Jumping at Shadows (18 page)

The scent of lemon and pepper assaulted him the second he stepped through the door, though T.J. didn’t turn around from his task of arranging the chicken in the baking pan. Lettuce,
tomatoes, and cucumbers sat on the counter by the sink, along with a red onion that had yet to be sliced. Eric laid the gun on the table rather than pocketing it and slipped the coat from his shoulders in a loud rustle of leather. T.J. didn’t waver from the chicken in the pan.

“Supper will be ready in about an hour. Then we can sit down and relax for a bit. I don’t know about you, but I’m hungry.” T.J. stepped back from the counter and opened the door of the wall-mounted oven, and Eric felt the heat as the tinted glass door was pulled down. A guilty flush further warmed his skin when T.J. turned to make the salad, keeping his eyes on his task, not looking even once to where Eric stood. Eric had won the argument, though he had never meant to make T.J. lose it.

The guilt finally made him move, and he caught T.J. from behind as his lover pulled the cutting board from the top of the
refrigerator, pressing into his back and nuzzling his neck. “Why don’t you go grab a beer and relax. I’ll finish supper.” He was relieved when T.J. relaxed into his arms, and his arms tightened as he nipped T.J.’s ear. It wasn’t exactly an apology, but at least it was a truce.

“That I will take you up on,” T.J. said quietly, brushing his cheek against Eric’s hair before leaving off the salad to grab a beer from the refrigerator. He claimed a quick kiss before leaving for the couch, and Eric heard the TV come on as he began rummaging through the drawers for the knives sharp enough to cut the vegetables. He could make enough salad that T.J. could take it and the leftover chicken with him for lunch tomorrow, as Sunday or not, the weather had left his lover with work he needed to catch up on. And he wouldn’t scrimp on the onions he knew T.J. liked far better than he did. He wanted to make sure that T.J. understood he was appreciative rather than victorious over standing his ground on the alarm, the cameras, and, though not overtly, the gun.

There was no way he was going to let Victor hurt them, or anyone else.

“
J
ESUS
, baby…
.” T.J. moaned as he rocked his hips forward, shoving his cock deeper into Eric’s willing throat. Eric’s hands squeezed and pulled on T.J.’s ass in encouragement, and he knew the low hum he sounded around T.J.’s cock would drive his lover crazy. T.J. was straining as he tried to hold back, but it wouldn’t be long before the blowjob turned into a throat-fucking.

Eric was counting on it.

Jace had called them earlier to invite them to the Main Street Pub, doing his own promotion of the Icy Hot party that was the Pub’s way of making the best of the weather while still drawing in customers. It would no doubt have been fun had their moods been better, but they weren’t, and so blowing T.J. was his attempt at easing the tension around them. Eric thought it was working, and by the sounds T.J. was making as the thrust of his hips began to grow erratic, his lover would agree.

“
Fuck
,” T.J. groaned, his fingers digging into Eric’s hair as his back slid against the bedroom wall. Eric’s own cock was hard and leaking on his stomach, but his attention stayed on the task at hand, and he braced himself on his knees as T.J. began to work his hips harder. Eric’s hands had barely turned from kneading to holding before T.J. began to fuck his mouth in earnest.

It wasn’t the Icy Hot party at the Pub, though there was no doubt it would end the same way.

“
F
UCK
!” Eric hissed, springing to his feet and reaching for his jeans as the shade rattled back into place. The bed rustled as he slammed one leg through the denim.

“Eric? What’s wrong?” T.J. was nearly out of the bed before he finished speaking, though his moves were clumsy from sleep. Eric snatched a sweatshirt from the floor as T.J. found his feet.

“He’s out there, T.J. Right now!” Fleece slipped over his head, and his shoes were next.

“What? Who?” T.J. made a move for the window, but a quick grab from Eric stopped him. T.J. swung to face him, but Eric was already dealing with the second shoe. “Eric, what’s going on?”

“It’s him,” Eric answered breathlessly, and then he was gone before T.J. could say another word.

