Pretzel Logic Read online

  He wasn’t sure his heart hadn’t just stopped. That conversation had taken place nearly six months ago, when she’d brought up possibilities of what she could do with the condo and had asked his opinion.

  “Do you have any idea how much I love you right now, sweetheart?”

  That sadness filled her smile again. “I guess you’d have to love me to put up with a broken-down cop like me.”

  He bit back the gentle scolding he wanted to issue for putting herself down. He’d just scored a life-altering win, and he didn’t want to do anything to make her reverse course.

  “Hey, you love bossy, ugly ole me. I think we’re even.”

  “You’re not ugly.”

  “And you’re not broken-down.”

  She rested her head against his chest. “I love you so much. We’re a pair, aren’t we?”

  “Yeah.” He kissed the top of her head. “A perfect pair.”

  Chapter Five

  After dinner, while Ethan was reassembling Brita’s shotgun, she told him about ordering the crochet supplies.

  “Now I need to set up a time and day with Gabe. I’m waiting to hear back from her.”

  “Have you checked your e-mail lately?”

  “Good point.” She retrieved her cell phone and, sure enough, Gabe had responded.

  “Thursday afternoon,” she told him as she tapped out a reply to Gabe.

  “I think that’s good,” he said. “Not only taking on a new hobby. It’ll do you good to spend time with Gabe.”

  “I like her.”

  He swiveled the barstool’s seat around to meet her gaze. “I know you’re worried about my job, but I need to ask you to do something for me, and I’m serious.”

  She felt her face heat. “What?”

  “I want to spend more time with them. Not just Gabe and Bill, and not just the private parties. I am not worried about my job. You and I are exclusive, and I’m not asking you to start going to the club yet. But I want to start going to more events, hanging out with them. My goal is that I’d like to get to a point where you feel comfortable going to the club. But I need you to focus on you and your feelings and what we need to do to make you feel comfortable. What I don’t want is you worrying about outing me.”

  She tried to process that. “How can I not worry about outing you?”

  “Do you trust me?”

  How many times had they had some variation of this same conversation when he was trying to get her to—rightfully—chill out over something?

  Too many times.

  “Yes, I trust you.”

  “Then you let me worry about my job. I want you to create a FetLife account. You can do the whole ninety-nine years old living in Antarctica thing, if you want. But create one, friend me and add me as your whatever title you want me to be, and then start friending people. Start with Bill and Gabe.”

  She swallowed hard. “Why?”

  “So we can start staying in touch with our kinky friends more easily.”

  “I’m friends with them on Facebook.”

  “Not all of them. And that way we can more easily keep track of the munch events.”

  The pretzel logic was trying to grab a foothold again. “Why?”

  Ethan never lost his chill. Not ever. One of the many things she adored about him. “Because I said so, baby. That’s why.”

  That turned into a long, silent staring match, his blue gaze never wavering.

  She gave in first with a long, deep sigh. “Yes, Sir.”

  “Good girl.” He stood and walked over, leaning in to kiss her. “I trust Bill. He’s known some of these people for several years now, as has Gabe. Gabe has a friend in the FDLE who’s been a member of Venture for years, before she ever met Bill. They’ve never had trouble. I don’t make this decision lightly, but it’s the right call for us.”

  “Yes, Sir.”

  He nuzzled her nose with his. “And thank you for that, too.”

  “For what?”

  “I’ll never force you to do or say anything. You know that. But I love hearing you call me Sir.”

  “Well, you ask me to call you the illustrious potentate or something, we’re going to have to talk about that.”

  He grinned. “I’ll settle for Sir, thanks.”

  * * * *

  Ethan retook his seat at the workbench to finish reassembling the shotgun. Brita would never know exactly how much he enjoyed hearing her call him that.

  Baby steps. That’s what he was used to with her, but lately, it felt like she’d finally started easing up more.

  He could only hope.

  Once he finished with the shotgun and secured it in the larger gun safe in that closet, where she stored her long guns, he headed into the master bathroom to take a shower.

  When he emerged, she lay on the bed, naked and watching TV.

  Not daring to hope, since skeet days usually meant she wanted to fall asleep cuddling, he climbed into bed, pleasantly surprised when she snuggled against him.

  She fit perfectly against him, his chin nestled against the top of her head.

  That’s when he felt her hand snake between them, her fingers curling around his cock, which immediately hardened.

  “Mmm.” He kissed the top of her head. “If you’re not feeling up to it, I understand, baby.”

  “I am feeling up to it.” She slowly pumped his cock, drawing a low moan from him. “A little light meepin’, maybe?”

  Catching her chin, he tipped her face up to his, kissing her. “Anything my baby wants.” He gently rolled her onto her back. After throwing the top sheet out of his way, he slid between her legs.

  Tonight wasn’t for teasing and tormenting her until she begged. Tonight was to make her feel good, as quickly as possible, before the mood was lost and she hated her body for it.

  Wouldn’t be the first time that had happened, either.

  First one, then using two fingers inside her pussy, he quickly built her up and got her over with his mouth. He always loved the taste of her, making her moan, knowing he could in some way bring her pleasure and counteract her body’s rebellion against her.

