Up Shute Creek

  Up Shute Creek

  Rose Gardner Investigation #4

  Denise Grover Swank

  Copyright © 2018 by Denise Grover Swank

  Cover by Bookfly Design

  Model photographer: With Magic Photography

  * * *

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Created with Vellum

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Acknowledgments

  Also by Denise Grover Swank

  Also by D.G. Swank

  About the Author

  Chapter 1

  I woke to a kiss pressed against my shoulder and James’s palm pressed against my naked belly.

  “What time is it?” I murmured, opening my eyes. James’s room faced west, so the light was slow to infiltrate, sometimes a blessing but a curse on the mornings when I needed to get up and get going.

  “A little after six.”

  I rolled onto my back and stared up at him, my hand automatically reaching for the stubble on his chin. “What happened to the alarm?”

  “I turned it off.” His face lowered, and his lips brushed against my jaw, blazing a path to my mouth.

  My free hand reached for the back of his neck, and I held him in place, reveling in the slow, lazy pace he was setting. I knew it wouldn’t last for long. James didn’t do slow or lazy. He was all drive and ambition.

  His face lifted, and he grinned down at me. “Good mornin’.”

  I grinned too, brushing my thumb along his jaw. I loved the contrast of rough stubble with the smooth, hard lines of the rest of his body. “I have to leave early. That’s why we set the alarm.”

  “Not until I’m done with you.” A dark look filled his eyes, raw hunger and possession. When I left his house for the day, we had no idea when we’d see each other again, and he was trying to satiate himself until our next rendezvous.

  James’s hand slid up to my breast, and his thumb began to do things that drew a gasp from me. He tugged down the covers and exposed my chest to the room’s cool air, and his face lowered, his tongue gliding a path to my nipple.

  My back arched as he continued his torture, moving to my other breast. I closed my eyes and soaked him in. We’d just spent the weekend together, but it had only increased my hunger for him.

  His mouth covered mine, his kisses hard and demanding. I slid my hands down his back, letting my nails trail down the rise of his butt, but he was done with slow. He rolled onto his back and pulled me up to straddle his legs. Staring up at my naked breasts, he grabbed my hips and pushed into me.

  I leaned back and moaned, reveling in the full sensation and the way his fingers dug into my flesh.

  Taking control, he set a pace that drove me wild.

  It didn’t take long for us both to get our fill. He knew there wasn’t time to make it last.

  It was one last claim on me after our intimate weekend—we’d spent nearly thirty-six hours straight together, half of which were in public in Shreveport, acting like a normal couple who wasn’t afraid of being seen together. We’d gone out to eat. We’d toured the botanical gardens attached to the art museum and then toured the museum itself. He’d gotten tickets to a symphony and had taken me to buy a dress to wear. He’d even worn a suit, something I’d thought I’d never see, and we’d dined at an upscale restaurant before attending the Beethoven performance. Throughout the evening, I watched how comfortable he was with choosing the right silverware and stemware, how easily he wore that suit—a sharp contrast to the jeans and T-shirts he usually wore—and how he attended a symphony as though he made a habit of it, and I couldn’t help wondering where he’d learned these things. No, I knew who had taught him, but J.R. Simmons was an unpleasant memory I didn’t want encroaching on my time with James.

  Still, it made me wonder what else I didn’t know about the man lying next to me. He was such a fascinating contrast of fierceness and gentleness, yet I knew I was the only one he allowed to see the latter. Softness could be the kiss of death in James’s world, a sign of weakness.

  Now, I could see he was struggling to shed any vestiges of the gentleness he’d shown me. The time had come for him to don his Fenton County crime lord crown.

  He cradled me close to his side, his hand on my butt, and placed a kiss on my forehead.

  “You’ll need to be careful,” he said, his voice still gentle.

  “I know,” I said, fully aware of what he was referring to.

  A couple of days ago, danger had seemed a good distance away, something for my future self to worry about. Sure, I was in a secret relationship with the crime boss of Fenton County, and there was no denying Mason Deveraux, my ex-boyfriend, had returned from Little Rock with a bee in his bonnet and a mission to root out corruption. But it had seemed unlikely anything would come of it just yet. And while my sister had been told she only had a few months left to live, I sometimes let myself pretend the doctors were wrong.

  But I’d fooled myself into complacency, so much so I’d chosen the worst possible time to go away with James. My farm had been the scene of multiple murders over the weekend, and for once the violence had nothing to do with me. It had been driven by Kate, the mentally ill half sister of my best friend, Neely Kate. I didn’t know all the details, but everyone involved had insisted it would be best if I stayed away from home a little while longer. I might not have listened—I really wanted to see Neely Kate and reassure myself she was okay—but Neely Kate herself hadn’t hung around after the murders. That very night, Saturday, she’d gone to Little Rock to attend a fundraiser dinner. She’d insisted it would be foolish, and possibly dangerous, for me to return to an empty house, and besides, there would be crime scene techs and sheriff’s deputies scouring the barn and fields around it for evidence. Both of us would do best to stay away. Even still, I might have insisted on going back, but I had some peace of mind in knowing she had the best protection there could possibly be—her half brother and her boyfriend were both with her.

