Under the Lights (8 page)

The garage door was closed, but the porch light was still on, so she pulled in next to Chase's truck and killed the engine. The front door wasn't locked, because no matter how often she lectured them, her parents only locked the house when they were going out of town. And even then, they told half the town where the spare key was hidden, “just in case.”

The television was on in the living room, but there was no sign of people, which was surprising. It was definitely the time of night when her dad was in his recliner, pretending to watch TV while he napped, and her mother would be in her chair, pretending to knit while she really just watched TV and held the needles.

When she heard a noise coming from the kitchen, she went that direction and found Chase half in the pantry closet, rummaging around. “She keeps the good stuff in the cabinet above the fridge, behind the light bulbs.”

He whirled around and she realized he hadn't heard her come in. She must still be subconsciously avoiding the squeaky spots in the old wood floors.

“Why do they do that?” he asked. “I think all moms hide their stashes behind the light bulbs in the highest cabinet. It's not a very good secret hiding place.”

“Women should hide stuff with the extra toilet paper,
because
that's
a secret location. Did my parents go to bed already?”

“No, they went to . . . somebody's house to see pictures of their new grandkid and eat dessert or something.”

“With that kind of detail, you should do my police reports for me.”

He grinned sheepishly. “Honestly, I mentally checked out at the words
slide show
and
new grandbaby
.”

She couldn't say she blamed him. “Did they say when they'd be back?”

“No, but they've been gone awhile and they're not exactly night owls.”

“Okay.” Awkwardness settled between them. By the time her parents got home, they'd probably be ready to go to bed, so waiting around didn't make a lot of sense. But turning around and walking out on Chase because they weren't home seemed rude.

He held up a bag. “Want some peanuts?”

“All the food my mom has in there and you bring out peanuts?”

“I like peanuts.”

It was such a random conversation, she didn't know what to say. “Okay. So do I, but no. I'm all set.”

He tossed the bag on the table and sat down. “So what brings you over here so late? Late being relative, of course, but you're obviously on duty.”

“Just looking for a pep talk, I guess.” She leaned against the counter and crossed one ankle over the other. “You know Coach is good at those.”

“Tough night?”

She shrugged one shoulder, but he waited her out. And
he looked sincerely interested—almost concerned—so she found herself telling him about her visit to the bridge. No names, of course, but enough to give him a sense of the discouragement and frustration growing in Stewart Mills.

He got up halfway through and got them each a soda from the fridge, handing her one. She didn't normally drink caffeine except when she first woke up, because she sometimes had to sleep weird hours, but her mouth was dry and she could use the pick-me-up.

“Listening is probably all you can do,” he said, leaning his hip against the counter so he was facing her. “It makes a difference, you know. You could have hassled him or ordered him to go home, but you cared enough to let him talk it out. Even if he doesn't consciously know it, it really matters.”

“If we can't save the team, it's going to get worse,” she said, setting her half-full can down. The caffeine was okay, but the sugar was too much. “Ugh. I'm starting to sound like a broken record.”

“No, you sound like a woman who cares a lot about her town and the people living in it, especially the kids.”

When he moved closer and put his hand on her shoulder, she stiffened under his touch. Alarm bells went off in her head—she should put some distance between them immediately—but it was a gesture of comfort, and comfort was what she'd come looking for.

Then his hand slid up to cup the back of her neck, while the fingers of his other hand laced through hers, and she knew she was in trouble. Looking into his eyes, there was no doubt he intended to kiss her. But he held back, not tugging at her neck at all while he waited.

To hell with it,
she thought, closing the small distance between them and tilting her face up. His mouth closed over hers as she slid her free hand up his back, and the hand on the back of her neck tightened.

When his tongue flicked over her bottom lip, she shivered. He tasted like sugary soda, but she didn't care. All she cared about was his mouth and his tongue dancing over hers and his hand on her neck.

“I've wanted to kiss you since the first night I got here,” he said against her lips, his voice low and husky.

Her fingernails bit into his back, but she didn't say anything. She didn't want to talk. She wanted him to keep kissing her until her knees were weak and she couldn't breathe.

“You are so sweet,” he murmured, and then he nipped at her lower lip. “I'd like to take you up against the wall right now.”

Her breath caught in her throat and she opened her eyes. How could he know how badly she wanted that?

Chase let go of her hand and lifted his hand to her rib cage, only to find the unforgiving hardness of the bulletproof vest under her uniform shirt.