Jagged slivers of ice pelted him the second he was through the door, and his feet, booted though with the laces still untied, turned sharply toward the high wooden gate that led to the backyard. The icy crust crunched and broke beneath his weight, and he slipped more than once before he reached the gate. He slid the bolt free without wasting a second and left the gate swinging open as he burst into the field.

The tree line was a mix of white and dark, the icy crust clinging to bark and branches alike. He scanned wildly from left to right and back, trying to catch a glimpse of the figure he had seen. Nothing moved between the trunks, and the only sound was the falling sleet landing on the frozen ground. Heart pounding and muscles tensed, he took a cautious step closer.

“Eric!”

Eric whirled at the voice and saw T.J. standing just outside the gate, the jeans and sweatshirt he wore already gaining a coating of white. He stared for a moment, then twisted back to the tree line. He couldn’t see him, but he was there. Eric knew it.

“Eric, come back here.”

Eric ignored him, and ice crunched under his sole as he took another step forward.

“Eric. There’s no one there.”

Eric’s head turned as he squinted along the length of the tree line. He froze as a rain of ice fell heavily from an overloaded branch, the sleet not yet fusing to the limb it had gathered on. The creek would be frozen, though maybe not solid enough to hold the weight of a man crossing its width. He strained his ears to listen for the crack he was sure he would hear. He jumped with a startled yelp as a hand landed on his arm. T.J. was right behind him, the seriousness of the frown he wore evident even through the fall of ice.

“Eric, let’s go back inside.” T.J.’s voice was low and even, and he was not asking. His hand hadn’t left its place on Eric’s arm. “There’s no one in the trees, and it’s freezing out here. Come on, before both of us catch a cold.”

“He was here, T.J.,” Eric told him, resisting the tug on his arm and scanning the trees again. “It was the same guy, and he was watching us
again
. He can’t have gotten too far away.” His next step toward the trees was stopped short by another, firmer tug on his arm. He twisted to find T.J. hadn’t moved.

“In this weather? Eric, even if someone was out here watching us, what do you think they were going to see? This,” he waved his free hand in a general sweep around them, “is hard enough to see through, not to mention that we have the shades over the windows. What would they see?”

“I don’t know,” Eric hissed at him. “But he was here! I saw—”

“Why, Eric?” T.J. repeated, stepping closer so that there was very little space between them. “Why would he come out here to spy on us? He already knows where we live. What could he possibly learn out here that he doesn’t already know?”

“I don’t know!” Eric bit out. “Maybe he’s planning on doing more than looking. Maybe he’s planning to break in—”

“So he’s going to case our house in the middle of the night during an ice storm?”

“You said yourself this is hard enough to see through! It would give him perfect cover—”

“But you say you saw him anyway,” T.J. cut him off. “And if you saw, then so could the Jensons,”—the family living across the field directly opposite their own house, the one with the son about to graduate—“and so could anyone else who lives along this street or that one.” T.J. pointed in the direction of the houses lining the opposite side of the tree line. “If he was working for Victor Kroger, do you think he would take that kind of chance? We’re not the only ones likely to call the police if we see a stranger slipping behind our house.”

Eric wanted to argue, but instead his lips tightened as he resumed scanning the trees. If anyone had been there, they were long gone now, and a dim shadow in one of the windows of the Jensons’ house all but proved T.J. right. Even if they hadn’t seen whoever was in the trees, he and T.J. had gotten the attention of whoever had woken up this late at night.

“Come on,” T.J. said again, urging him back across the field. “Let’s get out of this before we both freeze to death.”

Eric grudgingly let himself be led back to the gate, pausing without being told while T.J. locked the back gate, and then he stepped in front to lead the way into the kitchen. T.J. followed a step behind.

T.J. thought he was overreacting, but he knew he wasn’t. He was suspended from active duty, but he was still a detective, and a damned good one. The silence that followed them into the house was thick and foreboding, but the click of the kitchen door closing solidified a certainty as if it had locked into place.

He might be a good detective, but it was time he became a more active one.

