Including those about him. Rule grimaced and grabbed the soap.
She’d turned to him, though. In the middle of the night, haunted by a nightmare she wouldn’t discuss, she’d turned to him. Tension he hadn’t noticed eased from his shoulders at the thought. The soapy scent mixed with steam, with the water’s liquid massage, to pull him more fully into his senses. He closed his eyes and closed out thoughts, floating along the skin of the moment.
Another yawn took him. He shook his head. There had been a time when a single night of sentry sleep wouldn’t have left him this drowsy. He was older now. Out of practice.
Out of training, Benedict would say.
Rule grinned as he worked up a lather, thinking of the older brother who’d trained him, along with so many other youngsters. Benedict wasn’t easy on those he trained, but he never asked more of his cubs than they could give, and he had a knack for understanding each youngster’s limits. Unlike some of the physically gifted, he didn’t expect others to live up to his own standards.
Of course, that would have been unrealistic. Two-footed or four, Benedict was in a class of his own.
Those summers were years in the past, but Benedict’s training stuck. His methods wouldn’t suit human notions, but they weren’t designed for humans, were they? Being woken out of a deep sleep by having a chunk ripped out of your shoulder by an enemy’s teeth inspired a youngster to stay alert.
Grief pinched out his grin. He closed his eyes as memory arrived, sharp-clawed.
Mick.
For a moment he simply stood there, absorbing the pain, new and unblunted and tangled with so many other feelings. It had been Rule’s other brother, Mick, whose teeth had ripped a chunk from his shoulder all those years ago. Mick was—had been—nearly Rule’s age-mate, a rarity among his people. They’d met for the first time the summer Rule began formally training with Benedict.
There’d been rivalry between them, Rule thought, tilting his head back as the water washed away the soap. Of course there had been. But it had been friendly, not serious, back then.
Hadn’t it? Did the lens of the present distort the past, or reveal it more clearly?
Let it be, Rule told himself, shutting off the water with an sharp twist of the faucet. Mick was dead. He’d died saving Rule’s life—a hero’s death. If he’d first endangered it, that was the mad Helen’s doing, not Mick’s. With the power from that accursed staff, she’d tipped Rule’s brother into a sort of madness.
But she couldn’t have gotten to Mick if the seed hadn’t been there, the seed of jealousy of a particularly nasty sort. The clans had a word for it: fratriodi. Brother-hate.
Lily’s cell phone rang while Rule was brushing his teeth. He heard her curse, fumble for the phone, and then answer. And he heard her snap fully awake, a change as distinct as the flipping of a light switch. So he finished quickly, shut off the water, and opened the door.
It was just after six a.m. The moon had set and the sun hadn’t yet made an appearance, so she’d switched on the bedside lamp. She sat on the bed in a pool of that yellowish light scribbling on the pad she kept close, wearing pale yellow panties and a short black T-shirt that left a strip of her back and belly bare.
He’d removed those panties when she woke from a nightmare. She must have scrambled into them when the phone rang.
She glanced at him, exchanged some more police jargon with the person at the other end and disconnected. “I’ve got to go.”
“I know. I missed the first part, though. Who was it?”
She shoved her hair out of her face, frowning at him. “I wish you’d quit listening to both sides of my phone conversations.”
He shrugged. Even if he could stop his ears from hearing so much, he wouldn’t. “You don’t work homicide anymore. Why were you called about a murder in Temecula?”
“Possible homicide,” she corrected. Maybe her frown hadn’t been directed at him. It lingered as she stared into some mental space, totting up facts he lacked. “The call was from the FBI district office,” she said, pushing to her feet. “They were contacted by local authorities in Temecula about a suspicious death.”
“Why call you?” he repeated.
“There’s a connection to Harlowe. A witness. The body was discovered two hours ago,” she added abruptly and headed for the bathroom.
He stepped aside to let her pass, thinking.
This was hardly the first sighting of someone who might be Patrick Harlowe. Ten days ago, Ruben Brooks had succeeded in getting him put on the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted list, his photo and description sent to law enforcement agencies all over the nation. But the man was relentlessly average—Anglo, five-ten, brown hair and eyes, one hundred sixty pounds. No scars, no distinctive features other than an unusually mellow voice. The kind of man, Lily had said in disgust, you could meet at a party and forget two minutes later. Rule didn’t know how many reports of possible sightings had come in; Lily had only mentioned those few that seemed promising.
It was the first one connected to a possible homicide, though. She’d want to get to the scene quickly. He needed to get dressed.
He glanced at the closed bathroom door. First things first. If he didn’t make coffee, she’d probably stop for the convenience store version along the way.
Rule returned from the kitchen just as Lily was emerging from the bathroom. “Why is it only a possible homicide?” he asked.
She pulled off her T-shirt as she padded up to the tall chest facing the bed. Her shoulder was much improved, he thought. Until now he’d had to help her with things that went over her head.
“Cause of death hasn’t been determined,” she told him and opened the top drawer, made a disgusted noise, and closed it again. He’d seen her do that several times. She’d automatically open that drawer, forgetting she’d emptied it to make room for some of his things.
She opened the second drawer and plucked out a scrap of black silk. “This is definitely not mine. Why would anyone wear a thong?” She tossed it to him. “It’s got to feel like a permanent wedgie.”
He pulled on his underwear and watched her step into hers—carnation pink this morning. He loved watching her get dressed. It was fun to see her cover what he would uncover later, yes, but there was a quiet intimacy involved that he treasured even more.
She always put on her panties first, then her bra. She preferred to shower at night and seldom wore pantyhose. She bought toothpaste in tubes, pickles in bulk, and panties in every color. Her wound interfered with the run on the beach she was used to, but she adhered religiously to her therapy program. When it was time to leave, she’d slip on her shoulder harness before her shoes.
Small details, perhaps, but he was learning her. “Why do you wear a bra?”
She looked down at her chest and shook her head. “God only knows.”
He chuckled and moved closer. “I meant that a thong offers me some support. Keeps my dangly bits from bouncing around.”
Her glance skimmed his body, eyebrows lifting. No doubt she noticed that there was more looking up than dangling at the moment.
He placed his hand beneath one of her pretty breasts, covered now in stretchy white lace, and dragged his thumb across the tip. “I like everything about these, you know—the size, shape, texture… and the taste. Especially that.”
Her nipple ripened, and her eyes went smoky. That didn’t keep her from batting his hand away. “I have to go.”
“We have to go, you mean.” Resigned, he went to the closet—which was organized by color, season, and type of garment. She’d managed to find a few inches of hanging space for him, but his selection was limited. He took out a pair of black slacks. “You’re not wearing a bandage.”