  “You can stay here for another day,” James said. “Give everything a little more time to cool down.”

  Surprised, I tilted my head to look up into his eyes. “You’re taking another day off?”

  “No. I’ve got too much to do since I took off earlier than planned on Friday.” He paused, then added, “And I’ll be gone Thursday afternoon and evenin’.”

  Everything in me wanted to ask him what he planned to do, but I stopped myself. Discussing his day-to-day life wasn’t part of our arrangement, and I practiced the same discretion for a different reason. He kept his dealings from me to protect me from the knowledge of criminal activities, and I kept mum about my life to protect him from trappings of the heart. We’d agreed to a f
ling, which meant no deep entanglements, even if it was apparent to both of us that this was so much more.

  Instead, I pushed up on an elbow and said, “You want me to stay here by myself?”

  He didn’t respond right away, probably because he was trying to be careful with his answer.

  “I’ll be fine,” I said. “It’s Neely Kate I’m concerned about.” I sat up and slid my legs over the side of the bed to get up, but he sat up too and wrapped an arm around my waist, pulling my back against his chest.

  I expected him to say something, but he simply held me close, burying his face into the curve of my neck.

  We sat like that for several long seconds, and I wondered what was going through his head. James “Skeeter” Malcolm was a man of few words, and none of them were about his feelings and emotions, leaving me to guess what he was thinking.

  “I have to get ready, James,” I said softly, then pushed his hand away and padded into the bathroom to take a shower. I’d expected him to follow, but when he didn’t join me, I figured he had to deal with some work issues. Lord knew there were plenty of them now that there were whispers of a Dallas crime syndicate, the Hardshaw Group, taking steps to slip into the county. Worse, they had an interest in Neely Kate, and had tried kidnapping her. Twice.

  Just as I was rinsing the conditioner from my hair with closed eyes, I felt him walk into the marble-encased shower and pull my chest to his. His hands sank into my hair, helping the water rinse my hair.

  I opened my eyes and smiled up at him. “I thought you’d left me.”

  Something flickered in his eyes—fear? Pain? I couldn’t read it, but the emotion had been unpleasant and fleeting. “I put on a pot of coffee. I knew you’d want a cup before you left.”

  It was things like this that caught me off guard—little things that mattered so little in the scheme of things, yet mattered so much to my heart.

  And therein lay the problem. I was getting way too attached.

  Before I could stop myself, I grabbed a bar of soap and began to wash his glorious, naked body. “Seeing you—all muscles and no fat—makes me realize I need to start an exercise routine. Especially after all that good food this weekend.” While I wasn’t overweight, I wasn’t toned either. I had enough padding to have some curves.

  His hand slid up my waist and cupped one of my breasts. “I like you just the way you are.”

  I lifted a brow. “That’s good—because the likelihood of me starting an exercise program is slim to none.”

  He laughed, a lighthearted sound I never would have associated with the man I’d met a year ago. Sometimes I wondered if he’d become this version of himself because of me or if it had been in there all along and he trusted me enough to let it free.

  We finished the shower in a playful mood. James got dressed and said he was heading downstairs to check his emails while I got ready for the day, but he soon returned to his bedroom with a cup of coffee and a piece of peanut butter toast.

  When I came down to the kitchen, my bag in one hand and the empty dishes in the other, he was sitting at the kitchen island with his laptop. He had his phone pressed to his ear. “I need that report on Carmichael. That’s what I’m payin’ you for.”

  Hopping off his stool, he hung up as he walked over and took the bag from my shoulder and set it by the door to the garage.

  After I placed the dishes in his dishwasher, I turned and gave him a sad smile. “I really have to go.”

  He stood less than a foot away, watching me with a blank expression. “I know.”

  His wall was back up and I resisted the urge to sigh. Instead, I looked into his dark brown eyes and said, “This weekend was amazin’.” My mouth twisted into a lopsided smile. “It’s hard to go back to the real world.”

  “Real world?” he murmured as he lifted his hand to the side of my neck, lightly caressing my jaw with his thumb.

  “Our normal lives. Without each other in them.”

  His hand stilled, and I worried I’d made him think I was asking for more.

  I reached up on my tiptoes and gave him a quick kiss. “I’ll let you know when I can get away this week.” When I started to pull away, he tugged me back, wrapping an arm around me, his fingers splayed on my upper back. His mouth covered mine, and the fire and passion in his kiss made my knees weak.

