Deadly Christmas Read online

  “That was pretty good,” Mandy murmured.

  “Yes,” James agreed.

  “Let’s do it again.”

  James grinned. “Your wish is my command.”

  Twelve

  Mandy and James were a tangle of naked limbs when they woke the next morning. James met the day a few minutes before his wife, enjoying the sight of her slumbering on his chest. The few minutes they shared every morning before the day called were his favorite.

  When Mandy finally wrenched her eyes open, she found James staring at her. “Morning.”

  “Morning, my baby.” James kissed her forehead.

  “What time is it?”

  “You have five minutes before you have to get in the shower for work,” James replied, his hand rubbing lazy circles on the small of her back.

  “If you’re planning on trying to wedge another round in those five minutes, you’re going to be disappointed,” Mandy said, yawning as she lifted her chin. “I can barely walk as it is … and I’m sorry about drooling on your chest.” She tried to wipe the pool of liquid up with her palm, making a face as she did.

  James laughed and cuddled her closer. “I think holding you for five minutes will be enough. I’m spent after yesterday, too.”

  “Yeah, that was interesting,” Mandy said, sliding up slightly so she could kiss his chin. “What got into you?”

  “The truth?”

  “Always.”

  “Well, I was already keyed up from sneaking around looking for my gifts when you caught me,” James explained. “When you add the adrenalin rush from being caught to the fact that you were wearing my favorite garters without underwear … well … I really had no control over my actions.”

  “Very cute,” Mandy said, resting her forehead against his chin. “I wish we could stay like this all day today.”

  “We could if you would quit your job.”

  “Please don’t start,” Mandy said, sighing. “This has been a perfect morning. Please … just … .”

  “I’m sorry, baby,” James said. “That was uncalled for. We had the perfect night. We have exactly three minutes left in our morning. There’s no reason to ruin it.”

  “I think you like to fight.”

  “I think you like to fight,” James countered. “You like it when you get my heart racing and I yell because you know that I’m so infatuated with you that I can’t help myself from arguing.”

  “That’s a convenient excuse.”

  “At least I have an excuse,” James said. “What’s your excuse?”

  “I like getting you riled up so you can’t stop yourself from taking matters into your own hands on the pool table,” Mandy replied. “Guess who got their way last night?”

  James chuckled. “You make me laugh, wife.” He tightened his arms around her and snugly held her. “What is your day like today?”

  “It’s actually pretty quiet around the courthouse right now. Judge MacIntosh is trying to get everything he can in on the morning dockets so we can sneak out early in the afternoons.”

  James furrowed his brow. “You weren’t home early yesterday.”

  “That’s because I was picking up one of your gifts and hiding it so you can’t find it.”

  “You’re hiding gifts off of our property? That hardly seems fair.”

  “You’re hiding some big gift for me in the business safe,” Mandy argued. “Don’t bother denying it. I tried to look in the safe while you were gone and Grady slapped me down like I was a little kid trying to steal a cookie.”

  “You stay out of that safe,” James warned. “Trying to sneak into the safe here is one thing. Those aren’t your big gift. I don’t want your big gift ruined. Promise me.”

  Mandy stilled. “I promise.”

  “This is important to me, Mandy,” James said, searching her eyes for hints that she was lying to him. “Please, don’t ruin this for me.”

  Mandy sighed. “You’re so dramatic. I promise I won’t ruin this for you. I didn’t realize it was such a big deal.”

  “You’re going to love this gift so much we’re going to stay naked for the entire week you have off between Christmas and New Year’s Day.”

  “That sounds really nice.” Mandy rested her head against James’ chest. “I don’t want to get up. You’re so warm and cuddly.”

  “Well, I hate to be the wet blanket, but I have to get up, too,” James said. “We’re still running security at the jewelry store. I hope we finish it up today. I didn’t want to take on a job this close to Christmas for this specific reason. I wanted to relax with you, not deal with pretentious business douches and their obnoxious wives.”

  “You’re such a morning person.”

  James tickled her ribs, making sure to hold her close as she tried to escape. “While we’re talking about the douche and his wife, don’t forget we have that Christmas party tonight.”

  Mandy scowled. “I don’t want to go. Can’t you get us out of it?”

  “I can’t think of a way to do it that doesn’t make me look like an ungrateful ass.” James rolled his neck and stared at the ceiling. “You know what? If you don’t want to go, you don’t have to go. There’s no reason for both of us to be miserable.”

  “Oh, get over yourself, martyr,” Mandy teased, laughing into his shoulder. “You know darned well I’m going with you. The only reason to stay behind would be if we could get naked in the hot tub. I have no intention of sitting here alone without you.”

  “How did I know you would say that?” James asked, flipping Mandy over smoothly and rolling on top of her. His morning erection was obvious in this new position, and it was nudging Mandy’s thigh for some attention. “How about we compromise?”

  “I’m waiting … oh … um … I can’t believe we’re about to do this again.”

  James’ smile was so wide it almost swallowed his face. “If you go to the party with me for an hour I will rub you in the hot tub for an hour and then I’ll … do a little something extra in the hot tub.”

