I savoured the times we made love. He never went too hard, and I never raced to have my needs met selfishly. This was real sex. This was a real connection. This wasn’t banshee screaming, over-the-top fucking.

Everything about this was real.

Chapter Eighteen

Because this concerns your life

It was mid-morning when Ben left to the airport. I offered to drop him off, but he adamantly refused, insisting on taking a random taxi. I always wondered why, but I couldn’t bring myself to ask.

I thought about it a lot on the way home, but I kept drawing blanks. Just like the damn phone thing. I’d tried cornering him about it once, saying if there was an emergency, I needed a phone to contact him on. He ended up giving me a number, but it was to his home phone.

Who the hell still used home phones these days?

But it was a small victory, so I couldn’t really be that upset. Plus I was still on cloud nine since he’d told me he loved me. Nothing seemed to matter as much as that. Someone loved me, and he wasn’t just anyone, he was my dream man. It was surreal.

Just as I neared the main road that connected to my residential street, sirens erupted. I looked at my rear view, shocked to find a police car right at my bumper signalling for me to pull over. What the hell?            

I parked on the emergency lane and turned the car off. The police officer stepped out of his car and walked over. He tapped on the window and I wound it down.

“Have I done something wrong?” I asked cautiously.

“Do you know how fast you were going over the speed limit, Miss?” he sternly replied.

My brows came together. “I wasn’t speeding, officer.”

“You were speeding,” he adamantly stressed. “Ten kilometres over the limit.”

Bullshit! “Seriously, sir, I was not speeding –”

“Licence and registration, Miss.”

Dickhead.

I took out my licence and registration form and passed them to him. I tried my hardest not to give him a stink eye and run him over five times. This was bullshit. Was he drunk? Or was he in the mood to abuse his power today?

He turned around and ambled back to his car. I waited for some time before he came back over and said, “Miss Landon, I’m going to ask that you step out of the car and come with me, please.”

I gaped at him. “What?”

As though I was mentally inept, he said it slower. “Step out of the car and come with me, Miss Landon.”

“May I ask why?”

“The police want to have a word with you.”

“Why?”

“I’m afraid you’ll have to wait to find out.”

Feeling slightly panicked, I stepped out of the car. “You’re not going to cuff me or anything, are you?” I asked him.

He looked irritably at me. “Just come with me.”

I followed him to the car and sat in the back like a damn criminal. If anyone was around, I’d have been humiliated.

“What about my car?” I said as he drove past it.

“It’ll be there when you’re done,” he replied.

Yeah, but would it be in one piece? The amount of times I’d seen cars on the side of the road that were graffiti-ridden with windows smashed gave me more than enough cause for concern.

He didn’t drive long before we stopped in front of a small, local police station. We walked in, passing a few officers and an empty receptionist desk. I was led into a small, windowless room and asked to sit behind a creaky, old table. Then I was left alone, with nothing to read and nothing to do.

An hour passed. Maybe two. It felt like a slow eternity spent memorizing the bland room, looking over every inch of it. I felt confused and panicked. For the first fifteen minutes I wondered if I’d done something wrong. What the hell was wrong with my licence? Had it expired? No way. Impossible. Hypothetically, even if it had, they wouldn’t be doing this to me right now.

The rest of the time I was facing the wall of ignorance I’d put up the last few months. This had something to do with Ben. I knew it from the bottom of my soul, and forcing myself to come to grips with this wasn’t easy. It meant having to admit I knew all along I was right – that what he had been up to was no good.

But just how bad was it? That was the real question, and I dreaded the answer.

When the door finally opened, I sat up straight in my chair and looked at the man walking through. Who I saw made me go instantly still with shock.

I shook my head, feeling like my whole world was suddenly spinning off its axis.

“Do you need anything?” I’d asked him that day in Harbour town.

“Not yet,” he’d said.

Fuck.

He was in another cheap suit, carrying a file in his hands. He smiled at me in greeting and said, “Hi, Miss Landon, I’m Detective Malcolm Hardman –”

“And a stalker,” I interrupted angrily. “Don’t think for a second I don’t remember you in Harbour town, following me around. Next time a bit of discreetness wouldn’t kill.”

Looking unbothered, he took a seat opposite of me and laid the file down on the table. “I was just doing my job, Miss Landon,” he replied with ease.

“Why would following me be a part of your job?”

“It just was that day.”

Sure it was. I crossed my arms and leaned back in my chair again, glowering at him.

“I’ve got some questions I need to ask you,” he started, bringing his hands together over the file.

“I’m not under arrest,” I retorted. “I don’t have to answer shit. In fact, I should get up and leave right now.”

He chuckled. “You’re not under arrest, and you’re not being recorded right now either. This is strictly between you and me. We have confidentiality between us –”

“Just cut to the chase, Detective.”

He nodded, boring those blue eyes into mine. For a middle-aged, cheap suited Detective, he wasn’t that hard on the eyes. Not just in appearance, but his body language was relaxed and friendly. He was the type that could easily make someone feel at ease, and I didn’t want that someone to be me.

“You’ve been in a relationship with Ben Costigan for some time now, isn’t that right.” It sounded more like a statement than a question.

I shrugged and offered no response.