Whisper Me This(28)

You can do this. Just keep it light. Disable the weapon. Be polite. Then get the hell out of Dodge.

“Gun squad, reporting for duty.” He touches his fingers to the brim of his cap in a fake salute. “Where is the offending weapon?”

Maisey hesitates, briefly, crossing her arms over her belly, her eyes flickering over him full of questions. Nervous, he thinks. Probably having second thoughts about inviting him into the house now that he’s out of his official capacity. He smiles at her, tries to make his six-foot-three bulk look small and nonthreatening.

“I can wait here, if you want to go get it.”

An unexpected smile, pure mischief, lights up her face. “Wouldn’t Mrs. Carlton just love that? She’s already watching us from her window. Come in. Guessing what we’re up to will totally make her day.”

She steps aside to let him into the entryway and leads him into the living room.

“Hang on, I’ll go get it.”

Funny how a uniform and a crisis change everything. Out of his uniform now, with no official business here, it feels strange and wrong to him that he knows the floor plan of the house, has been in the master bedroom, has seen the blood in the kitchen. He’s here by invitation, he reminds himself. He’s here to do a favor. Such a small thing, really, and he hates the way the inevitable anxiety creeps into his body.

Maisey is blessedly quick, returning in less than a minute with a shapeless leather handbag. She holds it gingerly in outstretched hands. “It’s in here.”

“I thought you said it was in your mom’s knitting bag.”

“It was. I couldn’t just leave it there.” She presses the purse against his chest, and he can’t do anything other than grab it. His hands are starting to tremble. He can feel it, though thank God it isn’t visible yet.

Turning his back to her, he carries the purse over to the couch and sets it down, feeling his way through the clutter of items for the gun, which he knows will have settled to the bottom.

“My mother caught me snooping in my sister’s purse when I was six,” he says, offering an explanation for his reaction, a story that is true, although far from the truth. “I caught a spanking for that one. She said a woman’s purse is private business, and a man should keep his hands to himself.”

“Must have been a pretty effective spanking.”

“You’d think so, right? You’d be wrong. Jessica caught me snooping in her purse again later. Hey, I was curious about the ways of women. Jess wasn’t bound by any maternal principles of responsible discipline. She beat me up. Bloody nose. Black eye. When I tattled to my mom, she just looked at me. ‘Bet you don’t do that again,’ she said, and she was right. Now, thirty years later, you’re forcing me to scale the fortress. I’m terrified.”

He lifts the gun out of the handbag, keeping the barrel down while he ejects the magazine and clears a 9-millimeter round from the chamber.

“Your mom is a badass. It was fully loaded with one in the pipe.”

“No.”

Maisey’s tone makes him look up. Her eyes, wide with alarm, dominate her face. She shakes her head, emphatically. “My mom is the queen of the church supper and the PTA. She is vociferously antigun. When I was a kid, she tried to start an organization for mothers against firearms. It didn’t fare well here in Colville, but I can’t imagine what would change her like this.”

“Maybe it belongs to your dad? A lot of women opt for a .22. This is a Glock with a high-capacity magazine. It’s a lot of gun.”

A laugh bubbles up out of her. “My dad? Not exactly a gun man.”

“It must belong to one of your parents,” Tony persists. “Nobody else lives here, right?”

Maisey’s face crumples at his words, and she chokes on a sound halfway between laughter and tears. “I can’t ask either of them,” she whispers.

Hell.

He wants to comfort her, to make her laugh again, but that’s not why he’s here. Secure the gun, make sure everybody is safe, get out. That’s the plan.

He lays the emptied gun down on the coffee table and thumbs the ammo out of the magazine. “Maybe you can ask your dad tomorrow. I’ve seen people come clear overnight with rest and hydration.”

“Maybe.” She looks like a defiant child, hands clenched into fists, blinking against a flood of tears. A choked sob escapes her, and then another. All at once she reminds him of his little sister, Mia, and his resolve is all undone. “Hey,” he says. “Hey.”

He puts a hand on her shoulder. Her body stiffens, and he thinks he’s made a mistake, but then all the tension goes out of her, and she rests her forehead against his chest. Tony strokes her hair, murmuring, “Hush, now, it will be all right,” as if she’s a child.

Her arms go around him, and she buries her face in his shirt, her body shaking with sobs.

He holds her. Just like comforting one of his sisters, he tells himself. But it isn’t. Not remotely. Her hair isn’t smooth and black; it’s soft and fine as silk. A red-gold curl catches on his hand and winds around his fingers. Her back is a long, smooth-muscled arc, and his body responds, against his will, with an inconvenient arousal.

Thinking desperate thoughts of cold showers and accident scenes doesn’t do much to help.

When her tears slow, and she draws in a shuddering breath, he drops his hands with a mixture of relief and regret and waits for the fallout. “Don’t be mad now,” he says.