Yesterday's Scandal (The Wild McBrides 3)

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

HIS CHEEK on her breast, his arm across her, Mac lay on his stomach next to her as they very slowly recovered their breath. Their sanity.

“Tell me this isn’t a fantastic dream,” he muttered after a while, without lifting his head.

She laughed. “I don’t think you had that much to drink before I arrived.”

“Half a glass.”

“So which was more effective at making you feel better? The booze? Or me?”

He lifted his head to give her a faintly reproachful look. “Fishing?”

Unabashed, she touched his face. “Yes.”

“You are infinitely better than bourbon.”

She grinned. “I’ll take any compliment I can get.”

Propping himself on one elbow, Mac smoothed her tangled hair away from her face. “You’re in a feisty mood tonight.”

“I guess being bold and bad does that to me.”

“‘Bold and bad’? Is that what you’re feeling?”

“Of course. I don’t do things like this. Ever. I’m always sensible and responsible. I don’t take chances, I don’t have flings and I don’t act on impulse. Not usually. Not until you came along.”

He considered her words, and he didn’t look entirely pleased by them. “A fling,” he repeated in a murmur.

“For want of a better term.”

“I don’t care for that one.”

“Do you have a better word to offer?” she challenged, still in that oddly daring mood.

“No,” he said after a brief pause. “But it isn’t a fling.”

It wasn’t much—but it was something. She decided to be satisfied with that for now.

Her hand rested on his side, just inches from the scar on his back. “Why did you quit the police force? Was it because you were shot?”

“Not entirely. I was just tired of giving everything I had to a job and not seeing any real results for my efforts. I’d put one drug dealer behind bars and three more would take his place. For every at-risk teenager we set straight, we lost a dozen more. I started dreading going in to work in the mornings. I felt more and more like I was trying to put out a forest fire with a squirt gun.”

It pleased her that he’d answered her so candidly, giving her another glimpse into his character. She didn’t think less of Mac for walking away from a job that had grown frustrating for him; she knew it was because he had cared so deeply that he couldn’t stay. “So you went into the restoration business, where you could see definite results. You take something old and neglected and you make it useful and beautiful again.”

“Something like that,” he said with a slight shrug. Despite his offhand tone, she could tell her assessment had been on track.

Because he seemed in a mood to talk, she risked another personal question. “How did your wife feel about your change of profession? Was she relieved?”

“Actually, she rather liked being married to a cop. A contractor wasn’t nearly as exciting to her.”

That couldn’t have been the only reason the marriage ended, she mused. “How long were you married after you quit police work?”

“About a year.”

It must have been a difficult year, she decided, studying his expression. But maybe she didn’t want to talk about his marriage right now, after all. “Tell me about your mother,” she said, instead.

His eyebrows lifted. “You really are feeling chatty, aren’t you?”