He growled in frustration. “This vest
has
to go. And it can't be comfortable.”

“I'm used to it,” she said, but the reminder she was on duty sparked horror that burned through the haze of desire. She put her hands on his forearms and pushed them down. What the hell was she doing? “This can't happen.”

“You're right.” He blew out a breath and shoved his hand through his hair. “You're Coach's daughter.”

Anger pushed the lingering frustration of sexual need to the back burner. “Excuse me?”

“I can't mess around with Coach's daughter. And in his own house, for chrissake. You're off-limits to me, but I have a hard time remembering that when I'm around you.”

“Flattering, but very wrong.
Coach's daughter
is not my identity, and that's not why this”—she pointed from him to herself—“is not happening. It can't happen because I'm not going to be ground up in the rumor mill because I slept with one of the guys who are basically Stewart Mills' current versions of rock stars. Especially while I'm on duty.”

His jaw clenched and released. “Fine. That's your reason this can't happen. My reason it can't happen is that I don't want to disrespect a man who means the world to me.”

“Why don't you just leave my dad out of it?”

“That's kind of hard when we're standing in his kitchen.”

She shook her head. Sure, she was a little embarrassed to have behaved like that in her parents' house, but that was because they were her parents, not because her dad was
Coach.
“Let me make it easy for you. I'm leaving, so you can stand here in his kitchen all by yourself.”

He said her name, but she didn't bother turning back. And she thanked whatever stars kept her parents out late enough that she could get the cruiser out of their neighborhood before they got home. They definitely would have flagged her down, and the last thing she wanted to do was talk to anybody.

She'd had more than enough talking for one night.

B
y Friday afternoon, Chase was questioning whether or not he'd been crazy to agree to come back to Stewart Mills. He was hot and tired, and would happily spend the rest of his life free of teenagers.

He'd reported to the town hall that morning to get instructions from Alice Dubois, who had volunteered to oversee the street fair. Her instructions amounted to explaining to him what she wanted and telling him to go do it, so he'd rounded up the boys and gotten to work.

It had taken them almost two hours just to lug all the booths and tables the town used for Old Home Day out of the storage area, and then they needed to be sorted into the locations Alice had marked on a very badly hand-drawn map before being assembled.

Now he was trying to finish off the assembly of the town's
ancient dunking booth—which Alice had warned him hadn't been used in years—by himself, because he was a sucker and had finally let the boys go dig up a late lunch.

And they didn't have one of those lightweight plastic jobs you could rent for parties. No, Stewart Mills wasn't going to spend money when they had an almost perfectly good monstrosity from the sixties made up of heavy wood and metal.

When he'd finally gotten it placed according to Alice's map, he realized the only way to fill the tank would be with buckets by hand, which would take about two months. After looking around, he found a water spigot, probably used to water the town square if need be, and moved the damn thing so they could use a hose, which he borrowed from the hardware store.

He'd finally gotten the trigger mechanisms to work properly and was up on a ladder, trying to hang the old sign that advertised it was a dunking booth, just in case it wasn't obvious. The sign wasn't really necessary—especially since the thin wood it was made of was drying and splitting, and he was having to work around that—but he had fuzzy memories of the tank being used a time or two when he was a kid, and he liked the old sign.

When he paused, turning his head to stretch his neck, he saw Kelly across the town square, and it looked as though she was looking for somebody. It probably wasn't him, since they hadn't spoken at all since she'd stormed out of Coach's kitchen.

One the one hand, he hoped it
was
him but, on the other, she was in uniform. Official police business was rarely fun.

Through the corner of his eye, he watched her approach.
Maybe it was a combination of the boots, vest and weight of her belt, but she seemed to walk with an extra-sexy sway when in uniform.

When she stopped at the bottom of the ladder, he smiled down at her. “Good afternoon, Officer McDonnell.”

She put her hands on her hips and squinted up at him before adjusting the brim of her hat. “I should write you a citation for being disruptive in public.”

“Unless Stewart Mills got a noise ordinance along with all those shiny stop signs, this is feeling like harassment.”

When she smiled, he felt a rush of relief. Wednesday night had ended so badly, he hadn't been sure how things would go the next time they bumped into each other. Besides the fact that he didn't want to explain to his hosts why he and their daughter weren't speaking, he liked talking to Kelly. He didn't want a kiss—even one that had shaken the hell out of him—to ruin the budding friendship he thought they had.

