Armed and Devastating

“Will do, ma’am.”

Once the call ended, Brooke squatted to get her shoes. But her sleeve caught the corner of the box and pulled it down to the floor beside her, spilling its contents. “Attack of the Killer Klutz strikes again,” she muttered, shifting onto her hands and knees to right the box and retrieve papers, books and some wayward pencils. Her necklace and charm swung out like a pendulum from the front of her blouse, and she paused to catch it and tuck it back in. In the midst of crawling and tucking, something caught her eye. She squeezed the charm in her fist as she studied the image beneath her. “Is that my house?”

Hovering over the open pages, Brooke peered down at the now-sideways drawing. “What were you up to, John?”

There were dots and arrows and scribbled phrases marking the picture. Apparently, he’d thought he had a better plan as to how she should redesign the stone church’s interior. From this angle, what she’d excused as a meaningless doodle now looked like a crude architectural drawing.

No. Like a map.

But to what?

Brooke’s heart beat a little faster and new brain cells awoke.

“That is my house.” She traced the lines with her fingertip, identifying the original altar area of the church that had since been lined with windows and converted into a sun porch. “Three,” she read aloud. Had he wanted to add more rooms? “It’s a supporting exterior wall, John. You can’t budge rock like that. Three plug-ins? Three windows? Three…what?” More scribbles took shape. “B6N-NR.” An arrow pointed to an archway.

“B. 6. N. Basement? Brick? Board? North…Room?” Brooke squinted and rotated the drawing, as though better vision or a different angle would help the jumbled characters make sense. “There is no north room.”

No basement, either. Just a crawl space.

“Lose something?”

A deep, familiar voice, laced with amusement, greeted her from the doorway.

Atticus.

Brooke snapped the journal shut and jerked her head up. He leaned against the door frame, one hand behind his back, looking as perfectly at home in that tailored suit as he did wearing the gun and badge at his belt.

Meanwhile, she was shoeless, scattered and practically sprawled on the floor.

Every self-conscious cell in her body flooded her brain, blocking rational thought as words automatically popped out. “Mitch isn’t here. He’s gone to lunch.”

He chuckled, low in his throat. “Hi to you, too. I stopped by to see how you were settling in.”

The masculine pitch of his laughter danced across her eardrums and did funny things to her pulse rate, tying up her thoughts into even more of a knot.

“Sorry. Hi. Fine.” Brilliant conversation, Sherlock. Ah, yes, this was that moment of babbling stupidity that had plagued her nerves this morning. Aunt Lou had been right to worry. Breathing deeply, Brooke clutched the journal to her chest and ducked her head, buying herself a few moments to reassert control over her instinctive reactions by collecting a handful of pencils and dropping them into the box.

Black oxford shoes and charcoal slacks crossed the room until the gun and badge filled her peripheral vision. “Need some help?”

“I can get it.” But it had been a rhetorical question. She heard a clunk on her desktop just before miles of wide shoulders and charcoal jacket descended to her level.

Despite her insistence, Atticus knelt beside her to help pick up her mess. He wasn’t a man who wore cologne, but there was a clean maleness clinging to his clothes that made her want to turn her cheek into his starchy white shirt and silk tie. Maybe she’d unbutton that shirt to see if the warm skin underneath smelled even better.

Alarmed at the boldness of her thoughts, Brooke scooted after a folder of motivational quotes from her assertiveness class and straightened the scattered pages. She stole a glance at Atticus’s sharp jaw and gunmetal eyes, double-checking to see that she hadn’t revealed anything more embarrassing than her lack of coordination. Being attracted to the man was one thing—being attracted to the man and having him know she had these crazy impulses when she was around him was something else entirely.

No-nonsense hands that were strong and agile quickly scooped up the last of the items and lifted the box onto her desk. She stared at one of those hands as it reached out to help her up. Brooke lightly touched her fingers to his, but he wrapped his palm around hers for a firmer grip and pulled her to her feet. “Up you go.”

As practical and impersonal as the helping hand had been, Brooke was still feeling flushed with heat as she stood and spotted the clear vase filled with a half-dozen red roses sitting on the far corner of her desk.

“You brought me flowers” came out before “Thank you.” She reached out to stroke the velvety soft petals. When had any man given her such a gorgeous, dramatic arrangement?

Her incredulity was short-lived. Atticus tucked his hands casually into the pockets of his slacks and shrugged. “Sorry, they’re not from me.”

She curled her fingers into her palm and tried not to feel disappointed. “Oh.”

Brooke searched for a tag while he explained. “I’m just the deliveryman. I’ve been meaning to drop by all morning but I had to make an appearance in court, and then I had some calls to follow up on with a case and, well, the sarge caught me walking past her desk and handed them off. Gave me a good excuse to stop what I was doing and come see you.”

He’d waited until someone asked him to stop by? The nick at her ego was eased by the knowledge that he didn’t seem at all aware of the awkward affection she felt for him.

Before embarrassing herself any further, Brooke turned her attention back to the anonymous bouquet. Sergeant Maggie Wheeler had been the first officer to greet Brooke that morning and introduce herself. Though tall and imposing, she’d been friendly enough. Was this another welcome-to-the-precinct gift? “Did Sergeant Wheeler say who they were from?”

“No. She just apologized for being too busy to get them to you sooner.” He must have recognized the increasing consternation of her search for a nonexistent card. “Sarge told me the delivery guy said you’d know who they were from.”

Brooke frowned. “Really?”

“Got a secret admirer I don’t know about?”

Did she? Brooke’s single chuckle lacked humor. Sparing him a quick glance that didn’t quite meet his gaze, she turned the vase from side to side and worked her bottom lip between her tongue and teeth. Thoughts of the tan pickup that had followed her all the way downtown, never leaving her rearview mirror until she’d turned into the Fourth Precinct parking lot and he drove on past, came to mind. Were the roses another unexplained coincidence? She liked a good mystery, but she preferred to read them rather than be caught up in the middle of one herself.