Cuff Me(92)

“Oh yeah?”

“Yeah.”

Vincent lifted an eyebrow before pulling his cell phone out of his jacket pocket. He wiggled it at her. “I may or may not have what you’re looking for on this very device.”

Jill breathed out a sigh of relief. “You know me.”

Vin unlocked his phone, hit a button, and then handed it to her.

It was Dorothy Birch’s mug shot.

Jill laid a hand over her chest. “Vincent Moretti. Don’t you ever say that you don’t do romance. Where’d you find her?”

“Security cameras caught her near Port Authority, getting on a bus.”

“A bus,” Jill said. “You don’t see that every day.”

“Yeah, well.” Vincent leaned back in the chair. “You also don’t see a sixty-six-year-old woman committing sororocide either.”

“Ooh, good word,” she said.

The side of his mouth tilted up. “Only a homicide investigator would think so.”

She glanced down at the flowers. “I keep thinking that we should have known earlier. That we should have caught her.”

“You know what I’m thinking?” Vin asked, leaning forward. “I’m thinking that regardless of when we figured out it was her that you shouldn’t have gone in alone.”

“Agreed,” Jill said.

He opened his mouth, and then shut it at her easy agreement.

She gave a sheepish smile. “I’m not proud of the way I handled it. There are no excuses, really. I was stupid.”

Jill watched as his eyes turned darker. “Do you have any idea what it was like for me?” he said, his voice quiet. “Do you have any idea what it’s like to show up to a crime scene and see your partner on a stretcher?”

She reached a hand toward him but stopped almost immediately. They weren’t ready for that. Not yet.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered.

He cleared his throat and looked away. “What was the other thing?”

“What?” she asked, not following.

“You said there were two buts about the flowers. What was the other one?”

“Oh. Um—”

She felt foolish telling him now, when his face was all closed off and unreadable.

Then she remembered Maria Moretti’s words that day Vin’s mother had come to visit her. If you want him… you’ll have to be the brave one.

Jill lifted her chin. “The second thing I was going to say is that while the roses really are quite lovely, I find that I’ve recently discovered a new favorite flower. Carnations. Red, to be precise. Sort of like the ones a certain man got for me, only I was too blind to actually see them.”

His gaze snapped back to hers. “Is that so?”

She nodded, and this time when she reached out a hand toward him, she didn’t stop until her arm was all the way extended.

His eyes traced the motion warily, and Jill stared at him steadily in challenge. If this was going to work, he needed to be brave too.

Vin blew out a breath and then leaned forward, taking her hand in both of his and cradling it.

“Jill—”

“Wait. Me first,” she said. “About that night, I shouldn’t have pushed you. I shouldn’t have made demands, I shouldn’t have rushed you into anything, I shouldn’t have—”

“I love you.”

Jill’s words trailed off at his interruption. “What?”

He leaned his head down to their joined hands, pressed his lips against her palm. “I love you, Jill Henley. Always have. Always will. And you don’t have to say it back. And even if you never say it back, know that I will still want you, still love you, still die for you—”

Her free hand found its way to his cheek, and he turned his head, pressing his lips to that palm as well before finally lifting his eyes to meet hers. “My brothers said that saying it would be the hardest thing I’ve ever done. They were wrong. It was the easiest. Because loving you is easy.”

Jill’s eyes filled with tears. “Took you long enough to realize it,” she whispered.

He stood, leaning over her as he pressed his mouth to her eyes, her nose, then finally to her mouth, kissing her soft and sweet.

Vin started to pull back, but Jill’s fingers tangled in the fabric of his shirt, holding him close. “You interrupted my speech,” she whispered.

He ran a thumb over her cheek. “So finish it now. But make it quick—I’m dying to know if this hospital gown is one of the ones that gapes open in the back, displaying your perfect ass.”

She laughed. “All right then. I’ll skip to the end of my pretty speech. I love you too, Detective Moretti.”

The playful expression vanished from his face, and something tender and heartbreaking flitted across his harsh features. “Yeah?”

“Yeah,” she whispered.

His kiss was longer this time, hotter, and when he pulled back, they were both a little breathless, and both remaining red Jell-O cups had been knocked to the ground.

“I don’t understand why they don’t make these beds for two,” he growled.

“Um, probably because the walls are made of glass.”

Vincent whipped his head around to see every last one of his family members staring at them with happy smiles.