  When she’d had enough, she grabbed him by the hair and tugged to get him back up on top of her. Another of those perfectly matched moments as he slid his cock inside her and she wrapped her arms and legs around him.

  Tonight he wouldn’t need much, either, so he slowly thrust, gentle, reading her and seeing if it’d be possible to get one more out of her. As her tongue played with his she rocked her hips against him, grinding a little, and he let her set the pace.

  It didn’t take long before he felt her nails digging into the backs of his shoulders, and he quickened his pace, speeding up, finishing with her as his mouth muffled her cries.

  He didn’t let go. With his arms wrapped around her, he rolled them onto his back, her body draped over his. “Better, baby?”

  “Mmm hmm.” She pressed her ear against his chest. “Always better with you.”

  * * * *

  Everything was better with Ethan in her life.

  “Let’s talk this weekend,” she quietly said.

  His fingers, which had been lightly trailing up and down her spine, stilled. Inside her pussy, his wilted cock gave a little twitch.

  “This weekend?”

  “About moving in together. I want the finances and everything squared away and divvied up first.”

  His hand didn’t move. “Okay.”

  His tone made her look up. She wasn’t prepared for his silly grin. “What?”

  “I’m not going to argue with you, sweetheart. I’m not going to try to make you let me pay for stuff. This is at your speed, in your way.”

  “You want to do one of those silly touchdown dances right now, don’t you?”

  “So much, you have no idea. I did earlier, too.”

  She loved it when he smiled like that. Not that he looked prematurely old or anything, but being a detective, what he dealt with daily, it tended to darken a person’s exp
ression in general.

  Seeing him wear a silly smile warmed her heart.

  Maybe she could take care of him in some ways, the way he always took care of her.

  “It’s okay if I’m not much into yard work?”

  “Sooo okay, baby, seriously. You know that.”

  “Remember that one time when we caught that case where the idiot guy thought he’d get away with murdering his neighbor by making it look like killer clowns did it? So he went next door thinking the guy wasn’t home and he was going to hide and wait, and the neighbor shot him coming through the back door?”

  Ethan snorted. “Yeah. His bad luck the guy was home, shitting-bricks terrified of clowns, and had a gun. Good luck for the neighbor, though. And that guy was seriously whacked. Clown guy, I mean. Why?”

  “Remember we’d had tickets to a concert and missed it, so we went back to your place, laid out on a blanket in the backyard, and made love while we listened to their music?”

  His fingers resumed stroking her back. “Yeah. I’ll never forget that night, baby. I knew for sure I was in love with you that night.”

  “It was the first night we said ‘I love you’ to each other.”

  “Yeah.”

  She kissed his chest. “And here we are. Together longer than a lot of married couples.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Thank you for waiting me out,” she whispered. “For the first couple of months, I was waiting for the other shoe to drop. Then I realized this was you, all of you, who you were. You were always…you.”

  “Part of me would love to track him down and punch him for you,” he said. “Part of me knows if you hadn’t gone through that with him, you might not have joined the Army, you might not have become a cop, and we might never have met. For what it’s worth, I can’t imagine not having you in my life.”

  “Your girlfriend.”

  “Yes.” He kissed the top of her head. “My hot, sexy, skeet-shootin’ girlfriend.”

  She fought the urge to counter that, to deny it.

  That she didn’t feel sexy a lot of the time, but not because of anything he did or didn’t do.

  That was the pretzel logic talking, and she knew it.

  She told him about that, her conversation with Sachi.

  “That’s a good name for it,” he said after thinking it over. “I like that. Pretzel logic. One of these days, I need to take a weekday off and drive up there with you and meet her.”

  “I like her. She’s easy to talk to. Been through her own shit. She brings things into perspective with no bullshit.”

  “That’s always a good thing.”

  “Yeah.”

  She finally untangled herself from him so she could go use the bathroom. When she returned, she snuggled tightly against him. “I know that you’ve said a lot of the same things to me over the years,” she quietly admitted. “I don’t mean for it to sound like I was ignoring you.”

  He rolled onto his side, propped up on his elbow. “I honestly don’t care how the breakthroughs come, as long as we’re stronger as a result, and it’s helping you.” He brought her hand to his lips and kissed it. “If it’s your skeet coach, or a Tarot card reader—”

  “She does that, too.”

  He froze. “Um, I was just kidding. I didn’t think you’re into that.”

  “I’m not.” She smiled. “But she told me she does it when I first signed on for lessons with her. She always tells people about that so they don’t find out later and get upset thinking she was hiding it or something.”

  “Ah. I mean, if you wanted to get into that, I’m fine with it.”

  She laughed, closing her eyes as she snuggled against him. “No worries. I’ll stick to reading rap sheets instead of Tarot cards to tell me about human nature, thanks.”

  Chapter Six

  On Thursday afternoon, Brita had just finished washing, waxing, and detailing her car, and had returned inside her condo, when her home phone rang.

  “Hey, sis,” Alisse’s sing-song voice greeted her. “How ya doin’?”

