Geri Krotow - Reunion Under Fire

He knew thirty wasn’t old, but he also knew his limits. The paperwork for Becky’s application was daunting, and his protective urges were hard to let go of. But if he ever wanted to freely work as a detective again, he needed to know Becky was taken care of round-the-clock. Worrying about her being on her own at home, no matter that he had a neighborhood friend to check in on her, was stressful. For both of them.

“Officer?” Cali, one of the SVPD’s receptionists, walked into the break room and stopped in front of him. How long had he been daydreaming about how to fix Becky’s problems?

“Hey, Cali. How’s the weekend looking for you? Because I’m going to be right here at my desk.”

She flashed a quick grin, nodded. “Been there. Hey, there’s a woman here who’s asked to talk to one of our detectives. Says she’s with NYPD and showed me a badge.”

“What about?” Cookie temptation evaporated.

“A possibility of domestic violence.”

He quickly added some French vanilla creamer to his coffee, one indulgence his six-foot-four-inch frame could still handle. He was painfully aware that at thirty, his fast metabolism days were quickly fleeing.

“Send her back to my desk.”

“Will do.”

He carried the navy ceramic mug with SVPD’s gold logo stamped on it. Before he sat down a tall, willowy redhead walked up to him. His body immediately recognized who his mind struggled to believe was standing before him. The woman he’d never expected to see again. The one who’d got away. The woman his eighteen-year-old self had thought was his one true love.

Annie Fiero.

Chapter 2

Josh thanked his stars he had the seat to catch him because the sight of Annie after all these years sent him reeling. As soon as his ass hit the leather padding he shot back up, ingrained respect having nothing to do with it.

Josh wanted to be on his feet for this reunion. “Annie.”

He took her in, from the crown of her head still framed by her flaming-red hair, her catlike eyes luminous in her beautiful face and her lips—hell, her lips. He licked his own as he allowed his gaze to meander farther south, seeing how her formfitting white T-shirt under her open ivory cardigan clung to her breasts. He wished the sweater was off and he could tell if her nipples were hard, if she felt what he did. Her curves were nonstop, evidenced by how she filled out her dark, tight jeans. Pink polished toes in sandals underscored her femininity. And his reaction to it.

Damnation. He needed to get Becky situated so that he could start dating properly again. Ever since he and Christina broke up, he’d been afraid to bring another woman home. It was too hard on Becky when they left.

“Josh?” The incredulity in Annie’s voice hit him in the solar plexus. Her tone, the soft quality of her speech, was the same. As were her startlingly blue eyes. “Josh.” It wasn’t a question as she said his name the second time. The pulse at the base of her throat danced under her smooth skin.

Apparently he’d caught her by surprise, too.

“Annie.” He took his time to look her over again. Since they’d once been best friends, she wouldn’t misconstrue it for unprofessional police behavior. And damn it if he didn’t check her left hand. Bare as his. Not that it meant anything, necessarily. It didn’t matter either way. He wasn’t available, and if Becky were already situated, Annie would be the last person he’d risk his ego with. “I didn’t recognize you at first.”

She ran her fingers through her hair, flipped it lightly over her shoulder. A smile as she looked up at him. “Time marches on, right? You’ve grown at least a foot!”

He couldn’t help it, his chest puffed up at that. Not that he was immune to a woman’s admiration, but this was Annie. Her opinion had meant so much to him in high school. And still did, to his surprise. And maybe a little bit of alarm.

“Six inches is all. Had a spurt after we graduated.” He froze when he saw her eyes narrow. Oh hell... “Annie, we didn’t leave it on very good terms, did we?”

“If you call telling each other we were done, never wanted to ever see one another again...” She leaned against the edge of his desk, her long, lean lines seeming to underscore how very aware of her each inch of him was. Too aware. He maintained eye contact, hoping like hell she would, too. That she didn’t notice what she was doing to him, because if she looked at his crotch she’d know. He hadn’t had his uniform on for a day yet, and already he wanted to shove it off, show Annie just how much he’d changed. How the years had taught him how to be a man who could give her more than he’d been capable of on their bungled prom night. Her eyes studied him, too, and he forced himself to mentally detach from his reactions.

What the hell was going on with him? So what if Annie was hot? It wasn’t like he didn’t see attractive women all the time.

But none he had such a deep history with. “Yeah, we left it on crappy terms. I am sorry for anything I did that might have hurt you. We were kids, though, right?”

She sighed. “We were, but I’d like to think we shared more than the typical teen friendship.”

“I’m sure I was old enough to be more polite. I remember myself as a bit of a blockhead.” He indicated the chair next to his in the cubicle, and as she sat down so did he. “How are you doing, Annie? What are you doing? The last I heard you were in New York City.”

Her face, briefly open and almost vulnerable, snapped shut as tight as the security around Three Mile Island, the nuclear power facility only a thirty-minute drive away near Harrisburg. “I know you know I work for NYPD. Nothing escapes the Silver Valley grandmothers’ network.” She paused, an absentminded smile giving her face a soft glow. “I’m back here, though, for the time being. A few months. Running the local yarn shop for my grandmother.” She mentioned the name of the shop, one he recognized as being in the same building as a tourist adventure agency. “She recently had a minor stroke.”

“I’m sorry to hear that. She okay?” Couldn’t he sound more intelligent, come up with more than trite conversation?

Annie nodded. “Yes, she’ll have a complete recovery. A longer rehabilitation was in order, though, so my parents packed her up and shipped her to Florida, to their home in Naples. Grandma Ezzie can get whatever she needs there, from privacy to a bottle of her favorite sparkling wine.”

“Sounds ideal. But your mother didn’t want to run the yarn shop?”

“No, she thought it best she stay down there and help along Grandma’s rehab. I couldn’t argue with her. Besides, Grandma Ezzie is her mother-in-law, so the yarn shop hasn’t ever been something my mother felt particularly attached to.”

“I remember you always loved to knit when we were kids.” He couldn’t stop the chuckle that burst out of his chest. “Remember that sweater you made me in school colors?”

She blushed, and it was as if his dick felt the heat on her skin, too. He vowed to never go this long without a date again if it would keep him from making a fool of himself in front of Annie.

“I meant for you to be the envy of all the other kids, but instead made you a laughingstock. I am so sorry, Josh. You really took one for the team there. Wasn’t the body of it too short, the arms waaay too long?”

“All I remember is how warm it was at the freezing football game.” An immediate visceral image of them taking each other’s clothes off, including the sweater, in the back seat of his parents’ station wagon assailed him. And sealed his fate for blue balls.

Annie might have felt the same, but he couldn’t tell as she immediately shut down, went back into the shell he’d noticed the rare times they’d seen one another on her trips back to Silver Valley. They’d never even spoken, at most waved across a crowded mall or nodded during a Christmas church service.