I handed the receiver back to Anne-Marie, who was still staring at me expectantly, and let out a huge sigh as I stared up at the popcorn ceiling. Leary was crazy if he thought I was getting back on this roller coaster for another ride. I had my life. I had my girl. Nothing else really mattered.

If only she had felt the same way.

“Mark.”

I lowered my gaze and tried not to let on that I knew what was coming.

“So…detective who?”

I was tired of cat and mouse, too tired for any games as a matter of fact, so I went for the direct route. “It was Leary, the guy who was investigating your ‘abduction.’” I skipped the air quotes. That tells you how tired I was. But I did give appropriate emphasis to “abduction,” and she responded by again raising her eyebrows. “Says Jessica’s dangerous. Wants me to ditch you to meet up with him.”

“Me?” she puzzled convincingly.

“Yep. Apparently you are a tail posing as a leg.”

I expected a “what?” or some other sign that I was talking nonsense, but instead she seemed challenged…she said nothing for a second, and then her eyes narrowed, and then all I got for my trouble was a weak “huh?”

She was calculating. The last thing I wanted right then was more drama, but it was too obvious to ignore. I wanted the two of us to walk off into the sunset, and here she was acting like a teenager who’d been caught under the bleechers.

“Nothing,” I replied, trying to shake it off. She seemed relieved. She leaned in and slid her hand up my thigh. This game again. I felt an excitement in my loins. Yes, I mean “loins,” not “in my pants” or anything suave like that, because there was something really Samson and Delilah about this, and I suddenly recalled the emptiness in my gut when I woke up without her. I stopped her hand and reached for my jacket.

“Um…raincheck, okay? I really do need to get to work today. Deadlines, you know.”

And I kissed her. It was sweet. It was soft. And it felt like our last.

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