  Brita knew if she was staring in a mirror she’d spot the smirk on her face. “What do you need?”

  “Why do you assume I need something?”

  “Because I’m your big sister, that’s why. I know that tone of voice. What’d you need?”

  “Are you busy tomorrow?”

  Brita assumed this would have something to do with Jordan. Last-minute requests nearly always did.

  And Brita nearly always said yes to them, unless she had a doctor’s appointment, or a shooting lesson to give, or her skeet lesson.

  Alisse and John had added Brita and Ethan to Jordan’s school records as emergency contacts, as well as approved pick-up people. Brita had also chaperoned quite a few school field trips and events when neither of them could get the time off from work.

  The private school they had her enrolled in was pricey, but Brita had to admit Jordan thrived there. The school mixed traditional education with frequent guest presenters, outings, and alternative learning opportunities, to give the kids a real-world correlation for what they learned in the classroom.

  Considering the school’s students consistently had the highest test scores of any tracked school in the county—public or private—Brita couldn’t argue with Alisse and John’s decision to pay the expensive tuition every year. Which was another reason they both had high-pressure jobs that paid well, to afford to send her there in the first place.

  The school also placed a heavy emphasis on music, arts, and STEM classes, making sure all students had a well-rounded education in kindergarten through sixth grades, allowing students from seventh to twelfth grades to pick more specialized options as they grew older, based on their interests and aptitude.

  Over eighty percent of their graduates ended up with full collegiate scholarships, and ten percent of the remaining students usually had partial scholarships or grants. Fifty percent of their graduates usually had completed at least one year of college-level-credit courses before graduation. Another ten percent frequently graduated not only with a high school diploma, but also with an AA degree, putting them ahead of the game for college.

  “I didn’t have any set plans during the day, no.” She was supposed to meet Ethan for dinner, and they were likely going back to his house later for the rest of the night.

  Maybe the whole weekend, if she was lucky.

  He tended to come over more weeknights, while she usually spent weekends there. Her condo was closer to his office, but he had to catch up on chores like yardwork during the weekend.

  “Would you mind being a chaperone tomorrow for her class trip to Mote Marine? We’ve got a buyer coming in tomorrow, and nobody told me about it until today. I really should be here for it. And John has a meeting tomorrow morning he already tried to reschedule and can’t. I mean, I understand if that’s too much for you, and please don’t feel you have to say yes if you can’t handle it.”

  She loved Alisse for thinking about her like that. Mote on a weekday wouldn’t be too crowded. “Sure, I can do that. But how late do I need to keep her for you? I’m supposed to have dinner with Ethan tomorrow night.”

  “John can pick her up from you at the usual time in the afternoon. It’s a whole day thing, including a boxed lunch provided by Mote. They’re going to have their picnic lunch at the park next door. I’m really sorry about the late notice.”

  She sounded sorry, too. At least her sister and brother-in-law didn’t take advantage of her as free babysitting. Usually, they did give plenty of notice. It wasn’t like Brita minded taking care of Jordan, either. There were worse ways to spend a Friday than watching manatees and sea turtles and sharks and dolphins at Mote.

  “It’s all right. What do I need to do?”

  “Pick her up from our house at the usual time and go straight to Mote. Everyone’s meeting there at eight thirty. Some of the parents are carpooling and will drop their kids off and pick them up there, and the rest of the kids are riding in on t
he school’s bus. It’s going to last all day, so they don’t even need to go back to school after. They’re getting a regular tour, as well as a behind-the-scenes tour, plus they’re having special classes with the staff before and after lunch. It’s all three third-grade classes.”

  “I’m guessing sneakers and shorts is appropriate wear?”

  “Oh, absolutely. And thanks again. We really owe you one.”

  “No worries. I’m happy to help.”

  Once she was off the call, Brita headed for the shower. She knew she’d be aching tomorrow in the wake of today’s car care, but at least she could walk it off.

  Ethan could make her hurt in the good ways tomorrow night, if she was lucky.

  After he finished giving her his version of scolding her for not taking it to a car detailer and paying to have it done.

  She considered it physical therapy.

  More importantly, at least it was something she could do, making her feel marginally less helpless.

  As she stood under the hot spray, she closed her eyes and tried to clear her mind. Today her anxiety wasn’t too bad. Being at home all day and doing something physically intensive frequently helped keep her mind in a more relaxed state.

  Tomorrow would be emotionally taxing in some ways, but in the good ways. She loved going to Mote, she loved Jordan, and the kids in Jordan’s class were a joy to be around.

  Although she wouldn’t deny she might take a Xanax once they arrived at Mote to help her relax throughout the day and not be hyper-vigilant. Not nearly as taxing on her nerves as, say, a class trip to the state fair or Strawberry Festival.

  She’d just finished her shower and gotten dressed when someone rang her doorbell. Fighting the urge to reach for her gun, she walked over to the door and peered through the viewfinder, mentally smacking herself when she saw Gabe standing there, a brightly colored canvas tote bag hanging from her shoulder.

  I can’t believe I forgot.

  Brita was already smiling as she opened the door for her. “Hey. Come on in.”