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“You need a refresher course?”
CHAPTER 22
It was the tensest lunch date Celia had ever endured and yet somewhat pleasurable because he was there. His lack of care about the stares and whispers somehow got her to relax enough to take a few nibbles of the turkey club sandwich she was too nervous to really enjoy.
“How’s the case going, or are you not allowed to discuss it at this point?” Riley dug into her steak sandwich like a man starved. Sex with her always leaves him ravenous, and since he couldn’t take her back home to his bed for the rest of the afternoon, food was the next best thing.
“It’s going fine, and that’s all I can safely say at this point. Thanks for understanding.” She’d be surprised if he didn’t push. The man has no filter and doesn’t seem to understand the basic concept of no.
“As long as you’re not in any danger, I don’t need to know what you’re doing at work. But if you find yourself in a sticky situation and you don’t give me a heads-up, we’re gonna have a problem.”
Celia stopped with the water glass halfway to her lips. “You can’t be serious; it’s my job to deal with dangerous situations. And besides, I wouldn’t exactly call this town a hotbed of danger and intrigue.”
“You coulda fooled me. Two murders in a matter of months in a place this small seems mighty dangerous to me.”
She chose not to argue with him since she was fast coming to realize it was a wasted effort. The man crawled out of a cave it seemed, with his archaic ideals and what she would’ve deemed chauvinistic from anyone else but somehow found rather appealing in him. Something she had no plans of sharing with him ever.
Their trip to the door after lunch felt like the proverbial walk of shame with all eyes once again following them. She’d gotten sidetracked by Mr. Smooth while they were eating, but now that she was back outside in the light of day with the hot afternoon sun beating down on her, it was like she was coming back to herself after being in a stupefied daze.
Riley opened the passenger door for her and went to help her in when she stopped him.
“Riley, we need to have a talk about boundaries.”
“The fuck does that mean?”
“It means you can’t spring things on me like you did today. I’m a public servant in this town. I can’t just go around flaunting my personal relationship like that. Especially not with someone who was somewhat involved in my last case, and whose…”
“Didn’t we have this conversation before?”
“No, we didn’t.” Celia gritted the words through her teeth because she knew from his tone that she wasn’t about to get anywhere with him.
“Sounds vaguely familiar to me. Hop up.” She didn’t move fast enough apparently because the next thing she knew, she was being lifted and placed on the passenger seat before being belted in, like a two-year-old.
Celia didn’t dare look out the window to see who was watching this display and who saw what. She could only imagine the conversations going on behind the plate glass windows of the diner and the other businesses around if anyone had happened to look out their storefront windows and seen the spectacle.
Riley could care less who was looking or what they had to say. He knew what he was doing. Ms. New York would probably like to hide their relationship for the next year while he had no plans to bury his head in the sand and hide his feelings for her because of wagging tongues.
He was pretty sure that some people might have an issue with the fact that his wife had not too long died, and there might even be some who might speculate as to whether he and Celia had been an item before that. He had all plans to protect her as much as he could, but not at the expense of them spending time together.
She was wound tighter than a cat on a hot tin roof, but Riley knew the only way to deal with his darling detective was to push right through whatever obstacle course she had going on in her head. The woman is prickly as a cactus bush and can get rather salty when she doesn’t get her way. Typical female. He’d take her shit over the mess that was his marriage any day.
That had been smooth sailing all the way, the only blip being the lack of a child and look where that got him. He much preferred the sometimes-volatile nuance of his relationship with Celia, who was an open book as far as he’s concerned. There was no artifice in her, no subterfuge, and he didn’t feel like he had to look for hidden pockets.
