Page 46 of Killer on the Homestead
“Maybe they didn’t know that. Maybe they were looking for something else.”
“I thought everyone knew everything.”
She sighed, feeling nothing but sympathy for him. “You’re getting grumpy.”
“No shit.”
“Get some rest, huh? I’ll call Copeland and tell him you know how many pills you think were stolen and that’s all we found. If you think of anything else, we’ll let him know, but you need some rest.”
She started to get up, but he grabbed her arm. So she stood by the couch but couldn’t step away because he held her hand firmly.
“You’ve been up as long as I have.”
“Yeah, but I haven’t had my shoulder recently reattached, so I’m just a little tired, not exhausted and in pain.”
“I took some damn ibuprofen.”
“Yeah, it really helped. Come on, you big baby, I’ll tuck you in.”
He raised an eyebrow, and she laughed in spite of herself.
“Mind out of the gutter.” She pulled him up, making sure it was his good arm before she yanked. He got to his feet.
“My mind doesn’t have much juice left to find itself in the gutter, but I could work on it.”
She pushed him gently to the bedroom. “I’m sure you could, but not tonight. Or this morning, or whatever it is.” She nudged him into a sitting position on his unmade bed. There hadn’t been any broken glass in here, just upended drawers and a trashed closet. “Take off your shoes,” she told him.
He grunted, then toed off the shoes.
“Lay down,” she ordered, waiting for him to balk at being told what to do. But he reallywastired, because he did as he was told. And he held out his good arm.
“Lay down with me, Rosalie,” he said, in the same kind of authoritative tone she’d used on him.
She didn’t like the idea of him sleeping alone in this place that didn’t have a security system. That had been violated in some way. Maybe it wouldn’t make sense for a burglar to come back, but none of this made much sense.
So she moved over to the opposite side of the bed. She didn’t pull any covers over her, but she lied down on her back, staring up at the ceiling.
But Duncan reached over, snuck his good arm under her, and pulled her close to him. She might have balked at it, but she couldfeelhim relax. The tension leaked out of him as he exhaled.
Which somehow made her worry worse. Because this felt too good and there was nothing good about what was going on. “Once you’ve gotten some rest, we’re calling Cam Delaney and getting a security system for this place.”
“Are we?”
She could feel him falling asleep almost immediately, so she didn’t say anything else. Just lied there.
While she stayed awake, protecting them both.
Chapter Fourteen
Duncan woke up with a curse on his lips as a sharp zing of pain shot from his shoulder down his arm. Grumbling irritably, he blinked his eyes open. Everything about last night came rushing back at him and made him want to close his eyes and go back to sleep.
But Rosalie wasn’t here and he wanted to know where she went, so he forced himself to sit up. He scrubbed a hand over his face while his opposite shoulder throbbed. Just throbbed.
It was to be expected. It wasn’t a career-ending injury and two surgeries for nothing. But he was damn tired of it, and he didn’t have a real pain pill to take the edge off. Because someone had trashed his stuff and stolen his pills.
Rosalie was right that it had to connect, but that it didn’t make much sense in the grand scheme of things. Missing cows. Murder. Missing pills.
He scrubbed a hand over his face again. Coffee. He smelled it, and he needed some. Then he and Rosalie could sit down and plan out what to do next.
