Jaci Burton - Hope Flames

“She gonna use your discount, Luke?” Fred asked.

“If you wouldn’t mind, I’d sure appreciate it.”

“No problem. I’ll ring it up while you start filling out the paperwork, Miss Emma.”

He handed her a long sheet of paper to fill out and walked away.

“Discount?”

“Police officers get a discount. So do their family members.”

“You didn’t have to do that.”

He swept his thumb over her bottom lip. “Sure I did.”

She stared at him for the longest time, wishing they were alone.

“Paperwork, Miss Emma,” Luke said with a wink.

“Oh, right.” She filled out the paperwork, and once Fred verified her, she paid for her gun and the ammo Luke selected for her.

They were in Tulsa and decided to stop for dinner at a Mongolian place Emma had heard great things about.

“Shooting things works up an appetite,” she said after they were seated.

“Your arm will be sore tomorrow. And likely your hand. You use different muscles to shoot, so you’ll have to build them up. You should shoot at least once a week, until it becomes second nature to you. Most of the shooting ranges offer memberships.”

“Sounds fun. Maybe I can get Jane and Chelsea to go with me and practice. We could become pistol-packin’ babes.”

Luke took a sip of the beer the waitress handed him. “Hmm. A pistol-packin’ babe. I’ll have to get a mental visual going of that. Maybe you in a holster, six shooters on each side. You’d have to be naked of course . . .”

She laughed. “Of course.”

“So, now you’ve got your gun, and you did some shooting. Feel confident you could defend yourself?”

Did she? If threatened with certain death, could she end someone else’s life?

She wasn’t sure.

“Honestly? I don’t know.”

“It’s understandable. Until you’ve been in a position where you feel threatened, you don’t know how you’d act.”

She looked away. She had been in that position before. She had been threatened. She hadn’t been armed. If she had, how would she have reacted? If she’d had a gun in her hand at the time, would she have been able to fire it and end his life?

He’d certainly threatened to end hers. More than once. Sweetly and subtly, and he’d used a soft voice. But the threat had been there.

Leave me and I’ll kill you.

“Emma.”

Her gaze lifted. “Yes?”

“You were somewhere else just now.”

“Was I? Sorry. I have a lot on my mind.”

“I could tell. Do you want to talk about it?”

She gave him a small smile. “Not really.”

“Did Vaughn ever threaten you?”

Sometimes it was like he was psychic. “He threatened to kill me if I ever left him.”

“Christ. When was the last time you saw him?”

“When I had him fired. And he was only a bully when he had me alone. He would never have come after me while I stayed with my parents. And then I went back to school in South Carolina.”

“You never saw him when you were there?”

She shook her head. “No. I haven’t seen him since. I don’t think he ever believed I would leave him. He liked easy targets, women he could control. Once I left, it was over.”

“I hope so.”

She took a drink. “You think he’d come after me?”

“I doubt it. It’s been a lot of years. If he was going to come after you, he would have done it right away. Besides, I’m here to protect you now, so you don’t have to worry.”

She always worried, always had, ever since the day she escaped from Vaughn.

He, too, had once promised to protect her. Only his protection had turned into threats and near imprisonment, to the point she hadn’t known the difference, hadn’t trusted her own instincts, hadn’t been able to believe it when others told her that he didn’t love her, that he was trying to own her, that he was abusing her.

“I’m learning to protect myself.” She’d already experienced someone “protecting” her, and she didn’t care to go through that again.

Luke leaned back and gave her a smile. “Yeah, you are. And you’ll be kick-ass at it.”

And that’s where he and Vaughn differed. Because he didn’t mind at all that she wanted to be in charge of her own protection.

She needed to keep reminding herself that Luke and Vaughn were night-and-day different. And Luke wasn’t going to hurt her like Vaughn did.

Because Luke shouldn’t have to pay for what Vaughn had done to her.

And she needed to move on with her life. She deserved that happiness.

FORENSICS HAD FINALLY come through for them with the latest break-in. The perp had trampled in some dirt and left footprints, no doubt from making his entrance through the woods.

He might have been wearing gloves, but there was nothing he could do to disguise those footprints. The perp’s shoes were different from the ones all the cops wore, so it had been easy to isolate them. Now law enforcement was tracking the size and type of shoe he wore, at least narrowing the field.

Luke’s captain had agreed that setting a trap was the best way to go. They were going to make a big deal out of a drug delivery to one of the small pharmacies on the north end of town. If the perp was casing any of these places, he’d notice. They had it organized for the coming Thursday night. Luke and his team would be inside, the rest of the team forming a perimeter around the outside of the pharmacy, out of sight.

Of course, there was no guarantee this would work. The dumbass might not even be paying attention to the pharmacy, might not hit it at all, and their efforts would be wasted. But if he was interested in hitting a drug gold mine, then Hastings Drugstore would be the mother lode, and he wouldn’t be able to resist.

Luke and Boomer were still hanging out at Emma’s house. She hadn’t yet thrown him out, and until this guy was caught, Luke wasn’t comfortable leaving her alone. She didn’t seem to mind sharing her bed with him, and he sure liked being in bed with her.

They had a routine going, and even their dogs were compatible. They both got up around the same time in the morning, and Emma never asked him for anything or put any strings on him, like wanting to know when he’d be home or giving him shit when he was late. This relationship wasn’t as scary as Luke thought it might be.