  “Are we going to play the love nozzle game again?”

  “Baby, we can play any game you want,” James said, surprising her when he wedged himself between her thighs and smoothly slid inside of her. “Oh, baby.”

  Mandy lifted her thighs and hooked her ankles over his back. “Okay, but we have to be quick … ugh. I can’t be late for work if I have to get all gussied up for a party … ugh … James.” Mandy gasped as he surged inside of her.

  “I love you, wife.”

  James didn’t give Mandy a chance to respond. He already knew she loved him. For now they were working on a timetable, and he had no intention of either of them being late.

  “I’M sorry I’m late,” James said, offering Art an apologetic smile as he walked into the sheriff’s department lobby an hour and a half later. “I was … distracted … and didn’t see I missed a call until I was packing up to head to the office.”

  “You’re only ten minutes late,” Art said, brushing off James’ apology. “You have a life outside of your job and my appearance in your town was unexpected. Plus, it’s close to the holidays. I completely understand.”

  “Still, I try to be professional,” James said. “I was … reminding my wife about the party tonight and then she was running late for work so … it was just one of those mornings.”

  “Son, I’m not stupid,” Art said, a smile playing at the corners of his mouth. “You’re practically glowing. I know what you and your wife were doing this morning.”

  James pursed his lips. “We got a little distracted,” he admitted. “I’ll try not to let it happen again.”

  “Son, if I looked like you and was thirty years younger I would never get out of bed,” Art said. “That’s one of the things you don’t realize when you’re young. At least you’re enjoying yourself.”

  James enjoyed himself – and his wife – so many times over the past twenty-four hours he’d lost count. “The holidays put me in a romantic mood.”

  �
�And your wife?”

  “She’s always in a romantic mood.”

  Art was dubious. “I have to buy Ava a car … or a diamond … or a boat to get her in a romantic mood.”

  James wanted to point out that buying Ava off to marry him was what got him in this predicament in the first place, but he wisely kept his mouth shut. “Mandy just has to smile to get me in the mood and it doesn’t take much to convince her that I’m worth the time spent.”

  “You’re lucky.”

  “I tell myself that every day,” James said, glancing around the bustling sheriff’s department lobby. “It must be the last day for visitors before the holidays. This place is going to be a zoo in a couple of hours. What are we doing here again?”

  “The sheriff’s department managed to get some video from a gas station on the far side of the parking lot,” Art explained. “They say the footage isn’t great, but it clearly shows a white male pulling a black mask off and climbing into a car. I was hoping you would be able to do something with the video.”

  “It can’t hurt to check,” James said. “We have a great computer guy. Even if I can’t do something with it, Maverick probably can.”

  “Your computer guy’s name is Maverick?”

  “He’s got an inflated ego for a guy who still lives in his mother’s basement,” James explained. “The problem is, he can back it up. He’s a genius on the computer. It’s annoying.”

  “Well, we’ll take what we can get,” Art said, glancing down at the sheet of paper he was holding in his hand. “A Detective Branson is supposed to come out and talk with us. I told the people over there in the bubble who I was looking for and they said he would be up soon. This place is … not what I pictured.”

  “It’s not like the movies,” James said, chuckling.

  “It’s also gross and dirty,” Art said. “That woman over there stuck her hands in her bra to pull her boobs out really high when she heard she was only three people away from being able to visit someone she keeps referring to as her ‘honey boo.’”

  James snorted. “You meet different kinds of people in a jail setting.”

  “I’m glad I never went to prison.”

  “Oh, this is nothing like prison,” James said. “This is a theme park compared to prison.”

  “Well, it’s a nightmare to me,” Art said. “I can’t recall ever being in a police department before for anything other than making a donation.”

  “When you’re in my line of work, you get used to it,” James said.

  “Do you deal with the police often?”

  “More often than I would like.”

  “Do you get along?”

  James shrugged. “There are good police officers and bad police officers,” he said. “Most of the guys around here are good guys. That doesn’t mean all of them are good guys.”

  Art looked as if he was searching for a safe place to lead the conversation. “Is your wife looking forward to the party tonight?”

  “My wife isn’t big on parties,” James replied, seeing no sense in lying. “We have to go to some for her work, and we have to go to some for my work, but she’s happiest in fuzzy pajama bottoms in front of the television.”

  “That sounds horrible.”

  The face Art made was almost comical and James didn’t bother hiding his grin at the older man’s reaction. “We’re both pretty low key when it comes to social stuff,” James explained. “My happiest times are with my wife, a bottle of wine, takeout and whatever schlocky shark movie she can find on television.”

  “Your wife likes shark movies?”

  “If my wife could live in the movie Jaws, she would totally do it.”

  “I’ve never known a woman who liked stuff like that.”

  “My wife is like a teenage boy,” James said, getting to his feet when he saw a plain-clothed police officer heading in their direction. “She’s just got a better body and her laugh is enough to bring me to my knees.”

  “You really are a romantic.”

  “I’m pretty sure she made me that way,” James said. “Come on. I think this is our guy.”

  “WHAT do you think?” Art asked, studying the grainy video footage from Detective Branson’s office.