“Mrs. Clark bumped into Mrs. Davidson, making her drop her eggs, which led to a verbal altercation. According to the complaint, it was your fault.”

“I've been on this ladder for an hour, Officer. I'm innocent.”

She waved her hand in a gesture that made him look down at himself. Okay, so he was a bit of a mess. He'd taken his T-shirt off a while back and tossed it to the ground. And, because he didn't have his tool belt, the hammer and various other tools hooked on his pockets were dragging his jeans down a little. He swiped at the sweat coating his chest and looked back at Kelly.

Just in time to see the way she was looking at him before
she put her cop face back on. Understanding dawned and he grinned.

“Mrs. Clark wasn't watching where she was going, huh?”

She rolled her eyes. “Don't get yourself too puffed up. She's seventy if she's a day.”

Chase had intended to try to get another screw or two into the dunk tank sign, but it was good enough. Since the battery drill he'd borrowed from Coach had run out of juice, he'd been using a regular screwdriver, and he'd had about enough of that. He climbed down the ladder and stood in front of Kelly. “How does it look?”

“Old. Are you sure it's safe?”

“It might look a little shabby, but structurally she's still good to go. I just need to turn on the hose and fill it up while I grab a quick bite to eat. Have you had lunch?”

The amusement on her face changed to uncertainty. “I'm on duty.”

“Which I assume includes meal breaks, since you need to keep your strength up if you're going to chase down criminals.” He didn't think it had anything to do with being on duty and everything to do with their kiss in the kitchen. “I wasn't asking you out on a date. I planned to grab a couple of steamed hot dogs at the gas station and sit on the picnic table while I watch for leaks in the tank.”

Her expression cleared. “I could go for a dog right about now. How about I go get the hot dogs and a couple of sodas while
you
put your damn shirt back on so the women in this town can get back to what they're supposed to be doing instead of watching you.”

He grinned. “Yes, ma'am.”

As he watched her walk away, appreciating that extra
sway in the hips, he wondered if Officer McDonnell had been one of the women watching him instead of doing what
she
was supposed to be doing.

Snatching his T-shirt off the ground, he walked over to the spigot. Before attaching the hose, though, he turned the water on and stuck his head under the flow to cool himself off. Then he splashed some of the frigid water across his chest before turning it off.

When he pushed his arms through his T-shirt sleeves and tucked his thumbs into the neck hole to pull it over his head, he caught a glimpse of Kelly, who had stopped at the curb and was looking back at him. He grinned and pulled the shirt on, and by the time he could see again, she'd turned away.

—

K
elly paid for the hot dogs and sodas, calling herself every variation of
idiot
she could think of the entire time. After their kiss in her parents' kitchen, she should be avoiding Chase, not having a picnic lunch with him.

Avoiding him was easier said than done, though. Besides the fact that he was an honored Eagles Fest guest and was staying with her dad, he was in the town square. Not crossing paths with him would be harder than simply pretending the other night had never happened.

For instance, just a few minutes before when she'd started across the square before spotting him, and he'd seen her first. Turning around would have been obvious, and she refused to give him the satisfaction of her running away. Of course he had to be shirtless and glistening with sweat at the time, because that was just her luck.

“Kelly?”

She jerked her attention back to the change being offered to her, embarrassed to have been caught staring out the window, lost in thought. “Sorry. I was just running my to-do list through my head.”

The lie made her face feel hot as she realized she'd mixed Chase with
to-do list
. She was not doing Chase. Period.

By the time she made the long walk back to the picnic table where Chase was waiting for her—thankfully fully clothed—Kelly had herself back under control. He was a volunteer, working to make Eagles Fest a success alongside everybody else, and she was bringing him a steamed hot dog. No big deal. She'd do the same for anybody.

She sat on the picnic table bench across from him, but a little offset so they wouldn't find themselves in an accidental game of footsie under the table, and set the two bags in the middle of the table. “I got packets of everything, since I forgot to ask what you like on them.”

She pulled the cold sodas out of one bag while he unpacked the hot dogs and made quick work of drowning his in ketchup, mustard and relish. “I would have grabbed extra napkins if I'd known you were going to use
all
of the condiments. You're going to be a mess.”

He looked at the hot dog and then grinned. “You're right. Maybe I should take my shirt off while I eat so I don't get mustard stains on it.”

“And maybe I should write you up for running that stop sign, after all.” He was flirting with her and she had no idea how to handle that. Not while she was still having to make a deliberate effort
not
to think about his kiss and his hand on her neck and how he wanted to take her up against the wall.