Huh. He was in a relationship with Emma. He supposed he should just acknowledge that, at least to himself. He and Emma hadn’t talked about it. He stayed at her house and slept in her bed, and they saw each other as often as they could, considering their schedules. But neither of them had said the R word.

Or the L word, for that matter. The thought of either twisted him up inside. He’d made such a mess of his marriage to Becca. The last thing he’d ever wanted was to go down that road again, preferring his carefree bachelor lifestyle, as commitment-phobic as any guy could get.

And now he had his toothbrush and deodorant in Emma’s bathroom, and she’d cleaned out a couple of drawers in her dresser for his stuff, without either of them ever having a conversation about where they were headed.

That was just fucked-up. They needed to start communicating with each other. He needed to tell her his fears about commitment, and she needed to rely on him a little more instead of feeling like she had to hold the responsibility for her entire life on her own shoulders. He got the independence thing. After what she went through with her ex, he understood it. But leaning on him a little every now and then wouldn’t break her. He just didn’t know how to broach the subject without her turning tail and running. Tiptoeing around each other was only going to end in disaster.

And he didn’t like the thought of their relationship ending.

He sat in her living room with his feet propped up on the coffee table, Boomer and Daisy snuggled up together on the dog bed in the living room. Annie, on the other hand, had made a bed out of his lap. When Emma opened the front door, Annie leaped off his lap, causing him to wince, since she’d used his balls as a launching point.

“Hi, kids,” she said, her voice affectionate and warm as she greeted all the dogs. “Did you have a good night?” She petted all of them, and Luke loved watching her with them.

Someday she was going to make an incredible mother.

And didn’t that thought tighten his gut even more?

“How did it go?” he asked as she plopped down on the sofa to plant a kiss on his lips.

She grinned. “I passed with flying colors, of course. I even placed all my bullets on the bad guy in the target. I’ll have my gun license as soon as all the paperwork is processed and the required fees are paid.”

He pulled her onto his lap. “Congratulations. I knew you could do it.”

“The rules and law part of the class was pretty interesting. Dry at times, but interesting nonetheless. And how did you guys do tonight?”

“We watched a baseball game and then played catch in the backyard. Annie ate part of a tennis ball.”

“Of course she did.” Emma glared at Annie, who leaped on the sofa to launch herself onto both their laps.

“Annie. Off.” Emma shooed her off the sofa. “I don’t know where she developed such a bad habit.”

“Huh. No idea.”

Emma gave him a dubious look. “Tell me you’re not letting her up on the sofa.”

“Okay. I won’t tell you.”

She shook her head. “I need a pop. Would you like something?”

“Kitchen sex would be great, thanks.”

She laughed and got up. “Wasn’t what I was offering. I’m just going for the pop for now. You’ll get sex later.”

He grinned. She grabbed something to drink, then filled him in on the class, while he told her about his day and the sting operation they were setting up for the robbery suspect.

“That sounds intriguing. And dangerous.”

“It won’t be dangerous. Except maybe for the suspect. For obvious reasons, you can’t repeat this to anyone. Not even Jane and Chelsea.”

“Obviously. I won’t tell a soul. I do want you to be careful. I never saw the guy with a gun, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t have one.”

“And I won’t be the only one inside the pharmacy. Trust me, we’ll be well protected.”

She laid her head on his chest. “I hope so. I’ve kind of grown accustomed to seeing you here every day.”

He put his arm around her and stared at the TV. “Yeah, I’ve kind of gotten used to being here.”

And once again, the conversation stopped, neither of them willing to have that oh-so-important talk about oh-so-important things.

One of these days, though, all those critical topics were going to get discussed.

EMMA WAS SCHEDULED to have a late girls’ night with Jane and Chelsea on Thursday, but she was a nervous wreck. She knew all she’d be thinking about was Luke, holed up at the pharmacy, lying in wait for the suspect, and she wouldn’t be able to concentrate on anything Jane and Chelsea said. Then they’d ask her what was wrong, and she’d have to lie.

She hated lying. So she called them up and . . . basically lied, telling them she had a lot of paperwork to catch up on, so they’d have to reschedule. After the clinic closed at eight, she came home and snuggled with the dogs, trying to concentrate on television, though she found herself repeatedly getting up to pace. So she decided to read a book, but she couldn’t concentrate and kept reading the same paragraph over and over, which ended up frustrating her. Putting the book aside, she took the dogs outside and let them run off some energy, which did nothing for her own stress level.

She knew she wouldn’t hear from Luke for a while yet. He wouldn’t call while they staked out the place. And if they did manage to catch the guy, he might not call, because he’d be too busy wrapping up the case.

Which meant she had nothing to do but sit at home and . . . stress.

Ugh.

When her phone rang, she ran to answer it.

It wasn’t Luke. It was Ellen Andrews, whose poodle, Nina, had gotten attacked by a much larger dog. Ellen was hysterical because Nina was bleeding and weak.

“I’ll meet you at the clinic in ten minutes, Ellen. Do what you can to stop the bleeding by putting towels or bandages on the wounds and compressing on them. Do you have someone to drive you?”

“Y-yes. My husband Zane will drive.”

“I’ll see you there shortly.”

She slid into her shoes and grabbed her keys, then ran out the door to her truck. Within less than ten minutes she was at the clinic. Ellen and Zane were there with Nina a few minutes later.