Chapter Eleven

“
W
HAT
are you looking at?”

The sound startled Eric, and he whirled from his position on the floor to find T.J. standing between the couch and the kitchen, fully dressed in jeans and a sweatshirt. The weather had turned nasty again last night, but the short day T.J.’d had yesterday meant that he would have to brave the roads today, Sunday or not. They hadn’t spoken of the cameras since Eric had abruptly ended the conversation yesterday, but Eric had let T.J. shower alone this morning so he could review the recording. He had used the excuse that he had wanted to make his lover breakfast as his reasoning for not joining him, and had already dressed himself in the expectation of driving T.J. to work. But the kitchen remained obviously clean and unused, save for the coffee brewing in the pot. Eric felt another wave of guilt sweeping over him as he realized T.J. wouldn’t have time for a hot breakfast now, not if he planned to be at work on time. But it apparently wasn’t the lack of breakfast that had T.J. frowning where he stood.

“You’re getting carried away with this, Eric,” T.J. told him evenly. “Those cameras are as bad as the pictures at making you jump—”

“I’m not jumping at fucking shadows!” Eric cut him off, twisting away from the computer. T.J.’s expression closed, but Eric went on regardless. “Why don’t you want to believe that someone is following us? Someone working for Victor Kroger? I nearly put him in jail; don’t you think he’s going to want revenge? You’ve seen the pictures he left us! He knows us! I need to stop him before—”

“Before someone gets hurt?” T.J. finished quietly.

Eric froze as he watched T.J. disbelievingly.

T.J. didn’t blink and didn’t make any effort to move closer. “Someone already did. Do you know how many people were involved in the traffic accidents you caused yesterday? Do you even know how badly they were hurt?”

“The captain said that there were no serious injuries—” Eric began heatedly.

“But there were minor ones. It could have been a lot worse.”

Eric looked away, his mind replaying the blare of horns, the screech of tires, and the sound of crunching metal as the truck hit the… was it a Jeep? God. He scrubbed a hand over his face. T.J. didn’t say another word, but vanished into the kitchen. The sounds of food being pulled from the refrigerator followed, making it obvious that T.J. intended to have breakfast regardless of the time.

He heard the sizzle of bacon soon after, the only sound in the house besides the nearly silent laptop playing in front of him. Their neighborhood was one of the lucky ones that hadn’t lost power during the night, and Eric hoped their luck on that front would hold as he glanced toward the kitchen, then back to the computer. He knew he owed T.J. another apology, but that would have to wait for the moment. Once Victor was no longer an issue and he no longer doubted their safety, he would make it up to T.J., with interest. Right now he wanted to take a better look at what he’d caught on tape.

“Breakfast will be ready soon, if you’re hungry.”

The raw state of his nerves nearly made him blurt out a “Don’t you need to go to work?” at the interruption the words caused, but he bit it back in a sudden effort to keep from making things worse. Besides, he wasn’t ready to step away from the video yet, not when he had footage of the Lexus passing their house in the night. Nothing obvious or suspicious in the video, but he had the footage right there in front of him, though he hadn’t told T.J. of its presence on the film yet. Not when things were still less than smooth between them.

“I’ll be right there,” he called back instead, beginning the video again and stopping the footage every few frames this time, knowing he was missing something. Someone had been in the trees last night, while someone else had….

There!

A flash of white, blanking one spot on the video, hardly noticeable at full speed but abundantly clear in crawling slow motion. A rapid tapping of the keys, and the footage rewound; the video crawled forward again. Frame by frame the Lexus entered the picture, until…
There!
The time stamp said 2:46 a.m., and the video showed the heavy fall of ice caught in the headlights as the dark car slowly edged past their house. The video wasn’t clear enough to see the driver, not with the combination of the dark, the ice, and the no doubt tinted windows. And though it didn’t stop in front of their house, it drove by slowly enough that stopping apparently hadn’t been necessary. Eric stared hard as he replayed the slow progression again, trying to catch anything that might give away what Victor had been after last night. And whether or not he had received it.