“The statute of limitations on something like that is probably about five minutes.” He took a bite of the hot dog and then swiped at a dot of mixed condiments on his lip. “I haven't had a steamed dog in ages. I forgot how good they are. So, should we talk about the other night?”

The abrupt change in subject startled her. “No.”

“Okay.”

They watched the dunk tank filling very slowly with water while they ate their hot dogs, and Kelly felt the awkwardness looming large between them. She hated it. And there was no reason for it. They were two adults and they'd kissed.

“Fine, let's talk about it,” she said when Chase had shoved their napkins and empty condiment packages into one of the bags. “Being Coach's daughter is both wonderful and a total pain in the ass at the same time. All my life, it's felt like people . . . I don't know how to explain it. I don't have a different standard, per se, but I feel like I'm more visible. Everybody knows who I am and who my dad is. So when I'm alone with a guy, being called the coach's daughter—having it be the reason I'm pushed away—pisses me off.”

“You pushed first, just for the record.” Chase stretched his legs out, leaning his elbows on the tabletop. “And I'm sorry I pissed you off, but it's hard for me to separate the two of you, because he means so much to me. When I look at you, I see a sexy, confident woman who's amazing, and I want you so bad it hurts sometimes. But I love your dad, Kelly. I love and respect that man, and you're the most important thing in the world to him. That matters.”

Kelly absorbed his words, trying to focus more on the
emotional confession than the fact that he wanted her so badly it hurt. “I guess I can see that.”

“Maybe if my life wasn't in the shitter and my intentions were more . . . honorable, I wouldn't have a problem. But you're not a woman I can mess around with lightly, and that's all I've got to offer.” He turned his head to look her in the eye. “And even if I could put all that aside, I'm not what you're looking for long-term, and you're not looking to have a fling that'll put you in the gossips' line of fire. Right?”

“Right.” She felt as if she should say more, but he'd managed to sum up the situation pretty well.

“So we kissed. It happens.”

“It was a great kiss.”

His gaze dropped to her mouth. “Yeah, it was.”

Just thinking about it made her want to do it again but, even if they hadn't been in one of the most public spots in Stewart Mills, the kissing was over. “How's the street fair coming along?”

He shrugged and looked out across the grass again. “My part's about done. Once the tank is full and I've made sure it doesn't leak, I'll cover it and head back to your parents' house to clean up. I'm looking forward to seeing the guys again. Murphy and Leavitt should be here soon, from what I hear.”

She nodded. “Alex texted me when he found Sam, and they were on their way out of the airport. That was about two hours ago, so it'll be at least another hour. Probably more like two, with Friday night traffic.”

“Yeah, they're going to meet Jen in the school parking lot so she can take them to where they're staying. Then, after
they settle in, they're going to pick me up so we can go out and catch up over supper.”

Kelly nodded and then drained the last of her soda. “Break's over, I guess.”

“Somebody could be having a verbal altercation over spilled milk right now,” he teased, standing and gathering the garbage, which he tossed into the nearby trash.

“You're funny.” She tossed the empty can into the recycling bucket next to the garbage and gave him a stern look. “I'll see you later. And keep your shirt on.”

“Yes, ma'am.”

She really liked the way he said that.

—

B
ecause Sam texted him when he and Alex hit the town line, Chase was watching for them and stepped out onto the porch when the navy sedan pulled into the driveway.

When the two men got out, Chase felt a surge of emotion he hadn't expected. Sure, they'd been his teammates and his high school buddies, but then they'd all gone their separate ways and eventually lost touch. He hadn't realized he'd missed them until now.

They looked remarkably the same and yet different at the same time. Sam was more rugged than he'd been as their quarterback, and whatever he did for work was obviously physically demanding. His brown hair was cut short enough that the barber probably skipped scissors and went straight for the clippers, and he was wearing at least a day's worth of scruff.

Alex had changed even more than Sam. He'd been a very big guy in high school, the star of their defensive line, but now he looked lean and strong. Where Sam looked like he'd
just come off a construction site, in worn jeans and a faded T-shirt, Alex wore a button-down shirt and jeans that looked so new, Chase wondered if he'd bought them just for the trip. His dark hair had what Chase always thought of as a business cut, and he was clean shaven.

Seeing the changes in them made Chase feel old, but he consoled himself with the fact that they looked like they could still kick some ass, so maybe he could, too.