Death and Relaxation (Ordinary Magic #1)(61)

She smiled, and this time I could tell she meant it. “Dunno. Sounds ominous, right? So let’s hear it. Apologize.”

“Oh, for Pete’s sake. Fine. Sorry it took me so long to get to work today.”

“Forgiven. Why so late?”

I picked up my coffee cup. Stared at it. Empty. Right, I hadn’t brought my coffee. I stood, ambled over to the coffee pot.

“There was a penguin about to get blown out of a cannon, and by the time we jimmied it free and restored it to its natural habitat, I wanted coffee and deep-fried sugar. Just my luck, half of Ordinary had the same idea. I would have been here sooner if Cooper and Ryder hadn’t shown up.”

I poured the last of the coffee into my mug and shoveled sugar into it without measuring. I added flavored cream, figuring a double blast of sugar would count for breakfast and lunch and might keep me awake for an hour or two.

“Cooper and Ryder?” she asked. “Where? When?”

I took a drink. My molars hurt.

Ryder strode through the door. He hesitated a second, then strode across the waiting room. He still had that wicked light in his eyes, that one-corner smile, like he was up to no good and wanted me to know it. Broad shoulders were square in the jacket he wore over flannel, and his heavy boots came down with audible thuds.

He was sexy as hell. My heart raced. My breath caught in my throat. I felt stretched taut, against the power of him, of his gaze.

He pushed past the front counter and stopped right in front of me, so close, I could feel the heat rolling off him, could smell the soap and spice of cologne on his skin mixed deliciously with the cold salt air he’d pulled into the station.

“You wanted to see me, chief?”

Forget coffee. Ryder Bailey was what I craved.

For all my life, my heart said. I opened my mouth to say that and caught myself. How stupid would I sound? He was just here reporting for work. That was all.

“Uh,” I replied, brilliantly.

He exhaled and smiled, and everything in him went loose and relaxed. A dimple appeared by his mouth and I wanted to draw my fingertips over it, over his lips, over the dark stubble on his jaw, down the hard planes of his chest and stomach, and anywhere else that would make him kiss me.

He was just standing too close to me. I couldn’t think.

I took a step back. “Why do you smell like fir trees?”

Okay. Maybe I still couldn’t think.

He rolled his shoulders in a shrug. “I helped Mr. Tippin stack a cord of wood he had delivered yesterday.”

Mr. Tippin lived a few houses down from Ryder. He was also a jinn with a slight case of pyromania.

“Good,” I said. “That was good.”

“Just being neighborly,” he said. “Did you have anything you wanted me to take care of for you today?”

Wild images of him kissing me, tumbling me down onto my bed so I could tear his clothes off, flew through my mind.

“If not,” he went on, “I thought I’d take care of the filing in the record room.”

“Filing,” I repeated, heat creeping up my face as the memory of him standing naked in his living room chose just that moment to come back to me.

Why did he have to be such a good-looking man? And kind? And funny? And the love that I’d never dared ask for?

Jean cleared her throat. Or maybe she was just trying not to laugh at me.

“Filing,” I said. “Sure. Yes. That would be good.”

“Good.” His eyes crinkled in the corners. He was holding back laughter too.

Don’t bite your bottom lip, don’t bite your bottom lip, don’t bite— He bit his bottom lip, tugged, let it go.

All my bones went a little rubbery.

“Maybe Ryder should go on a ride-along with Myra again,” Jean suggested.

“No.” I walked back to my desk, needing the space between me and that man and his smile and his eyes and his bottom lip. “Filing needs to be done. That’s a good job for the morning.”

“And tonight?” he said.

“Tonight?”

“We’re still on for dessert?”

“Oh. Uh…no. I can’t make it.”

The pleasant man in a pleasant mood disappeared. “Really.”

“Bertie just sent my itinerary. I have to judge tonight.”

“Right,” he said. “Judging. I forgot.”

“Another time?” I suggested.

“Sure.” He didn’t look happy about it. “I’ll get to those files now. Holler if you need anything.” He walked back to our file and evidence room.

I rubbed at my eyes and groaned.

“That was some serious public display of affection you had in your eyes,” Jean said.

“Aren’t you supposed to be going home now?”

“And miss all the fireworks? The scintillating conversation? Good,” she mimicked. “That was good.”

I groaned again. “Did I sound like that much of an idiot?”

“Maybe a little more.”

I dropped my hands in my lap. Jean sat at her desk, looking smug.

“Fine. Ryder makes an idiot out of me.”

“I know. You let him in the records room.”

Huh. I tried to remember if there was anything in there that would betray the secrets of Ordinary. Maybe not right out in the open, but if he went digging far enough.