  “I think we’re never going to make an identification off of that.” James wasn’t surprised. Gas station video was never high quality. “Can we get a copy of this so I can have our computer guy go over it?”

  Branson nodded. “I’m not sure if you’ll get anything, but go for it,” he said. “I’m also going to tell you something that we’re not making public, so keep it under your hat, but a man in black clothing and a black knit mask did manage to rob that Christmas nursery about a mile down the road exactly twenty minutes after this video was taken. He didn’t get away with much – in fact, it was less than five hundred bucks.”

  “What does that mean?” Art asked.

  “It means that our perpetrator is probably the one who robbed the nursery,” James replied.

  “Is there any way to be sure?”

  “Not until we find this guy and ask him some questions,” James said. “Unless … did the nursery have video?”

  “No,” Branson replied. “The clerk who was at the end of the gun did say he was walking with a limp, though. My understanding is that our guy was hit with a partial taser charge and was limping when he fled.”

  Branson obviously didn’t realize James’ tie to the other incident.

  “Apparently it was some really hot chick who did it, too,” Brandon added. “She had a blonde friend and everyone was going nuts about how hot they were with the weapon.”

  James scowled. “They were protecting themselves.”

  “And apparently they were hot doing it.”

  “Great. Can we get the video? I … need to get this to our computer guy.”

  Art smiled as he sympathetically patted James’ arm. “I cannot wait to meet your wife and sister.”

  “Yeah. They make a great first impression.”

  Thirteen

  “How do I look?”

  Mandy stopped in the Ritz Carleton lobby long enough to study her reflection. Her blond hair was gathered into a simple bun, a few loose tendrils escaping to frame her face, and the black dress she wore boasted a high slit – that had James’ mind wandering – and a neckline that covered everything and yet still plunged low enough to give James ideas for the ride home.

  “I think we should go in that bathroom over there and forget the party.”

  Mandy smirked. “I’m being serious,” she said. “I’m guessing this is going to be a ritzy party given what you’ve told me about this woman. I don’t want to look … low class … or anything.”

  James scowled. “You could never look low class, baby. Stop fussing. You look beautiful.”

  Mandy blew out a sigh and slipped her coat off. James collected it and slung it over his arm, marveling at the sight of her sculpted shoulders. Working out in the pool had turned her already slim body into a work of art.

  “I’m serious,” James said. “Let’s go in the bathroom and then go back home.”

  “These are your business associates,” Mandy reminded him.

  “Screw the business. I want you.”

  Mandy gave him a soft kiss, making sure to wipe her lipstick off his mouth before taking a step back. “One hour. Then we can go home. And, as incentive, I’m not wearing any underwear. You can think about how that will play to your benefit during the drive home.”

  James grinned. “I love you so much it hurts sometimes.”

  Mandy slipped her hand into his and let him lead her toward the ballroom. “You know you have to dance with me, right?”

  “You know you have to let me feel you up under the mistletoe, right?”

  “Smooth,” Grady said, moving out from under a nearby archway with Sophie on his arm. The tall reporter was dressed in a gorgeous blue sheath that hugged her limited curves in all the right places.

  “Do you hang around eave
sdropping all of the time, or is this a special occasion?” James deadpanned.

  “Oh, Sophie, you look beautiful,” Mandy gushed.

  “You do, too,” Sophie said. “That slit is really high.”

  “That’s just the way I like it,” James said.

  “By the way, Finn texted me and he and Emma aren’t coming,” Grady said.

  James furrowed his brow. “Why not?”

  “If anyone asks, the official reason is that Emma doesn’t feel well,” Grady replied. “Finn says she put on a dress and had an absolute fit because she thought she looked fat. That pregnancy is turning out to be a great excuse to get out of things, if you ask me.”

  Sophie pinched his arm. “Emma is hormonal,” she said. “She feels doubly fat because she worked as a model. She can’t help herself. She made her living on her looks and now she’s insecure about them. Give her a break.”

  “I didn’t say it was a bad thing,” Grady said. “In fact, if you let me shove a pillow up your dress we can use it for an excuse to leave right now.”

  Sophie made a face, causing James and Mandy to chuckle. “You promised to dance with me.”

  “Oh, I’m going to dance with you, sugar.” Grady wrapped his arm around Sophie’s waist and whispered a filthy suggestion into her ear, causing the comely reporter to blush. “Then I’m going to do an even better dance when we get home.”

  “I’m not sure I’m going to make it home,” James admitted. “I do not want to be here.”

  “Join the club,” Ally said, moving in behind her brothers. Her off-white dress scooped low in the front and Mandy marveled at the excessive cleavage her friend managed to pull off and still look classy. “Jake kept faking he was going to throw up out in the truck.”

  “Who was faking?” Jake asked, tugging on his tie. His suit was black and simple, but he looked about as uncomfortable as any man could. “I honestly might get sick.”

  “You clean up nice, Jake,” Mandy said, beaming. “And, Ally … wow … how did you get your boobs to stick up like that?” Mandy moved to her friend’s dress and glanced down the neckline. “You’re not wearing a bra.”

  Jake perked up. “I’m starting to feel better.”