  His other hand grabbed my butt, pulling me close enough to let me know he was ready for another round. I was tempted—so tempted—but I was running behind as it was.

  “I have to go,” I murmured against his lips.

  “Just ten minutes.”

  I laughed as I pulled free, giving him a saucy grin over my shoulder. “Maybe we can meet somewhere durin’ the day this week and you can put those ten minutes to good use.”

  “Rose.”

  I turned back to face him, and his stoic expression was back, the one he wore most of the time.

  “Keep your gun with you.”

  And just like that, I was back to reality.

  Chapter 2

  Neely Kate and Jed were on the front porch when I got home. As soon as Jed saw me pulling down the short lane from the county road, he kissed Neely Kate and then pulled her into a long embrace. He left before I got out of the car, waving goodbye as he drove past me.

  After I hugged the dickens out of Neely Kate and checked her over twice, we went into the kitchen and I made her tell me everything. I’d already heard a bit about Kate and the people she’d killed in our barn, plus Neely Kate’s trouble with the Hardshaw Group. But there were plenty of details I hadn’t heard about—like the fact that Kate had left a body in our basement before I left town—and then Neely Kate said something else that good and shocked me. She was pretty sure the reason the Hardshaw Group was after her was because she’d killed a man in Ardmore, Oklahoma, five years ago.

  “Kate knows about the murder in your past?”

  She nodded.

  Last Friday morning, we’d learned that Kate had escaped from the locked psych ward where she’d been sentenced to spend the rest of her life. I’d wanted to cancel my trip with James, but Neely Kate had been adamant that she’d worry something fierce if I didn’t go. Kate had tried to kill me once, and she might do so again. James had agreed with her, and ultimately, I’d let them sway me.

  Of course, I might have decided differently if I’d known all the facts.

  “Let’s talk about something else,” I said. “Like the fact that Kate put a dead body in our basement early Friday morning, and you didn’t tell me before I left?” I couldn’t help but raise my voice.

  She grimaced, still not making eye contact. “We all agreed it was better that way.”

  “And I’m assuming that ‘we’ includes Joe?”

  She nodded again.

  While Neely Kate had spent the first twelve years of her life living in a mobile home, wondering where her next meal was coming from, her half siblings Joe and Kate had grown up in the lap of luxury in a mansion. In some ways, they hadn’t been much better off—the household staff had raised them, and their conniving father had carved their future for them before they were out of diapers.

  “I take it that Joe found out about Jed?”

  Neely Kate had kept her boyfriend a secret from Joe for the last month and a half, not that I blamed her. Though Jed was trying to go the straight and narrow, he’d been James’s right-hand man for years.

  “How is Jed still alive?” I asked in a teasing tone.

  A slight grin wiped away the despondent look she’d had moments before. “It went as well as you can imagine, but I convinced Joe that we needed Jed to help us. He’s still not thrilled I’m dating him, but he’s not tryin’ to stop me either. He realizes that Jed loves me and will protect me with his life.”

  My eyes flew wide. “Wait. He told you that he loves you?”

  Her grin widened, lighting up her whole face. “Yeah. He told me Friday night.”

  I couldn’t be happier for her. Despite his criminal past, Jed Carlisle
was a good man. Someone who would move heaven and earth for the people he loved. “It was as plain as day, Neely Kate, but I’m happy he finally admitted it.”

  Her eyes twinkled. “And showed me.”

  I gasped. “Does that mean…”

  She nodded. “Yep. We finally slept together.” Her face flushed. “He planned a whole dinner and made it so special…” A faraway look filled her eyes. “Who knew Jed Carlisle could be so romantic?”

  “I’m not surprised.” The man was smitten with her.

  “Neither am I, I guess,” she said. “The real Jed’s different than people would expect.” Her excitement seemed to perk her up. “He finally told me about his new business. He and Witt have opened their own garage.”

  That caught me by surprise. I’d known her cousin Witt was trying to open his own garage, but I hadn’t expected him and Jed to partner up. “Jed’s becoming a mechanic? I had no idea he knew how to work on cars.”

  “He said he used to work on them when he was growing up, and Witt’s been teaching him to work on newer cars. Did you see the car parked on the side of the house?”

  I nodded. I’d wondered about the shiny black luxury sedan.

  “He and Witt fixed it up for me. It’s mine, Rose! I’ve never had such a nice car before. He says he picked a dark color because it would be good for when we do stakeouts.”

  I stared at her in disbelief. Not because Jed had given her a car—he and Joe had both been trying to give her a newer car for weeks—but because she’d taken it. She hated charity of any kind, and I knew there was no way she could have paid for it. Her spare money was eaten up by the credit card debt racked up by her runaway husband, Ronnie. All eighteen thousand of it.