Then I watched in my mirror as Officer Rowdy Crabtree sat in his cruiser for a couple of minutes talking on the radio. Then my rapidly beating heart slid up into my throat as he opened his door and folded out of the vehicle.
My window was already rolled down so I didn’t take my eyes off the mirror until I lost sight of him at the side of the car. It was then I turned my head to the window.
I got him when he arrived at my window where he immediately bent at the waist, his shades hit mine and I smiled.
“Hi Officer,” I said.
“Miz Walker,” he did a mini-dip of his chin, “license and registration.”
“Can you tell me why you stopped me? I was a mile under the speed limit,” I replied.
“License and registration.”
Shit. Shit. Fucking shit!
I turned to my purse, grabbed my license then bent to the glove compartment and found the registration. Then I turned back to him and handed both out of the window.
He studied them, as cops do. Then he looked down his nose at me while I peered out my window up at him.
“My understanding, Miz Walker, is that you are now a resident of the state of Colorado.”
“Um… I am.”
“Plates on your car say Texas.”
Shit. Shit. Fucking shit!
Was that bad? Could I get a ticket for that? A fine? Didn’t I have a window to get that shit done?
I didn’t know. I wished I knew.
“Driver’s license is from Texas too,” he went on.
“Uh… well, I just moved here not too long ago –” I started but he cut me off.
“I do know that, Miz Walker, but vehicle registration, plates and driver’s license should declare the proper information, including address. You live in Colorado, these should state Colorado.”
“Okay,” I told him. “I’ll see to that on Monday. I have the day off. Won’t be a problem.”
“Monday isn’t now, Miz Walker,” he replied.
Dick.
He was f**king with me; I knew it, just because I was married to who I was married to.
The thing I didn’t know was just how much he intended to f**k with me and from what happened to Ty and what Tate said, the how much could be a whole lot and none of it I would enjoy.
And worse, Ty would lose his mind.
I opened my mouth to speak but saw another cruiser heading our way and I didn’t like that. Carnal wasn’t a big town when it came to it but the town was one thing and the city limits another. The Police Department had a big area they covered that went beyond the town proper, out across the valley and up into the hills where there were quite a number of developments, homes, ranches and even some businesses. This meant the Department didn’t just have Andy and Barney keeping an eye on things. They had manpower and seeing as they’d played Ty the way they’d played him, I’d paid attention to this manpower and noticed there seemed to be a lot of it, not just cruisers but also plainclothesmen with badges on their belts I saw in the grocery, at La-La Land coffee, in the bakery, in the sandwich place.
They were all over and they seemed to make a suffocating point of being very visible.
Like now.
It made matters worse when the second cruiser slowed and swung a wide u-ey to come to a halt behind Crabtree’s.
This did not bode well. One Carnal uniform and that uniform being Crabtree was bad enough, I didn’t want to have to deal with two.
My heart started racing harder as the adrenalin surge spiked and my hand inched toward my purse with my mind on my phone as I kept my eyes out the window then I looked up to see Crabtree had his head turned to the cruiser and his jaw was hard.
Hmm. That was interesting.
I looked to my side mirror and saw a uniform get out, one I’d seen but didn’t know.
“Got this, Frank,” Crabtree called but I kept my eyes to the mirror and watched the second officer continue to approach.
“Need a quick word, Rowdy,” he stated when he got closer.
“In the middle of somethin’, man,” Crabtree replied.
“Need a quick word,” the one called Frank repeated.
“I said, in the middle of somethin’.” Crabtree was getting impatient.
Frank came to a halt a couple of feet from Crabtree and I turned my head to look at him.
“And I said, need a quick word,” Frank returned, his voice low and tight.
Crabtree made an irritated noise and Frank’s shades dipped down at me then he gave me a chin lift.
“Ma’am,” he said.
“Officer,” I replied.
“We’ll have you on your way in a minute,” he informed me and I hoped that meant good things.
At that, Crabtree stalked angrily back to the cruiser and Frank followed him.
I turned forward and waited, eyes glued to the mirror because they were nose-to-nose and it didn’t take a behavior specialist to see the conversation wasn’t about who was going to bring the beer to the Department picnic that weekend.
This lasted awhile, long enough for Crabtree’s face to get red and my heart, already hammering, hammered harder and my skin, already tingling, tingled faster because he was already a dick, I didn’t need to be dealing with an angry dick.
Then Crabtree stepped back, thrust my stuff at Frank, Frank took it and Crabtree stomped to his cruiser. He was in and had it fired up, reversing and nearly clipping Frank who was walking to me as he squealed out and my head turned to watch as he drove thirty yards then did a hair-raising u-ey and sped back into town.
By this time, Frank was at my door and I stopped craning my neck out the window to stare after Crabtree and tipped my head back to him.
He was offering my license and registration to me.
“There you go, Lexie,” he said quietly and I blinked behind my shades at his use of my name but my hand drifted up and I took the documents. “May wanna see to gettin’ to the DMV soon’s you can.” He was still talking quietly.
I nodded and whispered, “Okay.”
“On top a’ that is my card. You get…” he paused then finished, “any further attention, I’m askin’ you to call me. Not Ty. Not Tate. Me.”
What the hell?
“Uh….” I mumbled.
“Smart way to play it,” he kept talking quietly, “not to rile your man or the ones got his back.” I stared at him, stunned he had this info as he paused then finished, “I think you get me.”
I didn’t.
“I can’t keep things from my husband,” I told him.
“They play with him, he’ll deal. They branch out to you, what’s he gonna do, Lexie?” he asked, gave me a second and then advised, “Think about that.”