Owen. Hands on his hips. Incredulous. “It’s been thirty minutes.”
“Does it help if I tell you I’m very, very sorry?”
Owen adjusted his casual police cap and stretched out a hand. Jason hauled himself up with it.
“Dare I ask . . .?”
Jason blurted it all out. How he’d intended to break into Cora’s house, but somehow ended up in the wrong one. Don’t all these houses kinda look the same? Oh, he wasn’t planning on stealing anything. Just wanted to mess about with her stuff. Er, not mess about in a creepy way: drop a few clues around, like parenthood quotes, and a frilly doll. That all sounded nutty. This was all about horoscopes . . . “Anyway, I meant to help, not to harm. I could’ve sworn this was 49 Gum Drive.”
“The Dallas’s letterbox lost a screw. The six swung down into a nine.”
“See? Not entirely my fault? I might get away with it? How did you turn the alarm off?”
“A quick call to the owners. And you left the door unlocked.”
“Bollocks, I also dropped the magazine in my rush outside. Would you mind hiding the evidence?” Jason winced. “Unless, ah, that could get you fired. Oh, shit, you should probably arrest me and do everything by the book.” It was all over. A silly alarm, ruining everything. As much as he wanted this to go away, he wouldn’t risk Owen’s job over it. Reluctantly, Jason held out his wrists.
Owen took one of them in a steady grasp and dragged him to the back fence.
Jason stared at him. What exactly did he intend? He wasn’t expecting resistance, was he? No need to push him against the fence and forcibly restrain him from behind.
“If you want me from behind you can ask, Owen. I’m not running anywhere.” Jason willingly turned himself around and locked his arms behind his back. The grass was softer here and his feet sank into the soil, pushing him off balance. He toppled forward into the fence, catching his cheek and shoulder on the wood.
“I’m not sure what you expect to happen here, but either option is wide of the mark.” Owen helped him off the fence and turned him around to dark eyes full of uninhibited joy.
“Um, what would be hitting the mark?”
Owen brushed a thumb over Jason’s scratched cheek. “Give me the car keys.”
Jason fished them out of his pocket. “Did you know it was me immediately?”
“As soon as I spotted my car. I had to tell Jane to let me come in on my own. She spotted it too.”
“She’s clever.”
“She probably isn’t far away from figuring it all out, Jason.”
Jason didn’t . . . hate the thought.
But Carl.
Cora.
Showing her she was loved was supposed to help unlock the secrets. That was . . . why he was here.
“Now, give me a foot.”
Jason gulped down his thought, returning his attention to Owen and his shaded smile. “Hm?”
“I’ll boost you over the fence. Meet you in ten at the store.”
The thing with boosting was . . . it was all kinds of intimate. Especially the way Jason did it, flapping about, grabbing Owen’s shoulder and smashing his groin in the face of the law as he tried to recapture the right alignment. Ultimately, all Jason achieved was knocking Owen’s cap off his head and wedging himself onto a wooden fence with a few delinquent nails popping up in places.
“Good lord, Jason. What are you doing?”
“Making love to a fence, apparently.”
“Enough of that, you’ll make me jealous.”
They laughed, a flushed face meeting . . . another flushed face, and Jason managed to rip himself free and tumble onto the bank on the other side. The ripping bit turned out to be quite literal.
The back seam of his jeans had split. Quite a bit. Thank God for flannel. He tied the sleeves around his waist and managed a few polite nods on his route back to the convenience store. One look in the shop window—he shrieked and pulled lavender and grass from his wild hair. The chafed cheek looked fabulous too.
He was being hailed from within the store. “Carl, Carl.”
It took him a moment to locate Patricia in the bread aisle.
He ducked in and met her and her basket of freshly baked goods. “I thought you were on today,” she said. “Always messing it up.”
“You’re in good hands, either way . . . Mum.”
Her keen eye dropped to the flannel around his waist. “New style.”
“Yep?”
Why did his heart always hammer like this? Why was it impossible to think of something to say? “Nice choice of bread.”
This just wasn’t his day.
“Nice choice of boyfriend,” Patricia motioned to the windows, through which Owen could be seen striding toward the store.
“Yes!” Saved by the boyfriend. “I gotta . . .”
He raced out, got caught in the door, lost his flannel to chomping metal, and crashed into Owen. In his peripheral vision, he was very aware of Patricia watching them. He whispered, “Quick! Act like you’re in love with me!”