and Faith Lewis.”

Eating another cookie, Ethan shrugged belligerently, which Nick took as a yes. Nick slapped his friend’s shoulder. “It’s a sad state of affairs when a man is afraid of his one-hundred-and-ten-pound wife.”

Ethan snorted. “About as sad as a man putting in a new water heater for a woman who’s clearly not interested.”

Damn. No wonder his mother always warned him not to gloat.

Once the water stopped draining, Nick took the bucket upstairs. Opening the kitchen door that led out into Faith’s tiny backyard, he was met by the loud rumble of a lawn mower shaking the hell out of Austin as he cut the grass. Squinting against the sunlight, Nick crossed over to the side of Faith’s one-stall garage, where she knelt weeding a flower bed.

Like the inside of her house, the small garden was a riot of colors. White, yellows, pinks and blues filled the base, but the centerpiece was a bright purple clematis winding its way up the sides and around the rungs of an old wooden ladder leaning against the wall.

She stood and met him by the edge of the garage. “Everything going all right?” she asked over the sound of the mower.

“Fine.” He set the bucket at her feet. “We had to drain the heater and I thought you could use this to water your flowers.”

She wore dark sunglasses, so he couldn’t see her expression. “That’s very…environmentally sound of you.”

“I’m all about reducing, reusing and recycling,” he said soberly.

“Really?” She took off her dirt-encrusted garden gloves, held them in one hand while trying to untangle hair caught in her sunglasses with the other. “I never would’ve guessed you were so green-minded.”

“Here,” he said, edging closer, “let me help.”

She stiffened as he gently extricated her hair from the small hinge and tucked the silky strands behind her ear. He let his hand drop and curled his fingers into his palm.

“I would try and tell you that Al Gore has always been a personal hero of mine,” he continued, trying to put her back at ease—if she ever was at ease with him, “but the truth is, I promised my nephew Isaac I’d do my best to save the planet.”

Acting as if it took her entire concentration, she stepped back and brushed the dirt from the knees of her jeans. “Sounds like a pretty big job for one man.”

“Isaac’s five. He pretty much thinks that since I’m a police officer, I’m something of a superhero.”

And why that made her wince, he had no idea.

“Every little bit helps. And since we’re not due to get rain for a few days, this—” she tapped the bucket with the toe of her worn sneakers “—will come in handy. Thank you.”

“That kills you, doesn’t it?”

She swallowed. “Wha…what does?”

“The few times you’ve thanked me, it’s as if someone’s dragging the words out of your mouth.”

“Don’t be silly. I appreciate you helping me like this.” She raised her head, and though he couldn’t see past her dark lenses, he sensed she was looking him dead in the eye. “Truly.”

He also sensed she was lying through her teeth.

“I’d better get back,” he said, not wanting to push her too far. He nodded toward a very sweaty, red-faced Austin. “It’ll take a while for the water to warm up in the tank, but I don’t think Austin will mind rinsing off under the hose today.”

“He’ll love it. Why little boys can stand under the freezing spray from a hose for hours, but hate the confines of a tub or shower, I’ll never know.”

Nick grinned. “The hose is more of an adventure. And if there’s one thing males of all ages can’t get enough of, it’s an adventure.”

Another thing they couldn’t get enough of was a challenge. At least Nick couldn’t resist one. And at the moment, his biggest challenge was figuring out the woman in front of him.

“We should be finished and out of your hair in no time,” he said before walking back into the house.

No, he wasn’t interested in Faith, at least not the way Ethan accused him of. But Nick was curious. Back inside the house, he watched Faith through the kitchen window. She crouched and began yanking weeds, tossing them into a small pile. He couldn’t quite figure her out, but he aimed to try.

She obviously loved bright colors, so why did she dress in such muted tones? Add that to her jumpiness around him, her obviously not wanting him alone with Austin, and the kid’s rush to get away from him yesterday and Nick couldn’t help but think he’d seen this situation many times before.

He’d been called to his fair share of domestic disputes, and each one of them had made his stomach turn. He’d also seen the results of that abuse. How the victims blamed themselves for the violence. And believed they could never get away from their abuser. Was that what made Faith and Austin so secretive? Had some bastard laid his hand on them?

Though Faith showed signs indicating she might have been abused, Nick wasn’t going to jump to conclusions. He needed more evidence to prove his instincts were right. He wanted to help them. And there was only one way he’d be able to do that.

He needed to earn their trust.

LESS THAN AN HOUR LATER, Nick and Ethan had her new water heater installed and the old one in the back of Ethan’s pickup. Standing in her freshly mowed backyard, Faith handed Ethan an envelope with the money she owed him.

“I really can’t thank you enough for coming today,” she said, her voice steady and almost pleasant. She even added a smile. After Nick’s remark about how strained she sounded whenever she thanked someone, she realized she needed to shore up her acting skills.

“Glad I could help out,” Ethan said. He was a big man, as fair as Nick was dark, with white-blond hair and pale blue eyes. He seemed harmless.

Nick, on the other hand, was a whole other story.

Last night as she’d tucked Austin into bed, he’d admitted he’d inadvertently told Nick they’d once lived in Serenity Springs. That, combined with her nervousness around Nick getting the better of her, convinced her she needed to be friendlier. More open and honest. To show Nick she had nothing to hide.

Even if it was all a lie.

“I was…” She cleared her throat. “I was hoping you would allow me to treat you both to dinner.”

“Excuse me?” Nick asked.

“Now I don’t have to go the rest of the week without hot water, not to mention the money I was able to save. I just wanted to thank you. Both.”

Nick searched her face. “Let me get this straight. You’re volunteering to spend more time with me?”

She ground her back teeth together. He just couldn’t make this easy, could he? “Yes. I thought the four of us could go to Nero’s for pizza.”

Ethan glanced from one to the other. “I’m afraid Nick’s in a hurry to get home. Something about a baseball game.”

“That game’s not on until tomorrow,” he countered.

Ethan’s pale eyebrows shot up. “It’s not?”

“Nope. I’d love to have pizza with you and Austin.”

“I must’ve heard wrong then,” Ethan said. “And I’d be happy to join—”

“But he can’t,” Nick interjected smoothly.

“I can’t?”

“He needs to get home to watch his kids,” Nick explained. “Tonight’s Lauren’s yoga class at the Y.”

“It’s Wednesday,” Ethan pointed out. “Yoga is on Tue—”

“Mohawk.”

Faith frowned. “What’s going on?”

“Nothing.” Nick seemed as innocent as a newborn. She didn’t buy it for a moment. “I just don’t want him to be late.” He lowered his voice as if Ethan wasn’t right there to hear him. “His wife holds grudges when she’s mad. One time she made him sleep on the couch for… How long was it?” he asked his friend. “A week?”

“Ten days,” Ethan grumbled.